Friday, October 12, 2007

What SHOULD we learn?

If you were on the curriculum board, what content and information do you feel ALL students must learn in order to earn a public high school diploma and be successful adults? What SHOULD schools be responsible for teaching? If you were to design a course that ALL students would benefit from, what would be the basic content of that course? For example, I believe that all ninth graders should, in some way, learn about study skills that would help them be successful in high school. There should be some kind of consistent study skills program that all ninth grade teachers follow. What do you think?

Creation vs. Evolution

In the play we will be reading over the next few weeks, a teacher is arrested and put on trial for teaching evolution to his class. Ironically, Garrett's discussion question last week regarding who decides what we learn in school comes into play significantly here. What do you think about teaching religion in school? Should schools teach students that there are multiple theories out there? Or should public school leave religion alone? This is a very touchy subject because religion is often at the heart of people's moral and personal lives, so, as always, remember there are multiple viewpoints in this class that we must all respect and appreciate, even if we do not agree with them.

Media Frenzy and McCarthyism

The play we are about to read, Inherit the Wind, was written in the 1950's as a response to McCarthyism, as was the play The Crucible which many of you read last year. Even though the public hysteria that McCarthyism specifically provoked is not with us anymore, are there other similar examples from history or modern day that have caused rampant fear, suspicion, public outcry, or media frenzy unnecessarily? Explain the situation.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/database/mccarthyism.html