Texas and Textbooks.

[thaiboxerken]

Looks like the Texas BOE wants to instill a distorted view of history and politics to children. It's really crazy.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/238322

[rjwould]

They've decided the christian bible is the only textbook they need.

[MattusMaximus]

They've decided the christian bible is the only textbook they need.

Ha, which version of the Bible? It's always funny to see the reaction from fundamentalists when confronted with that thorny question.

[Thunder]

Luckily, teachers will not be required to follow these books to a T.

[thaiboxerken]

The fact that they will likely have this false information in there is enough for concern.

[KingMerv00]

5. McLeroy also wants to clear the name of Joseph McCarthy. In sections of history books that deal with McCarthyism and the House Un-American Activities Committee, McLeroy wants to emphasize first and foremost "the extent and danger of Soviet agent infiltration of the U.S. government as revealed in Alger Hiss' guilt and confirmed later by the Venona Papers."

:mad: Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last?

9. A meta-lesson: never miss an opportunity to stick it to a Democratic president. A section on "political scandals" including Teapot Dome and Watergate, now includes "Bill Clinton's impeachment."

I'm having a hard time thinking of a reason NOT to include Bill in there. It was an impeachment for Christ sake. As long as they include Watergate, who cares?

[WildCat]

:eek: Actual Texas BoE meeting:

AdhGK9aYjDY

[Foolmewunz]

:eek: Actual Texas BoE meeting:

AdhGK9aYjDY

That's an invocation? It sounds like a campaign speech.

Oh, and this thread must have about four brethren around the other sub-forums. In depth discussions and all...

[shadron]

Ha, which version of the Bible? It's always funny to see the reaction from fundamentalists when confronted with that thorny question.

I would think Conservapedia has answered that question.

[Zygar]

I see no mention of them dropping Thomas Jefferson from history. Did that get fixed?

[Ladewig]

I'm having a hard time thinking of a reason NOT to include Bill in there. It was an impeachment for Christ sake. As long as they include Watergate, who cares?

I'm a (occassional) leftist who agrees with you.

[Alt+F4]

The fact that they will likely have this false information in there is enough for concern.

It might be if the kids acutally read the text book, which they don't.

[Alt+F4]

I see no mention of them dropping Thomas Jefferson from history. Did that get fixed?

I seem to recall that the Jefferson issue was in regard to curriculum standards for world history, not American history textbooks.

The Board wanted to drop Jefferson (the deist) as being an influence on Enlightenment thinking. Educators were not forbidden to teach about this aspect of Jefferson's life nor was there any talk about removing him from texts books in any subject.

[marplots]

I don't see the harm. Sure, we use grade school to socialize our kiddles, but most of this stuff isn't going to come up until they hit a college level history course. As long as the textbooks aren't outright lying, why should it matter to other than historians?

I have confidence in the ability of youth to ignore wholesale any subtlety in the instruction they receive, and most of the blatant stuff as well. If you want to see alternate histories reshaping public opinion, you don't need to look at textbooks, you can tune your radio to any AM talk show.

The idea that students are empty vessels awaiting any misinformation to fill them seems wrong.

[INRM]

This is obviously very dangerous as Texas buys a lot of textbooks, it's a big state with a lot of people in it.

They could have an effect on influencing the production and distribution of textbooks.

[Monketey Ghost]

*snip*
The idea that students are empty vessels awaiting any misinformation to fill them seems wrong.


But for a large percentage of them, it is true anyways.

High school students are idiots.

[Alferd_Packer]

I seem to recall that the Jefferson issue was in regard to curriculum standards for world history, not American history textbooks.

The Board wanted to drop Jefferson (the deist) as being an influence on Enlightenment thinking. Educators were not forbidden to teach about this aspect of Jefferson's life nor was there any talk about removing him from texts books in any subject.

I head that the SBOE was going to require that Jefferson be airbrushed from the paintings of the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
:p

[Alferd_Packer]

This is obviously very dangerous as Texas buys a lot of textbooks, it's a big state with a lot of people in it.

They could have an effect on influencing the production and distribution of textbooks.

That has been raised as a concern, except for the fact that modern printing on demand methods allow publishers to customize books to the particular state standards at will.

[Alferd_Packer]

One of the changes:

B) evaluate contrast the impact tone of muckrakers and reform leaders such as Upton Sinclair, Susan B. Anthony, Ida B. Wells, andW. E. B. DuBois on American society; and versus the optimism of immigrants including Jean Pierre Godet as told
in Thomas Kinkade’s The Spirit of America.

I wonder if this means that Thomas Kinkade will illustrate the new books?

[Darth Rotor]

The Board wanted to drop Jefferson (the deist) as being an influence on Enlightenment thinking.
Seems to me bass ackwards. Wasn't Jefferson a product of Enlightenment thinking?

[KingMerv00]

Seems to me bass ackwards. Wasn't Jefferson a product of Enlightenment thinking?

Positive feedback loop.

[Ladewig]

One of the changes:

B) evaluate contrast the impact tone of muckrakers and reform leaders such as Upton Sinclair, Susan B. Anthony, Ida B. Wells, andW. E. B. DuBois on American society; and versus the optimism of immigrants including Jean Pierre Godet as told
in Thomas Kinkade’s The Spirit of America

You didn't quote enough of the original document. It goes on to say:

JUSTIFICATION
Diversity of opinion and balanced presentation.
The words of Godet and immigrants like him were, “I love America for
giving so many of us the right to dream a new dream”. Such words
were as lost on the muckrakers as they are on many modern
historians obsessed by oppression.


So the best way to balance an award-winning journalist who documented institutional, unsafe working conditions and whose work directly led to two major laws to ensure the safety of the U.S. food supply is contrast him to a fictional character.

Go Texas!

[Alferd_Packer]

So the best way to balance an award-winning journalist who documented institutional, unsafe working conditions and whose work directly led to two major laws to ensure the safety of the U.S. food supply is contrast him to a fictional character.

Go Texas!

You missed the true irony here: A fictional character created by an artist* best known for his gauzy, schmaltzy, overly maudlin, landscapes populated by warmly glowing streetlamps, cottage widows and Christian symbols.






* A so-called Christian artist who's behavior is most definitely not Chrisitian (http://articles.latimes.com/2006/mar/05/business/fi-kinkade5)

[Ladewig]

You missed the true irony here: A fictional character created by an artist* best known for his gauzy, schmaltzy, overly maudlin, landscapes populated by warmly glowing streetlamps, cottage widows and Christian symbols.


I hesitated on that point because I found one internet reference that said that Kinkade did the illustrations but not the text. In any case, his is the only name on the book so I guess he should take the credit (blame?) for it.

I just found a blurb that sums up his work nicely. Thomas Kinkade paintings are the beanie babies of the art world.

[tyr_13]

I don't see the harm. Sure, we use grade school to socialize our kiddles, but most of this stuff isn't going to come up until they hit a college level history course. As long as the textbooks aren't outright lying, why should it matter to other than historians?

I have confidence in the ability of youth to ignore wholesale any subtlety in the instruction they receive, and most of the blatant stuff as well. If you want to see alternate histories reshaping public opinion, you don't need to look at textbooks, you can tune your radio to any AM talk show.

The idea that students are empty vessels awaiting any misinformation to fill them seems wrong.

But for a large percentage of them, it is true anyways.

High school students are idiots.

By that logic, why teach them at all? I'm sorry, but having wrong information will effect students. Just because it won't effect them all doesn't really mean squat. What will happen is that fringe fundamentalist Christians will grow up with their crazy ass version of reality reinforced by schools instead of providing them with the chance to question it. You see the same thing when these types of parents say, "See son, it says 'In God We Trust' right on our money, so we're a Christian nation who needs to keep the queers and atheists in line".

Don't feed the trolls at all.

[shadron]

I don't see the harm. Sure, we use grade school to socialize our kiddles, but most of this stuff isn't going to come up until they hit a college level history course. As long as the textbooks aren't outright lying, why should it matter to other than historians?

I have confidence in the ability of youth to ignore wholesale any subtlety in the instruction they receive, and most of the blatant stuff as well. If you want to see alternate histories reshaping public opinion, you don't need to look at textbooks, you can tune your radio to any AM talk show.

The idea that students are empty vessels awaiting any misinformation to fill them seems wrong.

Seems like we could save a lot of money here and just get them public domain copies of Grimm's Fairy Tales. :rolleyes:

To say that what you learn in high school doesn't affect the average student is dumb. Twenty years later, in the midst of an emotional crisis that could shift a life one way or another, they're going to remember stories they were taught in high school, and possibly make a bad decision based on what they believe is right or wrong based on those stories. Can it be good to think of McCarthy's politics as the right way to do things?

Lastly, the whole idea of feeding them malarky because that is the easiest course of action doesn't sit well with me, as it appears to sit with you. History isn't simply opinion; there is truth in there, ande it is the place for historians to debate and decide, not dentists from rural Texas who think Gould supports their creationist views.

[Newtons Bit]

I can understand, though I don't agree with, the reasoning of the religious right to include more religious stuff into the textbooks.

The McCarthy part, however, is just a big, "HUH?!?"

[ShadowSot]

Hm... I was a kid who hated history in school, and now I love reading about history.

One thing I've learned is that history doesn't happen to other people, what happened yesterday or a hundred years ago still can and does affect the world we live in today.

Learning what happened before helps us understand the world we live in, where we came from, and what we can do to change it, should we feel we need to.

[marplots]

Seems like we could save a lot of money here and just get them public domain copies of Grimm's Fairy Tales. :rolleyes:

To say that what you learn in high school doesn't affect the average student is dumb.

There is a simple test you can do. Ask someone who isn't an historian and isn't college educated about one of the 'historical truths' that matter so much to Texas. I think you will find that not only do they have a cartoonish view of history, but they will have many a fact blatantly wrong. These are the folks who took high school history before the controversy. The place for nuance is in a college history course, not a high school classroom.

It's done the same way in other fields. No one complains about teaching the Bohr atom because it is wrong. No one decrys algebra that doesn't include complex numbers or the notion of infinity. The reason is that for most of us, the basic version is fine. If we go on to further education, we get a better picture.

I do agree that if you want to teach history, you ought to have historians involved and value their opinions. In the same way I would want to have biologists involved in teaching biology. Where I disagree is that this is some grand tragedy with real impact.

As far as high school students being idiots, I'd put it rather differently. They simply don't care whether McCarthy was a valiant crime fighter or a blind fool who abused the power of his office. It's not relevant to them. It's a mistake to think of high school students as blank slates we write on to create some creature of our own liking. The Texas board of education will accomplish nothing with their creative editing.

[marplots]

Hm... I was a kid who hated history in school, and now I love reading about history.

One thing I've learned is that history doesn't happen to other people, what happened yesterday or a hundred years ago still can and does affect the world we live in today.

Learning what happened before helps us understand the world we live in, where we came from, and what we can do to change it, should we feel we need to.

This is an excellent example of what matters. People who are interested in a subject pursue it on their own. They find out more and better information. Those who remain uninterested do not and are left with some smooshy ideas that come to naught and fade. It is this mechanism that protects against minor bias becoming meaningful pseudo-truth.

[Alt+F4]

Seems to me bass ackwards. Wasn't Jefferson a product of Enlightenment thinking?

He was kinda in the middle of it.

[Upchurch]

The McCarthy part, however, is just a big, "HUH?!?"

Yeah, I don't get what's up with that either. The first I'd heard of anyone trying to redeem McCarthy in the history books was from one of Coulter's books.

I don't know if it is really a push to say McCarthy wasn't such a bad guy or if it is a way to justify McCarthy-like used today.

[thaiboxerken]

Mars, whether or not kids actually read text books is irrelevent. For Texas to place bltatant falsehoods into textbooks is wrong. Also, if it's in the textbooks, then teachers have a reference to a falsehood but "ammunition" to call it a fact.

[KoihimeNakamura]

There is a simple test you can do. Ask someone who isn't an historian and isn't college educated about one of the 'historical truths' that matter so much to Texas. I think you will find that not only do they have a cartoonish view of history, but they will have many a fact blatantly wrong. These are the folks who took high school history before the controversy. The place for nuance is in a college history course, not a high school classroom.

It's done the same way in other fields. No one complains about teaching the Bohr atom because it is wrong. No one decrys algebra that doesn't include complex numbers or the notion of infinity. The reason is that for most of us, the basic version is fine. If we go on to further education, we get a better picture.

I do agree that if you want to teach history, you ought to have historians involved and value their opinions. In the same way I would want to have biologists involved in teaching biology. Where I disagree is that this is some grand tragedy with real impact.

As far as high school students being idiots, I'd put it rather differently. They simply don't care whether McCarthy was a valiant crime fighter or a blind fool who abused the power of his office. It's not relevant to them. It's a mistake to think of high school students as blank slates we write on to create some creature of our own liking. The Texas board of education will accomplish nothing with their creative editing.

Perfect solution fallacy.

[Alt+F4]

For Texas to place bltatant falsehoods into textbooks is wrong.

There is nothing new about blatant falsehood being written into textbooks. This has been around as long as textbooks have been. Nothing new here, this too will pass without major damage.

Also, if it's in the textbooks, then teachers have a reference to a falsehood but "ammunition" to call it a fact.

Any evidence that Texas teachers are doing this in large numbers?

[tyr_13]

There is a simple test you can do. Ask someone who isn't an historian and isn't college educated about one of the 'historical truths' that matter so much to Texas. I think you will find that not only do they have a cartoonish view of history, but they will have many a fact blatantly wrong. These are the folks who took high school history before the controversy. The place for nuance is in a college history course, not a high school classroom.



I can almost promise you that if I asked one hundred random people on the street about what McCarthy did, 80%+ would say it wasn't good. Sure, I bet that about 10% wouldn't know who I was talking about, but those that would try to defend him would be few and far between.

Besides, not knowing is one thing, not learning is one thing, learning the wrong thing and thinking it is right, with 'authoritative' backup is completely different. What if some Truther had something as apparently 'reputable' as these Texas textbooks to cite to a lay person? Who would the lay person believe? The person citing a legitimate text book, or the person citing the wrong one?


Perfect solution fallacy.

Beat me too it.

[thaiboxerken]

Any evidence that Texas teachers are doing this in large numbers?

How does one provide evidence of something that "may" happen? I can only compare to silly arguments I've heard from those who want to convince me the USA was founded by Jesus. They've pointed to "In God We Trust" as evidence and "God Bless America."

If there are falsehoods in textbooks, they should be fixed when found.

[marplots]

I had to look it up:
The perfect solution fallacy is a logical fallacy that occurs when an argument assumes that a perfect solution exists and/or that a solution should be rejected because some part of the problem would still exist after it were implemented. This is a classic example of black and white thinking, in which a person fails to see the complex interplay between things, and as a result, reduces complex problems to a pair of binary extremes.(from wiki)

I'm not clear on what the binary relation is. Is it that I am making the perfect the enemy of the good somehow?

I looked over the standards to see if I could pick out some factual error rather than bias. I couldn't.

Here is a draft version in .pdf which takes forever to load... http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/teks/social/USHistory073109.pdf

[KoihimeNakamura]

Essentially. When most college teachers already spend time simply saying 'everything you learnt in high school is wrong' /something/ has to be done.

[marplots]

I think I understand the issue better, and I'd like to admit I had a weak case and was wrong.

I think what did it for me was the recommendations in the sciences and on evolution/creation, and the good comments I read here. Thanks.