Another thing that everybody knows, but I will come out and say is that the people who seem to the loudest about "leftist slants" are the least likely to have actually read a textbook in question themselves, and instead have let others do their thinking for them to tell them what to be outraged about.
I give the odds of you getting a specific answer to your request as very very very remote.
Problem is, for conservatives who have been trained on ten years of cable news and talk radio, neutrality = the lack of conservative viewpoint = liberal bias.
Because everything is about viewpoints. "Fair and balanced" means you let two pundits argue talking points back and forth until they're foaming at the mouth. I don't want that spilling into textbooks.
mogrovejo demands many answers, but seldom condescends to answer any question himself.
He comes and goes from this forum like a great bird, dropping his weighty nominations of wisdom upon us disdainfully, from about a mile up.
x1000
I would add my well-worn complaint that many who consider themselves "conservative" seem to lack critical thinking skills, and all the talk radio blather is contributing to that.
Its going to be a damned shame that the next generation of Texans will be mostly pre-programmed ideologues who have an attenuated sense of history as the rest of the world knows it.
I agree with Spurminator -- anyone who wishes to push a political agenda in setting a school curriculum (no matter the direction from which that agenda might come) should be doing something other than setting school curricula.
I'll go one step further: I think that anyone who wishes to push a political agenda in public schools is an enemy of education.
Why on Earth this State requires political elections to decide who will make these sorts of decisions is beyond me. I'm left to |think that we somehow value political power more than the education of our children.
Don't get me wrong, I agree with pretty much everything you said. And I also agree that the whole election aspect to the SBOE leaves a bad taste in my mouth. But what's the alternative? Letting those decisions get made by a board that Rick Perry gets to appoint?
that would be one scary textbook.
i think we all have to keep in mind as well that teachers can do alot with a textbook. they can add to what is missing or comment on what has been added and many do and many do not. in other words, as relevant as the material is those presenting it (and even the students themselves and what they have been taught at home). it is not as if the learning process starts or ends with the texts.
It was my experience in HS that virtually all of the teachers followed the textbooks pretty rigidly, except in AP classes. I don't think there's that level of talent teaching most high school classes. HS was so worthless in comparison to college IMO, with the exception of the AP classes again.
it may depend on the school i'm sure. i went to a private school so there were far more liberties afforded there. but i do know teachers who certainly add their own dynamic to the process.
and as i mentioned, parents can certainly add to the process. i know i never took the presentation of the texas revolution the way it was given in the textbooks, but i had a father who was from mexico and knew his mexican history like the back of his hand.
I guess I was lucky in that I did get a few teachers who would challenge the students to think beyond the text. But for the most part, you're right, it was simply teaching the textbook.
I had some classes that taught the textbooks verbatim, and some where we rarely even opened the textbook. All depends on the teacher in most cases.
View at 4:20.
http://www.comedycentral.com/colbert...isodeId=267536
What I have begun to wonder is what kind of professors of history will be willing to put their names as authors of these textbooks. The publishers will print whatever the state wants, but some historian has to put his name and reputation on the line to author these books.
Then, again, I have seen unbelievably awful "textbooks" (and I use that term generously) that are printed for home schoolers to purchase that teach all kinds of crazy stuff and that a public school would never accept as a suitable textbook.
No kidding.
It's ok SnC, the FSM is forgiving.that's right, he was flying. didn't mean to be blasphemous.
I haven't taken the time to consider any and all alternatives and my lament is not meant to offer an alternative.
In a non-existant perfect world the board would be made up of scholars who do not align themselves with a specific ideology or party. But that's how the Commies would steal power.
There could be an argument made that they already have.
Make it, then.
But before you do that, I'd like to hear what's so liberal about the history books right now.
They praise Thomas Jefferson!
We'll have to redact the Declaration of Independence and confiscate all the nickels.
7 Evangelical Creationists on this board? That's just stupid.
FIFY
I realize Michigan has its own stereotypes to overcome, but Texas has its own as well.
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