It's funny, at least 3 times a year my children are made to participate in an all school diversity activity or assembly. The other day we were listening to Radio Disney-who is running diversity commercials. In the commercial, one kid asks another kids what he got for his birthday.
Presents,
Were they all the same?
Well, no.
Then it talks abbut how people are like presents and we need to embrace and celebrate our differences, weaknesses, talents and strenghts because like presents, if we were all the same, it would be pretty boring.
My 9 year old turned to me and said I finally get what diversity means. Why did they have to make us sit through all those boring people talking when it is that simple to explain? I honestly have wondered the same thing myself. Are our children really getting the meaning of diversity in all the stuff we introduce to them? My kids seem to think diversity teaching is designed to make whoever doesn't fall into the ethnicity or whatever that is being discussed that month feel bad.
The irony of commitment is that it’s deeply liberating-in work, in play, in love. The act frees you from the tyranny of your internal critic, from the fear that likes to dress itself up and parade around as rational hesitation. To commit is to remove your head as the barrier to your life. --Anne Morris
our school has a diversity committee, and they sponsor several programs thru the year. Women in History, People with Disabilities and a cultural day that fits with a specific grade's studies(such as Native American day) all fall under their umbrella. We do not focus so much on teaching values, rather on exposure to people who may be different than you, and tolerance to that differenct.
<moving forward>
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18 years 8 months ago#113971by <moving forward>
I agree with you on school-taught values. I agree with you on school-taught values. This is a family responsibility that needs to be done at home and school should reinforce that teaching not dictate it.
We use Core Virtues, which is a Literature-based program and is often used in conjunction with Core Knowledge but the use of Core Knowledge is not a requirement.
Our elementary school has a diversity committee in the works. It's still in the planning stages. I've emailed a few people asking questions, but at this stage there's not a lot of info.
I'm a little concerned. Overall, I'm not a huge believer in school-taught values, at least not without parental knowledge of what's being taught. It's not high school, and I know for a fact that my third-grade son hears things and gets them wrong. For instance, the school decided to rename the "tug-of-war" Field Day game to "tug-of-power", and, on his own, my son concluded that the word "war" is not to ever be used in school! I had to set him straight.
So my question is: does anyone else have such a committee in their school? Our committee is run by teachers and PTO members. I'm not really interested on being on the committee; I'm far too blunt on some issues; but I would love any links to, or info on, existing committees.
