Subject: Horrible Histories is awesome.
Author:
Posted on: 2013-04-04 21:25:00 UTC
We actually picked up a £20 boxed set of 20 books (I think they're the revised versions - a lot of the titles are slightly different to my memories) for when my kids are old enough. It's kind of hard not to start reading them...
hS
I was reading a website of a magazine I occasionally look at (hey, I'm a teenager and I'm vain) and I stumbled across this little treasure; wondered if anyone else had any thoughts?
http://www.girlslife.com/post/2013/04/01/School-cancels-coolest-after-school-program-ever-after-parents-complain.aspx
Honestly, my first thought is that I would love for my high school to do something like this. The number one thing I see these days is catatonia. Although a lot of people would complain for some reason if lectures were reduced.......don't ask me, I suspect it's because they're self conscious and they enjoy texting under the desks. But I digress....
Anyway, the teachers, when they put their minds to it, plan a bunch of creative things. I can honestly say one of my best classes this year stays far away from textbooks, and instead does a lot of projects, discussion and writing (all right, you caught me. I'll admit it's an easy class to make interesting, at least for me.....although English is also REALLY easy to suck the fun out of. Plus, my Social Studies is included here too). This school planned this amazing course, though, that got students really interested. I would love to take this- it would be fantastic. So my first point is I wish that schools would plan more of these classes that put learning in a more interesting setting. I remember the first words out of my History teachers mouth last year were, "I'm not here to entertain you." Yeah, I get it. It's not like schools are supposed to be TV. But is it fun for teachers to just stand there and lecture you? Or watch you finish worksheets? Because it really isn't that fun on the other side of the equation, either. Besides, one of the points of school is to teach us how to learn. Half of this stuff we aren't going to remember past finals if it's not our career path, and that's ok. If the learning isn't fun, why would we look to it so much in the future?
Then again, teachers don't particularly have enough time to plan this stuff.....but don't get me started on the public school rant unless you want to be here all day.
My second point is this: why are the parents shutting this down? I'm sorry if you think parental censorship is great, but I simply never understood it. Any one of you pro-censors (if you're there, that is) mind explaining this to me? Literally, my parents never did anything of the sort. One time my first great teacher caught me explaining to the other students the.....erm, I'll just censor that out. Anyway, you can imagine how that went....but that's another tangent. Back on topic.
Here's my view on it: Yeah, there is a certain age where certain things probably should be kept to certain standards. But we can't really hide our kids from reality forever. Now, if this were a course for first graders, I'd get what the issue is. Sort f But this is a course for high scholars. Do they really think we haven't seen or read about graphic violence before?
My personal views on all censorship for children are a little radical...okay, highly radical, and I'll admit that. But I don't really understand this high school censorship- we don't know everything, and we never will even if we think we do. But first of all, that's what school is for. And B, if you're going to cut out educating us about violence, why not cut Social Studies for our education on wars, certain books in our English class (The Oddessy is violent as heck, but we still read it). Even science has it's violent tendencies. Seriously, the only subject I've seen no violence with so far is math, and to that point there's probably something I don't know about yet.
Sorry all that rant got mixed in there with my thoughts.....but I just wanted to spark a discussion. What do you guys think?
Insofar as I remember my high school days (they're only three years ago, after all,) I remember liking different teachers more than their subjects. For example, I had advanced composition with a sarcastic little old woman who we were all firmly convinced was british, and pretty much my entire class asked "how high?" whenever she said "jump." I don't remember liking the actual assignments that much, but I loved the actual class, despite having despised English the year before when I'd had American Lit. My chemistry classes, which I'd expected to be interesting, got really boring aft er the teacher stopped being able to explain things very well, and I won't even trouble you with my junior year Spanish teacher, who was universally hated.
With the right teacher, history can be amazing. (Like Neshomeh, I also read the Horrible Histories, but I also made myself instantly popular with the boys and unpopular with the rest of the girls in first grade when I presented "how mummies were made," and talked about them pulling the brain out through the nose, so my standards of what's cool tend towards the zombie attack school.) I've also had extraordinarily dull history teachers, but luckily I've learned to read between the lines (and to watch Hetalia) so that I can get through those negative charisma point teachers.
What I think the main reason might be for this course being removed or changed is probably because it doesn't sound educational, and parents and school board members want everything to sound as educational as possible. I'm pretty certain the school board at my high school would have wondered what the "educational value" of a class called "Zombie Apocalypse Survival" was, and not even bothered to investigate that it's a class where you read and write about the zombie apocalypse.
Never fear, though: depending on what college or university you go to and what you major in, the fun classes start there. In the past three years I've had the most fun in my Philosophy class, which was surprising given that most people expected it to be boring, an environmental sciences class where we had a field trip every week, Latin (our textbook was surprisingly dirty and we didn't get points taken off for some of our most ludicrous translations, such as "the poured soldier was a column,") and biology, a class I roundly hated in high school.
(Also, math gets violent when it turns into statistics or economics. :D )
Erm....a smoothie, not old enough to drink yet. But that's so off topic.....
I think it's a mixture of both. I've never had an interesting math teacher (There's probably one out there.....hopefully.....somewhere.....) but I had this one teacher in 6th grade English that made me absolutely hate his class. He was so boring and I can't remember a darn thing he taught us. My classes this year aren't bad. I have one teacher who's a lot like me, and since we have about five people in that class, we've really bonded. And then my Social Studies teacher is the bomb (before she ended up in the hospital three weeks ago.....long story. She's doing better).
Although I still don't understand other people sometimes. We have a teacher, our science teacher, who uses a lot of what he calls "virtual labs". Sometimes they are really virtual labs, sometimes they're scavenger hunts across the internet, and sometimes they are practice problems or articles, even online movies. But everyone says they're pointless and he's a horrible teacher because he doesn't lecture enough. And then we have this great student teacher in our math class who tries to do some fun stuff with Geometry, and everyone's like "I wish she would just lecture." So I'm just like "?". I mean, he's not that engaging a teacher, so he can do smaller explanations but lectures don't work out that well. And math is a boring subject for us all. Why do they just want lectures?
The worst part is they say something of that sort right in front of the teacher in question. So it's really rude.
I don't mind saying I hate a teacher. I've hated a lot of teachers. I do, however, wait until said teacher is out of earshot.
I've had a moderately interesting math teacher. It was in Statistics.
Your classmates are, if you'll excuse the presumption, lazy teenagers who prefer not to participate actively in anything and would prefer a lecture so that it isn't so obvious that they're texting under their desks, off in la-la-land, or obviously not following the material. (Also, if notes aren't being checked, lectures usually seem like "less" work to most people whereas most teenagers think any in-class participation or excercizes is "more" work.)
I've only ever had one teacher who I was tempted to tell the truth to (that I hated her guts) and she was a math teacher who actively played favorites, so that's sort of beside the point.
http://notalwayslearning.com/math-exercise-dividers-of-theoden/30451 If my calculus professor was this cool, I'd probably remember some of it! XD
Also, I get the feeling that if that had happened at my school, a lot of students would have loved it. LotR and HP got a lot of mentions, although mostly HP...
Aaaahhh...I want to have been in that class :D
Thanks for sharing!
~DF
Pretty much. And then they cram the night before to get "A"s. I actually like school as long as I do the homework.
Alright, I hate sitting still for several hours too, so maybe that's why I'm so different....
Seriously, the key to high school was, do more than 75% of the reading, take at least half the notes. No cramming required. :)
We actually picked up a £20 boxed set of 20 books (I think they're the revised versions - a lot of the titles are slightly different to my memories) for when my kids are old enough. It's kind of hard not to start reading them...
hS
I had the "Groovy Greeks" and the "Awful Egyptians." I have no idea where I got them, but I certainly remember that... um... Heracletus died after burying himself in manure! And the falling turtle thing.
I think I must have believed that all ancient Greeks died hysterically improbable deaths...
Zeroth thought: Pauline, you've probably noticed most people around here - or on the internet in general - put an extra line break between paragraphs. For some reason I've never been able to figure out - but Neshomeh could probably tell me - it makes reading from a screen a heck of a lot easier. Looks awful in books, though...
First thought: On the subject of interesting/enjoyable/educational lessons, I'm going to pull in three examples from my own experience:
-At one extreme, we have my Physical Chemistry lectures at university. These were blighted by the fact that two of our three lecturers actually had negative charisma (one of them literally read the slides out to us - yes, fine, I can do that myself). I had a horrible time trying to learn the stuff, although I did pass the exams with the aid of last-minute revision outside the hall. Don't remember the equations now, though.
-At the other extreme, my wife (Kaitlyn, she's around occasionally) had a... very... uh... interesting lecturer for some course at uni. Her assignments included trying to sell a piece of junk on eBay, and making a new Wikipedia page (without it getting immediately deleted). Okay, that's highly entertaining, and the latter taught her a few things about citing and referencing - but I don't know that she took anything else away from the class.
-And then there's the middle ground.
Erste links
Zweite rechts
Dann gerade aus...
German class at... oh, probably age 15? Could have been as early as 11 or 12. Our classes were firmly based in the textbook, but the textbooks were interesting, with random songs, stories, all sorts. French, too.
Tu comprende maintenant?
I have kept a far better working knowledge of (basic) German than I have equation-based physics and chemistry - and I'm a chemist. My teachers knew their jobs, made the class engaging enough to keep our attention, but also got the words to stick.
(Interestingly, I took German at AS-level - age 17 - and gave up. My only memory is a horrible, pointless creative-writing exercise which I didn't connect with at all. So there's that)
Second thought: I learnt a lot of my history from Horrible Histories (the books, not the TV show), tag line: 'History with the nasty bits left in'. That gave me a pretty good grasp of what things were actually like in the past (in contrast to the rather generic view I picked up in the early parts of school).
But here's the thing: they were still kids' books. They were censored - of course they were, with their charming little cartoony pictures. If I'd opened one and found gruesomely realistic photos, I'd have screamed the house down.
You say: "Do they really think we haven't seen or read about graphic violence before?" My answer is: I've certainly never seen any, and I'm nearly 30 (ohdearstarsI'mold). I've seen films which featured it, but most of that was off-screen (action films and the like). The few occasions when I've encountered it directly in the media, I've wished I hadn't. Nightmares did follow.
(Of course, nightmares also followed Jurassic Park, but I was a lot younger then)
And now I have two children of my own, and (astonishingly, I know) I haven't completely forgotten what it was like to be young. Yes, there will be different experiences - a different world - to shape my children's view of things... but that doesn't mean I'm not going to try and stop them from encountering things which will damage them (in whatever way). I might get a few things wrong - but I'd like to imagine I'll be able to listen to them as well as to me.
Third thought:
If you're going to cut out educating us about violence, why not cut Social Studies for our education on wars, certain books in our English class (The Oddessy is violent as heck, but we still read it). Even science has it's violent tendencies.
Education about violence is entirely different to direct exposure to it. Yes, wars are violent, and yes, school should teach you what that actually means. That doesn't mean they should shove it in your face.
... and the only violence in chemistry is explosions, which don't count, because they are awesome.
hS isn't making himself very clear
Thanks for the heads up!
Well, a class of all games wouldn't work. But I disagree that something at that end of the spectrum is not educational. You would just need the instructor to explain it to make sense, I guess.
Then again, I'm horribly hyper and creative, so that might just be me :)
Sorry, guess I didn't make myself clear: I'm definitely not saying that we should watch graphic violence. Bad things follow, and not that many people in my grade are that interested in gore. But is the reading as bad? It would depend on the book itself. I've read some violence, and honestly I tended to skim those parts. But I have read it, and most of the grade has had a little exposure at least.
Let's just agree to disagree on the last part. Both can be equally as horrible depending on a number of factors, including who's listening?
On a more serious note, the part of my history lessons that dealt with the Nazis featured some pretty graphic stuff, and that was in ninth grade. Then again, this was in Germany and supposedly meant to shock us into not ever doing stuff like that again... or something, I don't even know. Books that featured semi-graphic descriptions of people getting blown up were required reading for SIXTH grade German class. Also, my eighth grade English teacher made us watch "Silence of the Lambs", with the excuse that we wouldn't be able to understand the nastier language (as if that were the worst part). Childhood innocence? What childhood innocence?
Which sounds like a sci-fi name rather than an ordinal... or maybe a supervillain whose power is to make evil, grainy copies of things.
But I digress.
I think it's mostly because nobody uses first-line indentation online, which is what books normally have to set off new paragraphs; it's easier to hit "Enter" a couple of times than it is to remember the HTML/CSS code for creating an indent, assuming you're even posting someplace that allows that sort of code. Either way, though, I believe the idea is to make sure there's no possibility of confusing where one paragraph ends and the next one begins, such as if the last line of the previous paragraph is the same length as the first line of the following one.
I also find that double line-breaks (also called hard returns, I learned that today) are easier to read than indentation online, but I don't know why that is. Maybe because the average computer screen is wider than the average page, so that little indent doesn't take up as much space relatively and is thus less noticeable? I dunno.
~Neshomeh, who couldn't ignore an invitation like that.
So are the other two I found back-tracking from it. I don't think I can form a fair opinion about this without knowing what materials the teacher was using and what actually went on in the class sessions. I mean, the Zombie Survival Guide is pretty harmless, IIRC, but was that it? People seem to be upset about an "emphasis on violence" in the class. I suppose that could have come out of generalizations that all zombie materials are about gore and merciless slaughter, but it could also have been a real, present issue with the materials and/or class discussions. I wasn't there, I don't know what the teacher spent his time talking about.
This is slightly beside the point, but I'd also like to know how the class got started in the first place if "the use of zombie-related materials ... was not approved in accordance with district curricular policies." I'd assume new classes, even optional ones, have to go through some kind of official vetting to be added to the class lists, so who signed off on it in the first place, and why didn't they know it was against their school district's policies? And, parents, don't you pay attention to what classes your kids are signing up for? How did this even exist long enough to be cancelled if it's against everyone's parental and curricular policies?
Too many questions for me.
~Neshomeh
Though I think the reason it wasn't vetted is because it was an extra-curricular activity, rather than an academic class. The Huffington Post article is a little more clear on that, though all the articles seem to muddy the waters by talking about academic value... which is somewhat irrelevant to an extra-curricular program. That fact also has me seriously wondering if it was all that necessary to cancel the program outright, rather than just having kids need a permission slip, or somesuch.
My middle and high schools had "electives," which were regular-hours classes, but weren't part of the standard English-History-Math-Science core. Electives included gym, music, art, creative writing, and foreign languages, IIRC. I was thinking this zombie class (always referred to as a class) might be like a creating writing elective, so that's what threw me off. But yeah, the Huffington Post does say it was after school.
Cancelling an after-school activity altogether does seem a bit over the top unless some really objectionable conduct was happening, and there's no indication of that. They don't really say what was going on, though. At the least it's kinda flimsy reporting. Almost like they want to cause a stir rather than inform... but hey, the media would never do that, right? {; P
Note: I have nothing against the media in general, but I do find it helps to pay close attention to what a given article or segment is actually trying to achieve below the surface. These ones all pretty much reek of "Oh my gosh, you should think badly of those mean meanie-head parents and that draconian school district guy and not think too much about why they're reacting the way they are, because oh my gosh, we are just so miffed about the injustice of denying zombies to middle-schoolers, and you should be, too!"
~Neshomeh, who may be exaggerating just a bit for effect.
The media? Focus on spectacle rather than news? Preposterous! And frankly, as a journalist, I'm insulted by the very idea! *cough*
Yeah - very definitely flimsy reporting, at the least, and quite a bit of spin on both articles. It pays to look at the target audience, usually, and that'll tell you why the spin, and what they're going for. With the original article, it's fairly obvious - their target demographic is teenagers, and in this day and age, the point of "journalism" is to sell ad space and bump up viewers. So... yeah, they're going to tell their audience - teenagers - what they want to hear: The overprotective "censorship" of your parents and school board is super ridiculous and they're all just being mean and discriminatory!
The Huffington Post, on the other hand... well, there's a reason I try to avoid linking to it if I'm engaging someone farther to the right of the political spectrum - they're semi-rigorous with their ethics, but they definitely have a slant to the left, and that colors their article here - as you pointed out, there's a lot of "How dare they stifle the free-spirited teaching style and restrict information," etc. They're less biased, but not unbiased.
I see your point. I get that we don't know the whole story. But whatever violence there was in the class, someone didn't think it was too much (whoever signed off on the thing and whoever ran it) and if some parents thought it was too much, they still cut it for the rest of the student body.
I don't know, maybe it was really too much. But if there were at least two people in on it who were adults and were good with kids, and the kids don't seem to be plagued with nightmares according to the article, so....I'm not sure the material is that bad.
Could have had a few material links, though. But I doubt they would release them.
"Parents... were concerned about the violence inherent in the subject matter..."
Is it just me, or did they make a subtle reference to Monty Python?
Honestly, I think a zombie apocalypse survival writing program could be very successful and harmless if done well. While most movies and shows on the subject are extremely violent (it's a situation that allows you to lay waste to endless numbers of human-shaped creatures with no consequences whatsoever), there are many other aspects to consider. Perhaps the largest and most pervasive of these is the element of survival. If you were really in a zombie apocalypse (or any kind of post-apocalyptic scenario, for that matter), you would spend a lot less time dispatching the shuffling hordes and much more time obtaining shelter, food, clean water, etc, not to mention trying to find a way to contact other survivors. (Would you use a radio like in "I Am Legend"?) You can use a lot of creativity here.
There are also aspects of world-building, and things like the origin of your zombies to consider. Did they come from a virus? A voodoo ritual? Are there zombie animals? Do they retain a degree of intelligence? Can they be restored to life (like in "Warm Bodies")?
This is just the beginning. Then again, in a school that suspends students for drawing a picture of a gun, writing about a gun might be equally forbidden.
Imagine instead a class where they're told to write a 500 word story about surviving a zombie attack, and then asked to share their stories with each other.
Student One: 'It's been six days since the helicopter left. The food ran out this morning. Before long, one of us will have to make a run for the mall. The last one to try didn't make it back...'
Student Two: 'I gouged the undead's eyes out with my bare fingers and flung them to the ground at my feet. The orbs burst with a wet sound as I stomped down hard, and the zombie screamed with delicious agony.'
Student One: ... ... ... o.O
hS
To be fair, though... most people in my creative writing classes were somewhat self-censoring with regards to violence due to the fact that the stories were being read and graded. I know that student two's example is kind of disgusting, but it's honestly so over-the-top that it's hard to take seriously, and would probably pass muster at certain schools or at a certain age. (It sounds a bit like the most passable sentence in the revamped, zombie apocalypse themed "Eye of Argon," known as the Eyes of Aaaaaaargh!) The kids you have to worry about are the ones who aren't aware of the violence of what they're writing, and schools are usually pretty bad at catching them through examining their "creative expressions."
I've noticed the teachers tend to walk around watching us and reading over our shoulders while we're working. So they would probably catch that :)
Maybe....hopefully.....
I am highly offended by that hypothetical story!
And yeah, the last statement: true that.
Hmm.. I think today I'll be my mini-boarder and stay anonymous today.
Normally when people start talking about rights and censorship and whose allowed to marry who (I know not the point, but it's one of those issues) or what constitutes stepping on "pet rights" (also not the issue) or who's allowed to eat what or how far you're allowed to "influence" your children and whether punishment is ever appropriate or politics in general, I bow out of things rather than join the shouting match that ensues when both sides try to voice the "right" opinion.
I thought I might offer an opinion from the other POV here though, since I can hide behind anonymity of not having a set posting name, but rather being allowed to type in whatever one wants, and also because unlike some boards I visit, I don't see this as a particularly liberal leaning (or any leaning really) board, so perhaps a meaningful discussion can be had without things degrading to insults and shouting. (Which is oddly enough how most discussion boards on the liberal sites I'm a part of start out rather than degrade to...)
Anywho, on to the opinions! :3 About parental censorship, yes I think it's a good thing actually because what most teens see as and cry "censorship" at is more their parents trying to protect them, since that's what parents do. Can it be taken too far? Of course, but then again, every good thing can be taken too far. But is not allowing younger children especially (these are 11-14 year olds we're talking about in this article) to be exposed to excessive or gratuitous violence, sex, drugs, profanity, etc appropriate just because they can get it from other sources? I really don't think so. As for the argument that they have seen it before, if the parents are watching what their kids are up to, then no, no they haven't, and those parents that care enough to speak up against this are watching their kids and should be allowed to shield them, from certain things, that is their right as a parent. (Once again everything including this can be taken way too far, but that doesn't mean it should be stopped altogether) I've met children who run wild and destroy things and get into nasty crap because their parents don't want to do anything to "stifle or censor or shelter" them, they don't end up well. Or how about the middle-schoolers that show up with guns or kill themselves over a C or a break up because they don't understand the permanence or seriousness of death due to being inundated with it from a young age rather than sheltered a bit? Am I saying everyone who plays shot'em up games, or watches violent programming is going to go out shooting? No, I'm just saying this "no censorship eva" attitude leads to a lot of desensitization, which can precipitate other behavior. As a less extreme example, think about the 4 and 5 year olds that scream profanities at store clerks or in restaurants because the don't get their way and their parents either do nothing rather than risk trampling their "rights" or "censoring them" or they give in and get whatever the kid is asking for?
Hmm, and I think this too turned into a rant, I do apologize. Strictly the issue at hand, do I think parents should be able to have certain things censored from schools? Yes, in the case that it is a required course/reading/etc. Do I think this was such a case? No, it doesn't sound like it. And as an avid reader, I didn't need such things to keep me interested, I would have gone to the exploratory reading program happily. However, if parents are concerned about the inherent violence to the subject (a valid fear in my opinion) then in this case, as it is optional, don't sign your kid up for it, it's not the school's responsibility to raise your kid, you don't like their program, take time and come up with a way to get your own kid into reading, even if it's just a trip to the library to find appropriate books that interest them and unplugging the cable box , video games and internet for a couple nights a week. When me and my siblings were younger, both my mom and dad would read to us at night for family time. We colored or cross-stitched and they would read. That's how I found Tolkien. It's also how I discovered the difference between fiction and non-fiction.
And as for your cases of not understanding censorship, you said you were 14? 15? No one understands why they can't do what they want at that age, (some people never grow out of it), I know I didn't. But was I emotionally scared by my parents protecting me, even when it was from Scooby-Doo because it was "too dumb" and we didn't need to be watching it? No, I wasn't actually harmed by it in anyway. And in a lot of cases it was a very good thing. I can't stand all that horror/gratuitous violence/gore/etc, I simply can not handle it, I have a very vivid imagination, if you say it/I read it, I see it, and probably worse than it would be had I seen it. Even talking about it I can start imagining horrific things, so I don't think programs that require that sort of thing should be allowed in schools. If parents wish to allow it at home, that's one thing, and again, I don't think an anything is allowed because we can't stop it approach is good, but it's still based more individually than a school saying you must read/attend/watch this that may have age inappropriate themes. Wait another 15 years, or til you have kids, you'll understand it then. As to the history books, I've not ever seen a history text book that had gratuitous or gory descriptions of the wars of history. That's just, I'm sorry, having a fit and saying if you're going to censor one thing for being overly gratuitous why not censor all mention of anything bad ever and be done with it. That is not the sort of extreme all or nothing argument to be making if you want people to respect your positions, and that is not directed at you, it's directed at the internet where people seem to think that sort of attack is the way to win. As for historical accounts, I've read the Odyssey and the Iliad, and yes, they can get pretty bad, but then again they are not required reading til later high school. I've also read historical accounts of Nazi prison camps that really aren't that bad in the graphic/gratuitous description of things area. Were they disturbing and terrible? Yes, but they were able to tell their story accurately and evoke the emotions/outrage that are associated with those actions without describing every single graphic torture in detail. Just sayin'
Sorry to ramble on like that, and rant at things, but there it is...
First I should sincerely like to apologize for any toes I stepped on. That was not my intent, in either posting anonymously, or in that I ended up a bit on the rant-y side in the end.
Tray-Gnome, VixenMage and Huinesoron, I understand the problems that come with posting anonymously and the reason for the strong discouraging there of as it is most often abused. However from what is said in the Constitution;
Stick to one penname across the PPC as far as possible — or at least make it clear that the different names are still you. Please don’t deliberately use multiple names — it’s confuzzling and pointlessly annoying...
I understood it to be a strongly suggested request to keep confusion and drama down rather than a hard, fast, absolute rule that one must only ever post under one name. So as a dash and stab sort of post was not my intent, but rather that I wished to use the mostly con of internet anonymity to my favor in that if I were taken the very wrong way, or if as I suspected it might end up being an attackable position, I could let the opinion take the heat, leave the discussion as is recommended by the rules and continue to post as myself without worry that my posting an opinion on this topic would follow my name around for the rest of my (probably short after that point) time here. Plus I figured, as Huinesoron pointed out, it would not be hard for those in charge to determine my identity should I post something completely out of keeping with the rules around here, taking advantage of being able to post without naming myself to it's fullest and most often used extent. And I thank you for allowing me to remain as I wanted rather than outing me before a problem came up if it were going to. Nor did I hide the fact that I was a poster here, albeit a shy one yesterday.
Was I wrong to post without my name? In this case, most probably. However, while my newbie-shine may be wearing off, I've not been around but about a month and a half (Feb 12th), and I do not know people here well enough to have felt comfortable posting in opposition to the creator of the topic and it's responses at the time under my name. Should I have simply held off as I normally do in that case? Again, most probably, but for some reason I didn't. But having been stung before by people I know better, and stabbed in the back while by someone who was even at the time insisting we were friends and she looked up to me, I made a choice. And I ask that you please understand, even if it does not excuse, my decision, and accept my apology for it. I'm also sorry I'm awkward and shy (which do play a part) ^_^; And please know that you won't hear from me again. (The me that is the stated author of this post, not the me that is the boarder signed at the end that is.)
I now return you to your regularly scheduled discussion.
As to being or not being gifted, and thus being able to police yourselves vs. parents having to do so, I was going to try to make a similar argument/point as has already been put forth and I think Neshomeh put it well. Also as many have pointed out, the article is rather vague and I too fell victim to taking it at it's face value rather than realizing that upon a first reading, but my opinion still stands, that parents should be able to censor their children's reading/games/television when they feel it necessary, and although I didn't put it very well, I do agree with Pauline in that every child is different, and to a degree no one should tell them how they must parent, making allowances for abuse of the child and/or the child's abuse of others if they are allowed to run wild. But as Neshomeh said, parents will know their kids best, and so will be able to tailor their censorship of materials to the situations that face them. And since I know Pauline is right about kids sneaking around to do stuff as well the parents then either allow the material, if it was wildly in appropriate to teach them they should listen when they are told something is not allowed for reasons given. Or since they were involved enough in the first place to try to censor it, to appropriately disciple when the kid ignores the rules. Point is I still believe parents should have the right to speak up to schools and request certain materials or activities be removed or changed if they believe them to be harmful to the students, in this case mental, well being. Just as they can chose to not allow those subjects in their homes. And when enough parents are upset about the subject matter, as seemed to be the case in this story, then the school should re-evaluate the matter and either explain more to the parents, in the case of a knee jerk reaction as could surround a discussion about zombies considering most zombie games/movies can be fairly gory, and like Huinesoron pointed out, give kids a subject like that and you may get wholesome learning, and then someone steps up who is into all that gore and scars the rest of the class, yes we hope the teacher catches it, but what if they're not writing at school, what if it's a homework assignment that is not pre-read? And if the parents are still concerned the school can remove or change it. Such as in this case, you could still do a course centered around survival preparation and leave zombies out of it. Shipwreck them, spaceship wreck them on another similar planet, have an apocalypse scenario that doesn't involve zombies. It doesn't have to be zombies or quiet reading time. :)
And since I seem to have either most offended VixenMage, or at least they were the ones that spoke up about it, I apologize again.
I must admit, this made me raise my eyebrows. For every kid you can name who "runs wild and destroys things" because their parents haven't "sheltered" them enough, I'm sure I could name you a kid who goes wild and destroys things because their parents are controlling - or we could both admit that there are a lot of factors in the behavior of children and young adults, and anecdotal evidence doesn't really prove the point.
Here, I will admit you're right, I overgeneralized, or let the rant take over and yes lack of censorship is not always the cause of this, and yes, there are just as many perhaps that do so as a result of over controlling. The flip side being that for every kid I can name that "runs wild and destroys things" due to parents letting them get away with doing/reading/watching/playing anything they want, or was too controlling. There are probably just as many who are more like Pauline and her friends who receive less controlling in the material they are allowed because they are able to police themselves better than others, either due to higher intelligence, higher maturity for their age, good upbringing to begin with or some combination of the above. You don't ever really hear about the good kids, because... well they're good and don't cause trouble. So I do apologize for my over-generalization in the midst of a rant.
As for the other issue taken with over generalization on my part;
This, I really do have to take issue with. We have had a lot of kids on the PPC at fourteen or fifteen, and they're plenty mature enough to understand why they can't "do what they want." It's really quite an assumption to make, and honestly, I don't really appreciate the stigma you're putting on every/any 14-15 year olds. Plenty of us grow up faster than that, and it's pretty harsh to just assume that everyone has the same patterns of life. Some of us learned early why, exactly, doing "whatever you want" was a bad thing precisely because of parental situations.
Here I must disagree, mostly because although it was taken as harsh and directed toward thinking all younger people will act the same because they are younger. It really wasn't meant that way. I apologize for not being a little clearer on that point so that it wound up offending, but it was less a jab at young people and grouping them altogether in behavior. It was a response to the 14 (or 15) year old poster of this discussion stating she saw little reason for censorship (perhaps just of zombie violence) at any age;
Here's my view on it: Yeah, there is a certain age where certain things probably should be kept to certain standards. But we can't really hide our kids from reality forever. Now, if this were a course for first graders, I'd get what the issue is. Sort of.
So I was pointing out that her age probably played a part in her understanding of why censorship can be good. Yes there are people of all ages that still can't stand to be told, it's not just teens and children. And yes some younger people mature faster. But in this case, my point was that age was a factor to her argument, not trying to say every teen in general would follow the same behavioral pattern.
Again I apologize to toes that were stepped on.
~Myrddin
I'm twenty-two. It's been a fairly long time since my feelings were hurt by discussions about non-specific teenagers. :P
You are correct in your understanding that the Constitution is aimed at preventing people from creating confusion/drama by jumping between names - it's there to get people to have a single handle, rather than several confusing ones, and not to prevent people from posting anonymously. There is no "absolute rule" against posting anonymously - the reasons stated were more aimed at explaining why we'd prefer you to just use your own name. I should also mention, I suppose, that it's not just "those in charge" (quotation marks only because it is important to note that we technically don't have anyone in charge! Just The Nameless Admin, who is a shadowy figure who only gets involved when things are rally dire) who can figure out who you are - your IP address doesn't change when your name does, so it's very easy for just about anyone to match an anon's IP to that of a regular Boarder's.
Thank you for your apology - I was rather more snarky than I intended to be, and I apologize as well for getting aggressive about it. And thank you for returning to the discussion to clarify your points; dialogue is always a good thing!
I'm glad, as it was not my intent to offend.
Ah, well being new, I wasn't sure how the hierarchy worked around here, other than the Nameless Admin who was "in charge" of anyone else that might be "in charge" :D I also wasn't sure how hard tracking an IP was, though I knew it wouldn't be hard for those with admin sort of powers should I overstep the "privilege" choosing a nom de plume for a couple posts while I was still getting my feet wet around here as it were. :) Though I do totally understand why it is not something that is or should be allowed on any sort of regular basis. And I am sorry to have spooked everyone, honestly I didn't think about it since I was not trying to take abusive advantage of it, should have thought it through a bit more. ^^;
No worries, I was just concerned that I had offended terribly. Thank you for your apology as well though, and no hard feelings. :) Dialouge is excellent, I was actually kind of upset I didn't get the chance to return to the discussion yesterday, but events conspired against me. :) Ah well, life does like to gang up on people sometimes. XD
*really dire. Bah.
Aside from what Tray said about not jumping around names (the main reason for that, IIRC, is because putting on name after name after name is confusing and gets annoying), it puts up a sort of... flashing light, I suppose. When I see someone say "I'm going to post this, but I don't want to sign my name to it," my first thought - fair or not - is that it's going to be something hurtful or offensive that they don't want to take the blame for, and my second thought is that it's not offensive, but it's controversial, and they don't trust the rest of us not to jump down their throats. I don't think either of these were your intention, but as someone who places a lot of emphasis on identity, it's just something I would advise you to be cautious about.
That said, I would also say that we have a history, in the PPC, a fairly long one, of being able to discuss a lot of difficult, controversial, and emotionally charged topics without losing our cool or attacking one another. That hasn't always been the case, but I do believe we're doing pretty well, and I do trust people on the 'Board to be mature and respectful. I'll take this opportunity to remind everyone of the Constitution's words on the matter:
5. All respectful opinions that do not attack, insult, or persecute others (see Article 1) are welcome. We encourage respectful, friendly debates here. Should a debate escalate into an argument for any reason, everyone involved should step back and calm down before continuing. ...
6. Everyone in the PPC Community should be respected as people, regardless of who they are. The opinions of a newbie are just as valid and wanted as those of someone here for four years. ...
There's more, of course, and I strongly urge everyone to refresh their memory if they ever find themselves wondering "Is this appropriate for the PPC Posting Board?" (Perhaps I needn't say this, but when you start off by mentioning, offhand, "pet rights" and "who's allowed to marry who," I feel it might bear repeating.) But that's all beside the point! I am interested in what you have to say, here, so I would like to respond to that - I just wanted to get that stuff out of the way first, since it seemed to be merited by the oncoming likelihood of a Serious DiscussionTM.
Having seen both sides to the "parental censorship" thing, I would have to agree with you that it's not a bad thing for parents to keep an eye on the kind of media content their children consume. I also think it's important for kids to have some independence and choice in their media - my siblings and I were very, very strictly controlled in our media choices, and when we did finally get turned loose at the library without supervision, we made some very, very poor choices (and some good choices! Tamora Pierce, Harry Potter, A Wrinkle in Time, R. A. Salvatore...). So I definitely think there's something to be said for allowing kids to, so to speak, fall and hurt themselves on bad literature, if only so they know what it is when they see it as adults.
I've met children who run wild and destroy things and get into nasty crap because their parents don't want to do anything to "stifle or censor or shelter" them, they don't end up well. Or how about the middle-schoolers that show up with guns or kill themselves over a C or a break up because they don't understand the permanence or seriousness of death due to being inundated with it from a young age rather than sheltered a bit?
I must admit, this made me raise my eyebrows. For every kid you can name who "runs wild and destroys things" because their parents haven't "sheltered" them enough, I'm sure I could name you a kid who goes wild and destroys things because their parents are controlling - or we could both admit that there are a lot of factors in the behavior of children and young adults, and anecdotal evidence doesn't really prove the point.
And as for your cases of not understanding censorship, you said you were 14? 15? No one understands why they can't do what they want at that age, (some people never grow out of it), I know I didn't.
This, I really do have to take issue with. We have had a lot of kids on the PPC at fourteen or fifteen, and they're plenty mature enough to understand why they can't "do what they want." It's really quite an assumption to make, and honestly, I don't really appreciate the stigma you're putting on every/any 14-15 year olds. Plenty of us grow up faster than that, and it's pretty harsh to just assume that everyone has the same patterns of life. Some of us learned early why, exactly, doing "whatever you want" was a bad thing precisely because of parental situations.
Basically, I do understand your underlying point - there is a limit to allowing kids to just have unlimited access to the content they want, without supervision. But I think you could stand to tone down the condescension. This response came of as rather heavy-handed, especially in response to someone who is dealing with this issue from the other side of the argument. Please consider, in the future, that we have people of all ages (roughly, over thirteen) on this space - generalizing that "all" people of a certain age are too immature to understand certain things is something I'm not really a fan of.
I agree. I never swore or rebelled against my parents, even though my Dad swore like a sailor extremely loudly while working with technology. I'm one of the lucky teens who actually like my parents.
There is no right parenting style, really. It depends on what works with the kids. But kids aren't carbon copies of their parents, either. And that's where the problems start. For someone who's very loose in a family that's controlling (like a good friend of mine) then you have problems. On the other hand, if you have a kid who needs parameters in a family that's very loose like mine, then that can be bad too. The most important thing is communication, and then you can go from there.
There's a good friend of mine I mentioned above, who's a lot like me. But she and her parents are nothing alike personality wise. They're very forceful and controlling. And because of who she is, they're pushing her away. They won't even let her try to explain. So come her eighteenth birthday, she wants to get as far away from them as she can and never look back. And it's going to haunt both of them.
Good parenting is less a strict set of perimeters and more of a combination of communication, your best judgement, and a dash of knowing how kids tend to work (and being ready to throw that understanding out the window most of the time). At least, in my experience. I would never block my kids' media unless it specifically needed to be done, but that's just how I work.
Thanks for defending me! Fourteen,, by the way. And I think I'm somewhat mature for my age, if a little sheltered. In my defense, I'm working on that.
"On your anonymity... Honestly, that's usually kind of frowned upon on the Board. You may have noticed that we have a "one name per person" rule. The reason for this is because, well, we do try to be open and honest with each other here! You don't have anything to fear from us. This is a community where we do value everyone's opinion, provided it's not openly offensive. Seriously! If somebody disagrees with you here, it's highly unlikely anybody will flame you. Even when people disagree, the conversation is really quite civil."
... is that [name redacted, though really, it wasn't hard to pin down] was worried this would be considered "openly offensive". Paragraph 3 indicates prior experience with flamewars in this subject area.
And... I know we'd like to think the Board is a place where people don't get flames, but that has been really, really untrue at times. My wife saved a copy of one of my very early posts back in '03 which started with (words to the effect of) 'I strongly suspect I'm going to be attacked for saying this, but...'.
hS
I'll admit that my ideas on censorship are pretty radical. But here's my point- my parents haven't censored me at all. And I can't stand violence. I have no desire to read saucy sex scenes. And I've never sworn in school.
See, maybe I'm wrong and this isn't the norm, but I've heard so many times that a friend of mine wasn't old enough to watch something. Most of them who don't take that freedom as far as it can go, or sneak around it big time, have a huge bond with their parents.
But the rest of them? They sneak it around. And some of them actually like the stuff and that's why they do it. But most of them read the saucy sex scenes or the graphic violence because their parents don't like them reading it. By making it specifically banned, they're drawing the kid's attention to it. For a younger kid, this makes it desirable and a curiosity; for the older kids it's a way to rebel. My friends who don't but anything around their parents with this stuff were told as really young kids, as well, exactly why they weren't allowed to read the books.
This is possibly because all of us are gifted (and that's probably part of the problem- hard to censor your first grader when her reading level's a seventh grade) but we have huge curiosities. I don't condemn those who censor, though it doesn't make the greatest amount of sense to me (yeah, I know, wait a few years) but you have to do it the right way and once a kid hits a certain age, it has to stop.
What is my opinion on how censoring should go, if it's done? It's two very simple rules- A. Don't tell someone else how to parent, and B. Tell them why in the most age appropriate terms you can without violating your morals. There are several kids out there who are like me- they aren't censored, and their cool like that. So demanding to take out courses like this or books out of the library simply annoys them and, if it's one of the few high level books in a school library or high level courses in elementary school, can also hold back other kids education. Thank God no one in my town paid any attention to the level seven books in the library....
Second of all, kids are curious. Depends on the kid how much, but that's kind of their nature. Most of the people I know who censor just say "It's bad" or "It's not age appropriate" and that's not going to do you much good unless you have the most obedient kid on the planet. How about explaining that it's violence and it would be best to wait until their older, or whatever else works well?
I'm saying that unless people explain it, most of the time the kids are going to read it just to satisfy their curiosity, anyway. I satisfied it by reading and asking, and honestly the closest I got to actually wanting to watch the saucy scenes was one rated R movie I thought would be funny (I ended up never wanting to see it again, by the way). My parents may not have censored, but it's not like they put the books in front of me or actively swore. One of the things I loved about them was from a young age they never treated me as a little kid- they treated me as if I knew what I was doing and was capable.
Also, once the kid hits sophmore, freshman year, it's going to get practically impossible. That's just due to how high school students are treated and how other parenting methods work as well. If people keep trying to do it, not only is it not the greatest for the kid, they might get bullied if they don't try to sneak it.
And if it's a gifted kid, the deadline needs to get pushed back. Gifted kids often have higher reading levels and understanding levels- a gifted seventh grader can have the understanding of a freshman or higher, even if they don't have the knowledge.
Sorry, this is turning into another rant, and I definitely would rather discuss this civilly (You should see some political debates at school....). But my point is not many kids naturally want to read the stuff. Censor can be good (and you're right, sometimes seriously overdone) for a simple barrier, but it can also encourage it, from what I've seen.
That word, "censor," I do not think it means what you think it means. It's a rather heavily loaded term, so I think it's important to clear this up: To censor something is to block it from expressing, so if you were being censored, you'd be prevented from expressing yourself through speech, behavior, and/or other means. That does not appear to be what you're describing, so perhaps a different term is called for?
Also, being intellectually gifted does not automatically confer emotional maturity, so just because a smart kid can comprehend the language used to describe adult topics doesn't mean they're ready to process those topics in a healthy way. Every kid is different, even the smart ones, and in most cases I'd trust parents to know their kid's limits better than other people. After all, they have (hopefully) been around for the kid's whole life.
For some context about where I'm coming from, I was talking at nine months, brought in a toy plesiosaur for "P" week in preschool, and learned the mechanics of where babies come from at about age three and a half, when my mom got pregnant with my little brother. No topic was taboo in my house. I remember having a conversation about AIDS when I was in elementary school, and at first thinking we might be talking about the people who helped out in the cafeteria (it was actually about not being scared of people who are sick).
I still wasn't allowed to watch R-rated movies or read books with adult themes intended for adults, even if I was curious about said themes, until I was old enough, because I would have been scared or confused or disgusted, or some combination, and would probably have been traumatized to some degree, and my parents knew that about me. Probably from experience, since no one is perfect—my mom tells the story about the movie Airplane had me freaked out and refusing to eat fish sticks for months when I first saw it, because I was just a kid and didn't get the dark humor. Oops.
Come to think of it, I still don't eat fish sticks, though that could just be a function of growing out of them. Sushi is where it's at now.
Anyway, just want to go on record as kid who was bright for my age and who had the emotional maturity of... a kid my age... whose parents managed my media intake appropriately for the most part. {= )
~Neshomeh, supposedly some kind of responsible adult now, with a marriage and taxes and everything.
But that's an adorable toy Plesiosaur you must have had. :) I had "Carotene" for C day because my snack was carrots.
Strangely enough, I remember that our whole class was given a talk about AIDS in the first grade: it was one of those public safety lectures, I'm fairly certain that we learned what the disease was and that you can get it from used needles and that was why anything with blood on it was a bio-hazard.
You get automatic nerd kid credits for the Plesiosaur, though.
*High-fives Neshomeh*
I don't know if it was adorable. It was part of a set of plastic toys, which Uncle Google has informed me were made by a plastics company called Invicta. The set can be seen here: http://www.dinosaur-toys-collectors-guide.com/invicta-dinosaurs.html
I don't think I had all of them, but it's pretty darn nostalgic looking at most of them. They all had personalities and relationships—I think the plesiosaur was married to the icthyosaur, or something like that. The dipolodocus and brachiosaur were also a thing, with the cetiosaur being an elder to one of them. I think the iguanodon was the "cool guy." Not sure about the rest, but that's enough of that anyway. ^_^;
Anyway, thanks! Carotene counts for something, too, if you ask me. *high-fives back*
~Neshomeh, who definitely didn't watch The Land Before Time about a billion times, why do you ask?
My brother got obsessed with Dinosaurs when he was about two and I was seven and obsessed with mummies, so yes, by my standards, that plesiosaur was adorable. We didn't have those exact ones on our side of the pond, but Jurassic Park came out when I was little so there were a lot of plastic dinosaurs to choose from. I also remember when my stuffed animals had those kinds of personalities: I had four beanie-baby cats and they were all sisters. The white cat was the fancy one, the calico cat was a tomboy, the tabby cat was a bookworm, and the black cat was a troublemaker. :)
~ Swans, who never got through The Land Before Time due to her brother screaming "It's a carnivore not a 'sharp tooth'!"
We've got me in the US and Huinesoron in the UK both having had these ones, so...? Despite certain people mixing us up elsewhere in this thread, we're not actually the same person. ^_~
Hm, I shout things at the screen to this day myself. In my case, it tends to be along the lines of "No, that cat is clearly a calico and therefore almost certainly female!" or "Dammit, that is not how viruses work!" It really bugs me when TV shows and whatnot get medicine/general biology wrong. {= / I can usually grit my teeth and keep my mouth shut if pressed, though.
~Neshomeh
... but I've forgotten which one is the Brit. My apologies. That's what comes of having multiple conversations, but for my money, I was under the impression that you were both Brits. Of course, I'm a child of the 90's, so it's probably less that they weren't in my area than that they were gone by the time I got there. :)
People take me to spaghetti westerns to see how long it takes me to get cheesed off by the bad biology or illogical action. :)
^That's to help you remember.
hS
(I blame staying far away from the board for a couple months while doing an awful semester of school. It's a wonder my brain isn't a bowl of scrambled eggs by now.)
[Insert ALL the jawdrop emoticons here]
I had those too!
They sold them at the Natural History Museum (London, of course - the proper one), and I had, wow, most of them. Actually a lot of them were second-hand from jumble sales and school bazaars, but...
Baryonyx, Brachiosaurus, Cetiosaurus (although I would have pegged it as a Diplodocus, but the pictures are quite clear), Icthyosaurus, Iguanodon, Megalosaurus, Plesiosaurus, Pteranodon, Stegosaurus.
Interesting that I somehow missed out on the Trike, which I'm sure was my sister's favourite dinosaur (yes, Land Before Time played a part there...)... and the T-Rex. I think the Megalosaurus was a T-Rex in my head.
And of course I had a whole bunch of Jurassic Park dinosaurs, too... I liked dinosaurs. My children will like dinosaurs too.
Or else.
hS
Wow! Hello, coincidence! Looking at the years they came out, I guess they might have been hot items when we were little? I have no idea where mine came from, though. We lived in Pittsburgh, PA when I would've gotten them, so maybe a natural history museum there? I'll have to remember to ask my parents.
Ones I definitely remember having are the Brachiosaurus, Cetiosaurus, Diplodocus, Glyptodon, Icthyosaurus, Iguanodon, Megalosaurus, Plesiosaurus, Scelidosaurus (what even is that?), Stegosaurus (not sure if it was pink or green), T-Rex, and Wooly Mammoth. The Triceratops might have been there, but I feel like it was a different color, like a dark reddish purple. Maybe it was from a different manufacturer, or there were different varieties, like the Stegasaurus. Or I'm just misremembering. *shrug*
I feel like Megalosaurus wasn't necessarily a "bad guy" to me. He's not as rough and scaly as the T-Rex, so obviously he must not be as mean, right? Kid logic! >.>
Don't worry, all kids love dinosaurs at some point. I'm not big into them anymore (they were gradually edged out by horses, cats, dolphins, and fantasy creatures), but clearly I had my fling with them. And hey, Jurassic Park is just an awesome movie. {= )
~Neshomeh
Also, as for the Scelidosaurus...
Awesome. Reminds me of the Psittacosaurus, in a way. It's probably the head shape that's making me think of them. This picture's probably not the same color as the toy was, though.
Those pesky evolutionarily plausible colors know nothing of childhood nostalgia!
First off....oops? Sorry, the blocking thing was never really big in either town I've lived in, so I wasn't sure of the exact term.
Eh......depends on the kid in question. Giftedness and maturity aren't completely correlated, I know. But because of the advanced track I've seen all of us on at the four school systems I've been to, I've noticed that my gifted peers tended to mature a bit faster than the others. In my classes, discussions, competent ones about violence and death were commonplace. So I guess it's more of a personality thing. Or maybe it's just not a big sample size. I mean, my class has five people in it at the moment, so....
Now, don't get me wrong. Really young kids are going to get nightmares most likely if they go over "R" rated shows. But I doubt even a gifted five year old would want to go to a rated R show of their own accord. It's not something really talked about in school at that age. I'm talking about middle school here, when most kids are starting to show maturity anyway (key word: starting. MS's are in no way completely mature). Heck, I don't even want to see rated "R" shows, and that's with my upbringing.
Besides, I think it's more discouraging a kid than downright prohibiting. Telling a kid she probably won't like it because it's inappropriate for such and such a reason does more to discourage them from doing it than actually prohibiting it. That's just an observation, but I'm not a child psychologist, or anything.
To be honest, I'm in no position to tell someone how to parent. I deal with my own stuff. I really only get annoyed if it's to the point of ridiculousness or it's forcing other people how to parent.
Now that I think about it, you can't really generalize it for all gifted kids, either. It depends on what kind of gifted you are. When we're talking about giftedness, we're usually talking intellectual, but as my G and T teacher *loves* to quote, there's more than one type. Some kids aren't very good at reading but are gifted artists. Others are extremely gifted intellectually but not very well versed socially. And some people are a mixture of these. It really just depends on who you're talking about.
When I was talking about gifted, I was talking intellectually and also the gift of emotional maturity beyond an age level. That's pretty much how I'm classified (that would be a long story about living in a tiny town where all kids my age hated my guts and I only hung out with my parents friends and one of my older sisters, a senior in high school by the time I was three, but let's continue) as well as artistically gifted. However, I'm also extremely socially awkward, get way to into projects that no one else cares about, can't throw or catch a ball to save my life, and if you follow Harry Potter, I am a big time Slytherin (I'm not rude! I swear! At least, I don't think I am.....sometimes I don't think through things before they come out of my mouth. Did I mention I have all seven overexcitabilities as well?). We all have our own strengths and weaknesses, so if you're talking a gifted kid, you could easily be talking gifted with numbers or gifted with pottery, but not emotionally. My intellectual giftedness barely touches on numbers (I am in sophmore math as a freshman, but I suck at it), but I'm a good problem solver (despite being really bad at brain teasers and math) and lean towards English.
Everyone's gifted at something, but for some it's not as prevalent as others, and regular school teachers don't tend to pay attention to athletic or artistic giftedness unless they're a music teacher or visual art teacher, or possibly a gym teacher (depending on who you have). And others might be horrible at all of these things, but they have a gift socially, for making people have a brighter day just by being sunny. And that's not even measurable.
I guess I'm saying that since everyone is technically a gifted kid, and they just have to capitalize on it, you can't really say "gifted, no blocking". I still don't believe it should happen, but to be honest I stink socially, so I've only hung out with people who haven't needed it in the first place, even if they had it.
It really is all about communication between the parent and the kid as soon as the kid is old enough. Maybe a kid doesn't know what's good for them, but the parent is also not them and has probably not the complete idea of what's going through the child's head.
There is an age, though, where the child is ready to face it or they will anyway. And whether that's before high school is the job of the parents and child in question to decide. But even in my high school, which is in a fantastic suburb and only for ninth graders, they would face things that parents want to protect them from.
Plus, as I've mentioned before, no baby is born wanting to watch porn. At least, I've never met a three year old who enjoys it yet.
My first response to this is agreement that, yeah, parental censorship is getting ridiculous. Middle-schoolers are perfectly capable of handling zombie stories. I don't know why some parents think that's not the case - and I'd frankly rather not go into talking about why some parents don't think kids should read books with violence, because I view said parents rather dimly.
And as for school being fun, that is the best way to make sure someone remembers something! I can still tell you about books I read in elementary school because they entertained me (heck, I think I can even quote a few I only read the once when I was ten). Worksheets and such are fine and dandy for homework or quick in-class assignments, and it's rather hard to make subjects like math fun once you reach a certain point, but if a class is boring, the students won't get as much out of it as they would a fun class.
And...huh. You've reminded me of a certain grudge I have against Health classes, namely, that they don't teach students anything new and should be cut from curriculums altogether. (I learned more from my older friends than I ever did from my Health class, and I point-blank refused to do some of the self-confidence assignments my Health class assigned because they only made me feel worse about myself.) Seriously, my Health classes did nothing to prepare me for the real world. Everything I know about drugs, mental illnesses, and sex, I learned online or from older friends.
I have the feeling I got off-track somewhere in there, but I dunno. Blegh, Ima stop there.
Well, I'm definitely with you on the censorship thing. My curriculum (homeschool, little bit of private schooling) has been pretty uncensored, and I've read some textbooks that I don't think would get past public school censors, and I'm not TOO weird. Actually,that might explain a lot.
Okay, it's middle school. I thought it said High school. But 7th, 8th grade? That still pretty much counts, right?