Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Dr SEUS's Birthday on Wed March 2. No Christmas, No Lincoln, No Washington, No Jefferson
March 1, 2005 | mlmr

Posted on 03/01/2005 11:42:00 AM PST by mlmr

Tomorrow is Dr Seuss’s birthday, the highest holiday of the elementary public school calendar. The close second is the 100th Day of School. This is our first year in the government’s education clutches…my 7 year old came home so gleeful…Mommy, I have to wear my cat costume today….it is Doctor Seuss’s Birthday!

Now I am not going to argue the merits of Seuss…but if I ever read Hop on Pop again I will self-destruct. I have four children all, thank God, well past the Green Eggs and Ham stage.

My daughter never came home to tell me that she had to dress up as Washington, or Betsy Ross, or as a Johnny Reb, or as a WWII WAC, or as one of the hundreds of heroes of American history. Yes, she did have some tasks to perform during Black History Month. However, Blacks are not the only ones with history in this country, not by a long shot.

If the teachers at our local elementary school put half the effort into history and other subjects that they do into such a non-event as a mediocre children’s author’s birthday…then perhaps we wouldn’t have as much cultural idiocy and failing grades... To tell you the truth all this focus on this “nothing event” is embarrassing. That I pay for it with my tax dollars and time out of my daughter’s life, is infuriating.

What is behind this focus on nothing? My daughter told me that her class was not permitted to talk about Christmas. That is the birthday of someone whose philosophy altered the course of Western Civilization. However, there is not even a cultural acknowledgment. Washington and Lincoln? Forget it… not even a story at story time. Jefferson? Franklin, Daniel Boone? What kind of culture erases its history?

Pol Pot’s? Stalin’s?.

Where on earth are we heading?


TOPICS: Books/Literature; History
KEYWORDS: education; government; happybirthday; schools
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061 next last
To: Aquinasfan

Yup. This ain't no accident.

The Underground History of American Education




I have read it and every citizen and taxpayer should.


21 posted on 03/01/2005 12:16:19 PM PST by mlmr (The "Naked and the Fred"....is back!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 19 | View Replies]

To: MattinNJ
She told me they are starting to wipe out the name "Valentine's Day".

That's funny. This (Saint) Valentine's (Feast) Day, I was wondering how the PC police missed it.

Homeschooling year five and loving it.

22 posted on 03/01/2005 12:17:46 PM PST by Aquinasfan (Isaiah 22:22, Rev 3:7, Mat 16:19)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 11 | View Replies]

To: mlmr

School = mind control


23 posted on 03/01/2005 12:18:10 PM PST by Kirkwood
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: mlmr

So what are you doing about the lack of history education in your child's school? Are you supplementing their education at home so they know the importance of what those who went before us did? Are you questioning the teacher, principal, curriculum director, or school board?

Posting here may raise the awareness of some FReepers, but it doesn't do anything else about this problem.

Personally, I have no time for public schools. I am a product of one, I taught in a few of them, and I have chosen to have my children in a parochial school because I know what the ones around here teach in terms of values. I also know how impossible it is to change what they teach to meet the needs of a child raised in a conservative and religious home.


24 posted on 03/01/2005 12:18:53 PM PST by freemama
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

Comment #25 Removed by Moderator

To: mlmr
No Child Left Behind.

Physical impossibility when they are ALL being left behind.

26 posted on 03/01/2005 12:20:00 PM PST by iconoclast (Conservative, not partisan.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Aquinasfan

That's funny. This (Saint) Valentine's (Feast) Day, I was wondering how the PC police missed it.

They havent. It's going.


27 posted on 03/01/2005 12:25:29 PM PST by mlmr (The "Naked and the Fred"....is back!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]

To: mlmr
My daughter informed me that she needed to take candy to school to fill a Piñata as part of a Doctor Seuss’s Birthday. My reaction was: “That’s nice. Let’s go get some candy”. Referring to perhaps the most well known children’s author of all time as “mediocre” is ridiculous. “I will not eat them…” is not a familiar phrase to everybody because its author is mediocre. His stories have not been adapted into blockbuster movies that parents enjoy as much as kids due to mediocrity. Seuss’s writing teaches kids creativity with vocabulary and appreciation of poetry. It’s OK to let first and second graders have fun while honoring his contribution to their literature.

Abe Lincoln and Betsy Ross aren’t going anywhere. This is just a fun diversion, not PC BS. In limited quantities, fun diversions help kids digest the not so fun stuff. You wrote that your child is gleeful. Be happy for him/her. If you stick with government schools, someday they will be teaching your kid to roll a condom over a banana. If you push the outrage button for stuff like this, you’ll be too exhausted by the time that happens to do anything about it.

28 posted on 03/01/2005 12:25:55 PM PST by Minn
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: freemama

So what are you doing about the lack of history education in your child's school? Are you supplementing their education at home so they know the importance of what those who went before us did? Are you questioning the teacher, principal, curriculum director, or school board?

I supplement and this is the dry run for my local paper. But in reality, few care. A few months ago I brought it to the attention of local parents that the local school counselor could have FIVE sessions with their child without parental permission...nothing! Few care.


29 posted on 03/01/2005 12:27:56 PM PST by mlmr (The "Naked and the Fred"....is back!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 24 | View Replies]

To: iconoclast

Physical impossibility when they are ALL being left behind

Not mine,she is out of there as soon as I can.


30 posted on 03/01/2005 12:28:36 PM PST by mlmr (The "Naked and the Fred"....is back!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 26 | View Replies]

To: mlmr
If the teachers at our local elementary school put half the effort into history and other subjects that they do into such a non-event as a mediocre children’s author’s

Well I was taking you seriously until this part....now Im just gotta laugh at you, roll my eyes and walk away from this thread.

31 posted on 03/01/2005 12:31:17 PM PST by stuck_in_new_orleans
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Minn

“I will not eat them…” is not a familiar phrase to everybody because its author is mediocre

So are hundreds of commercial phrases, in the seventies it was "I cant believe I ate the whole thing"

"Pepsi for those who think young"

Catchphrases do not good literature make.


My point is that at least in my daugher's school, Betsy and the rest dont get any attention. The entire school day appears to be a diversion...and history is getting a short short handle.


32 posted on 03/01/2005 12:33:56 PM PST by mlmr (The "Naked and the Fred"....is back!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 28 | View Replies]

To: Corin Stormhands
(making note to self to wear "Cat in the Hat" tie tomorrow)

Good point. I'll wear my "One Fish, Two Fish..." tie.

33 posted on 03/01/2005 12:34:06 PM PST by r9etb
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 7 | View Replies]

To: mlmr

"...a mediocre children’s author’s birthday..."

I understand the point you're trying to make but you may have stepped in some oobleck here.


34 posted on 03/01/2005 12:36:02 PM PST by beelzepug (Parking For Witches Only--All Others Will Be Toad.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: r9etb
Good point. I'll wear my "One Fish, Two Fish..." tie.


OK, if I agree that he is a good author, will you address the focus of the post, which is Suess and other small issues supplanting history in curriculum
35 posted on 03/01/2005 12:36:06 PM PST by mlmr (The "Naked and the Fred"....is back!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 33 | View Replies]

To: beelzepug

I understand the point you're trying to make but you may have stepped in some oobleck here.

I am beginning to see this...too many Dr Seuss birthdays in the past ten years, there is no turning back.

OK. Suess is not a mediocre author.


36 posted on 03/01/2005 12:37:38 PM PST by mlmr (The "Naked and the Fred"....is back!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 34 | View Replies]

To: Aquinasfan
At my kids school they celebrate Mommy's birthday and take the day off...
37 posted on 03/01/2005 12:45:48 PM PST by DYngbld (Homeschool..... Home is cool)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 22 | View Replies]

To: Aquinasfan

It's part and parcel of the liberal plot to conquer America.


38 posted on 03/01/2005 12:52:10 PM PST by Killborn (It's called C4. Use lots and lots of it.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 19 | View Replies]

To: mlmr
LOL - no, he isn't, and bless you for saying so even if One Fish, Two Fish has half driven you round the bend. I sympathize. Heckuva an illustrator, too. Pity his politics were occasionally immature. His PC environmentalist garbage The Lorax or his denunciation of the arms race The Butter Battle were eminently forgettable, IMHO, although the Jesse Jackson race hucksters take a beating in The Sneetches, and Thidwick the Big-Hearted Moose is a cautionary tale about society's freeloaders. There's a fine line between propagandizing the kiddies and entertaining them.

I have to agree with you about history education, too, but reaching kids there is incredibly challenging. It's just tough for them to understand the importance of history when they've lived so little of it.

39 posted on 03/01/2005 12:54:25 PM PST by Billthedrill
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 36 | View Replies]

To: mlmr

Not yet. If the American ppl sit back and do nothing however...

A good way to determine how far we've sunk is to look at Europe and Canada. We are not there yet. But if we are, we have a problem.


40 posted on 03/01/2005 12:55:40 PM PST by Killborn (It's called C4. Use lots and lots of it.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 17 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-2021-4041-6061 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
General/Chat
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson