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Teacher Laid Off For Telling the Truth About Santa
Pfhorrest writes "The Times Online reports, "A supply teacher has been told not to return to one primary school after she told a class of seven-year-olds that Santa Claus did not exist. Children at Blackshaw Lane Primary School in Oldham were talking about Christmas when the teacher came out with the news. Father Christmas was not responsible for delivering their presents on Christmas Eve, the pupils were taught. The teacher, who had been drafted in for just the day, has now been told not to come back. Parents complained to the school after their children returned home to recount what they had learned in lessons that day." With all the contention about teaching religion (or the lack thereof) in schools these days, what do you all think about similar issues regarding more frivolous popular folklore like Santa Claus?" And what about Cthulhu? Should a 7-year-old be forewarned that he will eventually exist in a world of sublime madness at the whim of the ancient ones?
He's a SLUT! No wait, that's Victoria's Secret. Sorry.
Fascism trolls keeping me up every night. When I starts a preachin', he HITS ME WITH HIS REICH!
"A supply teacher has been told not to return to one primary school ..."
"Supply" teacher? In what country/planet do they teach 7 year olds about supply chain management?
I suppose you could make all sorts of legalistic, pedantic arguments about why what she did was justifiable. But at the end of the day, it's just a mean thing to do. Why would we want someone like this teaching seven year olds?
I dunno, if it happened to our 5 year old I probably wouldn't put up too much of a stink. I'm sure my wife and I would vent to each other about how stupid it was. I guess the subversive thing to do would be to just tell our son, "Oh she's just mean, you don't need to list to that particular teacher the next time". Then if she came back to that particular class, she would have to deal with it. Hopefully after that she'd just quit :)
The problem with education as it stands is that everyone in a position of power is a coward, unwilling to challenge the status quo. On the one hand teachers are fired for dispelling myths (Santa), yet are jailed for perpetuating other myths (holocaust revisionists). The point of teaching is to challenge young minds - either both of these events need to be deplored, or both accepted.
Where did she teach? At the North Pole? That's pretty retarded.
Though I agree that teachers should rather teach how to question things, and therefore should talk about controversial issues, I have to say your holocaust example is a bad example. It simply is not controversial, holocaust did happen.
Actually, what teachers should teach, and I think you agree, would prevent seeing the nonexistence of holocaust as merely a myth rather than the falsehood it is. Teachers should teach that good thinking requires fact checking, coherent thaught and questioning statements. And this is exactly why the Santa-teacher should not have been fired. she questioned an unfounded believe and did so on good grounds and (presumably) with no ill intend (although I guess that these rather abstract lessons might still be too hard on youngsters from primary schools).
Well yes, the holocaust happened, but that doesn't stop some teachers from teaching that it didn't and in some places it actually is considered controversial. There are plenty of people in both America and the UK who honestly believe it never happened and rail when they hear about such 'lies' being taught in school. It doesn't help things that over the last few decades schools have been caught teaching official lies (Gulf of Tonkin being an example) which gives a lot of ammunition to the holocaust deniers.
Being Jewish in this Christian country (Christmas is a "secular" holiday? Riiiight...), my wife and I had to solve the issue of what to tell our kids about Santa when they were young. On the one hand, we were not comfortable lying to them, but on the other hand, we did not think it was fair to their Christian friends' families for us to send them to school saying, "I know something you don't know! Santa Claus is fake. I have proof!"
While I'll never understand why Christians find it so damaging to a child to think presents come from their parents as opposed to Santa Claus, in the end, we simply pleaded ignorance on the whole Santa issue and let them know what their Chanukah presents came from us (how funny is that? Traditionally, Jews exchanged gifts on Purim, not Chanukah. Chanukah is a minor holiday, but it happens to coincide with Christmas, and well... the rest is history.). They were happy to receive gifts, and it turned out they didn't much care whom the delivery agent was.
To expand a bit on that, though, I think that the phenomenon of 7-year-olds becoming upset to learn that Santa did not deliver their Christmas gifts has more to do with the worldview shift than anything Santa-related. 7-year-olds are beginning to understand a fair amount of nuance, but at the end of the day, they still need to live in a world of absolutes. When something so absolute as their favorite magical person in the world goes up in a puff of logic, then, yeah, they are not going to react well.
The parents' reactions could have been a lot better, however. I mean, think about it. You've got a kid who had believed in Santa--who still *wants* to believe in Santa--but who just got confronted with an uncomfortable revelation. The parents reacted by blowing up about what a terrible person that teacher that was, and how the teacher lied, and how you shouldn't listen to your teachers, and whatever else. But at the end of the day, we're talking about a mysterious creature. Would it have killed these parents to just keep the mystery alive?
"Your substitute teacher doesn't believe in Santa Claus?!?"
"No, she said that Santa is really you and dad! And that it's physically impossible for one person to visit every home in the world in one night and..."
"But you sat on Santa's lap at the mall and I was standing right there... if I Santa were me, wasn't *that* impossible?"
"But she said that isn't really Santa! That it's just an actor and..."
"Well I guess that's what your teacher believes...and I can understand how that would make her sad. (Smile deeply and look at the kid in the eye) I believe that Santa is wonderful and real and magic! Tell me, what do you believe?"
If the kid still believes the teacher (yeah right), then call the kid's bluff and offer to write a note for Santa saying that all the children in the home don't believe in Santa anymore and to just go away without leaving any presents and never to come back. That should buy you another year of blissful ignorance.
You know, it's funny. The older I get, the more and more I believe in Santa Claus. And that the parents are the little Christmas Elfs. Tell me, Mantrid, what do you believe?
They don't grade fathers, but if your daughter's a stripper, you fucked up. --Chris Rock
and we had our first Christmas at school. My peers in the class were all talking about this dude Santa... when I got home I asked my dad that my class mates got their presents from a dude called Santa... My dad replied... "Son you get you presents from me and your mom. End of story."
Yes as a catholic the whole St. Claus is VERY different if taught the right way.
In any event I for one like the truth approach rather than some mumbo jumbo wool over my eyes carp.
Lying is never good but it is even worse to lie to kids. One just sets them up for one huge disappointment when they have to fly with their own wings later in life.
too bad that one cannot fire the parents that tell weird stories to their kids (which is fine) and wantto sell these fabricated and highly unbelievable stories to be accepted as truth (which is a crime against the intelligence of their kids).