‘If Frederick Got Two Beatings Per Day…’: Parents Outraged Over Slavery Questions in 3rd Grade Math Homework

If you are not a teacher or married to one, YOU HAVE NO IDEA of the madness that has taken over the elementary school system! Liberal, half wits are at the bottom of it!

Without personal knowledge of those involved, I am hesitant to automatically hurl accusations of racism. It does seem that common sense and good judgement are lacking; one would expect more from college educated persons. As an AA female, I believe that slavery should be included in history education( via age appropriate text).IMHO the problem is the liberal mindset that education must equal fun or playtime to engage children. Maybe if we returned to teaching Reading/Math/History/GRAMMER as separate subjects instead of concocting trendy teaching methods this type of nonsene would not occur.

What the Heck? They don't think the teacher was being insensitive and that it was just a matter of "creating a bad question"? Who honestly believes that? Calling those questions insensitive is a downright understatement. Outrageous is a better word. The teacher should be dismissed.

How sad. Its ok to combine lessons when appropriate. Slavery is a dark part of American history and should be taught to children today in our school. It helps them appreciate the freedoms they have and how far we have come in society. But sensitivity needs to be taken in to account when dealing with such a dark topic. Children need to know it is wrong and inhuman to treat another living person in such a way. They need to learn from history's mistakes, not how many beating Frederick earned in 1 weeks time.

Why did this teacher not already know what is appropriate?

Thanks to the NEA!

Are you kidding me! What is the world coming to when we start doing this?!?!?!

Listen people.

There were TWO sides in the Civil war. Our family admits there were family members on both. My grandfather and his father both talked about this a lot when I was a boy. We were against slavery for any human being. Black, white or chartruese and would have been back then if fighting in a war.That being said, I grew up wroking any job I could get. Period. We hunted and ate squirrel, rabbits, doves, and all kinds of (POOR LITTLE BEASTS) because we were poor. But did not blame anyone, or cry about it. We hit the yard at daylight and worked ours asse+ off til granny called dinner. We collected by walking the sides of roads - recycling bottles, inner tubes, junk batteries, and selling produce. Granny was a rug weaver and saved scraps of cloth and rags. She spent weeks weaving a beautiful artwork and sold them dirt cheap. All we needed was to eat and pay rent, gas for the truck.

For as many racists that exist, there are actually MORE who are not.

Considering the way that freedom thing turned out. Liberty is a hard won battle for any ethnic, diverse or race other than the one a human is born with, Whatever color or background we are born with EVERYONE is different from you. What an individual learns from school and every day life IN THEIR particular circumstances is often what breeds hostility or forgiveness.

Example: I was in Denver sitting ata bus stop. A young man with a beard etc carrying a copy of the Koran say down next to me. This was 2 years ago so I was curious but not paranoid or afraid.

I said' How are you today brother?" He looked at me strangely. And mumbled 'All Right.' he showed me his book. Then asked, "can I read something to you?" I replied, "if its from the Koran, I don't want to hear it. I am not interested in a religion that is based on everyone else being infidels deserving to die except for believers in the Koran or your religion."
He was taken aback slightly. I told him, " some people do not hate anyone. I do not hate you. I do not love you. We are fellow humans but you have your life and I have mine. We both deserve to live and let live as long as you do not hurrt me or my family and the same for me. I have nothing against you.:He smiled and said, Thank you." I have been studying but some ideas are hard to understand." I agreed. 'In every religion. Just try to have love in your heart and remeber that no one hates you unless they are crazy or know you and it is something you did personally. Okay?"

He grinned and put his bike on the front rack of the bus. Away he went.

The problem goes far beyond the teacher; clearly the principal and staff development team don't know what they're doing either. Cross-curricular teaching and learning is not about "activities." It is contextual learning within a thematic approach in which the teachers demonstrate an understanding of the various sub areas of the theme/context and in which student do extensive exploration of a theme through which they learn reading, writing, speaking skills, science, math, etc.. Sensitivity is a critically important element. Additionally, teachers work together to develop the curriculum - there should be shared vision. Sounds like no one in that school has any idea about what they think they're doing. Throwing around trendy terms about curriculum doesn't make you sound smart if you clearly don't understand what they mean. Someone should tell Ms. Roach that this is about more than just drafting more appropriate questions. What a shame. And we wonder what is wrong in our schools?

This is so wrong I was born in the south and educated their also never had any thing like this.This is downright wrong .makes my stomach boil .what are these people thinking .They are jerks silly jerks I am sure they are not raceist.The old saying is some of my friends are --------.

Unacceptable! Soon as i saw those questions, we would have been marching right up to that school!!

It's unbelievable, I wouldn't want my kids exposed to that either. They are better off not getting involved with racial issues.... That goes for any kid.

This teacher (and I use the term loosely) should be fired for even thinking up questions like this. It is appalling that in this day there are individuals who still have the mindset to create questions like that.

Do teachers really think this will help the kid learn math?

Intriguing how an example of twisted thinking is somehow held to be an example of speech freedom by the twisted thinkers. . . or not. Please explain how damaging others lives is a positive under the guise of freedom.

these questions are not only inappropriate, they are misguided. i think it's time for some sensitivity training for the administration.

Imagine the questions in a school in Mexico ! "Jose found 4 severed heads. Juanita found 9 severed heads. How many more severed heads does Juanita have than Jose ?"

One more reason to homeschool...

Technically, a teacher's lesson plans and assignments are supposed to be reviewed by either the department head, or an administrator. There just is not enough time for this to really occur. Someone came up with this junk, and somehow it even got printed, perhaps by the teacher that created these questions. Seems like they should at least randomly check assignments on all teachers, but they usually only check the new teachers' work.

how could they possibly think they could slide this one by and not be noticed?

I think that was the point; they WANTED to create controversy! Each and every one of them should be fired. there should be ZERO tolerance for this kind of crap.

Everyone is abused by this kind of garbage; the targeted audience and the referenced audience, and everyone in between. Except for maybe the bullies themselves ... and the bullies should be forced to publicly apologize and then get fired from their jobs. In a tight job market, maybe they will re-think their attitude.