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02-05-2002, 04:50 AM | #1 |
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Tennesee Bible class
What do you think of this?
<a href="http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,44743,00.html" target="_blank">http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,44743,00.html</a> The only way to keep it neutral is to teach it as myth. Some folks wouldn't like that. |
02-05-2002, 05:23 AM | #2 |
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If done properly, education about the bible from a scholarly perspective would be a good thing, IMO. The article didn't raise any red flags for me.
FWIW, Shelby county is the county which includes Memphis, TN (as the by-line indicates). I would have real reservations about the results if this were proposed in one of Tennessee's more rural areas, but Shelby is about as urbanized as we Tennesseans get. Bookman |
02-05-2002, 05:46 AM | #3 |
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Yeah, I didn't see a problem either. But, as we all know, someone will have a problem. Some group will try to get it twisted to reflect thier beliefs, and the whole thing will get thrown out.
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02-05-2002, 06:54 AM | #4 | |
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While the current proposal seems a reasonable approach to a significant work of literature, it is this earlier proposal by the same body of educators that raises a red flag.
Quote:
However, if I were a resident of that township, I would want to see the course of study added with some reservations and a watchful eye. As a teacher, I would want some guidance from my board as to how to handle students who would use class discussion to witness. As a principal, I would want to know what kind of support I would get from my board if I backed a parent's complaint that the teacher was using his/her position to further a sectarian belief. My own similar experience in a Detroit Public high school in a world literature course was a postive one. We had a unit on Hebrew literature that included sections of the OT and the Torah. The German unit included a psalm by Martin Luther and the Spanish unit Lope de Vega's "A Song of the Virgin Mother". None of us became Jews or Catholics or Lutherans as a consequence of appreciating beautiful stuff. After all, we did also read some Voltaire and Jefferson. |
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02-05-2002, 08:20 AM | #5 |
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Very reasoned approach, Orestra. We're in agreement.
I chuckled at the use of the word township, though. The "township" in question is the city of Memphis, the 18th largest city in the US -- about 2/3 the size of Detroit. Bookman |
02-06-2002, 07:27 AM | #6 |
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My apologies, Bookman. Living in Detroit, I should be especially sensitive to misperceptions about one's home town.
To contimue this thread, I had an email discussion on it with Buffman this a.m. We discussed how potentially devisive this course will be. I said that if I were assigned to teach this tar baby, I'd include comparative versions of creation, the flood, etc. I'd also be sure the students knew the definitions of "metaphor" and "literary device". |
02-14-2002, 02:04 PM | #7 | |
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Quote:
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02-15-2002, 12:44 AM | #8 |
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Yes...Memphis is a totally different place than the rest of the state. I'm going to college there (originally from a little town east of Nashville). I saw a little blurb of this on the news a couple of weeks ago and wound up writing a short paper on it for my rhetoric class. I don't have the text on me at the moment, but the gist was that I don't really think it's a good idea to begin with, but that if it had to go through, it should be a comparative religion class instead of focusing only on the bible.
(btw, hi everyone! I've been lurking for a pretty good while, but I felt like I should probably reply to this one, since I'm living there ) |
02-15-2002, 03:48 AM | #9 |
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Welcome,Rosiel!
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02-15-2002, 03:50 AM | #10 |
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MOJO-JOJO, my apologies. <img src="graemlins/notworthy.gif" border="0" alt="[Not Worthy]" />
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