Jennifer McWilliams, a former Indiana elementary school teacher who now works as an educational consultant, for example, told a Parents Defending Education webinar aimed at conservatives that “I like to tell people that critical race theory is the ideology, but social emotional learning is the delivery system of that ideology into our education system.”
This seemed like typical conservative paranoia until I got to this part of the article:
As the authors, psychology professor Lacey Hilliard and doctoral student Matthew Attaya, write, “SEL interventions have taken a race and culturally-neutral approach to teaching social and emotional competencies to students.” This, they explain, is well-intentioned. At the same time, “when SEL lessons are taught without acknowledging larger socio-political contexts, school communities may ignore prejudice, discrimination and racism that many students experience and that all students observe.”
This makes it pretty clear the suspicions of these conservatives are entirely valid. Teaching empathy and communication skills to kids is great and I fully support it, but teaching them how to interpret social interactions in the context of socio-political history seems like teaching them what to think, rather than how to think. That does sound like political indoctrination to me, and I absolutely do not support it.
Cue downvoting from a bunch of people who simply agree with the views being indoctrinated and don’t give a damn about anyone who disagrees.
Yeah, better not teach kids how to recognize systemic racism, why it is bad and how to not participate in it as much as possible. That’s teaching them what to think. And we wouldn’t want to teach kids to that racism is bad. We want to teach kids how to think about whether or not racism is bad.
…teaching them how to interpret social interactions in the context of socio-political history seems like teaching them what to think, rather than how to think. That does sound like political indoctrination to me…
Understanding history and how it applies to modern expressions of empathy is not “political”.
Empathy is simply not a conservative trait. It’s difficult for conservatives to understand it without experiencing it. For that reason, your position on it being “political” indicates to me you may be conservative.
teaching them how to interpret social interactions in the context of socio-political history seems like teaching them what to think, rather than how to think.
Right, because socio-political history is clearly not an important context for the real life situations that people experience.
Also, nice job preemptively dismissing those who disagree with you.
I would argue it’s important to teach about the negative parts of history when our or other cultures were bad to others.
Saying they want to avoid that context is like teaching someone how to be nice and quiet and not protest the status quo because “that would be so rude to white people”
There’s a place for humility and realizing people in our past, and sometimes our present, were absolutely dicks.
There is also a place for courage to stand up and Christlike love to support the people harmed by GOP othering.
This seemed like typical conservative paranoia until I got to this part of the article:
This makes it pretty clear the suspicions of these conservatives are entirely valid. Teaching empathy and communication skills to kids is great and I fully support it, but teaching them how to interpret social interactions in the context of socio-political history seems like teaching them what to think, rather than how to think. That does sound like political indoctrination to me, and I absolutely do not support it.
Cue downvoting from a bunch of people who simply agree with the views being indoctrinated and don’t give a damn about anyone who disagrees.
TIL acknowledging that racism exists is “indoctrination”
Yeah, better not teach kids how to recognize systemic racism, why it is bad and how to not participate in it as much as possible. That’s teaching them what to think. And we wouldn’t want to teach kids to that racism is bad. We want to teach kids how to think about whether or not racism is bad.
Understanding history and how it applies to modern expressions of empathy is not “political”.
Empathy is simply not a conservative trait. It’s difficult for conservatives to understand it without experiencing it. For that reason, your position on it being “political” indicates to me you may be conservative.
Right, because socio-political history is clearly not an important context for the real life situations that people experience.
Also, nice job preemptively dismissing those who disagree with you.
Never become an archer.
It’s very well crafted and pernicious.
I would argue it’s important to teach about the negative parts of history when our or other cultures were bad to others.
Saying they want to avoid that context is like teaching someone how to be nice and quiet and not protest the status quo because “that would be so rude to white people”
There’s a place for humility and realizing people in our past, and sometimes our present, were absolutely dicks.
There is also a place for courage to stand up and Christlike love to support the people harmed by GOP othering.