Do people really not know the difference between sharing a family tradition in a secular setting and inappropriate evangelism?

[Ipsey]

The writing in the photo is neither typical adult writing (which would be neater, especially if modeling writing for the child) nor typical 6 year old writing (far too neat, punctuated, small lettering, with margins). I don't find it to be credible as a photo of the original "speech".

 

Additionally, it contains no words that would be terribly hard to pronounce (presuming the child is familiar with "Jesus," "Christmas" and "Bethlehem".) In which case it would be odd for the teacher to spontaneously add a detail like that for no reason.

 

And also, note that saviour is spelled in the non-American variant spelling... Odd for either a first grader or Californian parents. Not sure what that implies, but it is odd.

 

The variant spelling caught me, too.

 

Now, I could imagine the parents writing out a couple of the main ideas that the child might use in her "presentation." Still, I never provided my children with helps for what was essentially "Show and tell". My kids did this every other day in their preschool and kindergarten classes. 

 

Clearly the girl was also ad-libbing and speaking her own ideas (if this is the actual note she was working from) if she talked about Mary and Joseph; that's not in the note.

 

I followed all of the links and couldn't find where the note came from. 

 

The first story sounded completely nuts and sensationalized. I read it and my BS-ometer started pinging like crazy. The explanations from the teacher and principal sound much more believable.

[poppy]

The variant spelling caught me, too.

 

Now, I could imagine the parents writing out a couple of the main ideas that the child might use in her "presentation." Still, I never provided my children with helps for what was essentially "Show and tell". My kids did this every other day in their preschool and kindergarten classes.

 

Clearly the girl was also ad-libbing and speaking her own ideas if she talked about Mary and Joseph; that's not in the note.

 

I followed all of the links and couldn't find where the note came from.

 

The first story sounded completely nuts and sensationalized. I read it and my BS-ometer started pinging like crazy. The explanations from the teacher and principal sound much more believable.

I agree that credibility leans more towards the teacher wrangling kids story than the schoolteacher -hate-the-Bible story.

[albeto.]

The king james version bible spells it "saviour." It could be this family uses that publication exclusively. The teacher's and principal's comments are now a matter of public record, so I guess they've closed the investigation (or enough of it). It would be interesting to see how the family responds, if they haven't already. This story is now up on AFF's facebook page. They haven't made a comment about this yet, nor have they responded on their website. The photograph was, I understand, a part of the investigation that was launched at the time of the accusation. You can see the news reporter holding up a copy and referencing it here (interesting to see the complete bias and assumption of credibility of the claim in the report). 

[Ipsey]

The king james version bible spells it "saviour." It could be this family uses that publication exclusively. The teacher's and principal's comments are now a matter of public record, so I guess they've closed the investigation (or enough of it). It would be interesting to see how the family responds, if they haven't already. This story is now up on AFF's facebook page. They haven't made a comment about this yet, nor have they responded on their website. The photograph was, I understand, a part of the investigation that was launched at the time of the accusation. You can see the news reporter holding up a copy and referencing it here (interesting to see the complete bias and assumption of credibility of the claim in the report). 

 

I'd thought of that (KJV) however the John 3:16 is not KJV.

 

I'll be interesting in any follow-up from AFF. :)

[IsabelC]

Interesting...

[Laurie4b]

It does look like the parents wrote it. However, if it was a speech assignment rather than a writing assignment, they could have been asking questions and writing down her responses. 

[milovany]

Yep -- I do that a lot with my youngers.  "Tell me what you want to say" and I write it so the mechanics of writing (more difficult) don't hinder their telling of a story or thought (far easier at that age). 

[mommaduck]

The writing in the photo is neither typical adult writing (which would be neater, especially if modeling writing for the child) nor typical 6 year old writing (far too neat, punctuated, small lettering, with margins). I don't find it to be credible as a photo of the original "speech".

 

Additionally, it contains no words that would be terribly hard to pronounce (presuming the child is familiar with "Jesus," "Christmas" and "Bethlehem".) In which case it would be odd for the teacher to spontaneously add a detail like that for no reason.

 

And also, note that saviour is spelled in the non-American variant spelling... Odd for either a first grader or Californian parents. Not sure what that implies, but it is odd.

 

The child's parents may not be native Californians. My mother is second generation American, grew up in a gypsy lifestyle, settled for short times in WI, CO, and PA. I'm Southern born...third generation American on my mother's side and my father's Southern side has been here since the colonies for the European and African sides and before that on the NA side, but also have grown up in a bit of a gypsy lifestyle. My mother and I both use the "ou" in various words: Saviour, honour, colour, neighbour, etc. We also use "cheque" for what you write out from your bank compared to "check" as what you do when you see how well someone has done.

 

I've seen many adults with that kind of handwriting. It may depend upon where they learned, their personal styles, and how much of a rush they were in.

[Learning fun]

 

If the teacher wanted to avoid discussion of religious issues, she should never have made the assignment concerning a religious holiday. And we are talking about 6 year olds here...are they supposed to understand all the finer points of political correctness? And would we even want them to? They are just full of love and enthusiasm. About Christmas or My Little Ponies...it doesn't matter.

 

ETA, yes, of course, we DO want them to eventually learn tactfullness, and we teach them. But I certainly don't expect that to be perfected at that age. There is something appealing about their enthusiasm, even at the same time we teach them to restrain it.

I love this. 6 year olds can be adorably enthusiastic.

I wonder if the teacher was just worried about the backlash she would get from parents who weren't thrilled with their child coming home from school with a scripture verse. Poor thing can't win.

[MistyMountain]

The writing in the photo is neither typical adult writing (which would be neater, especially if modeling writing for the child) nor typical 6 year old writing (far too neat, punctuated, small lettering, with margins). I don't find it to be credible as a photo of the original "speech".

 

Additionally, it contains no words that would be terribly hard to pronounce (presuming the child is familiar with "Jesus," "Christmas" and "Bethlehem".) In which case it would be odd for the teacher to spontaneously add a detail like that for no reason.

 

And also, note that saviour is spelled in the non-American variant spelling... Odd for either a first grader or Californian parents. Not sure what that implies, but it is odd.

The writing in what she read is above the first grade level and she is a 6 year old 1st grader. It is very plausible that she struggled through reading it. My 1st grader can read that but I know lots of 1st graders who would struggle their way through that really slow. My handwriting is very poor and would look like a child's and my 1st grader actually does better with smaller margins and would probably have handwriting that looked similar. It looks like the parents wrote something out that the child copied.

[JustEm]

If I asked my 5 year old the proper questions I could get him to answer all of them the same way as they are written on that sheet of paper, minus the bible verse but I don't do verse memorization with him (many Christians do and that would be one a first grader would learn.)  It seems to me that the parents wrote the paper for her with her answers to help her out, I've done things very similar with my son. 

 

I can see where this may have got blown out of proportion.  If the parents were active in preparing the paper they likely asked how it went when the girl got home.  If she responded by saying that she didn't get to finish the parents probably asked why or what do happened.  Her response could have easily been something along the lines of "well my teacher stopped me right before this part."  Parents ask why and daughter has no idea why or says because the teacher said that was enough.  Parents assume that it was because of the Christian part of the assignment and get pissed off about it.   I doubt they were looking for 15 minutes of fame but a lot of people react poorly when they think they're faith is under attack.  

[awisha.]

Curiouser and curiouser...

[mommaduck]

And the response to feeling one's faith is 'under attack' - hyperbole if I ever heard it, talk to the Christians in Syria if you want to know about attacks - is to run to the media ?

 

Whatever happened to turning the other cheek ?

 

Not directed at you hjffkj!!!

 

Yes, being asked to make room for other children is not an attack compared to what is happening to our people in Syria. Our nuns have still not been released. Homes and monasteries burned. Sacred items stolen. This is persecution.

[mommaduck]

btw, since moving to the deep South, I've had to endure comments in public places when I've simply crossed myself. I didn't see it as persecution or an attack. I saw it as ignorance and people being either nosey or understanding they think they are performing their "duty" of "planting seeds" (it's usually not done to my face, but passive aggressively). My daughter visited a church to see a friend and the pastor, once seeing her and knowing who and what she was, changed his sermon to preaching about "worshiping idols" etc (basically, anti-Catholic/Orthodox with all kinds of ignorance of those two faiths taking the forefront). She also took it as ignorance and arrogance rather than an attack....definitely passive aggressive. My son got shut down in a conversation. One boy asked him about his belief in paedo-baptism, he started to explain, and then a third boy interrupted to steer the conversation back toward their beliefs (because, you know, he had to "protect" his friend from hearing what another faith believes). Again, my son took it as ignorance and arrogance...passive aggression, but not persecution.

 

It's important that we and our children understand the difference. That crying wolf constantly will only work against us should real persecution come.

[albeto.]

In an ironically related case, The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Louisiana on Wednesday filed a federal lawsuit against Negreet High School in Sabine Parish on behalf of two parents. The lawsuit claims the school has “a longstanding custom, policy, and practice of promoting and inculcating Christian beliefs,†including the teaching of creationism. Examples include:

 

 

Sixth-grade teacher Rita Roark has told her students that the universe was created by God about 6,000 years ago, and taught that both the Big Bang theory and evolution are false, according to the lawsuit. She told her students that “if evolution was real, it would still be happening: Apes would be turning into humans today.â€

 

One test she gave to students asked: “ISN’T IT AMAZING WHAT THE _____________ HAS MADE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!†The correct answer was “Lord,†but C.C. wrote in something else. Roark responded by scolding the boy in front of the entire class.

 

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/01/23/dont-want-to-be-hassled-by-creationist-teacher-give-up-buddhism-louisiana-public-school-says/

 

Fox News predictably carries a most sensitized version of the news: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/01/22/aclu-sues-school-board-in-louisiana-alleging-religious-harassment-buddhist/

 

Not having looked into this at all, I can only speculate the evidence is strong enough for the ACLU to get involved. I would be interested in seeing the Christian community's reaction to this intolerance. 

[IsabelC]

If this sentence

 

“ISN’T IT AMAZING WHAT THE _____________ HAS MADE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!†

 

 

was truly written by a teacher, I'd be more concerned by the gratuitous capitalization and exclamation mark diarrhea than by the subject matter.

[IsabelC]

This page has links to additional documentation for the case.

 

 

[poppy]

I've never been to Lousiana, is it really like that day-to-day?

[Laurie4b]

In an ironically related case, The American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Louisiana on Wednesday filed a federal lawsuit against Negreet High School in Sabine Parish on behalf of two parents. The lawsuit claims the school has “a longstanding custom, policy, and practice of promoting and inculcating Christian beliefs,†including the teaching of creationism. Examples include:

 

 

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/01/23/dont-want-to-be-hassled-by-creationist-teacher-give-up-buddhism-louisiana-public-school-says/

 

Fox News predictably carries a most sensitized version of the news: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/01/22/aclu-sues-school-board-in-louisiana-alleging-religious-harassment-buddhist/

 

Not having looked into this at all, I can only speculate the evidence is strong enough for the ACLU to get involved. I would be interested in seeing the Christian community's reaction to this intolerance.

 

 

What irony! A story from a source with a photo called "Angry Screaming Woman" heading up their article (Fox is usually blasted for being sensationalist) vs. Fox stated to have run a "sanitized" version. I had to google for a while to find a mainstream news source.

 

Why don't you start a new thread with a poll with a question about how people view this and make it public so that you can see who stated which opinion. For the record, if it happened as reported, it's appalling. The teacher should be fired.

 

In googling, I found many conservative and Christian sites carrying the article and citing info very closely to the parents' letter published on the ACLU website.

[milovany]

Yes, being asked to make room for other children is not an attack compared to what is happening to our people in Syria. Our nuns have still not been released. Homes and monasteries burned. Sacred items stolen. This is persecution.

 

Amen to this. Not having time to recite a Bible verse in class is a far cry from what is happening to thousands of Christians in the Middle East and yet the Christians (and media) in America don't seem to have much of an opinion about that. Lord have mercy on the kidnapped bishops, the sisters and any children with them.  Lord have mercy on those whose churches have been desecrated and destroyed.  Lord have mercy on those who live with the reality of true persecution and death as their daily lot.  Lord have mercy on us all. 

[justasque]

ETA:  I created a new thread to discuss the Negreet High School case - the thread is here:
http://forums.welltrainedmind.com/topic/503390-so-louisiana-case-religion-in-public-school/


Evidence from the ACLU in the Negreet High School case - 
Test one
Test two
Clip from the school's web site
Posters at the Junior High
Picture of Jesus in what looks like a school lobby

The DOJ letter is also well worth reading.  It goes into more detail about the family's discussions with the district, and the student's experience in the school.  The superintendent's remark about "the woman who cuts her toenails" is jaw dropping.

The full complaint goes into more detail, and gives the context for each item of the evidence linked above (and more).

I looked at the district's web site but did not see anything from their side about the case.
ETA:  But I did find their statement of beliefs on their old web site (which is linked from their new web site).  It states:
 

We believe that:

 

¨  God exists.

¨  All children can learn.

¨  Excellence in education cannot be compromised.

¨  Every human being has worth and dignity and is worthy of respect.

¨  High expectations support achievement.

¨  Ongoing assessment is needed to improve programs.

¨  The school environment must be safe and orderly.

¨  The principal is the instructional leader.

¨  A significant amount of classroom time must be allocated to instruction in the essential skills.

¨  Education is a shared responsibility of family, school, teachers, staff and community and each should be given a voice in decisions that affect their children.

[albeto.]

In googling, I found many conservative and Christian sites carrying the article and citing info very closely to the parents' letter published on the ACLU website.

Have you come across any response from the conservative and Christian communities?