Passing though a Scottish village earlier this week, I bought the local newsletter. I was, and remain, dismayed to find the above piece in amongst more worthy and more cheerful stuff about museum visits and celebrating the royal wedding. The uncorrected English errors in this, and other pupil reports, suggest that perhaps neither teacher nor editor checked the texts before publication. But I understand that it is not fashionable to point out such errors these days, and so I am inclined to think that the pieces were reviewed at least for factual accuracy before being submitted. If so, the climate change report shown above is evidence that this phase of the war on children's minds may well have been won by those using CO2-alarm to gain political and financial advantages for their various causes. The children, and their teachers, are the immediate casualties, and they have my sympathies. But this propaganda war is not over while we still have the freedom and determination to comment, ask questions, criticise, and point out errors and misleading advice. A lot more of such activity is clearly required.
[Note: 'P7' stands for Primary 7 - the final year of primary school, when pupils are typically 11 years old]
Children are often let down by adults who underestimate them and set low expectations, it seems.
ReplyDeleteThat said, the "facts" here are not far removed from things I've seen written on plaques at zoos and aquariums.
Perhaps the best thing for the youngsters who wrote the piece would be if they were helped to Fisk it once they get to secondary school. Not to embarrass them, but rather to give them insight into the poor state of education on such matters in Scotland.
ReplyDeleteJust a general conversation with young kids, about (so called) Climate Change, will reveal that they are being fed much disinformation – be it via the media, the school curriculum or even from their parents and close relatives.
ReplyDeleteIt seemed to me that much of the ‘knowlege’ espoused from these children’s mouths was very biased towards the THEORY of Carbon Based Man Made Climate Change (CAGW). Please remember a theory is still unproven.
My Husband remembers that in 1943 – while in the 4th grade at school, in his weekly reader, it taught that within ten years America would have used up all of its oil reserves…. never happened yet the kids were fed that information!
Reading my news online I came across the following, which I believe backs up what I was thinking/experiencing. Get the children young enough, teach them what you want them to know and believe, therefore indoctrinating them, and you have the whole future society doing your bidding (perhaps?). For complete story follow the link
http://justmeint.wordpress.com:80/2011/06/29/are-we-polluting-our-childrens-minds/
Thank you very much for this comment and link, justmeint. I hope to make further use of it shortly.
ReplyDeleteYoung children have always been fed different forms of what could be termed "propoganda". Quite a lot of them will reject it, though they may not do so openly if they believe it is to their advantage not to do so, for example a belief in father christmas. Others will just accept it, though it will remain of no interest in their lives. Then there is another group who will take it very seriously and act on it with great passion. All these reactions can occur with religion, and also with climate, which has been likened to a form of religion. It is the last group who are the real concern here. A lot depends on the passion of the teacher.
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