Editorial
Gaps in the LGBT lesson plan
California's teachers need better guidance on how to meet a state law requiring positive messages about gays.
October 19, 2011
This is what happens when school laws are passed for political reasons rather than educational ones. Starting in January, public school teachers from kindergarten on must include some sort of positive message about gay people in their lessons, but as The Times has reported, they have little idea how to comply with the law. What's more, the state lacks the time or resources to develop lesson plans or a curriculum to help guide them.
GLBT: An Oct. 19 editorial about a new state law suggested that it might lead to the teaching of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender "issues" and that one appropriate place to do that would be in sex-education classes. In fact, the law specifically requires schools to teach about the "role and contributions" of GLBT Americans in the social science curriculum.
It's appropriate for state lawmakers to ban discrimination in public schools and to require that students not be harassed or tormented. It's another matter when the Legislature interferes with issues that are properly the jurisdiction of educators and textbook authors.
There is nothing wrong with teaching about people of various sexual orientations and the issues that affect them. But the California curriculum already is rightly criticized for packing in too much information at the expense of delving into subjects more deeply. Decisions about adding new subjects should be made by educators with an overall grasp of how best to structure education in the coming years. For each new subject that enters the school day, legislators should realize, another one has to leave or be given shallower treatment. Politicians, driven in large part by their desire to please one constituency or another, are not the best arbiters of what students should learn.
Meanwhile, what's a kindergarten teacher to do? The state Board of Education should step in swiftly with interim regulations that provide local school districts with significant flexibility, while also clarifying the minimum requirements so that schools are protected from legal claims that they're flouting the law.
During the first several years of school, those requirements should be truly minimal. Young children can learn that there are many different kinds of people and families and that all must be treated respectfully. But too much detail is not necessary at this age.
Beyond that, many schools will need suggestions about where instruction about gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people or issues might best fit into the existing curriculum. Such information should be relevant to the subject under study. So where might this schooling be appropriate? In sex education, definitely. (The Los Angeles Unified School District already addresses the issue in its health classes.) In civics classes about the California initiative process, perhaps, where a discussion of Proposition 8 might be germane. Public schools have been given a poorly crafted, politically motivated mandate; the state board will have to be thoughtful where legislators were not.
Analysis: During our last discussion class, we shared our thoughts on how the class has changed our understanding of gender and sexuality. As mentioned in discussion, this class, Gender Conflicts in a Cultural Context, has increased my knowledge of many gender identities and made me feel comfortable in explaining topics I would have been unable to talk about otherwise. Because of this class, I find myself discovering how various topics can be related to my everyday life. With this said, the article, Gaps in the LGBT lesson plan, in the Los Angeles Times newspaper describes how public education will begin to incorporate lessons about gay people and educate students on their positive contributions in society. Teaching children on this particular matter is advantageous creating a better understanding of the LGBT community. Through the educating of children, the discrimination and the hate crimes towards the gay community could be reduced in the future because people will recognize that gay people are no different and can have a positive impact on the world. Being gay does not affect one’s ability to succeed for there are many gay successful gay people in the world today. Some of them include the television host and actress, Ellen Degeneres, the fashion designer, Giorgio Armani, and the American feminist, Susan B. Anthony.
A very odd capture of the Wandering Womb, but nonetheless accurate as it is such a heinous idea. Text from the video presented implies that the women has an animal placed in her body that men do not have and thus they are hysteric. The "animal" placed inside is a reference to the womb, which travels throughout the m=body and drives the woman mad. In the Video, the actor who plays the doctor, grabs and pinches the woman, pulling at her clothes and irritating her, but claims it is the womb inside of her that is driving her wild. At 3:50, the video presents that idea that the womb talks for itself and is a separate entity from the women. Relative to the idea of the talking Vagina and male genitalia, this helps display a reoccurring theme explored throughout our class.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SvyLYN69wmE
It took me a second to even try and figure out what this trailer was all about. As I see it now, queer theory is expressed through this video in the way that a gay artists is being juxtaposed by a normal man. This is in attempt to show the vast differences between the two. queer theory is defined as,
ReplyDelete"whatever is at odds with the normal, the legitimate, the dominant. There is nothing in particular to which it necessarily refers."
Furthermore this video is showing the extreme of what is at odds with the norm, and promoting such with the title, "Get Your Queer Theory On." Here's the Link....
http://www.myspace.com/video/snax/get-your-queer-theory-on-trailer/54054476