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Teaching the Meaning of Freedom

By TChris, Section Civil Liberties
Posted on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 02:32:05 PM EST
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by TChris

How scary is it that one in three high school students surveyed by the University of Connecticut failed to appreciate the rights and freedoms associated with the First Amendment?

The survey of 112,003 students finds that 36% believe newspapers should get "government approval" of stories before publishing .... Asked whether the press enjoys "too much freedom," not enough or about the right amount, 32% say "too much," and 37% say it has the right amount.

Jack Dvorak, director of the High School Journalism Institute at Indiana University in Bloomington, has a point:

The survey "confirms what a lot of people who are interested in this area have known for a long time," he says: Kids aren't learning enough about the First Amendment in history, civics or English classes.

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    Teaching the Meaning of Freedom | 35 comments (35 topical)
    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#1)
    by wishful on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 03:39:52 PM EST
    Sometimes experience is not just the best teacher, but the only teacher. Our forefathers earned the insight to create our Constitution and Bill of Rights through their own personal experience of life without them. My heart aches that we must lose the rights described in the above-mentioned documents (and their spirit) to understand their value. Unfortunately, we are well on our way to this state of affairs. This survey is just a small indicator. Anyone with eyes to see is aware of our slipping away from our original democratic values. This phenomenon is accelerating exponentially, so it may be in these students' lifetimes that they wish they had been more vigilent in protecting what they once had. Our government was designed to derive its authority from the people. (See the Federalist Papers as one ref to this intent.) The shift away from this tenet is gaining momentum.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#2)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 03:44:33 PM EST
    This rise in nationalism hopefully will not last long. It is a very hateful thing.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#3)
    by glanton on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 03:48:51 PM EST
    These kids are good kids but they're materialistic, down to their very bones. Don't mess with their stuff and they could care less about whatever other infringements are at play. Gee. Wonder where they're getting those values from?

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#4)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 03:53:08 PM EST
    I found myself doing something interesting last night while researching a case - Reading my state constitution with the annotations. Fascinating. For me it brought home just how governement is supposed to work - for us, for the people, not for state power. I think we all loose sight of how all this started and how we got to where we are today. It wasn't by being passive sheep. B

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#5)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 04:05:52 PM EST
    The above reflects my growing reservations about and mistrust for government sponsored education (are you reading this, pigwiggle?). The government is a self-perpetuating entity which has an inherent conflict of interest between the momentum created by natural expansion of existing structures and the necessity to keep it a servant of the people. It follows that the less educated the populace is, the more likely that government will grow and perpetuate policies that are destructive to our citizens. The less informed buy the party lines more easily and can be better manipulated to serve the governments ends. Don't get me wrong, I'm a total supporter of education for all, but what do we do when our education is supposed to teach us to question the government that provided it?

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#6)
    by glanton on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 04:20:56 PM EST
    mfox: I realize it's very fashionable these days to blame the public schools for all of society's ills. Heck, at this rate, just one or two more GOP Administrations in a row and the Department of Education itself is going to be a thing of the past before too much longer. Allow me to suggest that the problem cuts deply into the culture--especially in terms of the naked materialism and intellectual apathy which has come to characterize so much of our citizenry. Excuse me for rejecting the idea that McDonald's University or Dr. Pepper High is going to do anything other than actively encourage these forces.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#8)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 04:58:44 PM EST
    test

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#9)
    by Richard Aubrey on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 05:20:56 PM EST
    Who, exactly, is teaching the kids in public schools? Where do they get their credentials? One suggestion is that the lefty view that the government should control everything the anointed find annoying is too prevalent in schools. Hate speech codes? Feigned offense as actionable? Has anybody actually looked at a syllabus? Sat in a class?

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#10)
    by Richard Aubrey on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 05:22:25 PM EST
    Oh, yeah. About the Fed Dept of Ed being a thing of the past: Wasn't that the good old days, before, among other things, they had to rejigger the SAT to make it easier? When kids really did know the Bill of Rights? Correlation doesn't prove causation, but it does start some interesting conversations.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#11)
    by glanton on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 05:32:20 PM EST
    Richard Aubrey: Yes the floodgate is open now you and your David Limbaugh/Mike Adams vulture buddies can pour into the thread and pound on the tyrannical schoolteachers. The nonsense is overwhelming but getting more and more prevalent on the airwaves and on blogs. Yes people go to class and yes they look at syllabi and believe it or not, people bust their asses day in and day out for minimal recompense to make sure that our kids get an opportunity to learn. Of course there are problems but those problems are culture-wide, with a huge doe of materialism whereby young people as well as their parents care less about learning or upholding and principles than they do about getting another damned cellphone or another video game or car or television set. not just the fault of the teachers or a particular political faction. Culture-wide. Do you have any idea what that means?

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#12)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 05:40:43 PM EST
    I don't understand the point of this blurb. The younger generation believes the press has "too much freedom"...so what? Younger generations are always going to have different ideas as the ones that came before. Many liberal thinkers fall into the trap of believing that whaen *they* came up with new ideas, when *they* were young, when *they* rebelled, it was fantastic, but can it please stop now? Nonsense. The next generation will rebel against the *new* strictures, mores, and ideals. Hence, we see post-feminism, rising materialism of the young, perhaps even a religious revival. You see, the 60s mentality that WE instituted and entrenched is now the "status quo" that the *next* generation will rebel against. Be ready for the rise of conservatism in academia and on campus. It's coming, as our liberal bastions will be transformed by a new, more conservative generation. Be ready for the backlash against environmentalism, when the new generation finds "protecting the earth" by recycling, etc, boring and uncool. And we'll wail, and we'll gnash our teeth, just as OUR parents did when we grew our hair out long, and listened to rock and roll. You see? It's all cyclical. It never stops. There's nothing new under the sun. Relax. The kids are all right.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#7)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 05:49:14 PM EST
    Well, first I'd like to know the rate of change over time - A lot of this chicken little stuff we see nowadays has to do with a very short historical timeline. Secondly, if you take a look at the ACLU's summary of the first amendment you might be forgiven for thinking that it is not surprising that many people are confused:
    Your First Amendment rights-freedom of speech, association and assembly. Freedom of the press, and freedom of religion supported by the strict separation of church and state.
    The way it really reads, if you're not afraid of religion, is:
    Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
    Personally, I don't find much about the first 10 or so amendments that requires much paraphrasing. I also think that the ACLU got it substantially wrong. -C

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#13)
    by glanton on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 06:13:09 PM EST
    Chuck: Are you one of the patients they've been experimenting on with hallucinagenics? If yes, drink lots of water and it will wear off eventually. If not, where'd you come up with this nonsense? Materialism is a rising force challenging some hippie status quo? Materialism has been THE status quo in this nation for a long, long time. Today's kids are rebelling? Yeah, right. They're simply following the nearest path to the most stuff, just like their daddies dun.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#14)
    by scarshapedstar on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 06:24:36 PM EST
    Uh, yes, I'm sure it's a grand conspiracy by "lefties." We're real big on protecting Bush from criticism. Thanks, wingers!

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#16)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 06:29:04 PM EST
    glanton, I'm no Nostradamus, but if the following things happen in the coming few years, I will take them to be a validation of the cyclical nature of our society: -increasing anti-feminism, especially among young women. -backlash against environmentalism, especially among high-school-aged children. -relgious revival of some sort (not necessarily overtly Christian, but some form of increased spirituality). Materialism is certainly rampant today, but it is also derided by large numbers of people, especially those idealistic 20-30 somethings. I'm talking about those 14-18, among whom it's a whole different ballgame.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#17)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 06:33:30 PM EST
    Richard Aubrey, you are a smart man. The line about the levers of power is excellent. Ecapsulates perfectly some things I have been thinking and writing about. The while left-versus-right thing is in for a massive shakeup. Can you be "conservative" while advocating change? Can you be "progressive" while demanding the status quo (think modern feminism in the face of many of today's young women)?

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#18)
    by Johnny on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 06:34:06 PM EST
    According to many, many people, compulsory schooling exists to produce good workers, not good civics majors. The schools are doing exactly what they are supposed to do. Train people to eat, sleep, exercise to a bell, deal with boredom, rooms without windows, a rigid heirarchy, "class" submission... As indoctrination centers for our particular brand of capitalism, they work wonders. As centers for enlightenment-they just plain blow. And that is the point. Writers such as Daniel Quinn and John Taylor Gatto express these theories much more eloquently (as well as provide documentation), so I suggest reading the works of these men.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#19)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 06:47:14 PM EST
    et al - Why are we concerned about kids attitudes about the press? Let's teach them how to read, write, do basic math and have a basic undersatnding of general science and history. With that, no one will be able to tell them what the Bill of Rights says. They'll know.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#15)
    by Richard Aubrey on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 07:27:43 PM EST
    So teachers' a**es are busted. Tell me about it. I'm married to the most conscientious foreign language teacher there ever was. The point is not effort. The point is the lesson. Which is more important, thirty minutes on the First Amendment--leaving out the religion part so as to not offend the ACLU--or finding that speech is censored, tee shirts are censored (pro-life?) (USMC?). When the smart kids have to self-censor, what are they learning? Remember, they didn't show up believing in the First Amendment. They showed up wondering what it was all about and discovered that speech can be limited by anybody with a teaching certificate, or anybody with a grudge. The light dawns. That's what it's all about. Well, if okay for them, why not for me? I have a problem with the materialism thing. The fact is that almost everybody has more discretionary money than ever before. When it falls out of your pocket and gets swapped for a couple of CDs or a nail job (what, $30 now), with no particular effort, is that materialism or an accident? I think the correct phrase is the love of money is the root of all evil. Not money. Not stuff. It's what you'd do to get stuff. This is not to say I don't get a bit disturbed by all the stuff kids have these days, but I don't see the burning eyes to get more. It just happens. Funny. We made an effort, raising our kids, to see that they didn't get all they wanted. Most importantly, we didn't want them to find the solution to the blues was to go shopping. Seems to have worked out. I tried to sell an article to several parenting magazines starting with the thesis that almost all toys are analogs of adult stuff. Kids are built to want to grow. Think of a toy for somebody over three that doesn't have some resemblance to an adult item. Guns? Toy hammers? Cars? From which I segued to the theory that kids, not being part of the work of the household any longer, are missing out. And, said I, Toys 'r Us is for adults. To make them feel better about kids being on their own. Editors suggested I look at their advertisers, which I did. But I still think it's a valid point. Years ago, I was driving a bunch of foreign exchange students (AFS) on a three-hour trip. Their common language was English, and, in common with kids everywhere, if the adult keeps mouth shut for three minutes, they forget he's there. So I heard for most of the trip about their dreams. BMW. Make sure the Izod alligator isn't a knock-off. The latest stereo or whatever. For a couple of hours. Toward the end, I asked them what the biggest surprise they had in America was. What did they see they hadn't expected to see? What had they expected to see that they hadn't seen? They were unanimous in saying that American kids were so materialistic. No self-consciousness that I could tell. From which I deduce that materialism is always somebody else's vice. Besides, what's the connection between materialism and not understanding the First Amendment? What about materialism makes the teacher unable to explain what happens when somebody is able to shut you up? Simple. Lefties always think they will hold the levers of power forever. So it's okay. Never occurs to them that somebody else might get hold of the mechanism. So they never bother telling the kids that.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#20)
    by Richard Aubrey on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 08:17:00 PM EST
    Well, Chuck, compliments are unnecessary. I didn't think up the levers observation. Yeah, at this time, the so-called progressives are calling for the status quo. Leave the Taliban in Aghanistan, Saddaam in Iraq, Social Security untouched, current definitions of feminism, environmentalism, and certain other issues not subject to discussion. Conservatives....well, you know. The alarms on this board are for what they are trying to DO, not to prevent happening.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#21)
    by Richard Aubrey on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 08:18:47 PM EST
    Poker. I believe there's an upscale school system in Massachusetts, Newton possibly. Their math scores are dropping through the floor. May have something to do with "multicultural and tolerance math" which does not appear to have, you know, math in the subject matter.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#22)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 08:39:55 PM EST
    RA - I have no problem believing it. I want to spit when I see politics being introduced below the college level.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#23)
    by cp on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 10:48:29 PM EST
    hmmmm, i wasn't aware that teaching the basics of our republican form of government now constituted introducing "politics" into the classroom. how you are supposed to teach u.s. history, without raising that ugly spectre, sort of escapes me. i'm sure ra, cliff and ppj will be happy to enlighten us however. ok, this is nothing new, really. 30 years ago, a survey was conducted: people were given a copy of the bill of rights, unidentified in any way, and asked what they thought it was. roughly 90% thought it was a communist manifesto of some sort. currently, at least 50% of all persons surveyed, in two recent surveys, believe that the biblical story of creation is true, and the scientifically validated theory of evolution is false. i have a theory myself: it is not advantageous for public schools to teach the bill of rights, especially the first amendment. it makes it much easier for the principals of those schools to then censor what goes into the school paper, web sites, etc. but, that's just my theory, with only anecdotal evidence to support it. in defense of public schools, at least in va, they are required to spend a great deal of their time preparing students to take the sol exams. the results of these exams can make or break school systems and careers. from what i have seen, civics is not heavily represented on these tests. as a result, not much time is spent on it. this makes perfect sense, from the administrator's perspective. when i was studying for the cpa exam, i didn't kill myself on non-profit accounting, since historically it represented only a minor portion of all questions on the exam. why waste my time on that? the same with governmental. very low return for the time invested.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#24)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Mon Jan 31, 2005 at 11:07:21 PM EST
    you might get a change of attitude if the kids are asked to give up their freedom to choose clothes or wear their hair they way they want it. They probably don't know what a newspaper is, anyway....

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#25)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Feb 01, 2005 at 03:17:57 AM EST
    I'm confused. Having been raised in Britain, I'm somewhat out of touch with the American education system. But I thought that this sort of thing was one thing the US education system pushed really hard - learning the constitution, how the country came to be and so on. Exactly what do they teach in civics if not the Bill of Rights?

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#26)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Feb 01, 2005 at 04:46:06 AM EST
    I skimmed the above 25 comments, but I think ya'll are missing the two biggest changes of the past 20-30 years that explain a lot of the high school kids' attitudes cited: 1. Lower readership and circulations for newspapers generally. A lot fewer people read newspapers, in favor of TV, radio or other forms of entertainment or information (computers, games, etc.). The decreasing circulation and increasing irrelevance of newspapers is a widely reported pheonmenon within the publishing industry itself. It is similar to network news shows: there are a lot more options for news or viewing. 2. Similar to this, I believe (without having done a study) that school newspapers and other publications are a lot fewer than in my day and are increasingly censored by the school administration to insure that they don't delve into anything too "controversial", particularly opposing school policies. A surprising number of today's professional journalists first cut their eye teeth on their school papers. Anyone whose written or edited a school paper has a much better appreciation of censorship and First Amendment issues than the clueless kids who responded to the cited survey, that's for sure. If I had a lot of money like Soros and wanted to do what the conservatives did 30 years ago with respect to cultivating college and high school kids about their way of thinking (like those college papers that opposed affirmitive action, political correctness, etc.), I would be supporting resources like think tanks and internships for progressive college journos.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#27)
    by Richard Aubrey on Tue Feb 01, 2005 at 05:13:05 AM EST
    cp. Do you miss this stuff on purpose? The issue of "politics" was referring to a math curriculum which spent so much time on some nebulous version of tolerance that they had to drop the math, resulting in dropping math scores. That has nothing to do with teaching our form of government. But you knew this, didn't you? You tried to change the subject. Can't you be a bit more subtle?

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#28)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Feb 01, 2005 at 05:50:02 AM EST
    cp - Are you unaware of Earth day? And teaching civics is not politics. But asking children how many guns their parents have at home, is. Of course since you are not concerned about this type of activity, I am sure you won't mind some teachers having a copy of the Bible on their desks amd religious pictures on the wall. Ginger Yellow - Problem is when they start telling the students what the BOR means, rather than just what it says.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#29)
    by kdog on Tue Feb 01, 2005 at 06:01:06 AM EST
    i
    have a theory myself: it is not advantageous for public schools to teach the bill of rights, especially the first amendment. it makes it much easier for the principals of those schools to then censor what goes into the school paper, web sites, etc. but, that's just my theory, with only anecdotal evidence to support it.
    Just what I was thinking. If HS kids are taught in-depth about the First Amendment, tons of teachers would be hearing what the kids REALLY think, and that does not make for a regimented, "just pipe down and pass the standardized test" classroom. enviroment.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#30)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Feb 01, 2005 at 10:02:55 AM EST
    Richard, Can you provide a link please?

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#31)
    by Richard Aubrey on Tue Feb 01, 2005 at 02:48:36 PM EST
    Steve. If you're talking about math scores and diversity curricula, I haven't been able to make this a link. However, if you search for "Newton Tab", which is a newspaper, go to Jan 12, and look for the column by Tom Mountain, you'll see the original story. If you google something like "math textbooks for tolerance and diversity", you'll get all kinds of stuff, some referring to this general subject.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#32)
    by jimcee on Tue Feb 01, 2005 at 08:35:08 PM EST
    In my public school years I was given a reading list and I read those tomes. I left highschool and worked for a few years but eventualy went back to Junior College. When I got the reading list for English 102 it was essentially the same list as I had in the 10th grade. At that point I realized that the advanced education that meant something just ten years before had become a remedial course in high school level English. If parents don't care about their kids education then frankly I don't either. That I, as a taxpayer have to support college instructors that are teaching at a 10th grade level is a rip off of my taxes. Learning is hard, instructing should be the same. Personally, I'd like to see all teachers have to work in a dangerous mill or mine just to straighten out their priorities, it worked for me...

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#33)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Feb 01, 2005 at 11:49:14 PM EST
    I believe there's an upscale school system in Massachusetts, Newton possibly. Their math scores are dropping through the floor. Not exactly. Only the sixth grade math scores have dropped over the past four years. In 4th, 8th, and 10th, the math scores Again, not exactly. Math is most assuredly in the subject matter. Don't believe everything you read in an editorial newspaper column. The problems in Newton may very well stem from the switch in 5th grade to a different math curriculum [the kind you purchase from a vendor, not the district's benchmarks]. The kids there may have trouble adjusting to the new curriculum, or the curriculum may not map well to the MCAS test. If the problem was with the district's emphasis on multiculturalism, then I'd expect to see all math scores go down, not just 6th grade, since the multiculturalism theme is in place in all schools, K-12, across the entire district. But that's not what's happened.

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#34)
    by Talkleft Visitor on Tue Feb 01, 2005 at 11:49:47 PM EST
    Oh crap, I messed up that last html link. Sorry!

    Re: Teaching the Meaning of Freedom (none / 0) (#35)
    by pigwiggle on Wed Feb 02, 2005 at 10:14:25 AM EST
    Happy Birthday Ayn.

    Teaching the Meaning of Freedom | 35 comments (35 topical)