New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teacher

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_I have a question
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New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teacher

Post by _I have a question »

As a current teacher of the Sunbeams, the Mormon class for three-year-old children, I was curious about the new Primary manuals for the new year, which are meant to supplement the church-wide home-study program of “Come, Follow Me.” So I went to the meeting we were asked to attend for our ward, part of the regular “teaching training” sessions that are held once a month.

I was . . . “disappointed” might be the kindest way to put it. No wonder so few of the Primary teachers ever attend these meetings. No one seems to have any interest in the needs of young children. All of the suggestions for teaching were for adults and youth.

I brought up my concerns with our Primary President, who assured me that once I had the manual in hand, I’d see how to use it.

Well, that wasn’t what happened. When I saw the manual, I was even more confused. We’re moving from 40-minute lessons to 20-minute lessons each week, yet the manuals have a LOT more material to cover, especially doctrinal material. I like the focus on Christ rather than faith-promoting stories about the pioneers, but I also felt a bit like someone read through the scriptures to find pat answers to particular questions about Mormonism instead of reading to see what the scriptures actually had to say for themselves.

It seemed clear to me that no one is thinking about three-year-olds.

https://religionnews.com/2019/01/05/the ... n-in-mind/
“When we are confronted with evidence that challenges our deeply held beliefs we are more likely to reframe the evidence than we are to alter our beliefs. We simply invent new reasons, new justifications, new explanations. Sometimes we ignore the evidence altogether.” (Mathew Syed 'Black Box Thinking')
_Jersey Girl
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Re: New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teache

Post by _Jersey Girl »

She's right on the money. I could tell you stories!

:lol:
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_Symmachus
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Re: New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teache

Post by _Symmachus »

The complaint in incoherent.

Well, that wasn’t what happened. When I saw the manual, I was even more confused. We’re moving from 40-minute lessons to 20-minute lessons each week, yet the manuals have a LOT more material to cover, especially doctrinal material. I like the focus on Christ rather than faith-promoting stories about the pioneers, but I also felt a bit like someone read through the scriptures to find pat answers to particular questions about Mormonism instead of reading to see what the scriptures actually had to say for themselves.

But

It seemed clear to me that no one is thinking about three-year-olds. These lessons are so far over their heads, it’s silly.

So, "what the scriptures actually [have] to say" is intelligible to three-year-olds? It's not intelligible to most adults without special training or years of experience. That is why most people just take it on authority.

But I think sometimes people in church imagine that teaching children by rote is what we’re supposed to be doing. One lesson even suggests that I have children repeat the phrase “Jesus Christ is the son of God.”

What a bunch of nonsense. Teaching barely-verbal children to repeat phrases is one way to get them to be verbal. Try learning a language without repeating phrases ever.

Of course the Church is indoctrinating them—that's the whole point! And what's wrong with that? I mean, their parents are Mormon and are responsible for making decisions on behalf of their children, and since they're at Church, presumably their parents have chosen to raise them Mormon. Why is it surprising that they are being enculturated as Mormons?

This idea makes me squirm a little. When I was in high school, one of my friends taught her two-year-old sister to repeat the quadratic formula. It was a great party trick, but this two-year-old didn’t understand the complicated math behind her recitation. She had no advantage over children who hadn’t learned this formula.

And you think your friend understood the math behind the quadratic formula? Most likely she did not deduce it herself or work through its proofs but simply learned the formula through rote memorization, not unlike a two-year old learning numbers.

And using children as puppets to make me feel good as a teacher or to make the parents feel good seems contrary to teaching the gospel of Christ.

Yes, better to make yourself feel terrible and to shame the parents into depression for choosing to raise their kids with the same wacky beliefs they have. We need a more progressive manual for three-year olds! One that lets them explore "what the scriptures actually say for themselves"! One that lets these little cuties explore whether Christ was the son of god or merely adopted by him at his crucifixion, and whether he was of the same or of merely similar substance with the father! And above all, we need a manual with more math and less verbal repetition!
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_Jersey Girl
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Re: New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teache

Post by _Jersey Girl »

Symmachus wrote:
But I think sometimes people in church imagine that teaching children by rote is what we’re supposed to be doing. One lesson even suggests that I have children repeat the phrase “Jesus Christ is the son of God.”

What a bunch of nonsense. Teaching barely-verbal children to repeat phrases is one way to get them to be verbal. Try learning a language without repeating phrases ever.

No, dear. That's not one way to "get them to be verbal".

:rolleyes:

That you completely missed her point is not missed on me.
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Re: New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teache

Post by _Symmachus »

Whatever you say, person who has never been in Primary.
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Re: New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teache

Post by _Jersey Girl »

Symmachus wrote:Whatever you say, person who has never been in Primary.


Person who spent 3 decades teaching Primary age children, their parents, and student teachers.

You're welcome buster.
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Re: New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teache

Post by _Jersey Girl »

Let's give it a more serious treatment. You can learn, Symmachus, I know you can.

You wrote:

What a bunch of nonsense. Teaching barely-verbal children to repeat phrases is one way to get them to be verbal. Try learning a language without repeating phrases ever.

You don't have to "get them to be verbal". What you're talking about is language development. What the woman in the article is talking about is (get this, it's a thing)…

attaching words to meaning.

That's why she's in opposition to children repeating phrases by rote.

Young children (you were a child, Symmachus, this is how you learned language, too) learn language by attaching words to experiences in the context of those experiences to facilitate language mapping.

Words have meaning. Write that down.

So what the teacher in the article is promoting would be something like...teaching young children in Primary Christian concepts such as "Be ye kind, one to another" then engaging the children in an experience where they can experience kindness and then, hopefully, show kindness to others.

Language mapping, scaffolding, and kindness, oh my!
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Re: New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teache

Post by _Symmachus »

I'm enjoying watching you attempt to lecture me about language. I'm also amazed that someone of your long experience could think "attaching words to meaning" belongs to some other category than language development, or that kids don't first learn to use words and phrases they don't understand before they can eventually understand them. Teaching children to say "Jesus Christ is the Son of God" is not an exercise in theology or in language but in enculturation through language. Every religious tradition does this with children as soon as they begin exercising their ability to use language, however limited. In any event, it really doesn't matter whether they understand it, and indeed most adults don't even understand it, if they're honest with themselves.

I'm sure you were a great at your career, but Primary is not a teaching environment, especially for Sunbeams. It's babysitting other people's kids for nearly an hour so that their parents can go pretend to learn from manuals that are as stupid as the one under complaint here. I have no doubt that the manual is ridiculous, as all of them invariably are. But the Church is, obviously, what it is. It attempts to fill the time with material that promotes its mission, not the cognitive and social development of children.

Come to think of it, that is how the Church treats adults as well. The Church isn't about teaching people to be kind or other kinds of social virtues but about teaching people how to be Mormon in Church-approved ways.

Therefore, complaints like this are totally irrelevant:

Ultimately, my main goals with Sunbeams are 1) to make sure that they think church is fun/interesting, and 2) that they feel safe and loved. These lessons aren’t helping much in those goals.


1) is just going to set them up for disappointment, because Church is neither fun nor interesting and 2) is not what Church in Mormonism is for. Of course the Church doesn't care about her teaching goals, because it's not a teaching institution nor is it a child care center. In any case, it doesn't require a manual to teach kids to be nice to each other.
"As to any slivers of light or any particles of darkness of the past, we forget about them."

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_moksha
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Re: New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teache

Post by _moksha »

Easy answer for that teacher: Turn to the Church Correlation Committee when in doubt. Train those toddlers with correct doctrine!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3nmYOQIidqo
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_I have a question
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Re: New manuals not suitable for Primary kids, claims teache

Post by _I have a question »

Symmachus wrote:1) is just going to set them up for disappointment, because Church is neither fun nor interesting and 2) is not what Church in Mormonism is for. Of course the Church doesn't care about her teaching goals, because it's not a teaching institution nor is it a child care center. In any case, it doesn't require a manual to teach kids to be nice to each other.


My opinion is similar. The programmes of the Church, all of them, are designed to condition children and adults into compliant "Yes" people who automatically put questions and doubts to one side. That's the only outcome being sought. The Church starts to attempt this conditioning at a very early age, as noted (albeit unwittingly) by the teacher in the article in the OP.

If the Church's aim was to educate, the materials, programmes and methods would be entirely different to the ones we now see.
“When we are confronted with evidence that challenges our deeply held beliefs we are more likely to reframe the evidence than we are to alter our beliefs. We simply invent new reasons, new justifications, new explanations. Sometimes we ignore the evidence altogether.” (Mathew Syed 'Black Box Thinking')
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