Cavey wrote:
Whichever way you cut it, trying to teach kids this type of stuff at 4 years of age, in this manner, is surely wholly inappropriate
Depends. You need to do it early enough not only so that they'll understand it but also so that it stands a chance of counteracting the learned bullshit they'll pick up from their parents. Whether four is too early or not I really don't know, and I suspect neither do you, as you'd presumably need to be a developmental psychologist or whatever to have a good idea.
Cavey wrote:
Fundamentally, kids need to be old enough to understand what it is they're being taught - even if their parents *are* arseholes.
Indeed, and maybe the general lesson of 'there's nothing wrong with black people no matter what anyone else has told you' is enough of a general point to make it through to kids who're hearing the opposite shite bandied about in their home environment. You're looking at it as them needing to appreciate the subtleties and nuances of it all but maybe it doesn't have too; maybe the broad strokes of the material would have a positive enough impact to set them up to question the negativity they hear from other sources, even if that actual questioning only happens later when they're a bit more mature.
Cavey wrote:
Of course, there's nothing to stop 4 year olds being taught that black and white people are equal, but "a month on black history", homework to research famous black people and being told how white people "hated black people" - at four years of age?? It's ridiculous, likely counter-productive and may even give a phobic-type reaction as alluded to in Zio's post.
Talking about white people hating black people does seem like it might be a step too far at that age; something that would required a bit too much subtle understanding to really work here. I can understand how they could end up their ("How do you inoculate someone against racist thinking without describing to them what it is?") but yeah, I agree with you on that.
What I don't agree with is the idea that a kid could go from no opinion at all to being racist (I assume that's what you mean by 'phobic'?) by being taught about racism. That's just utter nonsense man.
Cavey wrote:
When did teaching 4 year olds how to read, write and count become unfashionable
Eh? What's fashion got to do with it? And when did anyone say that schools were teaching more abstract stuff
instead of core skills? Seriously, where are you getting this from?
Cavey wrote:
and just precisely what "homework" are we expecting children of this age, who cannot yet even read, to do anyway?
I dunno, ask Zio what exactly they wanted the kids to do. It's pretty unclear here though what you're railing against though as your rhetorical question there isn't very illuminating.