InfoTeacher

Here is the text of President Obama’s speech to school children (provided by MSNBC).  Here is their story about his speech and conservative response (you want other links from a more centrist source?  Go find it yourself; it just ain’t that hard!).

I have to admit that I only skimmed the speech, but from my quick read it sounds a lot like an exhortation toward hard work and personal responsibility.  Not exactly the Socialist agenda that the Extreme Right swore he was going to indoctrinate into the nation’s children.  But the paranoia and partisan positioning are running hip deep, so no one should really expect a rational response or a thoughtful opposing viewpoint.  Now maybe the speech evolved into its current form as the Right reacted — or maybe it was a simple motivation speech the whole time.  Still, the entertainment value is high (though the sadness for our nation is extreme).  To my friends on the Religious Right — I commend you to read this essay (Christians: What Are You Saying about the President? — by Michael Spencer, the IMonk).

Tomorrow, as the “tech guy” in my school I will record and re-show the speech to all the kids that show up (OK — as the tech guy, I have to admit that our district will have a link to the video available after the live show, and it will also run repeatedly on our district’s cable channel, but it’s easier and safer to record it myself off of cable and download the streaming video as a backup).  The truth is lots of kids may not show up. We sent home parent permission slips telling all that we were showing the speech to all students. Our permission slips contained a parent “opt out” option; they also invited parents to come and watch with students if desired.  All schools in our district were left to decide how to handle this, but it was required that parent notification and parent opt out options were in place.

I want to continue to watch this story unfold, but I am quite saddened that we are so polarized as a nation that the extremes of both parties have undue influence. The balanced and thoughtful middle needs to regain influence in both parties.   (I am also saddened that the Christian Right has abdicated their position of political thinking influenced by the Gospel rather than their “Gospel” [read Culture War] influenced by secular politics).

Now that I’ve ranted about the Right, how about a little from the other side. Do I think this speech will actually do anything to motivate kids?  No, not very much.  I essentially agree with Doug Johnson. The speech will be really well received by many of the kids who are already motivated.  The kids who are more difficult to motivate will need a teacher who builds a relationship over time.  That’s the way it has always been — and those relationships are more important than ever.

Trackback URI | Comments RSS