"The highest result of education is tolerance" - Helen Keller
Loewen in chapter 12 brings up the issue as to why our Social Studies textbooks are lacking any kind of controversy or alternative points of view. One of the major reasons, Loewen discovered, was that people in the U.S. believe the purpose of educating students in Social Studies is to instill pride in our country. As I was reading this chapter in Loewen, I asked both of my parents whether or not they believed that the United States was the best country in the world and they both replied in the affirmative. Though my parents were in high school decades ago, they still retained the same message that kids are being taught today: America is the best country in the world because of the American dream, democracy, freedom, etc. Its almost as if democracy does not exist anywhere else in the world or that every other country in the world is evil and dictatorial. Even though the American system of government was rather unique in the eighteen century, it does not mean that it is the best form of government nor the only form of democratic government.
I am not saying that as Americans we should not be proud of our country or that we shouldn't pat ourselves on the back for the freedoms and liberties that our citizens enjoy. However, I think that by constantly repeating the message that the United States is the best country in the world and that we do no wrong is not only extremely misleading but it paints other countries in a negative light when we do so. There also exists large contradictions to the arguments of American democracy and freedom. Throughout history, the United States has violated its most basic freedoms but yet our students are never informed of those instances (such as Japanese internment camps during WWII). I say we can instill patriotism without false information and the alienation of other democratic countries.
Helen Keller once said, "The highest result of education is tolerance". In Social Studies classrooms, we have the responsiblity to teach our students that there are no correct viewpoints in life. The beauty of our world is that everyone is different and views life each a little bit differently. We shouldn't brainwash our kids into thinking that there is only one way of looking at things or only one way of doing things. This will only lead to further problems in society like hate crimes. The United States is an amazing country (the only country I want to live in) but it isn't the best country in the world. There are no superior countries in the world. All countries have made poor decisions, they have restricted the rights of their citizens, and they have progressed and degressed over time. The United States has had both its heroic moments and also its blunders. As educators, we have to teach tolerance or else we have failed to truly educate... we have instead forced a singular opinion on the suspectible minds of our children.
Last week, Meghan and I went to meet with our cooperating teacher for Junior Achievement, Mr. Pantages. He was extremely kind and accomodating. He gave us some ideas about what will most likely work in his classroom with his students and those things that probably would be too difficult or not interesting to the students. I felt much better about teaching economics after our meeting, since economics is not a subject that I know very much about. It also helps that there will be another Bradley student with me so that I will not have to teach it on my own.
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