Posted: Sep 16, 2013 10:04 am
Cito di Pense wrote:I know some of that is facetious. The only persons who are really going to benefit from a unit on Greek history (or some other key piece of the Canon) are those who would become interested in it on their own whenever they ran across a reference that interested them. Unfortunately, people deprived of a working understanding of algebra & geometry when they are of an age to absorb it will have so much trouble with it as busy adults that they will never master it, and will end up cognitively disadvantaged as a result. The incapacity for abstract thinking I've seen in some devotees who've become too focused on literature is shocking. The claims they make for their own capacities of 'deepity' in this regard are often comical.
The classroom hours devoted to RE, if they push aside something like algebra/geometry, are actually doing harm.
I guess the history I was taught (up to the point where I could opt out of it) gave a very basic timeline I could attach stuff to later, but was taught so badly that I developed knowledge and dislike for it in roughly equal measure. All bloody dates and various names for different Greek or Roman columns or cathedral styles.
I could probably have learnt more, far more pleasurably, by reading a few good books.
As indeed I did when I was older.
As far as 'this is the general background to a handful of common religions for social awareness' RE teaching, that seems like something that a fairly short book or a few hours of video should be able to cover adequately.