Help with public school providing sexual content to students

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Okay. My question is basically the same: What do you understand glorify to mean? How do these books glorify sex?
 
A Tree Grows In Brooklyn has sexual elements, but there’s nothing vulgar or nasty in Betty Smith’s treatment. She wrote about the real lives of the poor–it was compassionately written, but fairly frank for the time in was published.
 
I’m glad you had a constructive conversation with the teacher. And that you were able to make her see that objections to explicit books do not necessarily all mean the parent objecting is a book-burning fundie.
 
I completely agree that Hick Finn advocates for the opposite of the “racially insensitive content.” That is why I disagree with the analogy above. These books glorify the subject of the worry, UNLIKE Huck Finn, which advocates for the opposite of the worry.
 
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Bruised_Reed said:
Okay. My question is basically the same: What do you understand glorify to mean? How do these books glorify sex?
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In this instance I used the word “glorify” as a verb to convey that the books take something that is negative and portray it as a positive entity.

The Highest Tide. A teenage boy mastrubates while envisioning an adult babysitter he admires. The book presents this as a form of love for the woman. It is objectification of the woman. And after reading it, my daughter asked me what a “g-spot” is. Because it is discussed in more than one place in the book.

In Cold Blood. It has several instances of encounters with prostitutes. It has two instances where children watch their mother having sexual encounters with strange men. It has a major sexual molestation by an adult woman perpetrated on a young boy. It has a homosexual serial gang rape perpetrated on a minor. It has an adult man who molests and rapes children. It presents these things often in a neutral tone. It is desensitizing.

A Million Little Pieces. This one I have not read. And I won’t, because I looked it up and found a review that explains it. The reported enjoyment of the guy explaining the event glorifies the event.
https://www.shmoop.com/a-million-little-pieces/sex-rating.html
 
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0Scarlett_nidiyilii said:
A Tree Grows In Brooklyn has sexual elements, but there’s nothing vulgar or nasty in Betty Smith’s treatment. She wrote about the real lives of the poor–it was compassionately written, but fairly frank for the time in was published.
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Someone else in the thread my have discussed A Tree Grows in Brooklyn. I have never read it, and it was not a part of my daughter’s class. I was not referring to it in any of my comments.
 
Yes, I was replying to TheLittleLady’s comment.
But I still recommend the book!
 
Tis_Bearself said:
Yes, sophomore is year 10, the students are usually 15 or 16 years old.
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Thanks. I share to some degree Teek’s dismay at the content of some of the books prescribed (see her descriptions above). And I reject the proposition that to hold that view is indicative of a “need” to homeschool. Perhaps the educational authorities have simply erred in including these books in a list of quality literature?
 
Cath13 said:
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nodito:
Has she read . . . . The Scarlet Letter?
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This book probably wouldn’t be appropriate for the those concerned with sexual content in literature. The subject matter could be considered indecent and not appropriate for those under the age of 21
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It feels like you’re mocking OP. There’s a world of difference between the content of the Scarlet Letter and the sexually explicit material in the books the OP is concerned about. OP doesn’t seem at all interested in shielding her daughter from all difficult or unpleasant or even sexual topics. She just doesn’t want her daughter exposed to what essentially amounts to written pornography.
 
Rau said:
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Tis_Bearself:
Yes, sophomore is year 10, the students are usually 15 or 16 years old.
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Thanks. I share to some degree Teek’s dismay at the content of some of the books prescribed (see her descriptions above). And I reject the proposition that to hold that view is indicative of a “need” to homeschool. Perhaps the educational authorities have simply erred in including these books in a list of quality literature?
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Your last sentence highlights the issue.

America is a funny place when it comes to education.

In the end, it’s not “educational authorities” who decide things but individual teachers…especially in public schools and ESPECIALLY at the high school level.

My friend just became a science teacher at a Catholic school. Other than the AP classes she is allowed to pick–and doesn’t have to justify–any book that she deems appropriate. She is a science professional and has higher ed degrees but is permitted to teach without any classroom training. She’s not in a union so she answers only to her supervisor. She has the lesson plans of previous teachers and she has some minor guidelines, but it’s all up to her.

This is why changing schools is so traumatic for American children…even going across town can mean entirely different curricula in every subject. Some states have districts that lay down firmer rules, but in general, the teacher’s unions have made it so that teacher autonomy is paramount and every classroom will have different ways to meet the standards.
 
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Xanthippe_Voorhees said:
In the end, it’s not “educational authorities” who decide things but individual teachers…especially in public schools and ESPECIALLY at the high school level.
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Seriously? Where I live, the educational authority for the State sets the curriculum, and in English this includes prescribing a set of books that may be studied - the teacher chooses from that list. Well…that’s how it used to be. I can’t imagine that giving carte-Blanche to teachers is a superior approach.
 
Rau said:
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Xanthippe_Voorhees:
In the end, it’s not “educational authorities” who decide things but individual teachers…especially in public schools and ESPECIALLY at the high school level.
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Seriously? Where I live, the educational authority for the State sets the curriculum, and in English this includes prescribing a set of books that may be studied - the teacher chooses from that list. Well…that’s how it used to be. I can’t imagine that giving carte-Blanche to teachers is a superior approach.
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Some states do have lists…but most of those lists not only contain thousands and thousands of books but also give teachers leeway to teach “as needed” or "as appropriate for current student needs.
 
Meh, I read The Scarlet Letter.
It was pretty much the reverse of juicy and salacious.
Heck, it was pretty much the reverse of interesting…
 
Read that as a sophomore. Although boring, it wasn’t any more boring than any of the other books in that class. Give me a good electronics or science book any day.
 
Cath13 said:
No, not at all. In reading this thread (and others), I feel there are many catholics who are rightly concerned about what secular and atheist educators are offering to their kids in our public schools and colleges.
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Why would this comment be limited to Catholics or persons of any particular religious faith? The question is about the literary and educational merit, and the appropriateness (for 15 year olds), of requiring books with graphic depictions of gang rape, foul language and other material offensive to many ordinary people (let alone children), to be read.
 
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