Lyle,

One concept sbout education that you are missing is that education is not 
about being told what to "know", but in learning to think for oneself. In 
all likelihood, students are going to have textbooks that present Nat Turner 
as a "bad man". They will not be told why, other than that he killed "white" 
people. Imagine you black son sitting in the class being told that a black 
man who killed white people was bad without any discussion about his reasons 
for doing so? Will your black son come to the conclusion that white people 
are always right/good, and that when black people act contrary to that fact, 
they are automatically "bad"?

My intent is to present the information to the students as fully as 
possible. Yes, I have some bias inasmuch as I am not condemning Nat Turner 
but opening the possibilities that he did nothing more wrong than was done 
by the Patriots of 1776.

Consider, if you will, that the conditions of actual slavery were much 
harsher than the conditions of colonialism. The colonists, by comparison, 
cried before they were hurt!


Anne




Anne Pemberton
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http://www.erols.com/apembert
http://www.educationalsynthesis.org 

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