Lil' DeMarcus, Yo Name is Toby!

Reportedly, a fourth grader teach of Norfolk city public school in Virginia implemented a mock slave auction.  She separated the children by race; white, black and latino.

Yes, yes, I know, how can these 10 year old kids understand enslavement and its extremely dramatic effects on the human psyche and destruction of a culture of people? Shameful we should show kids the reality of the history of our nation at such an early age, right?

Well this teacher is not the only one to have gotten this bright idea.  An elementary school teacher in Ohio also felt this was a great idea.

In this day and age, children at that age are comprehending much faster than my generation (80's babies) could even imagine and much much faster (no offense) than generations before that. But that is because of the world we live in, things can become obsolete with the blink of an eye.


So is this truly appropriate? At what degree of detail do we show our children these realities, if we are to give them a kick of reality in history?

It seems with this generation of adolescent, we are ready to give insert into their minds the realities of sexual conduct but yet don't believe their minds can handle understanding discrimination at the age of 12?  I remember my first encounter of being discriminated against was when I was 10, being called a "Nigger."  I am still not saying what this 4th grade teacher did was right OR completely wrong. But what if she did not separate the children by race at all and simply did a mock slave auction where everyone's ethnicity/race was involved?  Isn't it OK wanting the kids to have a foundation of compassion towards a culture that almost completely stripped and destroyed?

I know many of you still say that an activity like this does not belong in the classrooms but I think this was a good concept with HORRIBLE execution.

I wanted to make this a thoroughly researched topic but instead I'd rather just spark interest of others reading for their own purpose of researching if they want to.  Simple as that.  Now, I will leave you to "Do the Dishes..."

~juskev