by John Galt » Tue Jan 29, 2013 7:42 pm
"somebody's gotta stand up to these experts!"
lol
speaking of evolution and textbooks, i've mentioned it before but the textbooks just copy each other over and over again as it's all "fact" and don't put in anything new. then they charge 150 bucks for each book. case in point would be the consistent use of sizing the "dawn horse" to that of a "fox terrier". fox terriers were common over a hundred years ago. i couldn't tell you what size they are, other than they are about the size of a dawn horse. yet most people have heard this because in their text book it likely said that... because they keep on copying stuff.
now, take this further, and some of the less apparent things (like evolution) that some administrator had used their power to change... well they changed it, then it was copied. it wasn't that big a deal so no one changed it and it just keeps getting copied and copied forward, as fact
in seventh grade i took american history when i lived in new york. we learned up until the civil rights era. in eighth grade i moved to rhode island and took american history again, this time only until the revolutionary war. they used the same exact text book, yet didn't go as far. still, in some respects it went more in depth (although to be fair, rhode island public schools are plain awful and i learned a lot more the year before in a private ny school, but i would guess a ny public school would be better too, because, as noted, rhode island public schools are awful) so i would agree with menson that they aren't just going to go off the text book. although some will, especially teachers that don't know the subject themselves
Americans learn only from catastrophe and not from experience. -- Theodore Roosevelt
My life has become a single, ongoing revelation that I haven’t been cynical enough.