October 29, 2007
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A Moment Of Silence
Most of you know I work for Safeway, since that's not it's real name anyway, I am changing it to Stayway ( as in stay away). Stayway is a residential treatment center and I work with the youth, boys only. Even though I work for Stayway, I really work for local town school district. It's a partnership.
Illinois now has a new law, all public schools must observe a moment of silence at the beginning of the school day. Our principal said it takes effect in January, although I read effective immediately. If we don't do it were breaking the law!
I am all for silence. I love silence. I just don't like being told I have to do it and I have to force the kids to do it.
In theory starting the school day with meditation/prayer/reflection is very nice and possibly helpful to some kids, but to make it a law?
What's next? I have to have a moment of silence in my house?
What if I want to have a moment of chaos? A moment of noise. Maybe I want my class to scream at the beginning of each day to get their excess frustration out.
Will I get arrested?
If individual teachers would like to have a moment of silence before they start the school day they should be able too. But government needs to really stop this control trip they are on.
Lets take the seat belt law for example. Seat belts save lives. We all know that and that's a good thing. However, if I am not wearing a seat belt, it's because I'm stupid and don't care enough about myself. If I die in an accident because I didn't wear my seat belt, it does not hurt the other driver, it hurts me and anyone who cares about me. One might argue that there a lot of stupid people who wouldn't wear a seatbelt if it were not the law. Well then, they should make the written part of the drivers test harder so stupid people can't pass.
Being fat can kill you, maybe that should be illegal. They better start making bigger jails I guess. Speaking of which, I found out my best friend when I was two is fat now too, yay!
Sorry off topic.
How about being anxious and stressed out, that can kill you, Should that be illegal?Maybe they should make a law that all public schools have to sing a song every hour, that always puts me in a good mood.
I'm telling you, I'm not into politics, I only watch the news with Robin and the boys, but I DO NOT like how this country is headed.
Do you know what teens do when their parents are too strict? They rebel. Do you know what a spouse does when their partner is over controlling? They rebel or live a sad life not trusting themselves.
It's just not a smart thing.
And I'll tell you something else, I have been a substitute and teachers aide for years. There is always a moment of silence ( and it really might just be one moment ) when the kids settle in, so if an individual wants to take that time for a silent prayer or whatever they should do that.
As you can guess, I am not a fan of PUBLIC, MANDATED, school prayer either. I think were opening a whole can of worms here.
I'm moving to Canada.
Comments (32)
there is a logic behind requiring seat belts: if you don't wear one and get hurt, your fellow taxpayers often end up paying for your medical bills. same goes for motorcycle helmets.
when it comes to moments of silence tho, that just doesn't make sense to me. maybe someone in the comments can make sense of it...
I have been out of school for a while but the best I remember a moment for a small nap would have worked better.
Love the look of the site.
That is kind of stupid to have a moment of silence. Maybe they should all do a yoga pose or something. See how people like that. I went to school when there was school prayer and I tell you what, having a teacher do the praying is not all that wonderful. Some are very bad prayers. I agree...rebellion rebellion.
That is pretty crazy that they actually made it a law to have a moment of silence at the start of school. You'd think the government would have better things to legislate than that.
I always used our moments of silence to sleep or finish my homework.
Pretty useless law.
I agree that making the moment of silence mandatory is a bit over the top. How the hell do they plan to enforce that? Will there be Silence Police? I bet the government will find money for THAT somewhere...
That's what I did. And if they made the road test harder it wouldn't stop people from driving. People drive with no license or insurance all the time. Many don't have a license because they don't know enough english to pass the test. And others are so old they know the test by heart even though they're legally blind with glasses and have a reaction time slower than a pot-head with parkinsons.
Here they want to do away with summer break. Like that will help the kids focus. Let's not make learning interesting, let's force them in school longer and stuff them with Ritalin if they try and act like kids!
Sorry, guess I should have switched IDs before commenting. Haha.
Canada's taxes are too high and I heard their health care system sucks. I agree with who would enforce it. Detention if you sneezed during the moment of silence? Or writing 'I will not sneeze during the moment of silence' 50 times?
Hey! Come to Montreal. It's such a kickass city that you'll wonder why you didn't move here sooner. Only downside is, you have to know French.
Anyway yeah, that law is ridiculous. In Canada we have one moment of silence a year, on November 11 to commemorate the end of WWI, but no one gets arrested for talking/burping/farting during the Moment. Sheesh!
It's sad that we have to "implement" a moment of silence.
Question: how did the US public school system start? What was the first curriculum?
I don't know...that's why I'm asking.
It's just a moment they still get your tax money but don't have to plan anything for you to learn
wow, I didn't know that law got passed. I remember a few kids praying in high school before meals, and they never had any government mandated silent time.
Insurance companies should make people wear seatbelts (by paying for less for an accident iif not wearing one), but the politians shouldn't be involved.
I heard that on XRT this morning too. Blew me away.
I kind of like the idea of screaming in the morning. Especially in some of these public schools. Let the kids get the hollering and screaming out of the way early and then you can move on with the day. Works for me.
How much ya wanna bet "not my man" Mitch follows in Blogo's footsteps and it becomes mandatory in Indiana too?
love the new look laura. Matts costume should get him alot of good candy!
ha. I love how government officials, who've never worked in the field and have no frackin' clue what really goes on, get to decide how we do things. I mean really, let them come in one day and make those kids observe a moment of silence. stupid stupid.
you would think there would be bigger things to worry about than whether or not kids are being silent in the morning. like maybe, test scores? or behaviors?
After the pledge, we have a moment of silence. A moment is defined as the following: In a twinkling of an eye, faster than a speeding bullet, quicker than you can say Jack Squat!!
I just have enough time during this moment of silence to say, God help me and then they say be seated.
ED high School kids would love a morning of silence ... AKA NAP
I know most schools already have a moment of silence... I never gave the law part much thought.... I don't imagine it will effect anything that is already happening...
Don't give up on America just yet. Have you heard about Ron Paul? I think you'll find you agree with him on the "crazy" idea that the federal gov't should have a very limited role in our lives.
A moment of silence great, >mandatory< ridiculous.... Seat belt laws don't bother me though, they were mandatory for active duty military & their dependents before it became a law..... Have an accident not wearing a seatbelt, no free medical. You can get around it though, my grandmother had a fear of seatbelts because of an accident she was in when she was young, where if she hadn't ducked she would have been decapitated..... She was afraid if that ever happened again she wouldn't be able to duck with todays shoulder harnesses, she had a doctors note stating she could not wear one for medical/mental reasons.
I knew you were a rebel
I cannot believe they made a law about having a moment of silence. Im really just kindof in shock about that. And i have to agree with you about the seatbelt. but the more I think about it I wonder if they made it a law because the injuries were so bad and it made the insurance rates go up or something so making people wear there seatbelts helps in that way??
It is SO totally time to scream.
Ok, so apparently I am the only one commenting on the 'fat friend' bit - that cracked me up. I am ashamed to say I have the same reaction when encountering (or hearing about) old friends... I always feel enormously better when I find out they're a bit on the porky side (it sucks being the only fat one).
Bad me. Bad, bad me. Hee hee hee.
Blago just needs to go. I sit on our local school board and I am just plain tired of all the mandatory crap that comes through to the district that is supposed to be funded by either the state or the fed, seldom do we receive all our money due. which leaves the local tax payer once again footing the bill for government mandated programs. stay away is right.
Blago needs to be concentrating on other things, for sure, like where's our state funding?
I haven't seen a difference in our school. We do it - but it doesn't last very long. My son is in band at his HS when they have their mandatory moment, during which the band director instructs them to reflect, sleep, get their music in order, or PRAW, since he can't say the other word.
"But government needs to really stop this control trip they are on."
Amen - the government needs to stay out of peoples lives. Now I'm going to take a moment of silence (or chaos maybe).
The US Supreme Court said in 1985 that a law in Alabama was unconstitutional because it said that students could use the time for prayer, so it's going to be really interesting to see if they hold that decision up in court. The same case came up in VA in 2000, but the Supreme Court refused to hear the case. I'm pretty sure that they're not going to be able to ignore it this time around with that girl from Buffalo Grove and her father suing the school district and trying to get the law repealed. They should just change the law before it starts to look like we're putting God on trial. This is going to be an interesting movie someday.
FYI, Blagojevich vetoed the law. Just shows how many crazy religious people there are in IL that elect other crazy religious people to office.
PS - Can you tell I'm taking a Religious Issues class right now? haha
rebel now. let's bring Canada here. or let's make more difficult tests for ppl in the government so we don't have stupid ppl running things!!!!! either that or vote in more comedians.
TOO funny.....but true
I was one of those kids who had rules up the waazoo (spelling??) and I did rebel! Fortunately, I bounced back kind of toward the middle......I think.....
I think it should be called a moment of shut-the-f***-up.
oh, I am laughing at the friend being fat comment!! Isn't that great! The silence thing is a bit odd... being forced tends to make me angry and noncompliant. I don't see that working well for the boys. I love the idea of a moment of chaos.
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