Teach Your Children

I don’t know if the song by Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young is appropriate for this particular piece but the title is.

If you were like me, when you went to high school, you studied the Constitution of the United States.  There were probably very subtle reasons for doing so but it was most certainly so that we would be good citizens of this country.  In September, 2005, Charles Slater wrote that a student should be:

1. Readers of literature
2. Poets whose words envision new ways of being
3. Writers who reflect thoughtfully
4. Problem solvers who can use mathematics
5. Observers who can sense the wonder of science
6. Citizens who study history and take action
7. Speakers of two languages who cross cultural borders
8. Workers who can create with their hands and use technology
9. Artists who sculpt, draw and paint
10. Musicians who sing or play an instrument
11. Athletes who exercise for a lifetime
12. Leaders who recognize the moral dimension.

(What Does It Mean To Be An Educated Person?)

Each of these points speaks about what education should be, even at the high school level and for all persons, not just students but for all people.  But lately, I have to wonder if that is the case.  First, there was the video about the perils of dihydrogen monoxide (“Dihydrogen Monoxide Ban”).  Now, if you do not understand chemical nomenclature, the formula for dihydrogen monoxide is H₂O.  In other words, this particularly dangerous sounding compound is nothing but water.  Granted, there are things about water that are dangerous (as the floods in Iowa and the Midwest so aptly point out) but how willingly should we be to sign a petition to ban its use when its use is critical to our own survival.

And with the July 4^th coming up shortly, there will probably be a number of efforts to have people sign the Declaration of Independence without realizing what it is that they are signing.  And most people will refuse because they will think it is some sort of subversive document that will take away their freedoms.

But as Dr. Slater wrote following point #6,  “An educated populace is necessary to preserve and renew democracy.” 

In a letter written to William C. Jarvis in 1820, Thomas Jefferson wrote

I know, (there is) no safe depositary of the ultimate powers of society, but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them, but to inform their discretion by education. This is the true corrective of abuses of constitutional power.

In a letter that he wrote to Colonel Charles Yancey on January 6, 1816, he wrote, “If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.”  President Jefferson also wrote, “Enlighten the people generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like evil spirits at the dawn of day.”

But, as I read the responses to my post “The Rule of Law or The Spirit of the Law?”, I have to wonder if we understand what this country stands for and what the Constitution means.  We have gone to war without declaring war, we have taken away the rights of individuals without the process of law, and we have passed laws that, in the name of liberty, take away our freedoms.  Whether or not Benjamin Franklin is the author, we are reminded that “Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.”

Let us remember that what we do each day teaches our children as well.  Let us work to insure that they find liberty and freedom in what they learn.