This goes way beyond the pale, the teacher responsible should be yanked from her job. What goes through the minds of these teachers nowadays? How could she have come to the conclusion that such an idea would be found acceptable to the parents after they found out? Most likely she didn’t care.
No victim of the Jewish Holocaust would have ever suggested that children be traumatized in order to teach them the horrors of the mass genocide of European Jews during WWII. On the contrary, they would have advised, if asked, to tell of the holocaust in an informative, and respective way. This dufus went way over the line. KGS
H/T: Gaia
A group of primary schoolchildren were left traumatised after their teacher told them they were to be taken away from their families during a bizarre Holocaust classroom ‘game’.Pupils became hysterical after a number of them were separated and told they were being sent away or might end up in an orphanage.The terrifying ordeal was meant to give the students at the Lanarkshire school an insight into the horrors faced by Jewish children during the Second World War, when they were plucked from home and sent to Nazi death camps.But the ill-conceived exercise, which was sprung without warning on the children at St Hilary’s Primary School in East Kilbride last Thursday morning, went badly wrong with many pupils, aged just 11, reduced to tears.Deputy head teacher Elizabeth McGlynn was responsible for segregating the pupils and telling them they were to be sent away.One angry parent, who has lodged an official complaint about the project, told how the ‘barbaric’ role play left children crying their eyes out in class.In a letter sent to council bosses, the unnamed mother said: ‘Mrs McGlynn told the children they would probably have to be sent away from their families and that their parents had been informed about this and knew all about it.‘When one child asked if that meant they might have to go to an orphanage, they were told that might be a possibility.‘At that point many of the children became very distressed.‘One boy kicked his chair over, one was angry and demanded to speak to someone in charge but most were crying on a scale ranging from mildly to severely.‘Their ordeal lasted between 12 and 15 minutes before the children were informed that it was all an act but that the role play would continue until lunchtime.’One girl said her classmates began crying when Mrs McGlynn told them she had a letter from the Scottish Executive saying nine children had to be separated from their classmates.She told the shocked youngsters those who were born in January, February and March had lower IQs than other children, ‘due to lack of sunlight in their mother’s womb’, and that they had to put yellow hats on and be sent to the library.The mother added: ‘When I asked why on earth they thought it was appropriate to deliver a role play situation to the children in this way, Mrs Stewart informed me that they didn’t inform the children beforehand.‘This was because they wanted the children to experience an “accurate emotional response” to this scenario in order for it to be reflected in their story writing.‘Mrs Stewart then invited me to come up to the school and see the excellent work that had been produced as a result of the exercise.‘I declined and my position and opinion on the method used to extract emotive story writing from the children was cruel, barbaric, traumatic and totally, totally unethical.‘My daughter and indeed no child needs to feel the terror, fear, panic, segregation and horror that a child of the Holocaust experienced during one of the worst atrocities in history to be able to empathise with them in order to produce good story writing.’A South Lanarkshire council spokeswoman, who confirmed that a role play activity took place, said: ‘The council can confirm that a parent handed in a letter to Education Resources on Monday, March 8, 2010, and this will be responded to shortly.’
