The Forest for the Trees

  My junior level history students recently watched  Duck and Cover,  a nine minute instructional film made by the Civil Defense Administration and the National Education Association in 1951. The purpose of the film is to teach students how to best protect themselves in the event of a nuclear attack.  One scene depicts a boy, maybe nine years old, in a white button down shirt and tie throwing himself under his school desk and covering the back of their head with folded hands. Another scene shows a girl in jacket and head scarf in the street asking an older gentleman for directions to the nearest bomb shelter as air raid sirens begin. Other scenes include an older boy leaping off his bike to shield himself against a curb, students playing stick ball at recess hearing the sirens and a gathering of young neighbors dispersing to their own homes under the air raid sirens. My colleagues and I play the film to teach our students about the Cold War, specifically th...

  In my previous post, I discuss personal liberty as a cognitive, emotional and spiritual experience that impacts and guides externally directed political thoughts and actions. The post is intended to evaluate and complicate my reflections on the political divide that has seeped into so many parts of life. This post is a follow up to the previous but is also written as a stand alone piece. To read the first in the series, click here . Otherwise, proceed with caution.  Part of my job as a teacher is to tell students what to do, when to do it, where to do it, how to do it and why to do it. If my students really listen to me, they find out I don't care much about the specific, arbitrary rules I am telling them and, in general, I prefer creativity and original thinking. Unfortunately, I almost always get work that reeks of compliance.  This tendency to do what they are told strikes me as curious given many students' equal and opposite tendency to ignore what I say. The endles...