Lego: The Preferred Toy of Evil Capitalists
Not long ago I started reading an article about a school that banned Legos. At first I thought it might be because they were discovered to contain trans-fats or emit second-hand smoke, but the reason was a little more Marxist than that.
My kids play with Legos on a fairly consistent basis, but little did I realize that the little interlocking colorful hunks of building plastic are actually teaching children about the evils of private property ownership. Cool!
So after I went out and purchased a few more tubs of the greedy capitalist-creating blocks — tools of the “vast right wing conspiracy” no doubt (this has Halliburton’s fingerprints all over it) — I went back and finished the article:
A ban was initiated at the Hilltop Children’s Center in Seattle. According to an article in the winter 2006-07 issue of “Rethinking Schools” magazine, the teachers at the private school wanted their students to learn that private property ownership is evil.
According to the article, the students had been building an elaborate “Legotown,” but it was accidentally demolished. The teachers decided its destruction was an opportunity to explore “the inequities of private ownership.” According to the teachers, “Our intention was to promote a contrasting set of values: collectivity, collaboration, resource-sharing, and full democratic participation.”
Not to mention the demolished Legotown was the perfect chance to show the kids what a city run by socialists and communists ends up looking like.
But, alas, after months of indoctrination by the feel-good Gestapo, the evil toys were allowed back in the presence of the students, with some caveats:
Legos returned to the classroom after the children agreed to several guiding principles framed by the teachers, including that “All structures are public structures” and “All structures will be standard sizes.” The teachers quote the children:
“A house is good because it is a community house.”
“We should have equal houses. They should be standard sizes.”
“It’s important to have the same amount of power as other people over your building.”
“Equal”? “The same”? “Standard”? Aren’t these the same types of bilge-tanks on the SS Chomsky who constantly harp on about “we’re like snowflakes, we’re all different” while Peter, Paul & Mary plays on a potato-powered radio in their Prius? If they are, it ends there.
The architects of “equal power” movements always make sure of one thing: Their amount of power is way more equal than yours — and if you don’t believe me, try getting this school to meet you halfway on changing its curriculum.
As AL Gore’s copy of the liberal dictionary teaches us, “we” is always defined as “you, not me.”
I’m off now to help my kids build a Lego unemployment office, a privately owned building of course, where we’ll pretend that “educators” such are standing in a Lego unemployment line until the second coming of Lego Lenin.
Note for MensNewsDaily readers: My entire blog is at DougPowers.com
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March 28th, 2007 at 7:58 am
Doug Powers, stand-up comic, “…potatoe powered Prius” It’s nice to start the morning with a laugh. If we can kick the commies and feminists (not always two groups) out of public education maybe we can get the country back on track.
March 28th, 2007 at 7:59 am
You say potato I say potatoe – my spelling gets even worse as the day progresses.
March 28th, 2007 at 9:31 am
Was the Lego donated?
Do all the other schools have the same number of lego blocks?
Did the kids get to vote on the rules?
Did the kids get to suggest rules for discussion and vote.
Did this lego village have any fathers living there.
Does it have a Wysteria Lane?
Any desperate housewives there wanting bigger, better houses?
We know the village has an idiot or three.
March 28th, 2007 at 10:13 am
Commies and feminists = two-headed dragon.
March 28th, 2007 at 12:06 pm
“the teachers at the private school wanted their students to learn that private property ownership is evil”
I wonder if any students pondered stealing teacher’s car that day? The teachers shouldn’t mind at all.
March 28th, 2007 at 12:07 pm
Great piece! Wow, lego’s are just about the coolest tool in the world to teach three dimensional thinking, creativity, and confidence.
This is really sad news.
This shows how badly the communist/thinking have taken over the schools.
I once guessed how many legos’ were in a four foot statue of lego liberty in a K-Mart contest. I was off by two, but I won. (3,867)
The prize was……boxes and boxes of lego’s! My son made a gerbal home out of them that they enjoyed forever.
Clearly the teachers of this country have become gerbils. We should house them in a lego community.
March 28th, 2007 at 1:16 pm
How many teachers do you have (to the nearest thousand)?
Are they all gerbils? If not, how many are?
What percentage of the nation’s teachers are female? What percentage of the female teachers would describe themselves as feminists?
If that’s too hard try another angle. How many teachers are:-
(a) Single and hoping to find a partner that can give them some respite from teaching (day after stressful day)
(b) Single/divorced and realise that sticking with teaching is their best hope of survival – even if means dealing with the results of dysfunctional parenting (day after stressful day)
(c) Political activists who want to make a name for themselves while pretending to teach (day after stressful day)
(d) Normal altruistic people who love their work.
Clue: Don’t rely too much on (d).
The prize? Free correction of sentences like “This shows how badly the communist/thinking have taken over the schools”. Not your fault. Your English teacher must have been somewhere in (a) to (c).
March 28th, 2007 at 3:05 pm
My mother was a teacher, and even she realizes that the quality of teachers today is despicable. I’m a college student. Let me tell you who predominately enters the education major: people that can’t hack it in other majors. Our children are taught by society’s C and D students. They figure that teaching will be easy (which it is not when done properly). The dummies train the next generation of dummies. I don’t think I learned anything in school after 6th grade except for mathematics (one of the few areas that can’t be dumbed down after a certain level). What a world.
March 28th, 2007 at 5:07 pm
I am a high school math teacher who began teaching after a career in accounting. I think that the best thing the teaching profession could do is to eliminate education as a college undergraduate major in order to force students into the real world before they return to the classroom, but that is another rant. How very sad for the children in this school, and how profoundly disappointing that the parents have not demanded a more appropriate education for their children, especially as they are paying for the privilege. This entire thing reminds me of the book, The Children’s Story, by James Clavell. If you’ve never read it, I highly recommend it. It will give you chills when connected with this disgusting news story.
March 28th, 2007 at 8:40 pm
rayu..studies show that the more a college expands women studies, the more it dumbs down the hard sciences..such as math and chemistry…
March 28th, 2007 at 8:53 pm
Most teachers are crap. I learned this early in life when I went to Grammar School, where one would normally expect to find dedicated staff. Indeed, I have fond memories of a physics teacer, a priest, who also taught at Oxford University twice a week. But my French teachers (women) were almost uniformly useless. I did first-year French for each of the first four years, each teacher going over what the previous one had done, which of course was the first teacher’s efforts. It wasn’t until the fifth year that I had a male teacher who had to prep us for our exams in fifth year French! (I didn’t pass!). Je parle le Francais like un nativ de British West Hartlepools.
It spreads to University. Mrs Amfortas the 1st (yes, I used to be an optimist) wanted to be a teacher. She had worked as a temp. Secretary and waitress for two years before we met and married. When married she had a three month stint as a sec to a Wing Commander on my airbase. That was her ‘career’ to date. So while I worked 70 hours a week as a military officer, she went to Uni.
After four years full time she did well and graduated with a first honours and got a job as a teacher. Just supply teaching. She lasted 6 whole weeks (actually 20 days all up) and ‘didn’t like it’. So back to Uni to do a Masters of Education. Three more full time years.
In the meantime alongside my working like a dog, – quite a happy dog mind you – I did two batchelor degrees and and a Masters of science. We both finished our Masters in the same month! My masters was full time and in just one year as I could not afford to make it last two. I had a family to support.
Then she wanted to do a PhD. So back to Uni she went. Seven more years. But she got it (with me writing half her thesis). Now, at last, after 14 years full time uni level education she would finish, I thought. She got a job as a research assistant. MONEY !! hahaha. The mortgage on our nice house could be paid of quicker. Our two cars could be afforded more easily. Our two children’s private schools could be managed. (it was costing me $18,000 a year just for their schooling). I had managed, just, so far.
But no, My money was ‘ours’, her money was hers. She needed to ’save’.
Bye Bye Mrs Amfortas (there were other issues too, of course).
She is now a Professor.
Her CV reads like a career woman’s dream sheet – and largely it is. Her temp sec workplaces are the venue for several imaginary ‘Executive in Industry, Television, the Law’; her sec stint is transformed into the Wing Commanders entire job on the largest airbase that Britain ever had; her six weeks pert-time supply teaching has grown to a ’successful career as a teacher in some of the best scools in England’. All lies and inflations but what the heck, no one challenges a career woman, especially in the Academic world. Its amazing how fast a woman can rise in that world. Fast-track they call it.
She loves lego.
March 28th, 2007 at 9:22 pm
Interesting article which I will use as a segue.
I am currently involved in compensating my 13 year old son for math skills that are no longer taught at his school. Many schools across the country have transitioned math curriculum to “Investigations”. Investigations was designed by a company in Cambridge, Ma called TERC. TERC receives funding from the National Science Foundation.
I recently discovered that my son’s school system began using Investigations when he was in elementary school. After learning about this, I tested my son and he is two years behind international math standards. According to research I”ve done on Investigations, this is the norm.
I’ve since learned that Investigations has been roundly condemned by college math professors as well as many teachers. My own son’s 7th grade math teacher was distraught that he is forced to teach his students with a curriculum that ignores basic math skills and algorithms. His job has been threatened if he speaks out.
Okay, so you get the general gist. Here’s the thing that disgusts me most. I was trying to figure out why Investigations is being used when it so obviously harms children. Guess what? TERC, the non-profit company that developed Inestigations curriculum, is a huge feminist driven organization. Their mission is to promote greater participation for women in the fields of math and science. They offer a mentoring program in this regard.
Investigations is described as a collaborative approach to learning math. That’s right! The teacher sits back and lets student come up with their own solutions for math problems! Who do you think is most likely to embrace a collaborative learning style?
The sad thing is that while girls may learn better in groups, math is a subject that requires rote memorizataion early on or higher mathematics are virtually impossible. So while Investigations is likely a feminist attempt to advantage girls, it is backfiring for all students.
I’d be interested if anyone here has any knowledge of Investigations curriculum, or the link between TERC and radical feminism?