Web sites give teachers forum to share material, ideas about Sept. 11

As students across the country grapple with issues surrounding
the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, educators too are engaged in
discussions about how to approach the difficult subject.

Despite various criticisms, Web sites and school boards provide
a variety of resources teachers can use to create lesson plans
addressing issues related to Sept. 11.

The www.teaching9-11.org Web site, created by the Clarke Center
at Dickinson College in Pennsylvania, offers a listing of
resources, sample lesson plans and syllabi for educators to share
with each other, including educational sites on the Taliban and
lessons on promoting tolerance.

“We just want people to share what they are doing so they
can incorporate these things in a way that is comfortable to them
in the classroom,” said Clarke Center Director Michele
Hassinger. “We did not get into any suggested way of teaching
because everybody has different ideas.”

The National Educators Association also established a Web site
to help guide parents and educators, called “Remember Sept.
11.” The site provides links to other news sites as well as a
link to 120 lesson plans.

The lesson plans are meant to help students talk about
frightening events and become critical viewers of the media, and
help children feel safe in the aftermath of Sept. 11, according to
a “Guidance from the American Red Cross” posting on the
site.

The NEA’s Web site has been under fire recently by some
who feel it places too much emphasis on feelings instead of facts,
and by others who are upset by some of the content posted on the
site.

In a column titled “Teaching 9/11 Lies,” syndicated
columnist George Will cites three things that make the Web site a
“national menace” ““ a condescending attitude
toward parents, a politically correct obsession with diversity and
America’s sins and a therapeutic, not educational, focus.

“Teachers are urged to be mere enablers,” he wrote.
“Which probably means assuring students that Sept. 11 is
about their serenity, not about their nation and its rigors in
responding to the world’s dangers.”

Because of the onslaught of media attention and recent
criticisms, the NEA responded with a news release posted on the
site.

“Using this national tragedy to attempt to score political
points is a new low, and we urge visitors to make their own
assessments of (the site’s) value,” the release said.
“We are confident that most will find the site quite useful
in helping our young people cope with the aftermath of the Sept. 11
attacks.”

Universities are another major target of criticism regarding
their approach to teaching Sept. 11. They are attacked primarily
for presenting America in an unfavorable way and leading
discussions based on the self-interests of the professors.

In October of 2001, a report titled “Defending
Civilization: How Our Universities are Failing America”
condemned colleges for a “blame America first” response
and for reflecting a “shocking divide between academe and the
public at large.”

The report, published by the American Council of Trustees and
Alumni, a nonprofit educational organization, says colleges can
still be subjected to criticism even though they have the freedom
to discuss the issues however they choose.

Critics specifically targeted professors at UCLA last year,
after the school pioneered 50 “Perspectives on Sept.
11″ seminar courses created to help students and teachers
explore issues that emerged from the attacks.

But despite accusations that professors were turning the subject
into “sentimental psychobabble” and teaching
“politically correct pseudo-courses,” seminar
instructors and their students found the classes to be
valuable.

“The objection seemed to be that people were reacting
emotionally and that it was simply academically inappropriate to
deal with topics like that in a classroom,” said provost
Brian Copenhaver, who also taught the “War, Terror and
Violence: Reflecting on Machiavelli” seminar.

“I find that wrong-headed and wildly out of line with the
whole experience of education in general,” he said.

French and francophone studies professor Eric Gans, instructor
of the “Culture and the Deferral of Violence” seminar,
felt the criticisms were unwarranted because teachers were not
using the courses to pursue self-interests, but rather to help
understand the traumatic events.

One seminar, taught by art history professor Albert Boime,
received attention for its name alone, “Navigating between
Blithesome Optimism and Cultural Despair.”

Boime said he was astonished by the criticisms at first, but
then understood they stemmed from “conservative voices that
could not break from the mid-line ideology at the time.”

“We need to keep a level of seriousness and commitment to
maintain an independent and self-critical position and not feel
that we are under pressure to tow any mainline reasoning,” he
said.

Other seminars offered include “Understanding the
Taliban,” “National Security in the 21st
Century,” and “Beyond Tears: Evidence, Fact and
Crisis.”

In an evaluation of the seminars, 40 percent of students said
the courses helped them understand the Sept. 11 events “very
much,” and 35 percent a “fair amount.”

Educators at the K-12 level are also discussing how to best
tailor Sept. 11 material for their students,

At Emerson Middle School students wrote reflections about the
event to read today for the anniversary. University High School
student leadership plans to make visitations to classrooms, but the
student council has not finalized its program.

“A lot of what the campuses have been focusing on is just
hearing the kids’ concerns and confusion and helping them
work through those feelings and questions,” said Caprice
Young, board president of the Los Angeles Unified School
District.

Since teachers know their students the best, Sept. 11 curriculum
will be left to the individuals to decide, rather than following
strict board guidelines, Young said.

“This is an opportunity to embrace the diversity that is
in our schools ““ that is the real message,” Young
said.