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Tag Archives: The Chinese Woman

Blind Obedience – Part 2/4

25 Jul

Were the educators in Atlanta, Georgia – that changed the answers on standardized tests – wrong?

According to our laws, yes, and many may be punished by losing their jobs. Some may even go to jail. That does not mean that the law is just.

However, I understand why they did it.

This is an example of how one morally wrong act leads to another. The NCLB Act signed into law (January 2002) by President G. W. Bush was flawed, and changing the answers on standardized tests was also wrong. Two wrongs do not make a right.

“…underlying NCLB is the assumption that schools by themselves can achieve dramatic, totally unprecedented levels of educational achievement for all racial ethnic groups as well as for children with disabilities, low-income children, and children who lack English fluency-all in a short time and without changing any of the other inequalities in their lives.” Source:Christopher Knaus, Ph.D.

Taking into account the Knaus quote, the NCLB Act made victims of teachers by holding them responsible for inequalities, such as poor parenting, that are impossible to change or control.

Teachers are responsible to teach, students to learn and parents to support. The facts indicate that teachers are doing their job and so are many students. The credit for any failure to achieve the goals of the NCLB Act belongs to poor parenting among other inequalities.

Continued on July 26, 2010 in Blind Obedience – Part 3 or return to Part 1

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Lloyd Lofthouse is a former U.S. Marine and Vietnam Veteran,
who taught in the public schools for thirty years (1975 – 2005).

His third book is Crazy is Normal, a classroom exposé, a memoir. “Lofthouse presents us with grungy classrooms, kids who don’t want to be in school, and the consequences of growing up in a hardscrabble world. While some parents support his efforts, many sabotage them—and isolated administrators make the work of Lofthouse and his peers even more difficult.” – Bruce Reeves

lloydlofthouse_crazyisnormal_web2_5

Lofthouse’s first novel was the award winning historical fiction My Splendid Concubine [3rd edition]. His second novel was the award winning thriller Running with the Enemy. His short story A Night at the “Well of Purity” was named a finalist of the 2007 Chicago Literary Awards. His wife is Anchee Min, the international, best-selling, award winning author of Red Azalea, a New York Times Notable Book of the Year (1992).

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Posted by on July 25, 2011 in American Public Schools, Education, government, NCLB, politics, Public School, Standardized Testing

 

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Risking the Mental and Physical Health of Your Children – Part 3/3

08 Jun

What are the results when we compare the permissive self-esteem driven Western parenting style and that of the Chinese and/or Asia parenting style?

First, a look at the average differences between parents in the US and China/Asia.

“Unlike in the West where children are encouraged to experiment and develop their own individual talents (as the Self-esteem movement and the Montessori methods preach), Chinese parents believe the child is an extension of oneself. Chinese parents believe they know what is best for their children and therefore override the child’s preferences.… Westerners believe in allowing children a large measure of freedom to choose their own paths while the Chinese parent makes choices for her children.” Source: China Daily


Different Cultures lead to Different Results

In fact, Nicholas D. Kristof, writing for the New York Times, says, “Perhaps as a legacy of Confucianism, its (China’s) citizens have shown a passion for education and self-improvement — along with remarkable capacity for discipline and hard work, what the Chinese call “chi ku,” or “eating bitterness”.

If you doubt these results, the U.S. National Library of Medicine/National Institutes of Health reported that Chinese have the lowest ATOD (alcohol, tobacco, and other drug use) rates in the United States.

Then the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) in 2008 said that Asian-Americans had the lowest prevalence of serious mental illnesses by race, while Caucasians had a much higher risk, which was higher than Latinos, African-Americans, and American Indian/Alaska Natives.

Return to Risking the Mental and Physical Health of Your Children – Part 2 or start with Part 1

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

To subscribe to “Crazy Normal”, look for the “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar, click on it then follow directions.

 
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Posted by on June 8, 2011 in family values

 

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Risking the Mental and Physical Health of Your Children – Part 2/3

07 Jun

What is the risk of mental and/or physical damage by spending too much time on the Internet or from cell phone use?

According to a recent poll, 22% of teenagers log on to their favorite social media site more than 10 timesa day, and more than half of adolescents log on to a social media site more than once a day.

Seventy-five percent of teenagers now own cell phones (In 2010, there were 33.5 million teens in the US, which means more than 25 million may be at risk for brain cancer in the future.), and 25% use them for social media, 54% use them for texting, and 24% use them for instant messaging.

Thus, a large part of this generation’s social and emotional development is occurring while on the Internet and on cell phones.

In fact, according to eMarketer, “Teens live, eat, sleep and breathe the internet. More than 95% are using the internet in 2011.”

We also know from parenting studies that self-esteem and/or permissive parenting is more prevalent among Caucasian parents in the US than Asian-American parents and comparing the suicide and mental illness rates among teens in these two groups reveals a shocking truth.

Suicide is the third leading cause of death of young persons aged 15-24 and according to Child Trends Databank, among males, suicide rates in 2003 were 13.3 per 100,000 for Caucasians but only 6.7 per 100,000 for Asian- Americans.

For females, the rate of suicide among Caucasians was 3.0 per 100,000 while the Asian-American female suicide rate was 2.5 per 100,000. Source: Teen Help.com

Continued on June 8, 2011 in Risking the Mental and Physical Health of Your Children – Part 3 or return to Part 1

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

To subscribe to “Crazy Normal”, look for the “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar, click on it then follow directions.

 
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Posted by on June 7, 2011 in family values, Parenting

 

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Risking the Mental and Physical Health of Your Children – Part 1/3

06 Jun

The permissive Self-esteem and Montessori approaches to raising children both encourage children to make many of their own decisions while adults/parents stay mostly out of the way.  Without more involved parental/adult guidance, the long-term results may be devastating.

Recently what was termed the Facebook depression study was reported in Pediatrics, the official journal of the American Academy of Pediatrics, and there was immediate criticism of this study.

However, before you side with the critics to justify spending more time online, stop and think about the higher risk of cancer that was linked to cell phone use, which was also criticized when it was first reported as a theory.

Then recently alarming new research from Sweden on the effects of radiation from cell phone use indicates that children and teenagers are five times more likely to get brain cancer from the use of mobile phones. Source: The Independent

As for “Facebook depression”, the advice said parents should understand the sites their children visit and encourage healthy use and should monitor for potential problems such as cyberbullying, “Facebook depression,” sexting, and exposure to inappropriate content.

Being popular and fitting in is the thing for every teen across the globe. Peer pressure is intense (and cyberbullying is quite common, can occur to any young person online, and can cause profound psychosocial outcomes including depression, anxiety, severe isolation, and,tragically, suicide.) and has an impact on many undesirable choices that many teenagers are making – whether or not to smoke, drink, have sex, attend school, indulge in criminal/antisocial behaviour.

The study concluded that, “As with offline depression, preadolescents and adolescents who suffer from Facebook depression are at risk for social isolation and sometimes turn to risky Internet sites and blogs for “help” that may promote substance abuse, unsafe sexual practices, or aggressive or self-destructive behaviors.”

The risk of cancer from cell phone use and more on depression will be covered in parts 2 and 3 of this series.

Continued on June 7, 2011 in Risking the Mental and Physical Health of Your Children – Part 2

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Lloyd Lofthouse is the award-winning author of the concubine saga, My Splendid Concubine & Our Hart. When you love a Chinese woman, you marry her family and culture too.

To subscribe to “Crazy Normal”, look for the “Subscribe” button at the top of the screen in the menu bar, click on it then follow directions.

 
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Posted by on June 6, 2011 in family values, Parenting

 

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