I am SO angry that I want to scream!

[binny]

ok so Cam gets into the gifted school and while he is not doing fantastic ( hes actually challenged for the first time) he was adjusting ( or so I thought).
SO he brings home this report that is due. I asked him what its about, he says " Ghosts" I say "ok... not exactly what I would have chosen but lets look at what you have" ( trying to be a supportive parent) I start going through his papers and what he had printed out.... well it turns out that he had FULL UNSUPERVISED INTERNET ACCESS and pulled up this site: www.ghoststudy.com
He said his teacher was in the room but not watching them, she was grading papers.

Now two clicks into the web page and I get " top ten searches " (and we all know what the top searches on the internet are. ) As an option to click on.

Then, I start looking through his papers and there is talk of demonic possesion, spirits, the afterworld, underworld and some VERY scary stuff!

THEN it talks about how the Bible is wrong and to question what you learned in Sunday School and how do we know whats what and just because the Bible says its wrong doesnt make it wrong etc...

This is NOT appropriate for an 8 year old child!!!

It doesnt matter what your belief system is, no one has ANY business shoving that down a childs throat! This site was obviously not intended for children so why wasnt someone at the school paying attention to it?

now I am the first to agree that his choice of subject matter was innapproriate but he is 8, there also should have been supervision on the topic choice!

I am going in first thing in the morning to have a talk with his teacher and principle, the more I think about it the angrier I get!! I cant believe that they have UNSUPERVISED internet time with NO FILTER and no one is checking to see what their choices were for their reports!

They were given Carte Blanche to choose a topic with no input whatsoever and were allowed to do whatever they thought was appropriate for subject matter.

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

 

[CEDmom]

I'm all for giving kids choices and letting them explore interests but I agree that this is over the top. I can't believe that 8 yo kids could just pick any topic. I think that at least a list of suggest topics should have been provided and supervision should be given when using the internet. Good luck at school. BTW, have you considered redirecting your DS's chosen topic? If he's interested in ghosts maybe he could do a report on the origin of Halloween?

 

[wickey's friend]

That is totally unacceptable -- you have every right to be angry!

Unsupervised access to the internet for an 8-year-old is wrong -- gifted school or not. You hold to your beliefs and make sure that they listen to your concerns and fix this situation. Sending pd to you to get this resolved in the way you want it done.

 

[winniedapooh]

Wow unsupervised and unfiltered, not a good combination and a way for young children to get into trouble as far as I am concerned!

 

[binny]

I told him no way was he doing that report that it was against what we believed in as Christians and I felt it was innaporopriate. Maybe Im a being an Ogre but its my duty to instill our belife system he can question it later.


He chose another topic and redid the report. He hadnt gotten too far into it thankfully.

When I asked him what he was trying to find when he chose "ghosts" as a subject, he was thinking stuff like Casper and just funny ghosts not serious stuff like possesions and such. He thought he would get some fun stories about cartton ghosts.

I mean hes 8 for goodness sakes! Thats the only exposure to "ghost stories" that hes had.

 

[zurgswife]

WOW!!! I'd be really upset...our kids access at school is limited to ONLY School approved sites...they aren't able to go any where else....because some kid could type in White House and get the adult porn site....I can't believe your school is not monitoring these kids better..

 

[robinb]

Hmmm ... I don't think I would agree with your assessment of "unsupervised and unfiltered". The teacher was in the room and I would expect that children in gifted schools are given a bit more room to explore and grow than in a normal school. I'm confused about what level of supervision you want. Do you expect her to sit by his side while he does his research?

As for filtering, I'm also confused about what you expect to be filtered. Is this school a faith-based school? Did you child actually click on a porn site? Do you expect non-Christian messages to be filtered in a non-faith-based school? How can you really talk about ghosts if you don't talk about possesion, spirits, the afterworld, and the underworld?

 

[mrsv98]

I was a tech coordinator for a private school and I will tell you what I did to teach children that young internet research in a safe manner. Our 2nd graders each did a research report on an animal they chose. They gave me the animal and then I went and found 4-6 sites (this is pretty easy after doing it once or twice, took no time at all) and then created a web page with those links. First the child had to choose mammal, bird, fish, insect and then their animal. Then they had the choice of the prechosen sites. I had 4 or 5 children working at one time and I watched to make sure they didn't click out of the area they were meant to be in.

This is the way internet research should be done. I don't care how mature and responsible a child is, he is still a child and there are many bad things on the internet. For example, try typing the word "zoo" into a search engine and see the kind of sites you get.

Since your child is in a gifted program, they teacher may think he is capable of researching on his own. You might approach it from the view that you trust your son, but not the internet. That may be a way to have a discussion without a confrontation.

 

[SeaSpray]

Binny, I feel you have a legitimate reason for being upset. Gifted or not, an 8 year old child MUST be protected from the evils that abound on the internet.

As for subject matter, as a Christian I totally agree with you, but perhaps the teacher was giving them free reign in this area in order for them to display their creativity. Are you able to, at this point, direct your DS towards a more suitable subject? If not, then perhaps you could guide him to web sites that you at least can preview. I know there is a lot of information that could explain "ghosts" from a biblical standpoint, which would be acceptable to you. At such a young age, subject matter should've been handled differently (in MY opinion).

I'll be following this thread to see what happens when you contact his school. I hope it goes well!

 

[Planogirl]

There is no way for a school to filter out a site like ghoststudy unless they somehow develop a way to filter out certain beliefs. It's certainly not the same thing as porn.

However, someone should have been paying closer attention when a kid that young is surfing, I can definitely agree with that. I wouldn't be too angry though because they will likely hit upon some things we don't like over the years.

Good luck tomorrow.

 

[Cindy B]

I can see the "lack of hand holding" as part of the gifted curriculum... it may be the schools philosophy that he "should" be able to do this on his own...

The school may also be having the students develop critical thinking, and good decision making within school parameters.

But it is true the students, especially the younger ones, need to have parameters set.

Personally as a educator (mind you I am a still a teaching student, but am in a classroom setting everyday) , I would have had parameters set. Whether it would be research only websites, (ie World Book enclyopedia online, or even kid type search engines ie Yahooligans or something like that)

Ghosts are not usually the cutesy Caspar stuff, and its rough that he had to learn this "life lesson" this way.

Did you know the lack of filters within the classroom prior to this? Do you know the schools internet policy? What types of firewalls are in place? --these are questions you need to ask the school administrator.

Also, ask the teachers philosophy regarding the research of the project? Was it an independent (no help) project? Was there a list of websites, or was it just a random searches? .. personally random searches gives my students so much to choose from and they get lost in details...

For example my students needed some research for an irrigation project. ONe student typed in irrigation, and found a colon rectal irrigation webstie And I was standing right there with him! (This was in my schools library, and it was a medical site although the pictures were a bit graphic) I can say things happen...

I like to stand with them, not only to help them filter the excess of information but also to "protect" them as well. These students are a little older (11/12) and they are special education students.. but they still need guidance and support.

I would consider this a life lesson for the moment. Next, find out what the philosophy is within the school and specifically Cam's classroom. Can you find out the expectations of reports for now on?

As hard it is for us to wrap our mind around, some teachers don't share our same belief system with regards to the Internet. Some do adopt the belief that they the students that is could "figure it out" on their own as to what is inappropriate or not.

Yes, the website is disturbing. That is bothersome, and I would be concerned about the content as well. This could be shown as a lesson to him that not everyone shares the family belief system. You could look at it at a purely research angle... ask him what he learned from that? How did he incorporate that information into his report?

 

[Cindyluwho]

You mentioned a website that told people to question the bible or stated that the bible was all wrong. This would be a perfect example of the right time to teach your child about the internet, differing opinions on different sites, etc. He could have included in his report that some people believe the bible is wrong and other people don't. It is, after all, just an opinion-not a fact. He still could have done his research on "casper like" ghost characters and made just slight mention of some of the deeper stuff he found on the internet. By taking the subject away from him you've passed up a great learning experience and showed him that he's not capable (in your mind) of making his own decisions.

 

[Planogirl]

It's interesting because ghost researchers normally won't refer to the Bible in any manner in their writings. I'm curious what this website actually said about the teachings in the Bible?

 

[binny]

UPDATE:

I went in first thing this AM and spoke with the teacher. I showed her what he brought home from school and her jaw dropped, she said she had no idea how it got past the filter and that she agreed the material was not appropriate.

She made a very valid point too, when I said " this is NOT acceptable in our house" she said " the problem is Cam is new, and I dont know you well enough to know that it isnt what happens in your house, while it doesnt fly with me, it may be perfectly acceptable in someone elses house and I cant force my own beliefs on them"
I am having another meeting this afternoon with her, dh, me, and Cam. I will be interested to see how we tackle some other issues.
She told me Cam is doing fine there and she really enjoys him.
She also said that while it appears he is struggling, all kids have about a 9 week adjustment at this school. She said the reason is for most of the kids this is the first time theyve been challenged. SO we will give it another couple of weeks depending on how the meeting goes today.

I did call his last school and cried on the principals shoulder ( she and I are friends) and she said " Honey, you know the door is always open, he can come back whenever he wants" so that is an option too.

Thanks for listening and the support! Ill let you know when I know more.

 

[CajunDixie]

You also need to be aware of sites that have chats. My DS was given internet time after finishing a project and he decided to play games. He found Pogo and registered and started playing games. The next night at home he mentioned playing Sweettooth on Pogo which is an appropriate game but what is not appropriate is the chats on the side of the games. Some of the Pogo rooms are for adults and are uncensored as far as the chats go. The school had no idea about the adult rooms....they thought it was simply a game site.