Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:58     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
records, not regards^
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:57     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think


So, is OP or others trying to make this political?

Because a lot of red states don't have stellar track regards when it comes to education

Taking politics out of it and we can have a rational discussion.
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:57     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
^^but that being said, I agree that elementary school spends too much time on weird video clip "brain breaks" and ipad games in early elementary. i'm glad it's being rolled back in our kids school. however, telling kids to be kind when reading eachother's work is not a bad thing. we DO want to encourage reading and writing. imagine if your kid wrote a paragraph and his friend said "this is stupid. i cant even tell what these words are supposed to spell anyways.". Would that encourage a sensitive child to write better, or to not write/ write less/ use only words they are positive they can spell, therefore discouraging the use of larger more complex words and sentence structures? some kids would take that sort of feedback as a challenge at age 7, sure. But not most.
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:55     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
Anonymous wrote:Education is run by progressive liberals who don't understand the consequences of their soft teaching.

We need to be focused on educating our kids with math and reading. And discipline, consequences. For all kids. We are too focused on feelings, making kids feel good.

As the saying goes, the worst preparation of adulthood is a stress free childhood.


What saying is that?? Numerous studies show very clearly that a stressful childhood leads to poor adult outcomes in many spheres (health, employment, drug use, crime, income, mental health)
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:53     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
Anonymous wrote:For what it’s worth I’m extremely liberal. Like way out in left field liberal/leftist.

And I agree with you.


“I am dumb” two ways!

I am extremely conservative. I think OP is full of shit.
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:52     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
Catholic school may fit your criteria. Lots of rote memorization, hand writing work, sitting still, and very little freedom of thought. My oldest attended for a few years, and there are some positives for sure. He learned things that weren't taught in public. Unfortunately he had severe adhd and they were wholly unequiped to support him.

Public school is academically less rigorous, but supports his needs in a healthy way. We decided that was the better option. We supplement academics on our own to make up for gaps (mostly hand writing, research type work, and reading classics. Math and science are pretty good at our Fairfax school.)
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:52     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
Anonymous wrote:I agree there are certainly ways in which schooling has gotten too permissive, but THESE KIDS ARE 6. The teaching and behavioral approaches appropriate for 6 year olds are totally different than what's appropriate for older kids.

At 6, they need to play and be creative and learn to interact with the world and each other, not spend hours on spelling worksheets.

In Finland, one of the most successful educational systems, kids often aren't even taught to read until they are about 7.

https://taughtbyfinland.com/the-joyful-illiterate-kindergartners-of-finland/


lol. Someone trotted out the Finland trope already.

Hey honey… we aren’t Finland.
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:50     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Let me start by saying I am politically liberal to moderate. Truth be told I’m a kind of crunchy woo woo mom who bakes her own bran muffins and who doesn’t allow screen time at home except to watch movies like Sound of Music. No video games. No toy guns.

But public school is too liberal and lenient for me. My son is at an UMC public elementary and I think it’s absolute BS. They do whatever they want and FEEL. You disrupted class? Go take a walk and grab a snack with the resource person! Now that you kids have all clicked through this BS TPT worksheet on the iPad, you get FREE CHOICE and can either read a book OR play games on the iPad (Hmmm which one will a 6 year old pick?). Oh we did some HARD WORK. Let’s take a brain break and watch Mario and Luigi dance on the projector for 5 minutes.
Ok, now choose which book you want to read. We are goi mg to write! Wrote about anything that you think of while you read? What questions do you have? Let’s think about thinking and fill up this book with post its of random BS questions! Next let’s do some writing workshop - trade notebooks and see what you think! Don’t worry about spelling. We just want to encourage writing and be kind! (Note - this would be considered a highly productive day. I don’t even think they do this all one a day.)

I think there should be consequences and kids need to know it’s not ok to disrupt 20 other students. You don’t get a snack as a reward!You might have questions about a book, great, but why don’t we first talk about setting, plot, characters? Why doesn’t the teacher TELL the kids what to look for and read for and notice? And any written work should be read and marked up the teacher. The teacher should mark spelling without worrying about hurt feelings.

Am I alone here? Is home school all that is open to me? I can’t afford 60k for private school, and based on some posts I read here they may not even be any better. Please tell me it magically gets better later. 5th grade? 8th grade?


Yeah. Since you obviously know it all and you don’t want your kid to be negatively affected by the behavior of others, I am thinking you should do the rest of us a favor a home school your precious.


Ah, the mom with a disruptive kids arrives.


There’s that arrogance and hubris again.

I am a sad. And my girls are the ones teachers tend to sit disruptive kids next to because they believe them to be good influences. They deal. It’s fine.
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:49     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Let me start by saying I am politically liberal to moderate. Truth be told I’m a kind of crunchy woo woo mom who bakes her own bran muffins and who doesn’t allow screen time at home except to watch movies like Sound of Music. No video games. No toy guns.

But public school is too liberal and lenient for me. My son is at an UMC public elementary and I think it’s absolute BS. They do whatever they want and FEEL. You disrupted class? Go take a walk and grab a snack with the resource person! Now that you kids have all clicked through this BS TPT worksheet on the iPad, you get FREE CHOICE and can either read a book OR play games on the iPad (Hmmm which one will a 6 year old pick?). Oh we did some HARD WORK. Let’s take a brain break and watch Mario and Luigi dance on the projector for 5 minutes.
Ok, now choose which book you want to read. We are goi mg to write! Wrote about anything that you think of while you read? What questions do you have? Let’s think about thinking and fill up this book with post its of random BS questions! Next let’s do some writing workshop - trade notebooks and see what you think! Don’t worry about spelling. We just want to encourage writing and be kind! (Note - this would be considered a highly productive day. I don’t even think they do this all one a day.)

I think there should be consequences and kids need to know it’s not ok to disrupt 20 other students. You don’t get a snack as a reward!You might have questions about a book, great, but why don’t we first talk about setting, plot, characters? Why doesn’t the teacher TELL the kids what to look for and read for and notice? And any written work should be read and marked up the teacher. The teacher should mark spelling without worrying about hurt feelings.

Am I alone here? Is home school all that is open to me? I can’t afford 60k for private school, and based on some posts I read here they may not even be any better. Please tell me it magically gets better later. 5th grade? 8th grade?


Yeah. Since you obviously know it all and you don’t want your kid to be negatively affected by the behavior of others, I am thinking you should do the rest of us a favor a home school your precious.


What others? I take issue with the behavior of teachers and admin here.


I don’t care what issues you take. Your feelings and opinions are invalid.

And I am neither a teacher nor an administrator. I do marvel at how others who are similarly not those things think they know better, though. The arrogance and hubris is rather shocking.

OP erected a straw man. She sees a problem, but it’s only a problem for her. Like many arrogant parents, she thinks exclusively about the needs of her child. So, yes, for her, home schooling sounds like a good option so the rest of us can be spared her obnoxiousness.
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:48     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
What school district are you in? My kids are at an APS elementary school and my 5th grader’s work definitely comes home with some spelling/grammar corrections and helpful feedback. I’ve volunteered for writing time in my 3rd grader’s class and they have an assigned subject to write about (sometimes it’s more creative, but other times it’s research-based).

Also, my kids get screen time at home (mostly during the weekend) so they aren’t deprived of video games and actually choose to read most of the time rather than play iPad games at school. This is what their teachers have told me during conferences. The iPad games really aren’t that exciting if you get to play games elsewhere.

Is your oldest (or only) kid just 6? So he’s in K, maybe 1st? That is still really little. Of course they’re going to talk about feelings and give kids strategies how to calm down.

And at this age it’s not appropriate for teachers to give harsh spelling and math corrections when kids are still learning how to learn. Also FWIW my oldest spent his K year virtual learning due to COVID (which was a disaster) and I was able to work with him at home to get him reading and doing math above grade level, so if your kid really needs more supplementing at this age you should be able to do it without paying for private school.
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:48     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
You're the parent of a young child? Yes, it's shocking to get inside an early elementary classroom, isn't it?

You need perspective. In later elementary, things tighten up, and by secondary, the advanced tracks get serious.

Unless you're in a crappy school district, perhaps? We moved to be in a better school district. It was worth it for us.

Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:45     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Education is run by progressive liberals who don't understand the consequences of their soft teaching.

We need to be focused on educating our kids with math and reading. And discipline, consequences. For all kids. We are too focused on feelings, making kids feel good.

As the saying goes, the worst preparation of adulthood is a stress free childhood.


How can we get back to actually educating our children as a society? I don’t mean a return to rapping kids with rulers, just telling kids they are WRONG when they say 2+2 =5 or spell “said” as “sed.” Right now they are complimented on their thinking and creativity and asked how they got there and to please show everyone else how they did it. No! Don’t teach 20 kids the wrong way! Tell the 1 kid that he is wrong and here is the correct answer.


If you volunteered in an actual classroom, you would see that teachers do that. But you want to invent a world in which schools somehow don't teach kids, when in reality, they very much do.

It's clear you have an agenda and are not basing your rants in reality.



My rants on based on volunteering a lot more over and actually seeing what’s happening at school. I was oblivious and assumed school was great in kindergarten.


You seem to have a catastrophizing mindset. Are you one of these people who think in black and white? If it's not great, it's terrible? Because that's how you're coming across. No, schools are never great. They cannot be great, since they're a collective effort. But it doesn't mean they're terrible either.

I do not particularly love the way public elementaries run their classrooms in my area... but my kids attend or attended these public schools, and I, as the parent, make sure they know what I think they should know. It works out. My oldest's first grade class had 31 kids and the teacher was completely overwhelmed. Kids were yelling and throwing paper planes. I thought no learning was actually happening. Fast forward to now, he's in college and is doing well. He was always a bookworm, like all of us in the family, and he's well-read, polite and took 12 APs in high school, including Latin. My second kid will take 14 APs and has won writing awards. I have volunteered extensively at all my children's schools: I don't think I've seen anything as bad as that first grade class

Plenty of kids do well in public schools, because their families figure it out. If you want, you can teach your children yourself, find a private that will fit your idea of what a classroom should like (newsflash - a lot of them behave like public schools!), or hire tutors for your children. So instead of whining, find solutions that work for you.

Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:43     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
Anonymous wrote:For what it’s worth I’m extremely liberal. Like way out in left field liberal/leftist.

And I agree with you.


+1. I'm generally very liberal, but the current liberal approach to education is a failure.
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:41     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:
Anonymous wrote:Education is run by progressive liberals who don't understand the consequences of their soft teaching.

We need to be focused on educating our kids with math and reading. And discipline, consequences. For all kids. We are too focused on feelings, making kids feel good.

As the saying goes, the worst preparation of adulthood is a stress free childhood.


How can we get back to actually educating our children as a society? I don’t mean a return to rapping kids with rulers, just telling kids they are WRONG when they say 2+2 =5 or spell “said” as “sed.” Right now they are complimented on their thinking and creativity and asked how they got there and to please show everyone else how they did it. No! Don’t teach 20 kids the wrong way! Tell the 1 kid that he is wrong and here is the correct answer.


If you volunteered in an actual classroom, you would see that teachers do that. But you want to invent a world in which schools somehow don't teach kids, when in reality, they very much do.

It's clear you have an agenda and are not basing your rants in reality.




NP. All you need to do is look at the test scores to know that's a lie.


Cite the test scores and let's see who is lying.


Just go read the article from the New York Times yesterday.
Anonymous
Post 05/14/2026 10:38     Subject: Unpopular opinion: young children should be taught what to think
For what it’s worth I’m extremely liberal. Like way out in left field liberal/leftist.

And I agree with you.