The Day the Crayons Quit: Drew Daywalt, Oliver Jeffers: 9780399255373: Amazon.com: Books
I saw this book on the back table in a Kindergarten classroom yesterday and picked it up to see what it was about. Here is the review I left for it on Amazon:
"Thankfully I did not spend money on this book. I happened to see it on a teacher's table and picked it up to see what kind of message was inside for the kindergartners in the classroom. What I found was not only annoying, but also riddled with complaint after complaint intended to instill guilt over offending inanimate objects. Each crayon was so so upset, or had it's feelings hurt, or felt used, or not used enough, or used only for certain things all the time.... So after many pages of each color having their sob story rant fest, (at this point little Duncan should've noticed how much more worn down the crayons made themselves by writing long whining letters, and just thrown them all away, and gotten new quiet ones with nice pointy tips to use), but, instead, he caved and appeased them by coloring a large picture using all the colors in equal measure (Insert Angels singing here.) I almost gagged. (Although the picture was really cute, but that wasn't the point). This book is telling small kids that they should always be worried about offending someone to the point of paranoia. Books should teach kids to be themselves, to do their best, to THINK, to use reason, and to not let others manipulate them. Too many people use the "I'm offended" thing to manipulate and gain appeasement from others and this is the LAST thing we should be teaching kids to accept as normal. (The crayons reminded me of a box of spoiled brats, if they had feet they would have been stomping them.)"
"Thankfully I did not spend money on this book. I happened to see it on a teacher's table and picked it up to see what kind of message was inside for the kindergartners in the classroom. What I found was not only annoying, but also riddled with complaint after complaint intended to instill guilt over offending inanimate objects. Each crayon was so so upset, or had it's feelings hurt, or felt used, or not used enough, or used only for certain things all the time.... So after many pages of each color having their sob story rant fest, (at this point little Duncan should've noticed how much more worn down the crayons made themselves by writing long whining letters, and just thrown them all away, and gotten new quiet ones with nice pointy tips to use), but, instead, he caved and appeased them by coloring a large picture using all the colors in equal measure (Insert Angels singing here.) I almost gagged. (Although the picture was really cute, but that wasn't the point). This book is telling small kids that they should always be worried about offending someone to the point of paranoia. Books should teach kids to be themselves, to do their best, to THINK, to use reason, and to not let others manipulate them. Too many people use the "I'm offended" thing to manipulate and gain appeasement from others and this is the LAST thing we should be teaching kids to accept as normal. (The crayons reminded me of a box of spoiled brats, if they had feet they would have been stomping them.)"
Oh wait...isn't that Common Core?
Vladimir Lenin
Give us the child for 8 years and it will be a Bolshevik forever.
Vladimir Lenin
Leave the rest to me.
"We do not play with our balls in the store!"
(in response to customers taking plastic balls out of the feature display and bouncing them noisily...)
Our Vision: Unprecedented excellence in education
Our Mission: The Mission of _____ public schools is to develop a highly educated and productive community, one student at a time.
Our Core Values:
--each child is important
--learning is our focus
--collaboration and innovation are indispensable
--sound fiscal stewardship is essential
--diversity increases opportunity
--success is expected and celebrated
Maybe I'm nuts but this is a shit pile of feel good wordery. And I wonder how much it differs from every other school boards' mottos these days. (The uninformed easily convinced that the public school puppets want, and can, turn their kids suddenly into brainiacs.) Not much different, I suspect. Wouldn't it just be easier, and more honest, to say, "we are in pursuit of your child's mind, to make them part of the many, to always work together for the greater good."
Plus, while I was reading it it started to have the voice of the lady who did the repetitious radio announcements for Terminus in The Walking Dead. "All who arrive, survive." Which is really code for, 'get here before you get bit because we want easy fresh meat to eat.'
Hamlet: Words, words, words.
That's about it. Most school boards send out these words that are like a cream pie, but once you get past the cream, you find that there's no pie.