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Primary school college course and atheism

number10a

So, as I've mentioned on here a couple of times, I'm nearly finished the H. Dip. for primary school teaching. We have our online religion exam on Wednesday and I was going through the demo exam to make sure it works. Some of the questions that will be on it are actually shocking!! I cannot believe that a college in Ireland in 2012 is allowed to preach such shìt.

I've attached two sample questions from the exam for your viewing pleasure. The answer that I will have to choose to get the marks for the first attachment is "True". And in the second attachment, asking which statement is false, I will have to choose the one about Hinduism. So apparently, the one about atheism is true.

I am actually in shock. How can something that is so subjective and open to opinion be included in an exam in a modern college??? I could understand something like "Atheist humanism has produced the worst horrors history has ever witnessed. Discuss." But actually putting a True/False option there?? There is no notable incident in history where someone actually went out and said "Oh those darn believers! I'll kill them all!!" I can think of plenty of examples where the reverse happened though.

I knew what I was letting myself in for when deciding to train as a primary school teacher in Ireland, but I didn't think it was this bad. I had already made up my mind that I was leaving Ireland as soon as I'm qualified (for a lot of reasons, teaching of religion being a more minor one), but this just confirms it even more. Effectively, I'm expected to spout this shìte out to a child if I ever teach in a Catholic school. Unbelievable.

/rant

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quietriot

@MichaelNugent, thanks to you and everyone else at a.ie for putting in the effort over this. It's greatly appreciated.

darealtulip

quietriot wrote: »

@MichaelNugent, thanks to you and everyone else at putting in the effort over this. It's greatly appreciated.

+1

The journal picked up on it:

http://www.thejournal.ie/atheists-criticise-religion-exam-at-student-teacher-college-368004-Feb2012/

JonPierson

expectationlost wrote: »

why did it take michael nugent to find out Twomey wrote these notes as opposed to somebody in the course?

Having read other posts in this thread, it seems to me that non-Catholic students feel it best to keep their heads down and their mouths shut. From what I have seen so far, it appears that if students fail to answer questions on moral theology in the way that the Roman Catholic church dictates, they will fail.

I find it deeply offensive to be compared to the Roman Catholic Adolph Hitler and the Orthodox seminarian, Joseph Stalin as somehow being the continuation of a belief system that wrought genocide across Europe. This course is doing nothing less than inciting hatred against those who do not believe in the fantasies peddled by the Roman Catholic church in general and Hibernia College in particular.

I would be very interested in seeing the equivalent teaching/lecture notes of; The Church of Ireland College of Education, St. Patrick's College, Mary Immaculate College, Froebel College of Education and Coláiste Mhuire/Marino Institute of Education.

If there is anyone from any of those colleges brave enough to let me have copies of their Moral Theology teaching/lecture notes, I undertake to keep their identity secret. In fact, the safest way to transmit such documents to me would be to go to http://anonymousemail.in/ use the email address collegenotes@gmx.com fill in the verification text and then, just below the advert, click on 'Choose file' to attach any document (N.B. MAX 1MB). Using this method means that I will not even know who sent the notes and so I cannot possibly divulge details of the sender.

Also, if anyone knows anyone at any of these colleges who may have such notes, perhaps you would be kind enough to ask them to send the notes to me.

Thank you all in advance.

Insect Overlord

I did the B.Ed in Mary I a few years ago, and there was nothing at all like that in the course content for either the Certificate in Religion or the Religious Education modules. I despised having to study the subjects, but I couldn't complain about the moral content of it.

JonPierson

Insect Overlord wrote: »

I did the B.Ed in Mary's a few years ago, and there was nothing at all like that in the course content for either the Certificate in Religion or the Religious Education modules. I despised having to study the subjects, but I couldn't complain about the moral content of it.

Thank you. I'm getting private mails as well and it looks like Froebel College is providing much the same (boring!) experience. Interesting.

Peregrinus

JonPierson wrote: »

Thank you. I'm getting private mails as well and it looks like Froebel College is providing much the same (boring!) experience. Interesting.

Just to clarify: I take it you mean the same as Mary Immaculate, and not the same as Hibernia?

JonPierson

Peregrinus wrote: »

Just to clarify: I take it you mean the same as Mary Immaculate, and not the same as Hibernia?

Yes.

What I mean is that I have had contact from Froebel College and I have been told that the course content is nothing like that at Hibernia and certainly does not vilify everyone and everything that isn't Roman Catholic.

So, it looks like both Froebel and Mary Immaculate are running courses that do not promote hatred of other religions and atheists.

The 'boring' reference is to the reaction one Froebel student said they had during the moral theology lectures which, apparently, most students have in that college. Also, I understand that the religion certificate in Froebel is awarded based on attendance at lectures rather than it being examinable. Was that the same in Limerick?

wonderfulname

Just to pipe in again, it's really been a pleasure to watch this thread gain momentum and to see real world effects from it, it's a credit to you all!

iguana

So the 'only non-religious' course is rabidly Christian/Catholic while the religious based courses are not?

darealtulip

iguana wrote: »

So the 'only non-religious' course is rabidly Christian/Catholic while the religious based courses are not?

It looks like it.

Michael Nugent

Jane Donnelly and I will be meeting with Hibernia College on Friday to discuss the content of their religion course.

oceanclub

Michael Nugent wrote: »

Jane Donnelly and I will be meeting with Hibernia College on Friday to discuss the content of their religion course.

Thanks, Michael. Has there been any reaction from Vincent Twomey himself? Will you also be meeting him as part of this?

P.

darealtulip

Michael Nugent wrote: »

Jane Donnelly and I will be meeting with Hibernia College on Friday to discuss the content of their religion course.

Thank you both for the effort!

I hope something good comes out of that!

Pwpane

iguana wrote: »

So the 'only non-religious' course is rabidly Christian/Catholic while the religious based courses are not?

Is the evidence for this the course syllabi or course notes? Apparently the syllabus from Hibernia is not the problem, only the implementation of it.

Darealtulip, or anyone else, can you clarify?

JonPierson

iguana wrote: »

So the 'only non-religious' course is rabidly Christian/Catholic while the religious based courses are not?

[QUOTE/]Is the evidence for this the course syllabi or course notes? Apparently the syllabus from Hibernia is not the problem, only the implementation of it.[/QUOTE]

With the evidence I have seen from students at the religious institutions Mary Immaculate and Froebel, those colleges do not appear to teach lies and hatred about non-Catholic religions and atheism whilst the independent Hibernia College does.

The evidence of Hibernia College teaching these lies and hatred comes from the course/lecture notes used in that college. The evidence from Mary Immaculate and Froebel comes from anecdotal evidence provided by rational, atheist students at those colleges who, in my opinion, are capable of recognising the type of religious propaganda being disseminated by Hibernia College and who consider that is not what is being taught in those two colleges.

I have yet to see any evidence, concrete or anecdotal, from the other three religious institutions of what they are teaching in their moral theology strand.

darealtulip

Pwpane wrote: »

Is the evidence for this the course syllabi or course notes? Apparently the syllabus from Hibernia is not the problem, only the implementation of it.

Darealtulip, or anyone else, can you clarify?

I am not sure what you ask here,

They were course notes and the questions were from a mock exam and I assume therefore that they are part of the syllabus?

I have no problem with religion being taught in a pluralistic, neutral and objective matter.

Pwpane

darealtulip wrote: »

I am not sure what you ask here,

They were course notes and the questions were from a mock exam and I assume therefore that they are part of the syllabus?

I have no problem with religion being taught in a pluralistic, neutral and objective matter.

The syllabus is a list of what should be taught on the course. The course notes are notes given out by teachers/lecturers, or taken down by students at a class/lecture - i.e. what is actually taught about what is on the syllabus. There can be quite a big difference, depending on the lecturer. Exams are not part of a syllabus either. They are supposed to be set to test the aims and objectives of the syllabus but are often (as seems to be in the case of Hibernia) set to just test knowledge of what has been taught - one of the dangers of teachers examining their own students.

My understanding from a previous post is that the syllabus at Hibernia is fine (I think it was quoted), but that the course and exam are not (as seen in the lecture notes and exam questions).

I'm asking if the actual syllabi of the other colleges have been seen, and if the course notes have been seen. Only then can we really compare colleges. Verbal recollections are not really sufficient - people may have been absent or 'spacing' during the relevant time!

Otherwise we can't conclude, and put it about, that only Hibernia is at fault.

KamiKazeKitten

Pwpane wrote: »

The syllabus is a list of what should be taught on the course. The course notes are notes given out by teachers/lecturers, or taken down by students at a class/lecture - i.e. what is actually taught about what is on the syllabus. There can be quite a big difference, depending on the lecturer. Exams are not part of a syllabus either. They are supposed to be set to test the aims and objectives of the syllabus but are often (as seems to be in the case of Hibernia) set to just test knowledge of what has been taught - one of the dangers of teachers examining their own students.

My understanding from a previous post is that the syllabus at Hibernia is fine (I think it was quoted), but that the course and exam are not (as seen in the lecture notes and exam questions).

I'm asking if the actual syllabi of the other colleges have been seen, and if the course notes have been seen. Only then can we really compare colleges. Verbal recollections are not really sufficient - people may have been absent or 'spacing' during the relevant time!

Otherwise we can't conclude, and put it about, that only Hibernia is at fault.

Primary teaching student here.

My own college is nothing like Hibernia, all beliefs and none are respected, and feck all happens in that Catholic studies class. Although a fair bit of spacing does go on!
(Can hardly blame us really :P )

I just found some notes from my own RE and Catholic studies classes, anyone who wants to know more or have a look at them feel free to PM me.

Pwpane

KamiKazeKitten wrote: »

Primary teaching student here.

My own college is nothing like Hibernia, all beliefs and none are respected, and feck all happens in that Catholic studies class. Although a fair bit of spacing does go on!
(Can hardly blame us really :P )

I just found some notes from my own RE class, anyone who wants to know more or have a look at them feel free to PM me.

You mentioned the Catholic studies class before and that you learn a lot of activities about Jesus in the RE class. Do you also learn about all the major world religions or just about Catholicism?

KamiKazeKitten

Pwpane wrote: »

You mentioned the Catholic studies class before and that you learn a lot of activities about Jesus in the RE class. Do you also learn about all the major world religions or just about Catholicism?

Catholic studies class and RE are two separate subjects, RE isn't optional (although I suppose you could argue the Catholic studies one isn't either really, if you want to teach in Ireland.)

In the Catholic studies class, we have to prepare Powerpoints in pairs and show them to the class, then have a class discussion. Deadly boring, but it's all about moral decision making, no mention of atheists=demon baby eaters or anything.
It's all very woolly tbh, but I can't complain about it, all points of view are accepted equally.

In RE class we learn mostly about religious activities, like songs, Bible stories, art displays, how to integrate it with other subjects, etc. Currently it's Easter and Lent, for obvious reasons. We haven't covered anything other than Catholicism so far, no.
I just had a quick glance at my notes, we've covered things like approaches to prayer, Advent, Christmas, Noah and meditation, to name a few.

RE doesn't have a curriculum from the NCCA to cover, so it's not as structured as other subjects.

recedite

I think we need to distinguish between two different elements of the course here.

One element seems to be the Religious Education module, which I'm presuming involves teaching the students about world religions, and how they will, in turn, best pass on that knowledge in an objective and sensitive manner to primary school kids, when they start teaching.

The other element seems to be the Catholic Studies module, which leads to a special certificate which allows the newly trained teacher to teach RC doctrine in an RC school. Without it, they will not get a job in an RC school. This being the case, I see no problem in Father Twomey, or Dana, or anyone else coming in and setting the course in this subject. The course could not in fact be objective, and would have to focus on RC doctrine. But, and its a big BUT, the course should not have anything to say whatsoever on any other religion, or on those who reject religions. It most certainly should not slander, libel, bear false witness against, or incite hatred against them.

Pwpane

recedite wrote: »

One element seems to be the Religious Education module, which I'm presuming involves teaching the students about world religions, and how they will, in turn, best pass on that knowledge in an objective and sensitive manner to primary school kids, when they start teaching.

One would hope so, but this doesn't seem to be KamiKazeKitten's experience, so far at least.

robindch

KamiKazeKitten wrote: »

In RE class we learn mostly about religious activities, like songs, Bible stories, art displays, how to integrate it with other subjects, etc.

What do you mean by "integrate it"?

Do you mean that religion is made an integral part of other topics? Say, reading bible stories in English, painting bible-related pictures in art, bible-related geography in geography and so on?

Gbear

robindch wrote: »

"Integrate it" -- what do you mean?

Cognitive dissonance training perhaps?

JonPierson

I think that I should preface this comment by saying that I have analysed the first couple of years of the "Alive-O" Roman Catholic indoctrination course used in all Roman Catholic National schools, i.e. 93% of all National Schools. The first couple of years are used against 4/5- to 6/7-year-olds, which always reminds me of a famous quotation (or, at least, a version of it) attributed the Jesuit indoctrinator, Francis Xavier:

"Give me the children until they are seven and anyone may have them afterwards."

I have discussed the content of the teacher's books for this course with a consultant psychiatrist, a psychologist and a therapeutic hypnotist. The consensus is that the books detail recognised methods of mind control and hypnotic techniques, including meditational techniques, to be used against the children. The children's books – the ones the parents get to see – are fairly tame but, of course, only serve to reinforce the propaganda disseminated during the day.

Clearly, it is necessary to explain to student teachers how to teach the Roman Catholic religion. I do not know whether students are expected to use these "Alive-O" books but something KamiKazeKitten said caught my attention:

In RE class we learn mostly about religious activities, like songs, Bible stories, art displays, how to integrate it with other subjects, etc.

In the "Alive-O" teacher's books, the songs are, clearly, 'repetitive music' and appear to fit into the 45-72 beats per minute range (around resting human heart rate); this is a recognised mind control technique.

The instructions to teachers include explaining the technique of 'voice roll' (without calling it that) to use to read the Bible stories. Voice roll is, apparently, a method used by hypnotists who, by using a steady, soft, regular pattern of speech, are able to put people into a hypnotic state. Again, the 'beat' of voice roll is to be pitched at around the human heartbeat level.

The "Alive-O" teacher's books also describe how to prepare the classroom before the main indoctrination sessions, including making sure the room is not too bright, lighting candles and incense and setting up a little sort of shrine. In addition, the books tell teachers how best to have the kids sitting. All of this gets the kids into a relaxed and receptive state ready for the indoctrination session. The sessions end with the kids being 'snapped out of it' by doing something more physically active.

The teacher's books are available at Veritas (where else?) on Abbey Street in Dublin.

The other part of KamiKazeKitten's quote tells me that student teachers are actually instructed on how to lever religion into all the other subjects studied in what is known as the 'integrated curriculum'. This is sort of, I imagine, 'Wasn't God good to us by giving us the trees?' or 'God was with the Christians during the Crusades' (or, presumably, 'Allah was with the Muslims during the Crusades' if one is in the North Dublin Muslim National School or the The Muslim National School).

It has been said already, in this thread, that, whilst parents have both a Constitutional and legal right to withdraw their children from 'Religious Instruction', this is, in any realistic way, impossible because schools refuse to supervise such children and will not allow the children to be unsupervised, let alone the social stigma that such withdrawal invokes. However, there is no mechanism to protect children from the frequent exhortations for the children to believe that God created everything during all the other subjects. In fact, I would suggest that anyone interested in this topic takes a look at the NCCA Primary School Curriculum (http://www.ncca.ie/uploadedfiles/Curriculum/Intro_Eng.pdf). Flip to page 70 and perform the analysis yourself but I calculated that, in the Infant classes, religion and faith formation take up a minimum of 20.833% of the school day and, in the senior class, 16.667%. (I have only included 'Religious education' and 'Assembly time' as religion and faith formation and these figures exclude 'Breaks' and 'Recreation' but include 'Physical Education'.)

What these statistics do not include are: training for first communion, training for confirmation, pre/post lesson prayers, ad hoc visits from priests and/or bishops, visits from evangelical organisations and, of course, the constant reminders of how wonderful God is throughout the school day as part of the integrated curriculum.

Even taking the base figures of 20.833% and 16.667%, this is incredible. That over a fifth of the school day for 4/5-6/7 year-olds is spent on the indoctrination of kids way below any realistic age of reason is obscene.

Galvasean

robindch wrote: »

What do you mean by "integrate it"?

When I was in primary we would often draw Jesus in art class, sing about Jesus for music etc. I'm pretty sure some Bible stories crept into history lessons too.

JonPierson

Galvasean wrote: »

When I was in primary we would often draw Jesus in art class, sing about Jesus for music etc. I'm pretty sure some Bible stories crept into history lessons too.

You're quite lucky, then. When we had draws in my primary school, I usually ended up being Judas.

(OK, it would have better if you'd said 'When I was in primary I would often draw Jesus...' but it's not too bad!)

Oh, here's another one... I wonder what they draw in the Muslim schools?

wonderfulname

Galvasean wrote: »

When I was in primary we would often draw Jesus in art class, sing about Jesus for music etc. I'm pretty sure some Bible stories crept into history lessons too.

We had bible stories for a while, but I was a very inquisitive child, we got Roald Dahl stories once the teacher gave up on trying to answer my questions

I don't remember ever having to draw Jesus but we definitely had to sing about him, bible stories didn't sneak into history but Christian myths did, like the stories of saints and such.

darealtulip

Pwpane wrote: »

The syllabus is a list of what should be taught on the course. The course notes are notes given out by teachers/lecturers, or taken down by students at a class/lecture - i.e. what is actually taught about what is on the syllabus. There can be quite a big difference, depending on the lecturer. Exams are not part of a syllabus either. They are supposed to be set to test the aims and objectives of the syllabus but are often (as seems to be in the case of Hibernia) set to just test knowledge of what has been taught - one of the dangers of teachers examining their own students.

My understanding from a previous post is that the syllabus at Hibernia is fine (I think it was quoted), but that the course and exam are not (as seen in the lecture notes and exam questions).

I'm asking if the actual syllabi of the other colleges have been seen, and if the course notes have been seen. Only then can we really compare colleges. Verbal recollections are not really sufficient - people may have been absent or 'spacing' during the relevant time!

Otherwise we can't conclude, and put it about, that only Hibernia is at fault.

As far as I am aware now is that it is only the Hibernia College teaching this.

Jon Pierson is researching that at the moment but going on the comments here it is really only the Hibernia. I have not seen notes from other colleges yet so I can only go on the anecdotal evidence now.

I am very interested to see the other colleges notes though. Atheist Ireland will have a meeting with the college so maybe it gets clarified in that meeting

darealtulip

robindch wrote: »

What do you mean by "integrate it"?

Do you mean that religion is made an integral part of other topics? Say, reading bible stories in English, painting bible-related pictures in art, bible-related geography in geography and so on?

This is common practice in catholic schools and that is a huge problem. I opted my son out of religious classes without a problem. However when there were planting flowers in the garden the teacher would tell him "Look god created this beautiful flower" and they had no problem making him recite prayers as this was outside the religious class.

It is integrated into every subject and throughout the whole school day depending on how religious the teacher and principal are. And with the local priest being at the head of the Board of Management it is likely they are very religious indeed in some part of the country.