Teaching the Three "R"s in the 21st Century

Once upon on a time, the main subjects we learned in school were called the three R’s, Readin’, “Ritin,” and Rithmetic. The students who finished their schooling in those times went on to become leaders in the private and public sectors, astronauts and used that foundation to construct their adult lives. While they were in school from the first day to that walk across the stage to receive their diploma, children were allowed to be children and reach maturity on a schedule mapped out by nature, not by bureaucrats and politicians. Now that schools and teaching have been “improved” by scores of bureaucrats and politicians who can talk Ed-Speak, (but probably have not or could not teach a class), with their proficiency tests, rubrics, outcomes and all of the other bells and whistles; the three R’s in use now are Repression, Restriction and Ritalin. The age of zero tolerance is here, applying equally to the 17 year old students soon- to- be- new- graduates and the newest five year old Kindergarten students.

Once it was essential for children to be children, but now they must grow up immediately, do not collect $200 while passing GO, but go straight to adulthood. The message is clear, we have found the enemy and it is our children, so no time to be a child and do those child-like things, being five is no excuse, shape up or ship out! We live in a time of diminished expectations, which are in some part our collective responsibility, for we traded oversight and looking out for each other; for every person for themselves and screw you. For this we must punish the young, by being lousy, exhausted or indifferent parents, teachers and administrators, while faulting the kids and subjecting them to the new “three R’s.”

The first “R,” Repression, the first order of the new order, start the regimentation early at five years of age. While we live in an era of colors to tell us how safe we are, from green to red, with green being safe and red being danger of an imminent terrorist attack, our children are now color coded in school for behavior with green for good and red for evildoer. The message being transmitted is stay in the green, stay away from red. Five year olds are being taught that authority figures have the power and that it is futile to resist, by acting like a child. The next “R” is restriction.

A child’s life is one of restriction, by always being in the “green,” and that acting like a child or a kid is definitely behavior rated “red” or future evildoer. Don’t point your finger at another kid and make a sound like a gun for that is definitely red behavior, playing and using your imagination is not allowed. Don’t get angry when you’re hurt by another child, for that is not allowed and is restricted. And if the threat of not being coded with the right color works, we’ll break out the chemistry set and cook up something to keep you down, repressed and restricted like “Ritalin.”

“Better living through Chemistry,” a marketing slogan that has brought us plastics, Agent Orange, polyvinylchloride, the Love Canal and a baker’s dozen of new forms of cancer, now gives us model children out of a bottle. A child acts up in class, he or she must have ADD or ADHD, quick get the magic bottle of Ritalin out and as quick a wink, the child is submissive and very much in the green. Of course, the child is actually in a zombie like state, more comatose than awake, but what a well behaved and trouble free student in the classroom. We live in a time of processed food, thought and behavior, why not processed children?

As our children act out the violent adult fantasies with each other from B movie scripts in class rooms, birthday parties and on playgrounds that are shoved down their throats by us, the adults. We naturally blame them, bemoaning and wondering aloud “why don’t our children act like us when we were children?”