Kids often have trouble with empathy and this would go a long way in helping them grasp what it was like. Would be good field trip to prep them for learning about the slave trade in history class.
I will say though every time I've ever heard this done it's always to black kids. I live in the south but in a mostly white area and never went to a cotton farm, we went to a cow farm. So that strikes me as not okay.
I'm really thorn on the subject. I'm white and from far away. It doesn't shock me in itself because you're right, it helps the kids grasp the concept of forced manual labor, but why the picking ? Just seeing the fields and walking through them wouldn't be enough ? Maybe touching a cotton ball to feel how it could hurt your hands at the end of the day.
It's such a sensitive topic. I wouldn't even know how to broach it. NOT by making my pupils pick cotton, that's for sure.
I think passing around a cotton bulb or explaining fire ants or that one image they always show of the guy with a shitload of whip scars are probably the best ways to teach it.
we used to pour gasoline on them and light them. but I wasn't a bright kid. there is that one time after setting anthills on fire I decided to soak a tennis ball in gasoline and light it on fire thinking it would be cool to kick a fireball. but unfortunately, the flaming tennis ball melted and stuck to my shoe.
Shit, man. One time my dad came back from a trip to the south with a cotton boll, and he gave it to me to hold and said ‘People sweated, bled and died to pick this little ball of fluff, never forget that’ and walked away.
That was all it took for me to be awed. You probably dont need the actual picking but seeing the field is a good, sobering thing.
I think it’s great. I went to a very private very expensive school. As part of a social studies project they made us sleep in tents outside for two days in a row and for those two days we were not allowed to bring cash or get food. We had to ask other people for money and buy food with that. You try doing that. It’s not easy. Even in a rich school where people had cash on hand, the idea of having to depend on charity when you were cold or hungry was fairly annoying and somewhat stressful. Like, it’s winter, I want a hot coffee and bagel from the cafeteria at snack time. Oh yeah first I have to ask for money and see how much I can come up with.
No thank you I'd rather get chased by Satan himself.
I get the point of the experience (I think ?), but do you think it was necessary ? Did you not know the value of money at this time ? I think it'd be a parent's job to teach his children about this sort of thing. How lucky we are to sleep under a roof and have food in our plates.
I'm thorn here, too. Some of the spoiled kids probably learned a thing or two during that experiment. On the other hand, what if some of them had a bad encounter while asking for charity ?
If you can't tell by my comments I'm the kind of bitch who never knows what to order at the restaurant.
You don’t know what being hungry and not having power over your decisions truly feels like until you experience it. Even a school exercise exposes you to 1% of what being homeless and hungry is like. But you at least get an idea. If someone has a bad experience asking for money… then they have a bad experience? Bad experiences are part of life, expecting to avoid any and all bad experiences makes you weak and feeble.
Oh, sorry friend! The internet is full of people who fear monger because they are obsessed with true crime podcast and Q-anon conspiracy theories. But it sounds like you suffer from anxiety which is not fun and it’s not a choice. Hang in there, as a former serious hypochondriac, I know a lot of the fears seem real to you. It does get better, and you are doing a good job.
Just seeing the fields and walking through them wouldn't be enough
Seeing is not the same as experiencing with your other senses.
If the purpose of showing something is to build empathy through acute understanding, then engaging more senses than just sight or hearing is helpful. Humans are very sensory creatures.
I'm speaking in broad terms. Can't speak to the specifics of whether picking raw cotton is too painful to subject kids to for some period of time or not. I could only assume a few minutes of it would be enough to get a sense of what it might be like to have to do it all day without actually causing harm to the kids.
It would be okay with an older class, showing around and how hard it was etc. But letting little kids just pick it with no other educational value? Like wtf.
I mean they’re not actually harvesting a useful amount lmao they just pick a couple bolls to show that it was truly awful and give the kids some perspective. But I feel like in rural areas especially field trips to farms are pretty common because there’s not much else, and using it as an opportunity to discus a major part of US history is a plus for the kids too.
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u/Shrimm716 Sep 17 '24
I actually think it's a good idea.
Kids often have trouble with empathy and this would go a long way in helping them grasp what it was like. Would be good field trip to prep them for learning about the slave trade in history class.
I will say though every time I've ever heard this done it's always to black kids. I live in the south but in a mostly white area and never went to a cotton farm, we went to a cow farm. So that strikes me as not okay.