Reading the Founding Fathers in High School

[erpowers]

I do not know about others, but when I was in high school, myself and the other students did not read the actual writings of the founding fathers. For a few years have thought that high school kids should be required to read the actual writings of out founding fathers. I think it would be good and informative for high schoolers to learn what the foundering fathers actually wrote. In addition, I think it would be good for high schoolers to learn the debate that went into the forming of this country. Furthermore, I think people would be less willing to accept the policies of politicians like George W. Bush if they actually knew what our founding fathers had written. It seems that people would be more willing to accept criticism of presidents, especially George W. Bush, if they knew that people like Thomas Jefferson said people should stand up against politicians if they knew or felt the politicans were being untruthful. Did anyone at DU read the writings of the foundig fathers when they were in high school? How do people feel about kids reading the writings of the founding fathers in high school?

[nadinbrzezinski]

1. In principle I agree

but your major problem will be the archaic use of the English Language

We have seen this, increasingly, as a problem

That is why it would be difficult to implement

That said, the RIGHT will never allow that to happen... they have invested too much in an uneducated and barely literate population

[pscot]

5. I don't think it's the language as much as the style

We're not talking Elizabethan English here. But the writers of the colonial era were in no hurry. There were no distractions. When your only means of communication is a letter, you really have to get it right, lest you be misunderstood. They tended to develope their thoughts in long, multi-clausal sentences, turning the subjects around and around, looking at them from various angles, and exploring all the facets of an idea. Given the propensity of kids to communicate in text messaging shorthand It's no wonder they have a hard time sitting still for, much less understanding the language, of the founders. I would guess vocabulary is also an issue.

[midlife_mo_Jo]

6. My homeschooled kids

are reading the Federalist and anti-Federalist papers this year, and other original documents. (Younger ones are in public school.)

I think you would be suprised how many homeschoolers on the right do read the original documents. They are very interested in classical education starting with Greece and Rome, and moving forward to colonial times with original documents. They are usually strict constructionists. They even study latin. I lean in that direction, but not nearly to the extent of most of them. I mean...it's not like Jefferson came down the moutain with the constitution on two stone tablets. :) Anyway, they interpret the constitution so strictly because they think it helps their cause. I lean in that direction because I'm afraid of what either side could do to our constitution and bill of rights over the decades. I fear the radical right and their theocracy, complete free market ideas, and I fear that the far left would trash the constitution and bill of rights if they could only get their own Castro.

shudder

[Bucky]

2. It puts some ca-ray-zee idears in them there kids' heads.

I have my 11th graders read the Founders'. In fact, next Monday we're going to reinact the whole freakin' Constitutional Convention. It takes about three days of class. It's a bitch to control, but they end up having a better appreciation of how the Constitution is a pragmatic political document, not divine law the way some folks like to imagine.

[Lars39]

3. For anyone interested: Jackdaws, Primary Source Documents

http://www.jackdaw.com/

[MisterP]

4. I got to play Elbridge Gerry at the Philadelphia Convention

we even mimed a brawl, and came out with a Constitution identical to the current one, except with 4-year Senatorial terms and the Bill of Rights included as another Article
but it was an accelerated middle-school class