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Actually, I was taught evolution in high school in the ninth grade in the 
mid 60s in a small town in Western,Oklahoma. I can still remember Mr. 
Bruce's lesson on physical simliarlies between animals in different species 
and information on the on a move from classification by similarities (we did 
insects collections) to explanations for reasons for simlarities in 
scientific research. Yes, he used the word evolution. After that we 
dissected a frog. I can still visualize the heart, lungs, and especially the 
liver in that frog and fighting my lab partner, the class science nerd, to 
let me do part of it. I remember making the connection to those organs in 
the human body and wondering if my own liver looked greenish brownish yellow 
like the liver in the frog. . He took us on two field trips, two hours away, 
one to a zoo and other to the Wichita Mountains where we talked about the 
differences in the plants and animals there and the ones in the high plains 
where we lived and adaptation. (There were all those trees in those 
mountains. We didn't have that many trees!)  He was a marvelous teacher! He 
had a masters degree in biology because at that time smart farm kids could 
afford to go to a state university and study science. (Even if they had to 
eat ketchup on crackers when they ran out of money. He told the class, 
almost of all of whom had parents who hadn't attended college, about that, 
too.)

Was he particularly brave? I don't know. He had gotten in trouble in another 
school system for a frank discussion of reproduction. Thus, his lecture to 
us was literally on the birds and the bees and fortunately the 
aforementioned science nerd (who had built an RF transmitter to record 
teachers from class) got it taped. (I know. Probably not legal.)  It was 
hilariously funny and we all played to our parents who laughed, too.

To me the real issue is the vulnerability of public school teachers. I 
taught a couple of years between high school and grad school. I can still 
remember realizing half way through teaching a play that it had a rape scene 
and laying awake at night worrying and if a parent got upset the principal 
would offer not support.  The pressure on teachers is immense and they are 
not protected by adminstrators or covered by the same traditions/contractual 
agreements about academic freedom that college professors are. School 
goverance is a huge issue. Asking individual teachers to take all the hits 
without developing some systemic means of protecting them won't work. 
Teacher education and workshops will have little effort because they do not 
address the places in the system where the issues lie.

IMHO.

Carey

Carey Tisdal
Tisdal Consulting
[log in to unmask]
314-496-9097

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