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Common Core State Standard
SL.CCS.1/2/3/4 Grades 6-12: An essay of a current news event is provided for discussion to encourage participation, but also inspire the use of evidence to support logical claims using the main ideas of the article. Students must analyze background information provided about a current event within the news, draw out the main ideas and key details, and review different opinions on the issue. Then, students should present their own claims using facts and analysis for support. FOR THE WEEK OF NOV. 07, 2011 Dad's videotaped rage spurs discussion of when physical punishment is abuseOutside the home, punishment can include fines, suspension, job loss and prison. Can you find a news report involving one of those?
Now look for coverage of a non-family personal relationship, such as coach-athlete, boss-employee or teacher-student.
Try to spot another story about something that happened years ago and is getting fresh attention.
What happens between parent and child in the home usually stays in the home – or at least it did before YouTube. Now millions of people have seen a stark, disturbing video secretly recorded in 2004 by a Texas teen who says she was regularly whipped by her father, a family court judge. Hillary Adams' seven-minute video has gone viral, prompting outrage and debate about when discipline goes too far. (The video and news reports about it are disturbing and graphic, so no clip is embedded here.) The scenes, recorded when the daughter was 16 and turned on a hidden camera in her bedroom, show Judge William Adams cursing and using a belt to whip her for illegally downloading music and games. "In my mind," he told a Texas TV reporter, "I haven't done anything wrong other than discipline my child after she was caught stealing." For her part, the 23-year-old daughter says she posted the saved video recently because of continuing family tension. "The disputes and the harassment were escalating," she said on NBC's Today show last week, "and finally it was just the straw that broke the camel's back." Her parents are now divorced.
While some specialists condemn harsh physical discipline and child-safety advocates say Judge Adams should lose his county job, many Americans defend the father in online comments and interviews. They believe it's a parental responsibility to shape character through discipline, including what's called corporal punishment (spanking, slapping or whipping). State laws allow broad leeway unless parents cause serious injury. Even some teachers can get physical: All Southern states except Virginia allow corporal punishment in school. Daughter says: "I told him [her dad] I had the video and he brushed it off. He didn't seem to think anything of it, and basically dared me to post it." -- Hillary Adams on Today show, Nov. 3 Father says: "I did lose my temper, but I've since apologized. It looks worse than it is." -- Judge William Adams last week on KRIS-TV in Corpus Christi, Texas Researcher says: "For a lot of people, this is child abuse, not corporal punishment, but . . . this would not qualify as a crime or child abuse in any state." -- David Finkelhor, director of the Crimes Against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire Front Page Talking Points is written by
Alan Stamm for NIEonline.com, Copyright 2024
Front Page Talking Points Archive►Schools vs. phones: Bans surge to keep focus on learning rather than screens ►Election drama: Democratic convention will pick a nominee as Biden ends campaign against Trump ►President Biden, 81, resists calls to let a younger Democrat run against Donald Trump ►Turning point: Supreme Court says presidents have 'absolute immunity' for official acts ►First Biden-Trump debate of 2024 airs Thursday from Georgia ►Health experts monitor the jump of bird flu to cows and a few farm hands, but see no wide risk ►Negro Leagues stars from a bygone era gain new standing in Major League Baseball records ►Justice Samuel Alito adds two flags to Supreme Court ethics storms |
Step onto any school campus and you'll feel its energy. Each school is turbocharged with the power of young minds, bodies, hearts and spirits.
Here on the Western Slope, young citizens are honing and testing their skills to take on a rapidly changing world. Largely thanks to technology, they are in the midst of the most profound seismic shift the world has ever seen.
Perhaps no time in our history has it been more important to know what our youth are thinking, feeling and expressing.
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