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Florida Bans Math Propaganda Textbooks
The Left is relentless in pushing its agenda, particularly on our children, who are vulnerable and naïve about the effects of propaganda in the schools. Gov. Ron DeSantis continues to hold the Left and its cohorts accountable for their actions and agenda, and they continue to misrepresent what they are doing.
The latest salvo from the Florida Department of Education and the legislature has been the rejection of math books being offered to the state. Propaganda in math books, you ask? How is that possible? The political Left has found a way. They cloak their teaching in the framework of critical race theory, by offering euphemisms for that term. Worse yet, they have taken a subject that was probably relatively harmless in its original form—Social and Emotional Learning Theory—and have redefined it through the racist content of the class. Before I explain how this manipulation of our education has evolved, I’d like to explain the actions that the FL Dept. of Education took just over a week ago:
Last Friday, the FLDOE announced in a press release that it is rejecting 54 of the 132 new math textbooks submitted for approval this year—the highest number of banned textbooks in the state’s history. The press release was titled ‘Florida rejects publishers’ attempts to indoctrinate students.’
According to the FLDOE, what made them reject all these books were references to Critical Race Theory, inclusions of Common Core, and ‘the unsolicited addition of’ Social Emotional Learning. Some books simply didn’t match Florida’s Benchmarks for Excellent Student Thinking, a set of standards set by the state.
The publishers that were affected were Accelerate Learning, Bedford Freeman and Worth Publishing Group, Big Ideas Learning LLC, Cengage Learning, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Math Nation, McGraw Hill LLC, and Savvas Learning Company LLC.
Gov. DeSantis has made his protest against these books eminently clear:
On Monday, DeSantis tweeted: ‘Math is about getting the right answer, not about feelings or ideologies. In Florida, we will be educating our children, not indoctrinating them.’
Works for me.
The FLDOE gives several examples on its website, but this is one of the most blatant:
Under an exercise supposed to be teaching students about polynomials, a kind of mathematical expression, the first few words introducing the teaching instructions are highlighted as guilty of mentioning the FLDOE’s ‘prohibited topics.’
‘What? Me? Racist?,’ read the instructions, before mentioning that the students will be working with a mathematical model measuring bias that has been used by over two million people to test their racial prejudice through the Implicit Association Test.
Once the State of Florida realized that, in spite of the Left’s protests to the contrary, the FLDOE saw that CRT (without using the term) was appearing under the guise of Social and Emotional Learning. The proponents of SEL state that teaching this curriculum is helpful to children:
Social-emotional learning (SEL) describes the mindsets, skills, attitudes, and feelings that help students succeed in school, career, and life, such as growth mindset, grit, and sense of belonging at school. Educators use many names for these skills, such as ‘non-cognitive skills,’ ‘soft skills,’ ‘21st century skills,’ ‘character strengths,’ and ‘whole child.’ Social-emotional learning is an important part of a well-rounded education. Research shows that SEL is an important lever for boosting academic achievement. Positive social-emotional skills are also correlated with improved attendance and reduced disciplinary incidents.
It sounds pretty harmless, doesn’t it? The description leaves out the latest infiltration of the focus on racism:
Our mission at Empowering Education is to enable learning through social and emotional learning. That includes helping children wrestle with the racism and injustice of the world, learn to appreciate differences, and develop the skills to resolve conflicts. We need SEL more than ever so that our children grow up in a world where they feel valued, respected, and heard no matter their skin color.
Fortunately for the citizens of Florida, Gov. DeSantis and his Department of Education are well aware of the insidious nature of the Left’s education curriculum.
They are adamant about forcing their agenda on all of us.
We all need to keep a watchful eye on the Left’s efforts to brainwash our children.
Published in Education
But is it being rejected, or merely not being used as part of the curriculum?
Maus? It’s being removed from the school library in a district in Florida. A school district in Tennessee removed it from the curriculum because:
Meanwhile, in Oklahoma the State Senate has proposed a bill where:
Is it just me or can anybody else hear CAIR and the Satanic Temple clearing their throats and speed dialling their lawyers?
It is a well known fact that 6 is afraid of 7 because 7 8 9. This is clear allusion to cannibalism and allusions to cannibalism in mathematics is, of course, racist…but also offensive to hardcore vegans, PETA, and other animal rights activists. I say remove the number 7 altogether and substitute it with a new and different number…either or both Zirven or Zirzem might work. Don’t even get me started on the entitlement and privilege of 7 while playing craps or slot machines!
They’re not banned. They’re removed from school libraries, and for good reason. They are not literature that has stood the test of time, but rather are attempts to normalize deviant behavior and expose kids to things they’re too young to be exposed to. It’s school. But here’s a (partial, off the top of my head) list of books the Left wants banned:
To Kill a Mockingbird
Huckleberry Finn
Dr Seuss
Maus
Of Mice and Men
Everybody’s got it in for Maus for some reason.
When I was in high school (at the turn of the century), there were a couple different kinds of reading assignments.
We had lists where we could pick and choose what we would read or options allowed to choose from and others that were required reading.
Two books that were required when I was 16 that stood out were Huxley’s A Brave New World and Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings.
The stand out because, for the former, another student’s parents became outraged that their daughter was being forced to read it for a grade. The girl graduated in the top 1% of our high school class so grades were a big deal. She was also the most modest girl in school. The 8 year olds having sex and soma orgies were a bridge to far for them. For some reason, I liked the book and my discernment bells did not go off. They weren’t detailed and the author was negative about these things.
However, the latter of the two is the only book in high school I read cliff notes on. And that says something considering I read Great Expectations cover to cover. The descriptive scene of her father raping her in childish language was too far for me. They were details my 16 year old self did not need. I was confused about the “wiggling worm” until it hit with stunning clarity and I was repulsed. Huxley never went so far.
These books are not “banned,” however students’ grades should not be dictated by the students’ and their parents’ willingness to be exposed to some of these books. The students should have options that range in innocence and age appropriate exposure, but it seems to me books were being selected without consideration for innocence that still can exist in high school.
When I hear leftist media outlets claiming “banned,” I seriously doubt they are using that word correctly. They are still accessible and maybe even to high school students. But using them as required curriculum reading is not allowed. And that’s a far cry from “banned.”
The best part is the [sarcasm] incredible subtlety [/sarcasm] of the racism baked into the examples.
But but but but but this is an attack on free speech according to the David french right wing eunuchs. We must allow the left to turn our kids into gender confused communists from the age of 4 or we aren’t being true to our principles.
Someone needs to get the “Like” buttons working again.
This must have been what the professor (American citizen) in my class referred to last week. He held up the book from which he took materials for our lecture and said that Desantis would probably ban it. I wasn’t sure what the heck he was talking about. Now that I know, I’d like to ask him if he’s aware of the sexualization that’s occurring in American elementary schools (I’ll be prepared if the topic comes up again in the future). My school is in Tokyo and his kids are in primary schools here, so I doubt he has a clue about what’s really happening in the US. Since this class is part of a university’s masters program, even if it were happening in FL, Desantis of course wouldn’t care.
As for woke textbooks, if there currently are no acceptable alternatives to them, what should be done about it? Much like Fox News is an alternative to the MSM, there should be alternatives to what is on offer by the CRT-ingrained textbook manufacturers. If none exist, there’s a huge untapped market just waiting for the right materials.
There is one other option that comes to mind: what’s wrong with the old textbooks that we used when we were young? If there are copyright issues, one just has to go back further until the copyrights no longer apply. Someone just needs to find the books online or scan them and, bam, they’ll have lots of options that are free of Critical© pedagogy.
My recollection is that there are more books that aren’t “banned,” than that are. So they have plenty of options.
Related to this, I cannot recommend enough last night’s Bill Cunningham monologue. It’s a national Sunday show out of WLW in Cincinnati. I get it off of the iHeart app. All of his monologues are excellent every single week. He he is a lawyer and he has very sensible conservative analysis. Frequently he opens his second hour with one as well.
I suspect the publishers will compromise because they don’t want to lose the business. They’d probably rather have some of the woke angry with them than give up the profits. Otherwise, I’d be delighted to see new publishers fill the gap!
That’s the hideen racism of Affirmative Action. AA started as a way to get qualified minroties in positions. That’s been done. However, AA is now a way to get unqualified minorties equal footing with (and in some cases, ahead of) qualified whites.
And we haven’t even talked about Asians yet . . .
Which is why standardized tests must be abolished!
Announce that they are racist … nah.
Announce studies show that they are racist.
Of, course, soon we will not have to worry about racist word problems because the kids won’t be able to read.
That leaves us with the systemic racism in the base-ten Arabic numerals. We need to decide whether whole numbers are more racist than mixed numbers (that term will need to go) because they suggest a construct of precision susceptible to hegemonic conceptualizations. Or are fractions more racist because some white-adjacent Asian kids and a few Jewish kids will be the only ones left who know how to use them?
We will likely need to replace “8” because of its use by white supremacists (“H” being the eighth letter of the alphabet…). Maybe 7.9 or just skip it when kids learn to count.
In the coming new world will we really need more numbers than one, two, three, many? That system served our ancestors for many thousands of years. If teens can do cave paintings corresponding to such numbers, they graduate.
Studies show that literacy is racist.
No. It’s just proof that math is racist. Just like saying that expecting employees to show up to work on time is a white supremacist idea.
That’s what they call “non-linear” thinking. See, rational thought is just another racist and white supremacist idea.
Truthfully, I don’t think that most lefties believe any of this nonsense. Any more than they believe in 300 genders or “fluid” pronouns. I think they just dream up the most ridiculous ideas they can, and then challenge you to disagree. They are demanding that you profess your admiration for the sartorial splendor of the Emperor’s New Clothes. If you refuse, they attack you. And that’s what they really want. An excuse to attack. But they also know that many people will just take the course of least resistance, and say the the Emperor’s New Clothes are very beautiful. That’s how they get converts.
They have to do things to move things more left all of the time. Excuses for more government or to tip voting in their favor. Republicans that think things are like the Scoop Jackson 70s are idiots.
You crack me up, OB. In a very sick way! How do you think up this stuff? Actually it’s kind of scary…
An intriguing thought, Larry. There may be some truth to this point, especially with the radical Left.
It’s their shibboleth. In both the modern and biblical senses of the word.
There was a loud and immediate call for examples of the allegedly offending texts, as I think is appropriate. Those examples have now been released. I find it interesting that, among all of the articles I’ve found that talk about the examples, none linked to the Florida Department of Education website that contained the examples. Rather, each mentioned the same two math problems.
I’ve looked through all the comments on this post, and the original post, to see if there’s a link to the examples. I didn’t see one — but easily could have missed it — so I’m posting one here for anyone who is interested. Apologies if this is redundant.
Florida Department of Education – examples of problematic texts
I would like to see more examples, both to reassure myself that Florida made a good call (which I suspect they did) and to provide more grist for the reclaim-the-culture mill.
No promises, but it looks to me like these guys unlocked this interview with David Stockman that I keep telling people about. People hate him. I’m not saying he’s perfect. But what is he wrong about? The GOP and the GOPe gott a bunch of people to idealize about stuff and it does not work.
https://www.realvision.com/shows/grant-williams/videos/grant-williams-in-conversation-with-david-stockman
Thanks for the link. I looked at and compared the math textbooks accepted vs not recommended and the same publishers exist on both lists.
This isn’t publisher specific. And this feels very much like someone is making a big deal out of some stuff.
I have learned that Florida’s DOE opens up registration to be a curriculum reviewer and that they accept community feedback when reviewing curriculum. They have a nice little system for community involvement and feedback.
I had friends in High School, back in the 1970s, and we did the “one, two three, many…” thing back and forth, regularly.
Multiple examples would be good, but really, especially when there are multiple options, even one CRT shibboleth should be enough to disqualify a textbook. As would a single pornographic image, or what-have-you. Otherwise, what, go through all the books and tape over the CRT/nudity in each one?
I’m not interested in multiple examples per textbook, but rather in examples of what was deemed disqualifying in various textbooks. If 20 textbooks are excluded, it would be nice to see roughly 20 examples of why those textbooks were excluded. Not necessary: I’m comfortable with Florida having a broad latitude in its textbook approval process. But it would be nice ammunition with which to engage the opposing side in the culture war.