UK Children to copy Muslim prayer for handwriting practice

[Veritas]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=473401&in_page_id=1770

Imagine asking Muslim children to practice their handwriting by copying Christian or Jewish prayers. Do you think their parents would get upset? (Actually, I can't imagine children being asked to copy "prayers" anyway)

 

[PoliticalGuru]

The question I'm not sure about here is: Was this a translation of it into English or just in Arabic, because I don't see how tracing a prayer in Arabic handwritting helps their handwritting if they haven't even mastered english handwritting?

 

[Rebekka]

I personally wouldn't choose prayers, but arabic is definitely beautiful and needs a steady hand, so I can understand why they would use arabic for improving children's handwriting. Over here, most kids' handwriting is pretty bad, and either calligraphy or something else like arabic might be a good way to get a better handwriting. My school used calligraphy and quills to teach kids patience and fine subtle hand movements. And it worked - most kids in my class had a very good handwriting, and all of the kids had legible handwritings. Understanding of arabic is not necessary to copy a text. You just need to look closely.

 

[PoliticalGuru]

I personally wouldn't choose prayers, but arabic is definitely beautiful and needs a steady hand, so I can understand why they would use arabic for improving children's handwriting. Over here, most kids' handwriting is pretty bad, and either calligraphy or something else like arabic might be a good way to get a better handwriting. My school used calligraphy and quills to teach kids patience and fine subtle hand movements. And it worked - most kids in my class had a very good handwriting, and all of the kids had legible handwritings. Understanding of arabic is not necessary to copy a text. You just need to look closely.

I guess that's maybe why she thought it was a good idea, I would just think that the cirriculum would have expected her to do exercises in english first.

 

[Veritas]

The question I'm not sure about here is: Was this a translation of it into English or just in Arabic, because I don't see how tracing a prayer in Arabic handwritting helps their handwritting if they haven't even mastered english handwritting?

It was for a handwriting class, if you read the article. The kids are studying Islam in their RE (religious education) class and I guess the teacher wanted it to be something relevant. However, I fail to see how writing these words make it so:

The Call To Prayer copied by ten-year-olds at Newlands Primary School in Wakefield, West Yorkshire, included the lines "Allah is the greatest" and "there is no god but Allah".

Regardless of the intent, this smacks of indoctrination. None of the students is Muslim. Why not a Christian prayer instead?

 

[français]

They should have at least made the students write a Psalm or 2 in Hebrew!

I am getting so sick and tired of muslims coming to the West and trying to tell us what is right or wrong. If they were ever told to write from the Bible, they would riot and kill innocent people. Yet they expect us to write from their quran. Nope. Not going to happen.

It is so sad to hear stories like this..

 

[nyj]

Some religions are more equal than others.

 

[Sandlapper277]

A teacher with bad judgement. Considering how often this happens, why are we still surprised? Even if it's only one teacher out of every 5,000 with bad judgment, that's still an awful lot of teachers.

If it was in Arabic, I ahve to think Rebekka has a point, if a kid has the fine motor control to copy Arabic, writing in English shouldn't be a problem. Did the teacher know what it said, or just decide to use the first thing in Arabic she could find?

 

[JoshuaCh1v9]

OK....for the benefit of all my American friends

I am

a) British

and

b) a parent (with a daughter about the same age as these kids)

I am not offended by this. As has been pointed out, this was an RE lesson, and they were learning of the Muslim faith. If that was my daughter in that situation, I would have no problem with it, any more than if, when she was a little older, she was asked to read Das Kapital or Mein kampf as part of history studies.

These angry and outraged parents (both of them from what I could see) are, I'm sure, re enforcing the truths of the Christian faith to their offspring as we speak......(and pigs might fly as well)

Some things to bear in mind here as well folks.

The article came from The Sun newspaper, who, well...lets just say that they are not known for letting something as trivial as the truth get in the way of a good story

Sensationalism is kinda there strong suit. Balanced and fair reporting of facts is not.

It was claimed that there were no Muslim kids in the class. Well, bearing in mind what I said about The Sun, I know Wakefield pretty well and frankly would be amazed if this was in fact the case. It would also be pretty surprising if there were any Christian kids in the class as well.

To use a British expression, this is a classic case of this weeks headlines being next weeks chip wrappings.

Crisis over....

 

[Veritas]

OK....for the benefit of all my American friends

I am

a) British

and

b) a parent (with a daughter about the same age as these kids)

I am not offended by this. As has been pointed out, this was an RE lesson, and they were learning of the Muslim faith. If that was my daughter in that situation, I would have no problem with it, any more than if, when she was a little older, she was asked to read Das Kapital or Mein kampf as part of history studies.

These angry and outraged parents (both of them from what I could see) are, I'm sure, re enforcing the truths of the Christian faith to their offspring as we speak......(and pigs might fly as well)

Some things to bear in mind here as well folks.

The article came from The Sun newspaper, who, well...lets just say that they are not known for letting something as trivial as the truth get in the way of a good story

Sensationalism is kinda there strong suit. Balanced and fair reporting of facts is not.

It was claimed that there were no Muslim kids in the class. Well, bearing in mind what I said about The Sun, I know Wakefield pretty well and frankly would be amazed if this was in fact the case. It would also be pretty surprising if there were any Christian kids in the class as well.

To use a British expression, this is a classic case of this weeks headlines being next weeks chip wrappings.

Crisis over....

You know, this same thing could have happened and maybe has happened in the US. The point is and you very conveniently overlooked it is, would Muslim parents have allowed their children to copy Christian or Jewish prayers for handwriting practice? I think you know the answer to this. Further, what was actually copied is offensive to at least some Christians, though perhaps not you personally. Do their views not count?

BTW, I do agree with your assesment of the Sun, which is nothing more than tabloid journalism at its worst. Frankly and no diss intended, I find most British newspapers, online or otherwise, very tabloid oriented compared to say most US Newspapers.

 

[MikeK]

The point is and you very conveniently overlooked it is, would Muslim parents have allowed their children to copy Christian or Jewish prayers for handwriting practice?

I don't know. Are we trying to emulate Muslim parents now?

 

[Veritas]

I don't know. Are we trying to emulate Muslim parents now?

You're missing the point, too. No surprise there.

 

[MikeK]

Umm...read your quote. You said that was the point. According to what you clearly labeled as "the point", we should care what Muslim parents do. I don't.

 

[JoshuaCh1v9]

You know, this same thing could have happened and maybe has happened in the US. The point is and you very conveniently overlooked it is, would Muslim parents have allowed their children to copy Christian or Jewish prayers for handwriting practice? I think you know the answer to this. Further, what was actually copied is offensive to at least some Christians, though perhaps not you personally. Do their views not count?

BTW, I do agree with your assesment of the Sun, which is nothing more than tabloid journalism at its worst. Frankly and no diss intended, I find most British newspapers, online or otherwise, very tabloid oriented compared to say most US Newspapers.

Better get used to that kind of gutter press. The guy who owns the Sun just bought the Wall Street Journal.

As for you question about Muslim parents, you need to remember that the vast majority of Muslim kids attend mainstream state schools. The RE classes in these schools teach kids about ALL major religions, so it is highly likely that Muslim children do indeed copy out Christian and Jewish scriptures as part of this.

Of course there will be the extreme Muslims who will object, just as there are extreme Christians here objecting, but the vast majority of parents, of whatever faith, will simply shrug and say "Yes? And the problem here is?"

 

[Veritas]

Better get used to that kind of gutter press. The guy who owns the Sun just bought the Wall Street Journal.

As for you question about Muslim parents, you need to remember that the vast majority of Muslim kids attend mainstream state schools. The RE classes in these schools teach kids about ALL major religions, so it is highly likely that Muslim children do indeed copy out Christian and Jewish scriptures as part of this.

Of course there will be the extreme Muslims who will object, just as there are extreme Christians here objecting, but the vast majority of parents, of whatever faith, will simply shrug and say "Yes? And the problem here is?"

So are you implying that because I object, I'm "extreme"?

PS. My understanding is that the relationship with the WSJ will be "arms length" so as to not compromise the integrity of the paper. The WSJ has historically been a conservative paper focusing on financial, ecomical and cultural issues. Rarely any tabloidism. Better stay that way......

 

[JoshuaCh1v9]

So are you implying that because I object, I'm "extreme"?

PS. My understanding is that the relationship with the WSJ will be "arms length" so as to not compromise the integrity of the paper. The WSJ has historically been a conservative paper focusing on financial, ecomical and cultural issues. Rarely any tabloidism. Better stay that way......

Murdoch can't interfere with editorial content.

But he does decide who gets to be editor

Writings on the wall there I'm afraid

 

[Veritas]

Murdoch can't interfere with editorial content.

But he does decide who gets to be editor

Writings on the wall there I'm afraid

Trouble is if he messes with the formula too much, he'll lose subscribers and ad revenue. My guess is he'll be smart enough to not change things around a lot. There's plenty of popular columnists.

Speaking of, I'm very fond of Melanie Phillips of the Daily Mail. She's a bright spot on a dark night. I love her take on Islamofacisim and how it's running/ruining the UK.

 

[JoshuaCh1v9]

Trouble is if he messes with the formula too much, he'll lose subscribers and ad revenue. My guess is he'll be smart enough to not change things around a lot. There's plenty of popular columnists.

Speaking of, I'm very fond of Melanie Phillips of the Daily Mail. She's a bright spot on a dark night. I love her take on Islamofacisim and how it's running/ruining the UK.

Sadly you appear to have gone from one end of the jouralistic spectrum (and I use that word very loosely inrelation to The Sun) to the other.

Your average Sun reader doesn't give a stuff what is taught in scholl as long as the teacher has large 'assets' (a generalisaion, but not a massive one) to Daily Mail readers who still advocate flogging for minor parking offences.

I appreciate that it's hard to assess the situation properly from several thousand miles away but neither of these papers reflect either the true situation or mainstream public opinion.

There ARE fanatical Muslim extremists in the UK, but they represent a very small minority of Muslims, just as the American funded IRA represented but a small fraction of Irish people for so many years.

By far and away the vast majority of Muslim people in this country want no truck with theses people and live peaceful, hardworking lives alongside non Muslim friends and neighbours.

American paranoia on this subject just does not reflect the reality of life in Britain.

 

[Da_Funkey_Gibbon]

Oh I don't know, sure columnists are usually overly opinionated, but to deny there are serious problems in sections of the Muslim community is just idle.

I agree that only a minority of them may be blowing up tubes or organising honour killings, but the fact that its happening at all is worrying, and the amount of blindness to the problem in the Muslim community, as well as widespread complacency, particularly in regards to honour killings, is concerning.

I'm not saying that the Muslim community isn't an asset to Britain, I just think that ignoring the problems exasterbates it more than anything else. The Muslims need to get their house in order, just like the Irish Catholics did. (And if you think the support for the IRA was anything like negligable, I think you need to look up the history books again.)

Sure, all newspapers are sensationalist, but it doesn't mean there isn't a point to be had in them.

EDIT: In fact, googling her - I think she's not hugely off the mark... I'm not sure I agree with her conclusions, it doesn't seem like she has any real ones, but I think she has the cause down better than most.. or perhaps most just have the tact not the spell it out...

http://www.melaniephillips.com/articles-new/?p=341

 

[Veritas]

Sadly you appear to have gone from one end of the jouralistic spectrum (and I use that word very loosely inrelation to The Sun) to the other.

Not really. The Daily Mail has plenty of gossip and trash.

Your average Sun reader doesn't give a stuff what is taught in scholl as long as the teacher has large 'assets' (a generalisaion, but not a massive one) to Daily Mail readers who still advocate flogging for minor parking offences.

A complete exaggeration! Get real!

I appreciate that it's hard to assess the situation properly from several thousand miles away but neither of these papers reflect either the true situation or mainstream public opinion

.

Subtle put down, eh? We live in a global world and although I don't purport to know the nuances of British life, I think the access to a variety of medium and opinion give me just as much a right to my views as you.

There ARE fanatical Muslim extremists in the UK, but they represent a very small minority of Muslims, just as the American funded IRA represented but a small fraction of Irish people for so many years.

This point really irritates me. You see, even if as has been determined that only 20% of Muslims are Islamofacists, that still amounts to thousands of people. It only took a half a dozen to bring down the Twin Towers.

By far and away the vast majority of Muslim people in this country want no truck with theses people and live peaceful, hardworking lives alongside non Muslim friends and neighbours.

Ah yes, those peaceful Muslims. The same ones who silently support the radicals by not vocally opposing them. I understand that they fear for their lives if they speak out, but somebody's got to. A few do, but far too few.

American paranoia on this subject just does not reflect the reality of life in Britain

I wouldn't call it "paranoia". I'd say it's more realism and genuine concern for the future of Europe and thereby the world including the US. Britain simply has not done enough to ensure the safety of its citizens and the perpetuation of its Western Culture. Although I'd love to visit the UK one day, I fear the country I want to see no longer exists.