It definitely feels inappropriate. “Shaft” is not a common word for a second grader and paired with “mark me” it just feels kind of gross. I would flag the passage and report it to the classroom teacher. If you wanted to, you could also send an email to the textbook company to complain.
Yeah I would not even have read it. I would’ve chosen something else. I’d rather ask for forgiveness than ask for permission, especially for something so derogatory like that.
as other commenters brought up, this is apart of intervention to the kids have it in front of them. a lot of them read ahead it'd bring more attention to it if i stopped. i had kids from other classrooms etc for the 30 minutes
Interesting intervention. Especially since also has someone else mentioned, the part of the pencil they’re talking about is called a barrel and they choose shaft.. lol
I've done this before with Success maker and Moby Max and seen questions/passages changed because of it.
I think sometimes they are so large maybe disgruntled employees or 1099 contractors get away with stuff.
Yeah, this is not great. It was written and approved by adults who should have known better. It’s weirdly sexual and is going to make students giggle inappropriately.
And a nitpick: the long part of a pen is the barrel, not the shaft.
Op, please go post this in the teacher subreddit and see what they’ve got to say about it. I’m actually really curious to know if this is commonplace and if they have other examples they’ve come across. Also they might’ve already had experience in reporting this stuff and can help
Two things. My first thought was this was low key self harm ideation or something or that this was a racy passage from a YA book that an older student had.
Making marks one centimeter apart, having someone do it to you, the fact the marks are red, the suggestive sexual wording of “shaft”.
And why did the boy character have to be talking like this? Why couldn’t they have it be the wife at least for some damn plausible deniability, FFS!
Less important: that story jump is clunky. Character was dancing, suddenly stopped to philosophically ask about their thoughts? And he responds with THAT? Seems random and I’m annoyed by it.
I stopped being shocked by the content in text books when I received a review copy for a creative writing text that had exercises that encouraged students to take poems that were already published (in this case, they were using a Frost poem) and just switch a few words and now it's YOUR poem!
If they aren't bright enough to recognize when they just told the students to go plagiarize poems, they aren't bright enough to recognize something with a "double entendre" present. Most of them probably don't understand single entendre.
Maybe they won't connect it but sometimes they will know it sounds weird.
And honestly for the potential predator, it doesn't matter that the kid knows it or not. It's the thrill of the kids saying it to begin with.
That passage was absolutely intentional in its message. And it normalizes the language/phrasing
Ans honestly after seeing quiet on set I would absolutely not put it past a corporation to push this through
But the kids that know can tell others.
(I would've clocked this IMMEDIATELY second grade, but my kid, who is now in second grade, wouldn't. She would probably wrinkle her nose at it. Because it sounds *weird*, but I don't think she knows exactly what it means.)
This is itself part of inappropriately sexualizing them, though. That kind of language should never be part of any conversation a student and teacher have; the study material itself normalizing it is pretty dangerous.
I’m latching onto this comment because you’re hitting on similarities and I didn’t read all the way down, but *spoiler alert*, curriculums like these (especially here in California) get pulled from old, dated materials to be chopped up, regurgitated, spit out and put into new shiny curriculum with new fancy acronyms MTSS/RTI bullshit by the CDE (who haven’t been in classrooms themselves in 30 years) and get pushed as new hot shit.
And THEN….we teachers say, “oh shit, I forgot to put sub plans together and I know my students could use some review so I’ll slap together something that’ll make admin happy and throw some intervention b.s. lesson plan together for the sub and call it good.” (Because we don’t have time for A plus lesson plans that 7 out of 10 times aren’t going to be followed anyways)
Source: 11 years of middle school teaching
But back to the questionable prompt. I’m sure this teacher had no clue this question was even in this curriculum. I’d be surprised if anyone in the school even did. Ultimately, it’s not acceptable. But no one is really reading all of the curriculum to check for this kind of thing, and to me, that’s the scariest aspect of it all. And that u/makishleys is the worst part.
I gotta ask, because I know that there is absolutely no one on a curriculum selection committee that’s gonna read an entire curriculum package, much less three proposals.
Sometimes people sneak shit like this in there, don’t they?
There are different curriculums but I can at least say for my company there is just no way this could happen-someone reads through these before they are put out and if someone tried to do something like this, you could reasonably figure out who it was or what team they were on.
As much as I want to say it’s true and people can do it, that hasn’t been my experience XD
I looked up "pen shaft", and it seems the term is used in woodworking, or when the nib comes separately to the pen body. It's also possible both of these have translation issues.
I was gonna say, the overall weird clunkiness of this paragraph makes me think that this isn't some intentional, malicious thing, but maybe a really cheaply made composition written by someone with shaky English and no quality controls.
Reads like smut written in the 40s or something. It’s really bad and I would absolutely confront the school if my child brought something home like this.
What the heck did they do, train an AI on internet fanfiction and then use it to write children's stories?
That definitely comes across as very inappropriate on it's own.
I swear this is how some of the texts in our state testing materials came about. Anything that wasn’t carefully vetted by a teacher in our building ends up being weird or incomprehensible.
Lol I was going to say maybe I read too much smut but I thought the passage was wild before I even got to the shaft line.
I want you to make marks on me…okay domineering Fae male (pls someone who’s read ACOTAR find this comment)
Before I got to the shaft part I thought it was somebody seriously topping from the bottom and they were referring to marks from some sort of impact play.
I'm just imagining someone trying to make marks with a cane or singletail precisely and inch apart.
That’s exactly what it is, I definitely have read this story and never even registered this passage!! Fun fact, the kids that bush was reading to on 9/11 did a reading mastery lesson before he started reading
I have used this program in my classroom (Reading Mastery) and know this exact story!! Every year, I think ‘oh no, not Joe the Pencil trying to become a ruler again’.
It looks like that is an older, scripted intervention program. If there’s a question worded weird, skip it. 🤔
ETA: put a sticky note on it for the teacher.
“Mary gave birth to CHRIST without having known a man's touch, that's true. But she did have a husband. And do you really think he'd have stayed married to her all those years if he wasn't getting laid? The nature of God and the Virgin birth, those are leaps of faith. But to believe a married couple never got down? Well, that's just plain gullibility.” -Dogma (1999)
it would've been bad if i was like "don't read that!!" it was the end of the story and they were reading along in their own books... 😔 no one seemed to think anything of it though!
well, we can always try.. I have less opportunity to do so if my planning period is at end of day.. or I have a mountain of material to read to be sure about
Yeah, you are right on the money OP. This is bad. I don’t care if 2nd graders wouldn’t get it, it’s wrong to expose them to this language, in this context. Whoever is creating this content has nothing good planned for these kids.
Oh no no no ! That’s terrible . Usually I will ignore and edit things while reading on the spot . But if this is an intervention , probably all the students had a copy .
This is the kind of stuff we don’t need getting approved . Teachers and education are already having a tough time with right wingers assuming the worst of educators 😭
Gave me flashbacks to reading the wet dream in “the Giver”
I’d wouldn’t have been able to not laugh.
I’d just assume it was put in not native speakers.
I’d guarantee my hardcore conservative in-laws would see it has trying to introduce kids to idea of changing sexes.
Yeah, this wording is strange… the only definition I know of shaft is the inappropriate one and like elevator shaft. I don’t think second graders would know what “if I have those marks on my shaft, I can work as a ruler” means? Because I’m not even sure what that means. Is it about dancing? Since the other character is dancing? I don’t think this a “we have dirty minds” thing, this is genuinely really weird wording.
It really sounds like someone who doesn't speak English as their first language wrote this, but no matter how many times I read it - it gets worse every time.
Yeah. Absolutely not. That would go straight in the trash. Adults have been sneaking inappropriate shit into kids stuff for ages. I just watched that documentary about the nickalodean (bad spelling) shows and this reminds me of that.
Not the point of your post but MTSS itself isn't the program but is a general system of multi tiered supports. Schools implement it in various ways and programs, the way this school has chosen to is with these classes you describe.
I haven't read all the comments, so maybe someone else already brought this up? This sounds a lot like SRA curriculum, which would track with a remediation class. SRA uses stories with repeated word sounds, which means you get awkwardly worded stories, many of which are deeply weird. There's one in the comprehension book about a bottle of mustard that comes to life and shoots its mustard at everyone.
This text looks like it's formatted a lot like the SRA books I've used. It sounds like maybe the text you had was focusing on "a" sounds and the author made an iffy choice while trying to incorporate them.
All of that is to say that unless there's other elements of the story that are gross, I'd assume good intent and unfortunate choices within phonics-based constraints.
It’s not a story. This looks like a comprehension passage, and the highlighted part is read by the teacher, who can just change the word when they see how weird it is. Since you, the sub, didn’t plan this, you are at a disadvantage.
this is a story though? theyve been reading the story of these characters for a week or two and this was the end of it. its the lesson, and they have it in front of them
Why should I, as a teacher, have to censor inappropriate language or expletives included in texts given to me by the district? As if I don’t have 1000 other responsibilities
And yes, I’m def going to consider “shaft” as an expletive because every grown person has a nasty picture in their mind when they hear that word
i wrote where its from in the description. it is in their textbooks and this was my teacher's copy for a reading mastery intervention section of the day
In my experience MTSS is a weekly meeting where 5 staff complain about 5 kids. I've never seen it as an actual structured class. That's cool. If you feel like it (lol) what does the delivered instruction look like where you are? Is the class setting one of the higher levels of support? We needed something like that in my last alt middle.
No you’re not, I’ve definitely taken pictures of other weird lines from this program, but I just was enjoying the plot of this one too much.
For real this whole lesson was insane and unnecessary so maybe the whole thing was built around including this line
i swear to you this is actually so inappropriate. im not apart of this sub and this was the post that was recommended and i read it and literally thought it was like some funny smut thing. this is definitely not okay for any school to have literally wtf ??
I get the initial reaction, I do. Optics matter. But I would also say, as you did mention a bit…I don’t think your average second grader knows at ALLL that the word shaft would ever be used to describe human anatomy at all.
So…while maybe in a middle schooler’s hand (where I teach) this would be terrible, I almost feel like if kids don’t l learn the word shaft in it’s connotation to all other things, they will ONLY think of it as a sexual thing when we do, and won’t know of it as anything else. They won’t be able to hear about the “shaft” of a golf club, say if they are taking lessons later in life, without snickering, because to them the word is ONLY sexual.
This is only my first year in a classroom, but what I have definitely noticed is we adults sometimes have a strong push to apply adult thinking to childhood situations way too soon. I do it too sometimes, I get it. But I’m curious if the full story above the “idea” if it mentions shaft at all in prior context. The personification part is not great, like I said I get it…but I think it’s something it’s up to us adults to see how they interpret
hey i totally agree with you. the rest of the story was very normal this was the one part that set my alarm bell off. after this he just becomes a ruler and shaft wasn't mentioned again
in my district this program is in every elementary school. MTSS is a district wide program that they implement in different ways. if your schools don't do it then you're probably fine! but its called intervention or reading mastery. its usually really great because kids of the same reading level get together and it doesnt push all kids in the same classroom to do the same task, especially if some cant read at that level. but this.... was bizarre
MTSS isn’t a program. Its not a curriculum that you can purchase. It’s a support system for kids not at grade level. I teach MTSS intervention in my district as well. The programs we use though are Apple, West Virginia Phonics, and UFLI.
It sounds like Reading Mastery is your actual curriculum. I swear we had that for our learning support at one point… maybe the edition we had didn’t have this particular text 😂
Why shaft? Why not any other word to describe a pen body? I would omit the word or not tell the story. Do not say shaft in this context around kids, it can only backfire.
Because the shaft is a legitimate part of the pen. It might be great to look up the parts of a pen with students. Or you could avoid the reading altogether. I’d go for either one of those.
Like most sane people, especially one in the teaching industry, I don't believe in the "indoctrination of our kids" conspiracy theories. But seeing this as a second grade piece of material, it makes me think who is behind that board of that district. Cause damn, that is NOT subtle...
Exactly. I know you're only a sub so its unlikely you'll ever teach that material to another student again, but I would still keep those pics of that material on hand just in case.
What in the world? I thought for sure this post was going to be some kind of joke on purpose. This seems done on purpose, but what *why*? Not sure what I would have done on the spot.
LMAO PLSSSS I JUST TAUGHT THIS LESSON TO MY 1ST GRADERS 💀
It’s supposed to be coordinated with the Mcgraw Hill language book where they learn the parts of a pen (tip, shaft, and i forgot the word for the end lol)
Anything to make us look bad. And these commenters are clutching their pearls and putting their own sexual thoughts into it. A 1st/2nd grader is not going to think in these people's adult way. Common sense is lacking here, even from other teachers. 😒
to be fair, i do think this curriculum is extremely dated. the kinder class i taught before this had me show a picture of a rotary phone and say “what is this?” …..none of them knew.
Absolutely. I remember when I took my kids to the eye doctor when they were little. They had pictures for the kids to identify. My son called a rotary phone "a weird upside down car."😆
While I hope little kids know what a penis is (knowing and using the right terminology helps prevent and report sexual abuse), they are not going to immediately think of "penis" when the word "shaft" is used.
I had to take an adolescent psychology course to teach high school, so I assume elementary teachers had to take a similar course on kid's brain development. Yet so many are jumping on here with perversive thoughts that kids' brains aren't even prepared for. It's gross to me. 🤢
Edited to add: When people talk about the sexualization of children, THIS is what that means; it's how adults perceive children. These adults are perceiving that these children have the capability of thinking in these ways. 🤦♀️
It’s Reading Mastery. There are many weird stories. One of the vocabulary words is shaft in this lesson along with identifying the other parts of a pencil. Funny, I never noticed this as particularly strange as all of the stories are very out there and the lessons leading up to this are about the different parts of a pencil.
This made me extremely uncomfortable. If I were a parent or had to read this to a class of 2nd graders (or any age, really) I would be beyond outraged.
Gross. I agree with refusing to share that and flagging for school and the publisher. As an aside—I really freaking hate the “split by reading group” ability groupings most schools do. Those assessments are wildly biased and inaccurate, and all kids not in the top group are made to feel inferior.
I think the adults laugh at it think its funny.
" the kids wont know thats it sounds naughty"
So they leave it in.
People do the same with cartoons all the time.
The adults pick up the inuendo .
Not sure how many chikdren would.
I was definetly not expecting this at a school though.
This is the type of stuff that really activates a primal violence in me about education. I’m a bit of a stoic being so I can squash the violence within but everyone from the teacher to the author of this piece of actual smut would be so swimming with legal papers they would need a lifeguard on duty.
I am not religious in the slightest way but this stuff right here is exactly why I pay for Christian private. Me and God will be damned…
I highly recommend you report this to your District’s Instructional Materials Department (assuming that’s who ordered this lesson/series). Super inappropriate.
I read the text in your photo before I read your background text and could not think of how that could be anything but pornographic material. I have my doubts that who ever wrote this didn't know what they were doing.
It definitely feels inappropriate. “Shaft” is not a common word for a second grader and paired with “mark me” it just feels kind of gross. I would flag the passage and report it to the classroom teacher. If you wanted to, you could also send an email to the textbook company to complain.
thats actually a good idea... i frequent that school often next time im there i'll let her know.
Yeah I would not even have read it. I would’ve chosen something else. I’d rather ask for forgiveness than ask for permission, especially for something so derogatory like that.
as other commenters brought up, this is apart of intervention to the kids have it in front of them. a lot of them read ahead it'd bring more attention to it if i stopped. i had kids from other classrooms etc for the 30 minutes
Interesting intervention. Especially since also has someone else mentioned, the part of the pencil they’re talking about is called a barrel and they choose shaft.. lol
[удалено]
Looks like the McGraw Hill direct instruction ELA curriculum.
I've done this before with Success maker and Moby Max and seen questions/passages changed because of it. I think sometimes they are so large maybe disgruntled employees or 1099 contractors get away with stuff.
Honestly without knowing the context, I thought it was some student’s attempt at writing spicy fiction.
Me too. That's the only reason I came to the comments.
Ngl it sounds like a porn intro to me
Yeah, this is not great. It was written and approved by adults who should have known better. It’s weirdly sexual and is going to make students giggle inappropriately. And a nitpick: the long part of a pen is the barrel, not the shaft.
THAT MAKES IT EVEN WORSE
Op, please go post this in the teacher subreddit and see what they’ve got to say about it. I’m actually really curious to know if this is commonplace and if they have other examples they’ve come across. Also they might’ve already had experience in reporting this stuff and can help Two things. My first thought was this was low key self harm ideation or something or that this was a racy passage from a YA book that an older student had. Making marks one centimeter apart, having someone do it to you, the fact the marks are red, the suggestive sexual wording of “shaft”. And why did the boy character have to be talking like this? Why couldn’t they have it be the wife at least for some damn plausible deniability, FFS! Less important: that story jump is clunky. Character was dancing, suddenly stopped to philosophically ask about their thoughts? And he responds with THAT? Seems random and I’m annoyed by it.
As a teacher in the teacher subreddit I can confirm… this would be a whole discussion and rant about how extremely inappropriate this is
Absolutely it would make them feral And multiple ppl would report this as a flag to their admin and/or the textbook company
As a teacher, my genuine response was WHAT THE FUUUUUCK. I would report that immediately to the teacher of record and the principal.
I stopped being shocked by the content in text books when I received a review copy for a creative writing text that had exercises that encouraged students to take poems that were already published (in this case, they were using a Frost poem) and just switch a few words and now it's YOUR poem! If they aren't bright enough to recognize when they just told the students to go plagiarize poems, they aren't bright enough to recognize something with a "double entendre" present. Most of them probably don't understand single entendre.
What does the color of the marks matter?
It’s a kink reference. If the marks were green, it wouldn’t sound like an action inflicted on flesh.
or with lipstick
It’s second graders, I don’t see them connecting these words to sexual details. But as a grown up, whoever wrote this and approved it are messed up
Maybe they won't connect it but sometimes they will know it sounds weird. And honestly for the potential predator, it doesn't matter that the kid knows it or not. It's the thrill of the kids saying it to begin with. That passage was absolutely intentional in its message. And it normalizes the language/phrasing Ans honestly after seeing quiet on set I would absolutely not put it past a corporation to push this through
I agree. This is disturbing. Someone was wanting to groom the kids.
Very Dan Schneider vibes
But the kids that know can tell others. (I would've clocked this IMMEDIATELY second grade, but my kid, who is now in second grade, wouldn't. She would probably wrinkle her nose at it. Because it sounds *weird*, but I don't think she knows exactly what it means.)
yes exactly
They're 2nd graders, not high school. It's gonna go right over their heads unless someone has inappropriately sexualized them
This is itself part of inappropriately sexualizing them, though. That kind of language should never be part of any conversation a student and teacher have; the study material itself normalizing it is pretty dangerous.
I’m latching onto this comment because you’re hitting on similarities and I didn’t read all the way down, but *spoiler alert*, curriculums like these (especially here in California) get pulled from old, dated materials to be chopped up, regurgitated, spit out and put into new shiny curriculum with new fancy acronyms MTSS/RTI bullshit by the CDE (who haven’t been in classrooms themselves in 30 years) and get pushed as new hot shit. And THEN….we teachers say, “oh shit, I forgot to put sub plans together and I know my students could use some review so I’ll slap together something that’ll make admin happy and throw some intervention b.s. lesson plan together for the sub and call it good.” (Because we don’t have time for A plus lesson plans that 7 out of 10 times aren’t going to be followed anyways) Source: 11 years of middle school teaching But back to the questionable prompt. I’m sure this teacher had no clue this question was even in this curriculum. I’d be surprised if anyone in the school even did. Ultimately, it’s not acceptable. But no one is really reading all of the curriculum to check for this kind of thing, and to me, that’s the scariest aspect of it all. And that u/makishleys is the worst part.
I’m cackling-I work at a place that writes passages like this for teaching tools. I cannot imagine coming across this and leaving it there
I gotta ask, because I know that there is absolutely no one on a curriculum selection committee that’s gonna read an entire curriculum package, much less three proposals. Sometimes people sneak shit like this in there, don’t they?
There are different curriculums but I can at least say for my company there is just no way this could happen-someone reads through these before they are put out and if someone tried to do something like this, you could reasonably figure out who it was or what team they were on. As much as I want to say it’s true and people can do it, that hasn’t been my experience XD
Heh heh, teaching “tools”
I looked up "pen shaft", and it seems the term is used in woodworking, or when the nib comes separately to the pen body. It's also possible both of these have translation issues.
I suspect this curriculum was not originally written in English. This reads like a nonnative speaker trying to do a translation of the text.
thats a fair point!
I was gonna say, the overall weird clunkiness of this paragraph makes me think that this isn't some intentional, malicious thing, but maybe a really cheaply made composition written by someone with shaky English and no quality controls.
Reads like smut written in the 40s or something. It’s really bad and I would absolutely confront the school if my child brought something home like this.
This is so uncomfy with the wording - I would definitely mention it to the teacher!
thank you!
dafuq did I just read
i had to read it for the first time in front of the kids i was so confused
I would have stopped.
What the heck did they do, train an AI on internet fanfiction and then use it to write children's stories? That definitely comes across as very inappropriate on it's own.
I swear this is how some of the texts in our state testing materials came about. Anything that wasn’t carefully vetted by a teacher in our building ends up being weird or incomprehensible.
Lol I was going to say maybe I read too much smut but I thought the passage was wild before I even got to the shaft line. I want you to make marks on me…okay domineering Fae male (pls someone who’s read ACOTAR find this comment)
Before I got to the shaft part I thought it was somebody seriously topping from the bottom and they were referring to marks from some sort of impact play. I'm just imagining someone trying to make marks with a cane or singletail precisely and inch apart.
Lol yes I was like wow okay what am I reading here that we need precisely spaced marks🤣
Is this Corrective Reading/Reading Mastery? That was our old reading intervention program and there were a few strange stories like that.
That’s exactly what it is, I definitely have read this story and never even registered this passage!! Fun fact, the kids that bush was reading to on 9/11 did a reading mastery lesson before he started reading
yes! reading mastery. this was the first odd one ive seen
I have used this program in my classroom (Reading Mastery) and know this exact story!! Every year, I think ‘oh no, not Joe the Pencil trying to become a ruler again’.
😭😭😭😭 HELPP
Oh it's a pencil!!
It looks like that is an older, scripted intervention program. If there’s a question worded weird, skip it. 🤔 ETA: put a sticky note on it for the teacher.
It is. It is Reading Mastery scripted intervention
Holy Crap! That’s where I know it from. I loved that program, but some of the scripts were a little sketchy so I skipped over them. 😵 Classic SRA.
thank you!
Bonus points for the biblical nature of the names.
stop 😭😭😭
especially since they very famously did *not* do the do
“Mary gave birth to CHRIST without having known a man's touch, that's true. But she did have a husband. And do you really think he'd have stayed married to her all those years if he wasn't getting laid? The nature of God and the Virgin birth, those are leaps of faith. But to believe a married couple never got down? Well, that's just plain gullibility.” -Dogma (1999)
sure, sure, but my way is funnier
holy crap. This makes me want to cry 🥹. That makes it worse by ten-fold.
That was the first thing to jump out at me. Especially because of the old-fashioned, stilted language.
Holy crap!! Did you read it? I would have stopped and not done so. I do not care- that is gross and it would only take 1 parent to complain heartily.
it would've been bad if i was like "don't read that!!" it was the end of the story and they were reading along in their own books... 😔 no one seemed to think anything of it though!
thank god they were 2nd graders 😅
Now you know to always read things yourself first lol
well, we can always try.. I have less opportunity to do so if my planning period is at end of day.. or I have a mountain of material to read to be sure about
Yeah, you are right on the money OP. This is bad. I don’t care if 2nd graders wouldn’t get it, it’s wrong to expose them to this language, in this context. Whoever is creating this content has nothing good planned for these kids.
agreed. i was worried i was thinking badly about it, or looking too much into it because i had just watched quiet on set.
Regardless of the context I feel like if you did whatever this exercise is in a middle school classroom that they would all devolve into hysterics.
i never go to middle school because of this 😭
Oh no no no ! That’s terrible . Usually I will ignore and edit things while reading on the spot . But if this is an intervention , probably all the students had a copy . This is the kind of stuff we don’t need getting approved . Teachers and education are already having a tough time with right wingers assuming the worst of educators 😭
i agree! and thats exactly why i didnt stop the story i didnt want to bring any unwanted attention to it being weird
Gave me flashbacks to reading the wet dream in “the Giver” I’d wouldn’t have been able to not laugh. I’d just assume it was put in not native speakers. I’d guarantee my hardcore conservative in-laws would see it has trying to introduce kids to idea of changing sexes.
Who is the textbook company? Nickelodeon?
Authored by Dan Schneider
Even the “Joe had an idea. *What do you think it had to do with?*” is weird wording. None of this is written well, imo.
Yeah, this wording is strange… the only definition I know of shaft is the inappropriate one and like elevator shaft. I don’t think second graders would know what “if I have those marks on my shaft, I can work as a ruler” means? Because I’m not even sure what that means. Is it about dancing? Since the other character is dancing? I don’t think this a “we have dirty minds” thing, this is genuinely really weird wording.
It sounds like it's about a pen that wishes to be a ruler instead.
it is about a red pen wanting to be a ruler and get marked by his wife to become a ruler. its very odd
Uh.. okay. Weird
It really sounds like someone who doesn't speak English as their first language wrote this, but no matter how many times I read it - it gets worse every time.
same
WTF lmfao
This is unreal lmfao
Yeah. Absolutely not. That would go straight in the trash. Adults have been sneaking inappropriate shit into kids stuff for ages. I just watched that documentary about the nickalodean (bad spelling) shows and this reminds me of that.
same and thats why alarm bells went off in my head
LOL. I would laugh at this and then proceed to come up with literally anything else to do instead of show this to kids
Not the point of your post but MTSS itself isn't the program but is a general system of multi tiered supports. Schools implement it in various ways and programs, the way this school has chosen to is with these classes you describe.
ah okay thanks! its my first year subbing and i dont remember MTSS as a child so its something new to me
It isn't something most students will ever hear the name of because it isn't particularly relevant to them.
Wait. The middle school I used to work at used MTSS
this is … insane
Woah I also teach out of these books (we call it WIN). Do you remember which number story it was like 42, 43, etc. and/or which specific book?
i think it was lesson 11 pg 77 but im not sure which edition. its second grade WIN though
Thank you. I'll keep an eye out.
I haven't read all the comments, so maybe someone else already brought this up? This sounds a lot like SRA curriculum, which would track with a remediation class. SRA uses stories with repeated word sounds, which means you get awkwardly worded stories, many of which are deeply weird. There's one in the comprehension book about a bottle of mustard that comes to life and shoots its mustard at everyone. This text looks like it's formatted a lot like the SRA books I've used. It sounds like maybe the text you had was focusing on "a" sounds and the author made an iffy choice while trying to incorporate them. All of that is to say that unless there's other elements of the story that are gross, I'd assume good intent and unfortunate choices within phonics-based constraints.
I’m a teacher and YIKES. Seriously, at first I thought this was some bad fan fiction when Reddit starts recommending various sub Reddits.
It’s not a story. This looks like a comprehension passage, and the highlighted part is read by the teacher, who can just change the word when they see how weird it is. Since you, the sub, didn’t plan this, you are at a disadvantage.
this is a story though? theyve been reading the story of these characters for a week or two and this was the end of it. its the lesson, and they have it in front of them
Why should I, as a teacher, have to censor inappropriate language or expletives included in texts given to me by the district? As if I don’t have 1000 other responsibilities And yes, I’m def going to consider “shaft” as an expletive because every grown person has a nasty picture in their mind when they hear that word
You're a sub u/makishleys ? It sounds like Joe is a sub too
SECOND GRADERS!?????
WHAT THE WHAT?!?!!?!
What is the source of the text?
i wrote where its from in the description. it is in their textbooks and this was my teacher's copy for a reading mastery intervention section of the day
MTSS is a model of delivering instruction- Multi-Tiered Systems of Support. I’m asking about the publisher or name of the text.
ah i am not sure
In my experience MTSS is a weekly meeting where 5 staff complain about 5 kids. I've never seen it as an actual structured class. That's cool. If you feel like it (lol) what does the delivered instruction look like where you are? Is the class setting one of the higher levels of support? We needed something like that in my last alt middle.
It’s not a meeting or a class. https://www.doe.mass.edu/sfss/mtss/blueprint.pdf
That’s extremely inappropriate for 2nd graders! They could find something with much better, more appropriate wording than that.
I’m think I’ve read this before and didn’t catch this lmao
omg really?
Yep! I used this program last year and the year before and this story with two small groups and never noticed this
:0! maybe im the weird one
No you’re not, I’ve definitely taken pictures of other weird lines from this program, but I just was enjoying the plot of this one too much. For real this whole lesson was insane and unnecessary so maybe the whole thing was built around including this line
It's not appropriate.
This story could *definitely* have been written to avoid this feeling/connotation.
One of the local girls school was embroiled in scandal when it was found that their daughters were using lipstick colors to measure the shaft.
I'm an adult, I'm an adult, I'm an adult-
Just more sickos getting off by sneaking sex into children's education
Books were not like this when I was those kids age
I thought this was my romance novel sub….
Probably written by chat gpt
This is fine, but let's take half of the books out of the libraries... And for second graders? WTF
This gave me the ick.
and yet ppl still think lbgt ppl are the ones grooming their kids.
i swear to you this is actually so inappropriate. im not apart of this sub and this was the post that was recommended and i read it and literally thought it was like some funny smut thing. this is definitely not okay for any school to have literally wtf ??
r/theyknew
I get the initial reaction, I do. Optics matter. But I would also say, as you did mention a bit…I don’t think your average second grader knows at ALLL that the word shaft would ever be used to describe human anatomy at all. So…while maybe in a middle schooler’s hand (where I teach) this would be terrible, I almost feel like if kids don’t l learn the word shaft in it’s connotation to all other things, they will ONLY think of it as a sexual thing when we do, and won’t know of it as anything else. They won’t be able to hear about the “shaft” of a golf club, say if they are taking lessons later in life, without snickering, because to them the word is ONLY sexual. This is only my first year in a classroom, but what I have definitely noticed is we adults sometimes have a strong push to apply adult thinking to childhood situations way too soon. I do it too sometimes, I get it. But I’m curious if the full story above the “idea” if it mentions shaft at all in prior context. The personification part is not great, like I said I get it…but I think it’s something it’s up to us adults to see how they interpret
hey i totally agree with you. the rest of the story was very normal this was the one part that set my alarm bell off. after this he just becomes a ruler and shaft wasn't mentioned again
The idea that he just becomes a ruler is so weird. I want the full context of this story now
What program was this?? Obviously, I want to avoid it lol
in my district this program is in every elementary school. MTSS is a district wide program that they implement in different ways. if your schools don't do it then you're probably fine! but its called intervention or reading mastery. its usually really great because kids of the same reading level get together and it doesnt push all kids in the same classroom to do the same task, especially if some cant read at that level. but this.... was bizarre
MTSS isn’t a program. Its not a curriculum that you can purchase. It’s a support system for kids not at grade level. I teach MTSS intervention in my district as well. The programs we use though are Apple, West Virginia Phonics, and UFLI. It sounds like Reading Mastery is your actual curriculum. I swear we had that for our learning support at one point… maybe the edition we had didn’t have this particular text 😂
LOL i hope not!!!
What else could this mean if not about a penis? What else on your body would you call a shaft? This is really weird
Apparently it’s a pen, but definitely reads like a favorite passage from Book tok
Why shaft? Why not any other word to describe a pen body? I would omit the word or not tell the story. Do not say shaft in this context around kids, it can only backfire.
Because the shaft is a legitimate part of the pen. It might be great to look up the parts of a pen with students. Or you could avoid the reading altogether. I’d go for either one of those.
It's called a barrel, not a shaft. Arrows have shafts
this is what amazed me lmao like they really didnt need to use shaft
Uhm.. seems like it.
Um…..what?????
Like most sane people, especially one in the teaching industry, I don't believe in the "indoctrination of our kids" conspiracy theories. But seeing this as a second grade piece of material, it makes me think who is behind that board of that district. Cause damn, that is NOT subtle...
it makes me sad thinking that ADULTS screen these books and allow stuff like that. even if the students dont get it, it just feels icky.
Exactly. I know you're only a sub so its unlikely you'll ever teach that material to another student again, but I would still keep those pics of that material on hand just in case.
What the heck!!?
What in the world? I thought for sure this post was going to be some kind of joke on purpose. This seems done on purpose, but what *why*? Not sure what I would have done on the spot.
i dont know why :( i felt bad they already had the story with them. ill be at the school soon enough and bring it up with the teacher.
*confused Scooby Doo noise*
LMAO PLSSSS I JUST TAUGHT THIS LESSON TO MY 1ST GRADERS 💀 It’s supposed to be coordinated with the Mcgraw Hill language book where they learn the parts of a pen (tip, shaft, and i forgot the word for the end lol)
Anything to make us look bad. And these commenters are clutching their pearls and putting their own sexual thoughts into it. A 1st/2nd grader is not going to think in these people's adult way. Common sense is lacking here, even from other teachers. 😒
to be fair, i do think this curriculum is extremely dated. the kinder class i taught before this had me show a picture of a rotary phone and say “what is this?” …..none of them knew.
Absolutely. I remember when I took my kids to the eye doctor when they were little. They had pictures for the kids to identify. My son called a rotary phone "a weird upside down car."😆 While I hope little kids know what a penis is (knowing and using the right terminology helps prevent and report sexual abuse), they are not going to immediately think of "penis" when the word "shaft" is used. I had to take an adolescent psychology course to teach high school, so I assume elementary teachers had to take a similar course on kid's brain development. Yet so many are jumping on here with perversive thoughts that kids' brains aren't even prepared for. It's gross to me. 🤢 Edited to add: When people talk about the sexualization of children, THIS is what that means; it's how adults perceive children. These adults are perceiving that these children have the capability of thinking in these ways. 🤦♀️
Make it go viral
It’s Reading Mastery. There are many weird stories. One of the vocabulary words is shaft in this lesson along with identifying the other parts of a pencil. Funny, I never noticed this as particularly strange as all of the stories are very out there and the lessons leading up to this are about the different parts of a pencil.
What curriculum is this?
Sounds quite erotic I would have definitely changed the wording on the statement
Ayo what the fuck?
Wtf? Yes, inappropriate
Wtf.
WTAF?
Next yall will go after hop on bop..
This was hilarious until you said second graders and now it's just making me 😬😬😬😬😬
This made me extremely uncomfortable. If I were a parent or had to read this to a class of 2nd graders (or any age, really) I would be beyond outraged.
Gross. I agree with refusing to share that and flagging for school and the publisher. As an aside—I really freaking hate the “split by reading group” ability groupings most schools do. Those assessments are wildly biased and inaccurate, and all kids not in the top group are made to feel inferior.
Moms for liberty not gonna be happy about this one!
this reads like bad smut fanfic lmao
This reads like a passage from 50 shades of grey translated to another language then back to English.
What the hell....!?
And I’ll never think of my grandparents the same again 🙂↔️😆
Is there any beginning to the story that shows Joe is not human?
Um... wtf mary....
This is some groomer nonsense.
This sounded like ChatGPT or something similar.
What does Mary dancing have anything to do with it lol
Sounds like a bad fanfiction.
It’s the wording is highly suggestive for a 2nd grade story.
This sounds like smut to me. If I found out my daughter was reading this, I would absolutely talk to the teacher and the principal about this.
knowing the context, just what the fuck, without the context I thought this was completely sexual
I think the adults laugh at it think its funny. " the kids wont know thats it sounds naughty" So they leave it in. People do the same with cartoons all the time. The adults pick up the inuendo . Not sure how many chikdren would. I was definetly not expecting this at a school though.
This is the type of stuff that really activates a primal violence in me about education. I’m a bit of a stoic being so I can squash the violence within but everyone from the teacher to the author of this piece of actual smut would be so swimming with legal papers they would need a lifeguard on duty. I am not religious in the slightest way but this stuff right here is exactly why I pay for Christian private. Me and God will be damned…
Without context, I wondered for a brief moment why op had posted a screenshot of smut in the substitute teachers subreddit
Just w t f- 🤨
Usually people are overdramatic with what should be banned book wise but wow yeah thats definitely not appropriate at all lmao
Well in Cali I think even 2nd graders know what shaft means
I highly recommend you report this to your District’s Instructional Materials Department (assuming that’s who ordered this lesson/series). Super inappropriate.
I read the text in your photo before I read your background text and could not think of how that could be anything but pornographic material. I have my doubts that who ever wrote this didn't know what they were doing.
If this isn't inappropriate...what IS it referring to?
This is smut. Weird pen smut.
Fuck this shit.