Internet safety, homework - and Jack the Ripper

[PermaShattered]

I have a few concerns about my daughter's homework from school - bearing in mind the of the internet for just about everything. In point form!:

1. She is 13 (yr 9)
   
2. Ethics homework last week: researching capital punishment, including famous murderers (amongst other things - she asked me what necrophilia is)
   
3. History homework (project): research everything about Jack the Ripper. Detailed instructions here. Including researching the victims, evidence.....
   
4. Reminder: this is for 13 yrs olds.
   
5. It's constantly drummed into our children - and to us parents - about internet safety, etc. We try to protect them from images and other stuff.
   
6. Then she gets this sort of homework.
   

What are you thoughts please? I'd be very interested....

[IguanaTail]

It's fine. It's not all fluffy clouds and butterflies on the curriculum.

[Stillunexpected]

I am not seeing the connection between internet safety and researching these topics on the internet? Am I missing something? If she is in Year 9 at school, she will have heard about far worse in the playground.

[G1veMeStrength]

I don't see how you can google this without some really awful stuff coming up. I would contact the school and ask wtf.

[AuntieStella]

Yes, it's of course it's fine. Somewhat gory, if she reads the full inquest reports, but few photographs and B&W only and not good quality. But it's a vast subject, so perhaps could have been narrowed down a bit.

And btw, the single best Ripper site is this one: www.casebook.org

[titchy]

Nothing remotely dodgy, apart from a Daily Mail link, come up when I type 'Jack the Ripper' into Google.

They also do the Holocaust in year 9. Can't see the problem with 13 / 14 year olds finding out about capital punishment or what necrophilia is either tbh.

[balletgirlmum]

My dd (year 9) had to research crimes in our area fir geography. The programme she was using (new windows 10 presentation thing) kept trying to tske her to a pornography/sex crimes site which our controls wouldnt allow.

In those instances I refer back to the old fashioned method of library books.

[f1fan2015]

You could always go back to the good old fashioned method of sending her to the library and researching from encyclopaedia and books

[knittingwithnettles]

Another mother whose son received this project in Year 9 was shocked by how long they did Jack the Ripper. Weeks spent on that one topic. Surely there is plenty of other things to cover in Victorian history that are equally relevant to an understanding of the period??? 19th C History is full of horrible events, but there are others of socio economic significance- Tolpuddle Martyrs, Crimean War, Indian Mutiny just off top of my head. There are equally horrific crimes committed today - think Fred West - why would that be part of a curriculum on 20th Century when there are would be so many other gaps in their knowledge? I think it is dumbing down in a rather exploitative way.

[knittingwithnettles]

I think if you went to the library and asked for a book on Jack the Ripper the librarian would be quite shocked. That about sums it up. Unless there is a special series commissioned now...

[AuntieStella]

I suppose whether it's reasonable depends on whether it was narrowly about the murders, or if it was a broader look at Victorian London (immigration, social reform, rise of the influence of the press, introduction of new technologies, effects of absence of welfare state etc)

[LookingUpAtTheStars]

Why would a librarian be shocked at being asked for a book about a particular subject?

[AuntieStella]

It's also a good topic for teaching historical method - describing source materials and evaluating his much relative weight to put on things like inquest reports, remnants of police files, parliamentary statements, contemporary newspaper reports, later newspaper reports or other analyses, personal memoranda of individuals involved in the case etc.

Even picking over the evidence for why some murders are canonically ascribed to Jack, but others were not could be a good exercise. Plus why others, such as the torsos in the Thames, or the body in the basement of New Scotland Yard, never received the same place in the public psyche.

[Impostersyndrome]

I share your concerns.

Nevertheless, I agree with AuntieStella advice - I wonder if you can see this as a lesson in how to do internet searching (though of course the school should be guiding this too): rather than just plugging in terms into Google, she should think about resources, such as history websites, museums and so on. I'm not a fan of Wikipedia, but she could look in the links on the relevant pages there for academic articles.

The Museum of London has a good page of information: www.museumoflondon.org.uk/explore-online/pocket-histories/jack-ripper-and-east-end/

There's a resource on Victorian history she could use: www.victorianlondon.org/index-2012.htm, though I'd advise you doing it with her.

Do avoid the Jack the Ripper museum site, which is rather gratuitous and unscholarly.

[Theonethatgotaway772]

I wouldn't have a problem with my dd who is 13 doing this.

[LooseAtTheSeams]

OP, I agree with you if your concern is lack of guidance. I don't like the attitude of we'll teach you about internet safety but then just tell you to research something by googling it. I'm sure they haven't set an indepth project on horrific crimes against women without some thought as to what students might look at so it's worth asking them for the list of reputable sites they recommended! Actually, though, a lot of the books on the subject are pretty rubbish and rather too keen on murder as entertainment. The school does need to make clear this is a history project not an unsolved crimes project! It works much better as an example of what was happening in 1888 and public attitudes towards women, the police and poverty, rather than an isolated event.

[teacherwith2kids]

[Remembers with horror the homework DD had in Year 5 to research a country. She chose Ukraine, and one of her 'places of interest' was Chernobyl. Needing a picture, she searched for 'Chernobyl pictures'. Not a good plan, even with good parental control software.... rather a lot of mutant creatures....]

[Babycham1979]

I was a voracious reader as a child, and went through my parents' bookshelves multiple times over. Some of my favourite books were true crime ones, and particularly one that included graphic photographs of autopsies and crime scenes, including some of Jack the Ripper's victims.

I was fascinated by them (I was probably nine or ten), and a little haunted, I suppose. Anyway, I've grown-up pretty normal, and there was no internet in those days.

Get a grip.

[Impostersyndrome]

That's a bit harsh babycham. Why 'get a grip'? It's a perfectly reasonable response.

[Brioche201]

I wouldn't have wanted to do this at 13 (if the internet had been invented then) I think it is unsuitable.Some would be fine with it but more sensitive ones wouldn't.

[museumum]

I would be concerned - not about the genuine Jack the Ripper info but about what might be online in terms of glorifying it or torture porn. For me it's exactly the sort of search I'd be wary about doing in work for example (I work in an educational context).

[Bumpsadaisie]

There are lots of sites about the genuine Jack the Ripper murders, which I have clicked on in an idle moment and then got interested in, in the past.

I have a good head for gore and true crime but I had to stop looking at them because it scared the hell out of me. You can see the genuine photos of the victims which look all the more horrid for being faded victorian black and white ones.

I dont think I'd be happy with a 13 year old free searching for this material. Looking at a particular site which didn't have scary images OK, but if you google you are going to find v disturbing photos.

[Bumpsadaisie]

Just to clarify, I don't think the problem is that the topic links to dodgy torture sites, more that the actual photos from the real case are pretty disturbing.

[Bumpsadaisie]

And to add further, I think do it is very a valid topic historically - the challenges of early policing, anti-semitism and the stress of immigration, poverty and the great fear in the 1880s that the impoverished underclass in East London would swell and become unmanageable.

Its not a coincidence that about that time we get universal schooling, various Housing and labour acts and so on, not to mention votes for working class men for the first time.

[PermaShattered]

Thanks all for your insights, appreciated! Will come back soon...