Teacher showing photos to kids of victorian dead children - slightly disturbing

This thread is hilarious 🤣🤣

I am finding this so disturbing I can't sleep!

It seems likely that the OP is actually the 14-year-old DC, posting out of boredom during the school holidays. That would explain why they needed to leave school before raising the issue

You said yourself that they were learning about photography.

What i remember about learning about the industrial revolution/victorian times is the amount of death from infection and disease, workhouses, children being put to work in dangerous conditions. All the grim stuff. I can't remember anything about transport or construction although I do know we discussed it.

Personally I think learning about the genocide of WW2 (seeing/hearing about the concentration camps) and the slave trade (went really in-depth, yr 9 I think, even watched a bit of roots) and even the current genocides that are currently taking place in the world, far more disturbing and upsetting than looking at how victorian people took a lasting memory of a loved one to keepsake.

The children are 13/14. They are not inappropriate pictures, they were very normal pictures for the time and likely led to a discussion of what life was like in that time.

I imagine the focus of that lesson may have been the consequential dangers of the invention of machinery and therefore the increase in child mortality. It's called 'context'. I'm not even a History teacher, just someone who has a bit of logic and no desire to teacher-bash.

Yep, can't help but love a parent who knows better than every education professional involved about what this age group "should" be taught and the quality of the education they're receiving based on a conversation about one lesson!

For lots of people, open casket funerals (or more usually pre-funeral wakes) aren’t disturbing at all, they’re completely normal.

Yes, and the teacher will spend time in these things in other lessons. They will be teaching this topic for 6+ weeks and will get to it... I imagine the focus of that lesson may have been the consequential dangers of the invention of machinery and therefore the increase in child mortality. It's called 'context'. I'm not even a History teacher, just someone who has a bit of logic and no desire to teacher-bash.
Get over yourself, or discuss your concerns directly with the teacher.

So disturbed you can't sleep????

Massive over reaction given the age of the class. I take it you don't allow them to watch the news?

OMG.

I'm suprised they allowed her to continue in school after an abortion, but maybe they just wanted to torture her.

My RC VI form we had a couple of people come from the non RC schools. One of them made the huge mistake of approaching a teacher about the possibility that she was pregnant.

She was told if she had an abortion she would have to leave, so she did.

For anyone who has not gone to an RC school you would be amazed at what they teach.

I know a lot of people say, "Oh they just say a couple of prayers morning and afternoon" and I hope that is true in some schools but it certainly wasn't my experience.

RE, well RC doctrine came into most lessons, cookery - oh time to bake a simnel cake.

History, Mary I was a wonderful woman returning England to the RC church.

Art, design an anti abortion poster.

Biology, this is how 'natural contraception works'.

We actually had a lesson called 'hymns' where we learned new hymns.

Oh and yes those little feet badges.

Also an odd rule. You could wear a cross or religious medal on a chain, but not a chain on its own or a non religious pendant.

It’s only bizarre and disturbing in the context of the modern day where we behave like death is something offensive or unnatural. Half the point is showing how social acceptances have evolved and changed over the years. Or do you just want your children to exist in a bubble?

I think you should be a history teacher if you think photos of amazing victorian engineering will engage Y9 🤣.

Ex-history teacher here. They'll be teaching the Holocaust soon, assuming the school has taken a chronological approach to the curriculum, so best to prepare yourself if you find the content of this lesson disturbing.

This.
13 - 14 years old? I thought you were going to say 5 or 6 or something, then maybe you'd have a point!
History can sometimes be gruesome, you can't just "rainbow and sunshines" gloss over it and you never should. Otherwise you never learn from it.

I can't sleep! Can I see some of your wonderful pictures of Victorian engineering?

YABVU

No wonder we have a generation of pansy arses if a 14yo can’t cope with a picture of a corpse - which BTW just looks like someone asleep upright.

I wouldn’t be bothered at my 8yo being shown that, let alone a 14yo. It’s a fascinating part of history.

However do you manage when they’re taught about the Holocaust?

I'm sure the kids were also shown the extraordinary feats of the industrial revolution. I doubt the entire topic focused on Victorian post mortem photography, perhaps this was just one interesting facet of it to engage the children. Who knows? Perhaps discuss with the teacher so you have full knowledge and context?

That's not contemporary evidence! That's a rather shoddy article by a modern journalist with some pictures of people for whom there's no evidence they're dead at all, and some actual postmortem pictures, eg the child on the bier, who is not posed as if living.

Contemporary evidence would be a treatiae on postmortem photography detailing how to get the best results; an advert from a photographer saying 'Get your dead kids photographed by us!' or a letter between relatives describing how a family member died and was posed and photographed after death.

The treatises on photography that do exist, describe using the (rather flimsy) posture stands to assist in keeping a live subject still.
There is an astonishing dearth of advertising of death photography, when you consider the extensive advertising surrounding other death customs, which were highly comercialised. See, for example, necropolises.

The dd was probably exaggerating that the entire lesson consisted of looking at post mortem photos.

It's relevant to the lesson though......he wasn't just being macabre.......unlike my old biology teacher who used to like whipping out the fetuses he kept in bottles and plonking them on the table. He got a firm telling off after traumatising a Spanish language student but still kept them on his shelves so they'd catch you off guard when you went in the cupboard (( He was however an amazing teacher. We all loved him dearly ))

It's a really good example of an invention (the camera/photography) changing society quickly and profoundly. The Victorian death customs/rituals is a very interesting subject anyway - I researched the topic for part of my Masters. I could have happily continued researching.

I actually think this fits well into the Industrial Revolution. child mortality was a big part of that of the time from disease and death in the factories. There was a big amount of trauma for families. They expected to have children die in those times. Seeing the photos in the context of how things were changing and the technological improvements so they could have memories of their departed children and family members is actually very interesting. No subject is isolated

There has also been another thread on MN defending many people taking photos of the dead pope as it can be cultural, although the Vatican did end up asking people not to take photos. So could have been an interesting discussion in class, has society really changed.

surprised you didn't know about it https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-36389581

No it didn't occur to me as I haven't seen a picture of the Pope's body this week (just a tiny bit of what I am hoping was his hand on the BBC!). And I think that's unnecessarily pedantic. Doesn't change my opinion that it might have been kind to give them a heads up even if a few of them saw the Pope lying in State. And maybe this teacher did?

I’m Irish and we have wakes with an open coffin. It’s not unusual for children to come pay their respects. It’s not disturbing it teaches that dying is a part of life. Our wake culture is one of the things we do well here. The whole community comes to pay their respects and support the bereaved