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

I thought you were going to say they were 5 or 6, not 13 or 14.

The photos will have been quite tame - children dressed up nicely and with their families.

I’m pretty sure at that age we were being show videos about the holocaust etc.

13/14 year olds will have daily access to far more dodgy content if they use the internet IMO.

I think it’s relevant to the lesson. When photography was first made available to the general public it was expensive. People didn’t have lots of photographs taken because they couldn’t afford it. When someone died they would then shell out the money because that was their last chance to get a lasting memento of that person. I’d assume the teacher was explaining that to the class. Kids these days are used to being able to take photographs whenever they want on their phones so it’s good to show them how rare and precious photographs were when they first were available.

Excellent. There is a serious shortage of teachers so plenty of opportunities for you to use your superior knowledge to advantage by becoming a teacher instead of a critic.

I suspect you are younger than me, the trend for disturbing stuff is relatively recent.
I know you are younger than me because I was at school in the 60's/70's - it isn't recent at all. Kids love this sort of stuff. What is more recent is parents wrapping their kids in cotton wool.

Oh - and you are also really rude when people don't agree with your weird opinions.

A bit macabre but as a kid that age I would have been fascinated .

History teachers always use the gory bits to engage students. I bet there were other bits to the lesson but this is the part your DC remembered or paid attention to

It's a bit strange to show these photographs which have a flimsy connection to the Industrial Revolution, especially when there are ample images that are relevant. Also, were the kids aware that they would be looking at an image of what is probably the first dead body they have ever seen? Personally I would have wanted to be prewarned and I have decades on these kids.

That’s excellent teaching. I’m glad you didn’t have any idiot parents complaining that you told them the real truth of what can happen.

I would much rather my children had a lesson like that.

I didn’t know about this, just looked it up. I would be fascinated at the is age. I think it brings home something of how normal/expected it was for Victorian children to die from poor diet, disease and industrial accidents. Kids study all sorts of gruesome things such as the plague. I think we attach more sensitivity to these things as we’re parents. I’m team teacher.

I was once obliged to cover a "Health" lesson for a class of Year 10s at a girls' school. The lesson was some boring text about the dangers of alcoholism. The kids were entirely disengaged and I wasn't going to put up with nonsense when I had a pile of assessments to be marked for an internal. I slammed my copy of the book shut, very loudly, then announced that we could do better at this ourselves, and that I was going to tell them a story. Intrigued, they shut up and listened as I told them about someone of my youthful acquaintance, a young woman who had become a heavy smoker and drinker at a young age. When she discovered that she was pregnant, she had the self control to stop smoking almost immediately. But back then, the connection between alcohol and F.A.S.had not been established. I described in great detail the baby and her painful, wasted life, her struggles to connect with people and her early death. The girls uttered not a peep. They sat there, stunned, and one or two shed tears. That was one of the best lessons I ever taught, the most meaningful and the most important. The girls, subdued, filed out at the end of the lesson, many thanking me for telling them how it really is.

If that's all you have to worry about be grateful. I did industrial history for A level many years ago. As interesting as it is now to me as an adult; as a teen it was dreary and downright grim. We didn't cover death practices either.

History is like that but kids are resilient

Yabu. Meanwhile if you turn the TV on the pope is in an open coffin.

Well there's a huge teacher shortage at the moment so here's your chance. Retrain and show them all how it should be done.

The only thing I remember about my history lessons in school was a discussion with the teacher about his new contact lenses. We managed a double lesson dedicated to these new things in 1981 or 1982.

How fascinating. I would not mind my children learning that.
It sets their minds wondering about what we treasure, how we store a memory of a loved one, how history is kept, monuments of special people etc. etc.
In future they might learn about our voices being stored on memory sticks, or our videos of weddings etc.

There is more to worry about with the kids watching the news of today.
And old WWI pictures etc are thought provoking.
Life is varied and cultural practices change over time.

I'm 40 and my text books had images of death in them, especially around WW2 and the Holocaust. I think the thing that's more recent is people being upset by historical accuracy.

It’s a rubbish idea for a lesson but considering they study the holocaust and WWII at most schools in year 9, it’s really not a big deal.

OP have you heard of the internet?

I can promise you these 14 year olds have seen a lot more disturbing things than Victorian death photography on their own mobile phones.

How many do you think have watched things like Game of Thrones or Dexter?

@whyiwonderwhy are you a history teacher too? You know a lot about the sequencing of the lessons and what the curriculum and content should include?
It sounds like you have previous grievances with this teacher and wonder whether that makes you examine this subject more deeply (or do you analyse each lesson to this depth?).
As they are secondary school age then lessons are generally prepared and shared across the department, so it wouldn't just be your child's class receiving this content.
You don't want to address the teacher directly, but can you contact the head of department (if that isn't them) and ask them to explain the content of the lesson and I am sure they will be able to give you the rationale for it.

What does your child think of the lesson?

Did you attend this lesson, you seem to know a lot of detail.

I’m sure your child has, like the majority of other children, zoned out at all the boring Ismbard Kingdom Brunel and Stephenson’s Rocket stuff. It’s dry as hell when you’re in your teens. It only becomes interesting once you’re an adult. Learning about the advent of photography is a big part of history lessons. Just like learning about other methods of recording evidence.

The kids will remember those pictures. And they’ll be viewing far worse on Tik Tok.

I get the impression that you are not keen on the teacher and that this is another example of 'form'. As you are keen on context, it might be worth sharing that.
I'm a teacher and increasingly avoid showing/discussing anything other than very uncontroversial things because of these kinds of complaints. A couple of years ago I had a complaint from an A Level student's parent about teaching Frankenstein (because some people die in it) to her 17 year old.

I do think this is part of the problem with resilience. Ostensibly, (in school and with parents) children seem to be increasingly sheltered from every uncomfortable emotions/ideas and then some seem struggle to deal with challenging feelings appropriately. Meanwhile, some (though not all, of course) see very disturbing things online without the support of parents/teachers.
I terms of it being 'out of context', I would say a whole lesson solely on this may be a little OTT but perhaps it was a 'starter' to get the students talking about the period. These students seem to have found it memorable as they talked about it at home. I don't suppose the engineering marvels of the Spinning Jenny are quite so engaging to share! In a way, job achieved. Bringing topics home to discuss is a real win in teaching.
You may have said, but did your child object? If so, perhaps he or she could ask the teacher how it links to the topic? If they didn't object, I'm not sure what the problem is.

For teaching factual historical events to school children in their history lessons apparently. How very dare he!!

Have you ever tried teaching a bunch of teenagers about the spinning Jenny?! This sounds way more interesting for them then going on about making cloth, building bridges and railways

I’ve taught History (yes a qualified History teacher) for 15 years and to my knowledge have never used a photo of dead Victorian children in my teaching for Y9.

I find this whole conversation odd, and having taught in very challenging schools no I did not feel the need to use these kinds of photos to shock Y9 children into paying attention.

It’s all very strange!

Do you really think kids of that age are remotely interested in extraordinary engineering?

Unless you’re one of DS’s autistic friends, then you’d never get off the topic.

Death traditions are much more interesting to most people and others have already pointed out, can be made relevant to the topic.

Kudos to the teacher for having a bit of creativity to be honest.