DS teacher has apparently told the class...

[rockiestbottom]

That the zika virus is not real and made up to hide other bad stuff in the media.

Teacher apparently then said it was a made up story anyway to cover up bad press.

Ah-made up story different thing to made up virus. The press are useless at presenting scientific data in an accurate and unbiased way.

Why would Brazil want to discourage people from going to the Olympics?

We have an aids-denier lecturer at my uni. He believes all sorts of conspiracy theory nonsense.

He tried to have an event showing an aids-denying film to the students. The uni made him cancel it when the local press started taking an interest.

He's not a science teacher though - that is bad!

I'd be more inclined to think that the teacher is a bit of a conspiracy theorist. There are plenty of them about, and while I guess a science teacher could be setting up for an interesting debate usually that would be fairly obvious and in the same lesson. This sounds more like an off topic chat with the teacher giving a personal opinion.

Like my ds's IT teacher who apparently believes that vaccines cause autism. ds challenged him on this and has now been told not to discuss anything political in class again (ds can be a bit forceful!). We had an interesting parents evening too.

This reminds me of when ds's then primary school class teacher told the class, shortly after Obama had been elected, that it would be the shortest-lived presidency in the US ever.

I still haven't quite worked out what point he was trying to make.

And he was a crap teacher.

Not part of a lesson where they're discussing media in some way? One of my children is in year 6 and in literacy they have had to a basic analysis of short newspaper articles.

I think im going to gently enquire at parents evenings in a couple of weeks about the topic.

I asked if they were talking about the way the media promotes things and scare mongering but ds said they weren't, that they were just discussing the virus.

Ds opening words when it came on the news this morning were.

The virus isn't real anyway. Mrs x said its just made up to cover up bad news

I think its worth making her aware even if it is just the kids who have misunderstood so she can clear it up.

That the zika virus is not real and made up to hide other bad stuff in the media.

I think the teacher was taking a massive risk in saying this about something so current and potentially so damaging. However, I do think it can be a good idea to make the point about "press scaremongering", "papers write bad news because it sells", and if the government want to bury bad news, there might be headlines such as "the Queen drops a toffee paper outside the Palace".

I always knew that politicians were professional liars, but I always thought the word of the press was gospel, until I was aged about 21!! Perhaps I could have done with the lesson at age 12 that the press speaks just as much drivel as the Westminster Elite.

Could it have been a joke? We had a great English teacher at school who used to say these sorts of things all the time to get a reaction and encourage us to question things. He'd always end up being serious though eventually. He is widely believed to have been the best teacher the school had seen.

I would bet she didn't mean 'made up' virus, but the news is 'made up' in that there is nothing which has to be news, it is what is decided on and created by those whose job it is and industry it is to make the news. These 'epidemic' stories often do start with a lot of catastrophic and apocalyptic rhetoric, think Ebola, think Swine Flue Bird Flue, which then fades away. More children die of diarrhea daily than of some of these viruses, but it is not scary, not 'foreign' and not newsworthy. If she means that she may be spot on.

If she didn't, I still think it's fine for teachers to hold unusual views, hopefully their students will rise to the challenge of debating them, especially at secondary. There are millions of climate change deniers, should all teachers who are deniers be prevented from letting their students know what they think? (I'm in the no camp on that one). Children need to be exposed to different views, unless they are illegal (e.g. racism, incite hatred).

Well its good that he's encouraging them to question the media and think for themselves rather than just take everything the BBC reports as 100% truth like 99% of posters on here but he is definitely unreasonable to present a conspiracy theory as fact.

Next week's topics for discussion include the moon landings, Elvis, and the Loch Ness Monster presumably.

I don't mind teachers challenging their pupils, I do mind them propagating batshit conspiracy theories. But I agree that if this one was simply advocating caution about the way the papers keep telling us to panic about new illnesses, then good on her.

People in all sorts of professional, responsible positions come out with bizarre opinions sometimes...

My mum is a retired paediatrician - when DD was born she was not (quite) retired, yet told me to wean DD at 16 weeks purely because she was a big baby so would be hungry - it was 10 years ago but still everyone, including me as a parent to a pfb, knew by then that there are actually more calories in breastmilk than pureed carrot, and that weaning a thriving 16 week old was a bad idea...

My DS1's German primary school teacher told him that he was forgetting to use capital letters and full stops because English is all written in lower case This was at a parent/ child review (like parents eve) with me sitting right there - I said that of course only certain nouns in English are capitalised, but that DS1 was often not using any capitals at all (even for place names, people's names and at the start of sentences) and she repeated that this was because he is English... Its doubly bizarre because she will have done at least 6 or more years of English at school...

I think some people, regardless of how well qualified, educated and professional they are, sometimes have some kind of brain to mouth blockage going on and spout nonsense some days!

People in all sorts of professional, responsible positions come out with bizarre opinions sometimes...

^^ This

It's worth pointing out to children - that it worth looking at many sources or where the information originally came from.

I like Radio More or Less program for that where they look at statistics used in the media and sometimes try tracking down often repeatedly ones to the source - and it can quite eye opening.

Though it possible the teacher could have been making a point out poor reporting of science related topics in the media as well - which is a also something worth pointing out to children.

Wouldn't it just be easier to run though those point with your DC than tackle the teacher about what was possible a throw away comment they may not even remember? Though it if was a pattern I'd be worried.

Maybe they are talking about the tdap vaccination...

I couldn't leave that to parents eve, I'd have to email (politely! but today) to someone at school to clarify just what did the teacher say & mean.

I have no tolerance for conspiracy theories, though.

Definitely clarify, some of DS's teachers do talk about conspiracy theories that might be relevant - for eg the climate change theories in science - in class (high school) and get them to discuss what they read and think it through.
The way he described the last one sounded pretty interesting.

Here is a patient information leaflet on Zika virus in pregnancy produced by the UK teratology information service (I work there!). It was updated yesterday so contains all of the most up to date info. Feedback very welcome, and its written in accessible language so might be suitable for in-class discussions for 12 year olds

www.medicinesinpregnancy.org/Medicine--pregnancy/Zika-virus/

I actually DO believe that the timing of the release of certain news stories is manipulated sometimes. It's an interesting concept. It's good to remain open minded about this stuff.

However, that's not a theory i would expect my kids to be told randomly by a teacher, and without any balanced argument. I would want this cleared up.

Schwab - I have a seventeen year old and we were all told then to wean at sixteen weeks. Your mum had probably been giving that advice all her working life. Not so bonkers, I don't think.