Steve Beaven
At Mt. Hood Community College, funerals are part of the curriculum
http://www.oregonlive.com/gresham/index.ssf/2011/03/at_mt_hood_community_college_f.html
3/1/2011
Topic: Unconventional subjects in school
The heading pretty much sums this up. The director of the Funeral Service Education Program explains the activities that outline the program. Students learn how to prepare a body after it has died; they learn some themes of business in funerals, and the psychology of death. Intended audience: Any student interested in the process of arranging a funeral and preparing the deceased for eternal sleep.
Key Points:
Students explore the scientific elements of a dead body
Students explore the art behind decorations for a funeral
Students learn the process for starting a business in funerals
Students learn about the psychology of death and how to cope with it
Relevance: I thought this was an interesting video and an interesting subject to teach in school. We know that sex (intercourse and gender related issues) can be a taboo subject in school, and administrators and teachers are always trying to find ways to teach the subject matter appropriately, but one thing that no one really touches on is death. People die every day but no one ever really studies the biological and psychological aspects of death in schools, not unless you take it as an elective like course in college or something. Should we be teaching these kinds of things in K-12 schools? Maybe just middle school and high school? A student can be excused from class because a family member died, but we don’t really teach anything on coping with death or helping a peer deal with a recent death in the family or friend. Just a thought.
Interesting thoughts... I do remember when I was in High School at some point, we went over the cycles of grief in one of my classes. That was the closest I can remember coming to this topic (other than, of course, studying wars, genocide, etc.). There was also a point in High School when a friend and teammate died in a car accident. In that time of tragedy for the school, there were open counseling sessions, an assembly was held, and students were taught about ways to deal with their grief and confusion over the loss. It was a sad time for a lot of people, but I think that the school did a really good job guiding students through it.
ReplyDeleteI thought this was also very interesting. It also made me think about all the other non traditional classes and subjects we could teach, things that people encounter everyday but are not covered in class, or they have the potential to be if we make those connections and applications to the real world.
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