I am a basic skills teacher with the trailor and such. I take certain children out of their classrooms for special help. I have many different kids everyday. Recently, I've been asking students what they're gonna be for Halloween. The majority of the students I spoke to said they're not gonna go Trick-o-Treating because their parents said that "they" might poison the candy. Wow! That's scary! I don't know if that's even true, but I guess many parents are not taking ANY chances. Geez...this Halloween won't be fun if no one's going Trick-o-Treating. I even heard that a lot of malls are cancelling their Trick-o-Treating as well.

So, many of you are parents, is your child(ren) going Trick-o-Treating? (by car or whatever)

May be they should just cancel Halloween. I dunno. It's just no fun anymore. Geez...Halloween has changed so much since I was a child. I remember when I went Trick-o-Treating with my friends we used to go all over the neighborhood, and sometimes into other neighborhoods. We had no boundaries. The best was going to rich neighborhoods because they had the best candy, and we could peek into their beautiful homes. Oh well, so much for going back to "normal."

Happy Halloween my @$$.


God bless,
Deina

God Bless America

That's a tough call, eh? I wish I could offer a comforting answer. Until a month or so back I would have said it's not going to happen, but then...the anthrax thing started to happen. Maybe groups of families/neighbours/friends could organise something - and make the goodies?

Alot of people are going to private parties. My sister asked her neighbor, and they had 60-90 kids come to the door last year... I've never had any.

'shana

go Trick-or-Treating!! We just go to people we know. I know most of the people in my neighborhood and most of the people in my parents' neighborhood, so that's where we'll go.

My kids love this holiday. I'll do anything I can to make it fun for them!

Shhh,
Whisper

THAT is the question.........why not take the little demons to the local mall? We have about a handful here in KC....and I know at 2 of them give out candy on Halloween....What could be safer? Other then staying at home, that is? But, then what does that teach your child? Fear? It's good to have fear...only idiots fear nothing! But still, lets get realistic here.....other then Anthrax poison, TO POLITICAL LEADERS, and those IN and AROUND POLITICS, nobody else has been poisoned....I think people are OVERREACTING again.....

'Drea

me... I don't care for Halloween. There are people who use it as an excuse for torturing animals. All cat owners have to be on guard, and black kitties are in danger for a couple of weeks before.

Many malls here are cancelling their "trick or treat" tradition this year.

I am a regular ed teacher, and it bothers me that we can spend half a month with decorations, worksheets, and stories about witches, ghosts, and demons in school, but we can't sing a Christmas carol or read a story with baby Jesus mentioned. We can't even call the vacation "Christmas vacation"... it has to be called "winter break".

So personally, I say "Bah! Humbug!" to Halloween. "Equal Opportunity for Christmas!"

...anti trick-or-treaters are overreacting. But then I've always lived in rural or suburban areas too.

That said, anti trick-or treat sentiment is not new as of Sept 11. It comes and goes. Believe it or not, when I was 7, which <cough> was over 2 decades ago <sigh-giggle>, I lived in a town where trick-or-treating was banned! I believe there had been a problem in recent year(s) with pins or razorblades in candy

Well, needless to say, I was darn disappointed. I thought it was silly to not allow trick-or-treating. I didn't care that there was a community party instead... until we went to the party

I think private parties are a bad idea because they're, well, private. If you're not in the 'in crowd', then what do you do? But, ya know, the community party was great! It was on an estate and there were hay rides and apple bobbing, a costume contest, and candy natch. I think there was probably a bonfire and hot mulled cider for the adults... and who remembers what all?! It was a wonderful way for the community to try to overcome the gloom, fear and isolationism of banning trick-or-treating.

If you're really afraid of trick-or-treating, I think the community party is the way to go. But if you are really afraid you probably ought to consider having your community ban trick-or-treating. It's hard for would-be trick-or-treaters and would-be treat givers to know what to do in a climate of fear.

And, 'shana, from the time I was 6, we've never had more than a dozen trick-or-treaters, usually none. I haven't had any in the ~14 years I've lived in my WI apt. <pout>

Aquillea

I think kids spend too much time in malls and/or thinking about what sneakers and computer games and whatnot they just can't live without. Who came up with the idea to take kids to malls for Halloween... parents or shopkeepers? (ROTFL)

And you may not be an 'outcast' to not be in the 'in crowd' for parties. I think we had lived in that town (actually, outside of town, in the country) about a month before Halloween came along. When I heard about the trick-or-treating ban... I was pretty sure moving had been a big mistake <giggle>.

A~

...I can't imagine not doing trick-or-treating on some level. If the weather here continues to be this nasty, I think we'll stick to the mall idea. And, as with everything, it'll also depend on the general health of the kids.

As far as the curriculum at school goes, is there some sort of rule requiring you to hand out Halloween-themed projects? If not, why not focus on autumn themes such as pumpkins (fills in the requisite Jack-O-Lantern idea), harvest, changing colors, what certain animals do to prepare for winter... I remember one year in grade school, we did a project called a "leaf book." The teacher had made a visual list of all the various types of trees found in our particular area, and our assignment was to go around on a scavenger hunt around our homes and collect one of every variety we could find. We then attached them to paper with pre-punched holes and bound them into a book. I kept that thing for years afterwards, until the leaves basically disinegrated.
I'm fine with them not having Christmas carols and such in school. But I'll tell you what Emily's first grade class did instead. As the winter holidays approached, they got to learn about ALL of the "signifigant" winter holidays...Christmas, Hannukah, Kwanzaa, etc. They made a huge book with pocketed pages. On the outside of each pocket was a pre-printed "blurb" about each holiday (what is Kwanzaa, who celebrates it, how do they celebrate, etc.) Then, inside the pockets were things the kids had colored and cut out or otherwise created or decorated. The Hanukkah one, I remember, had a colorful cutout of a Menorrah and a few other things. The kids were able to recognize their own holiday (if they celebrate at all), learn about other holidays (very important in our culturally diverse society), and gain knowledge of other cultures (thus demystifying them and consequently illustrating that being "different" can be interesting rather than condemnable). I grew up and was educated in the Bible Belt, so I understand fully your sentiment. But now that I'm older, and a Christian married to a Jewish man who's told me about how he remembers feeling as a child when all the kids in class would sing carols and talk about baby Jesus...and I can see the lasting effects of being in a room full of people who only observe one thing, something your family doesn't believe in, being a kid and wondering if your family would be upset if you just "went along" with the class so you wouldn't stick out. So, I'm all for not celebrating Christian holidays in the classroom. But that doesn't mean it should be ignored altogether. It simply means that the teacher must strive for promoting diversity, for educating the students to the fact that "their" way isn't the only way or the best way...
Wow, did I get soapboxy there? Sorry!

Zoni

teach about leaf color changes and all that, but it's as foreign to the south Texas coast as the rice paddies in Japan. We still have green grass and green tree leaves until December. Then the leaves just turn brown and fall off... no nice reds and golds and oranges here!

And snow? Once about ten years ago we had some flakes fall... the principal rang the fire alarm so we would all be sure to get outside and witness the event before it ended!

that does present a problem, eh? LOL I couldn't stand that, I don't think. It's bad enough here in the Seattle area. Now in Middle TN we had REAL seasons and weather changes! LOL

Zoni

Zoni, I know! I lived in Nashville for two years when I was in high school! My brother and I were goggle-eyed at those gorgeous colors on the trees! If I had not seen them for myself I would not be able to imagine them...

Then we moved back to central Texas (Austin) and we thought the trees in Texas sure were short and scrubby after spending those two years in central Tennessee! LOL

I drove through Seattle last summer on the way to BC. I was just as goggle-eyed at the beautiful, tall evergreens there. What a landscape to see every day!