Teacher suspended for Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown reenactment lesson


A reenactment of two deadly shootings that came under national attention has left parents upset and a teacher suspended without pay in Alabama.

According to the Selma Times Journal, the sixth-grade teacher, who has not been named, had students reenact both the Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson, Missouri, and the Trayvon Martin shooting in Florida.

Dallas County School superintendent Don Willingham said the lesson, which he had originally thought only reenacted the Brown shooting, was a mistake and that it went too far in the discussion.

Williams, according to the report, said the teacher planned the assignment on current events where students would have to research and reenact events the class voted on.  The students chose Brown's and Martin's shootings.

The Montgomery Advertiser reported children were asked to draw fake guns and use wadded up paper as bullets.

One child, who is white, was allegedly asked to be the shooter in the Brown reenactment, the Advertiser reported.

His mother, according to WSFA, went on social media to complain about the assignment.  She claimed a black student pretended to be Brown.

Willingham said he wants parents to come to him first if they have a classroom issue, instead of going online, WSFA reported.

The teacher has been suspended without pay, with no estimated return to class.  But the superintendent said she will return to the classroom in the future, the Times Journal reported.

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