The question is, how do you handle it when your (six year old) daughter comes home singing a Islamic Prayer Song? It's a silly song like what many christian kids are taught during dinner time at home. Such as: (I'm paraphrasing, and making this up, but it was about this bad:)
Bless our friend, bless our food,
Come, oh, Allah and be with us.
In our Islam, grow with peace;
The parents (friends of ours) were shocked when their daughter came home and just happily started singing it. They quickly questioned it, and asked their daughter "Where did you learn that?" The daughter replied, "my teacher". Her teacher is a teacher at a non-religious Triad area charter school. They knew the teacher was Muslim, but didn't expect their child to be taught and required to sing this prayer-song before lunch everyday. The child, unaware anything is wrong, is happy to sing the song. How do you unstick a song (as Dip has asked)? That's what the parents are asking.
Now as I understand it, Charter Schools, are considered public schools because they receive money from the state. Or at least this is what I've told my friends. Due to that, separation of church and state is a requirement. I've come to this conclusion after looking on the Internet and finding stories like this or this:
Charter schools are nonsectarian publicly funded schools of choice that are privately managed. They operate with freedom from many of the regulations that apply to traditional public schools.
cite
What's interesting to me, is so many local people do send their children to Charter schools locally because they're the type of individuals who can't afford private christian schools and want those "values" instilled in their children, though most of them are smart enough not to bring christian prayer into these organizations because they realize here in America we're guaranteed the right to practice our religion and beliefs at home, but not infringe upon others beliefs in (oh say) publicly funded schools.
So of course; the parents, after confirming what they heard was really what they heard, and trying to eliminate any other possibilities. Like it was being taught in a historical context. (It wasn't)- It was done everyday before lunch. They called the vice-principle. The VP said they'd look into it. You would expect a immediate response, but the next day when they asked their daughter: (did you sing your new song at lunch today?)... she advises her parents that she once again was asked to sing this Islamic prayer prior to lunch. This was two days ago, and they're trying to be patient... but I can see how their patience running out.
I'm curious to what advice, perhaps anyone else would suggest that I could might give them from my readers. They're trying to keep this on the down-low. They love the school, and the teacher, and they don't want anything bad to come out of this- but they believe their beliefs are deeply personal, and things such as religion and prayer should be kept at home, taught by them. What do you think?
