MESA, Ariz. -- President Barack Obama is planning to welcome students across the country back to school and some parents don't approve.

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Next Tuesday, the president will address elementary, middle and high school students in an online speech and will challenge them to set goals. But critics call it politics and say he's gone too far.

The White House said the speech is intended to be inspirational, and challenge students to set goals for their education.

Mesa Public Schools is one of many districts across the country where parents have expressed concerns about the speech.

Some of the criticism comes from the lesson plans and recommended classroom activities that go along with it.

Mesa teachers plan to have an alternative assignment for those children whose parents want them to skip the lesson.

One Mesa parent, Margaret Stokes, said Thursday that it didn’t matter to her because her two sons were too young to understand.

"They don't even know who the president is right now in Kindergarten and preschool,” said Stokes. “I think if they wrote something, they wouldn't know what they were writing about; except for play time.”

State Superintendent of Public Instruction Tom Horne said Thursday that he did not agree with the lesson plans because he doesn’t think they’re good teaching tools.

"We like to encourage critical thinking of our students, seeing both sides of an issue, being able to argue both sides of an issue, being able to analyze. And instead what we have are materials that have phrases like how will he inspire us, what are the most inspiring things he said, write them in big letters on the black board, how can we help him, that kind of thing," said Horne.

Horne said each district will decide on its own how and whether their schools will participate in showing the video.

Tempe and Scottsdale will have an alternative assignment for students whose parents don’t want them to participate.

Deer Valley Unified School District’s Web site said the video will only be shown to high school students enrolled in American Government or American History classes.