Almost 70% of 8th Grader are Stupid...

originally posted by: Aazadan

originally posted by: hopenotfeariswhatweneed
a reply to: Aazadan

Society is based on worth. My statement has nothing to do with intelligence, more to do with circumstance.

Then you should clarify because first you challenged the assertion that people are not getting smarter, and that the schools are to blame, and now you say your opinion has nothing to do with intelligence.

No I meant the people who get into politics is more about circumstance not intelligence.

I never said schools are to blame either, they are only part of the problem, there are many factors as to why people aren't getting smarter.

originally posted by: seagull
a reply to: ntech

Wouldn't it be better to have them want to learn?

Pay 'em for an A? What's to keep 'em from cheating? After all, that money is incentive to do that, as well.

No. The answer, as it's always been is good teachers, preferably great ones, who make learning fun.

Over the years, I've had many a teacher, on many a topic, yet the one teacher that I'll forever hold above all others is Mrs. Anderson, my 4th grade teacher.

Almost 50 years have passed since a little boy sat in her classroom, yet I remember, with great respect and affection virtually every day in that classroom. The same thing can not be said for many of the other teachers I had. Many, I can't even remember their names, muchless that she couldn't abide the feel of chalk dust on her hands, so she had a special chalkstick holder, and an undying love of Mark Twain--she read to us in class every afternoon, and the works of Mark Twain featured prominently, it's where my love of Twain originated.

No, the answer isn't money--though that does help--it's having teachers to whom teaching isn't a job...it's a calling from something outside of themselves.

When teacher love their calling, kids will respond, and love to learn.

I coached Youth Soccer for many years, and too often I saw kids not having fun, because the coaches, and too often the parents, weren't there to have fun...

Again, I lucked out on that--My first coach was Mr. Corn, by day he ran a very successful tree trimming business, by night he was a very enthusiastic soccer coach--who knew less about the game than many of us kids

--but what he had was an infectious sense of fun. I was one of those kids who knew more about the game than he did, what I didn't know, and he taught me, was how to be good at it, yet still have fun.

The same can be said for the classroom. Enthusiasm. Fun. Learning. Not mutually exclusive, yet somewhere along the line, that seems to be being forgotten.

Now I'm ramblin'...

But not every kid gets the good teachers. Also there is a number of other factors that can apply as well. If a black kid in a inner city school gets straight A's then the other kids call him an Oreo. Or worse. It's cool to be a failure and a thug when you're black. Then there are bad uninterested parents. And probably a few other factors that would hinder their performance as well.

That's why pay for performance would be a big carrot towards better grades. When the nerds start walking away with free money the thugs and losers would sit up and take notice.

My opinion is that there are kids that are too stupid or uninformed to be thinking about whats going to happen to them years in the future. With the proper incentives they don't have to think about it until High School. And then they would be way ahead of where they would be without the incentives.

a reply to: Aazadan

Pish tosh.

There is as much security in it as there is in being some sort of programmer.

If you're good at it, there's always a market for good carpenters--and there are all sorts of carpentry, as well.

I'm a functional carpenter--meaning it ain't gonna be pretty, but it'll do the job. Contractors are always looking for good ones. Or you start your own business as an independent contractor. A good friend of mine runs his own woodshop, doing high end cabinetry, counters and the like. He's got more work than he can handle most of the time.

He made my mom a set of glass cased cabinets for storing china and such. I've been sending business his way for better part of twenty years. He didn't graduate high school.

Same with any trade or training. The better you are, the better the security. Which is as it should be.

originally posted by: ntech

originally posted by: seagull
a reply to: ntech

Wouldn't it be better to have them want to learn?

Pay 'em for an A? What's to keep 'em from cheating? After all, that money is incentive to do that, as well.

No. The answer, as it's always been is good teachers, preferably great ones, who make learning fun.

Over the years, I've had many a teacher, on many a topic, yet the one teacher that I'll forever hold above all others is Mrs. Anderson, my 4th grade teacher.

Almost 50 years have passed since a little boy sat in her classroom, yet I remember, with great respect and affection virtually every day in that classroom. The same thing can not be said for many of the other teachers I had. Many, I can't even remember their names, muchless that she couldn't abide the feel of chalk dust on her hands, so she had a special chalkstick holder, and an undying love of Mark Twain--she read to us in class every afternoon, and the works of Mark Twain featured prominently, it's where my love of Twain originated.

No, the answer isn't money--though that does help--it's having teachers to whom teaching isn't a job...it's a calling from something outside of themselves.

When teacher love their calling, kids will respond, and love to learn.

I coached Youth Soccer for many years, and too often I saw kids not having fun, because the coaches, and too often the parents, weren't there to have fun...

Again, I lucked out on that--My first coach was Mr. Corn, by day he ran a very successful tree trimming business, by night he was a very enthusiastic soccer coach--who knew less about the game than many of us kids

--but what he had was an infectious sense of fun. I was one of those kids who knew more about the game than he did, what I didn't know, and he taught me, was how to be good at it, yet still have fun.

The same can be said for the classroom. Enthusiasm. Fun. Learning. Not mutually exclusive, yet somewhere along the line, that seems to be being forgotten.

Now I'm ramblin'...

But not every kid gets the good teachers. Also there is a number of other factors that can apply as well. If a black kid in a inner city school gets straight A's then the other kids call him an Oreo. Or worse. It's cool to be a failure and a thug when you're black. Then there are bad uninterested parents. And probably a few other factors that would hinder their performance as well.

That's why pay for performance would be a big carrot towards better grades. When the nerds start walking away with free money the thugs and losers would sit up and take notice.

My opinion is that there are kids that are too stupid or uninformed to be thinking about whats going to happen to them years in the future. With the proper incentives they don't have to think about it until High School. And then they would be way ahead of where they would be without the incentives.

What is ironic is that smart kids usually understand being smart leads to more money... in a way, society is already paying kids to be smart. Unfortunately, too many kids and families don't understand that dynamic.

I know my parents told me to do well in school as it would lead to more opportunities and money than they had... so I understood the long term plan.

originally posted by: ntech

originally posted by: seagull
a reply to: ntech

Wouldn't it be better to have them want to learn?

Pay 'em for an A? What's to keep 'em from cheating? After all, that money is incentive to do that, as well.

No. The answer, as it's always been is good teachers, preferably great ones, who make learning fun.

Over the years, I've had many a teacher, on many a topic, yet the one teacher that I'll forever hold above all others is Mrs. Anderson, my 4th grade teacher.

Almost 50 years have passed since a little boy sat in her classroom, yet I remember, with great respect and affection virtually every day in that classroom. The same thing can not be said for many of the other teachers I had. Many, I can't even remember their names, muchless that she couldn't abide the feel of chalk dust on her hands, so she had a special chalkstick holder, and an undying love of Mark Twain--she read to us in class every afternoon, and the works of Mark Twain featured prominently, it's where my love of Twain originated.

No, the answer isn't money--though that does help--it's having teachers to whom teaching isn't a job...it's a calling from something outside of themselves.

When teacher love their calling, kids will respond, and love to learn.

I coached Youth Soccer for many years, and too often I saw kids not having fun, because the coaches, and too often the parents, weren't there to have fun...

Again, I lucked out on that--My first coach was Mr. Corn, by day he ran a very successful tree trimming business, by night he was a very enthusiastic soccer coach--who knew less about the game than many of us kids

--but what he had was an infectious sense of fun. I was one of those kids who knew more about the game than he did, what I didn't know, and he taught me, was how to be good at it, yet still have fun.

The same can be said for the classroom. Enthusiasm. Fun. Learning. Not mutually exclusive, yet somewhere along the line, that seems to be being forgotten.

Now I'm ramblin'...

But not every kid gets the good teachers. Also there is a number of other factors that can apply as well. If a black kid in a inner city school gets straight A's then the other kids call him an Oreo. Or worse. It's cool to be a failure and a thug when you're black. Then there are bad uninterested parents. And probably a few other factors that would hinder their performance as well.

That's why pay for performance would be a big carrot towards better grades. When the nerds start walking away with free money the thugs and losers would sit up and take notice.

My opinion is that there are kids that are too stupid or uninformed to be thinking about whats going to happen to them years in the future. With the proper incentives they don't have to think about it until High School. And then they would be way ahead of where they would be without the incentives.

What is ironic is that smart kids usually understand being smart leads to more money... in a way, society is already paying kids to be smart. Unfortunately, too many kids and families don't understand that dynamic.

I know my parents told me to do well in school as it would lead to more opportunities and money than they had... so I understood the long term plan.

a reply to: Aazadan

The smart kid and the less able kid can be taught together, but the smart kid will pick up what you're trying to teach the first time where the less able kid will need more days to pick up the concept.

Now you are talking about kids who come from broken homes where the parents themeselves don't understand the meaning of being involved, so if you want to kid to "get it," he or she needs to "get it" at school, but you want that kind of diversity in the classroom with the kid who comes ready, willing, and able to learn as quickly as the teacher dishes it out.

So you can't win this one. You are talking about kids who *will not* get it.

Of course, with your "diversity" of home life added in, the definition of less able actually rides up the intellectual scale to where kids who might otherwise be able to "get it" it in a timely manner are only able to "get it" with their less able peers because they don't have parents as teachers at home seeing to their needs.

But, hey, it's OK, the smart kid who got it the first time doesn't need all the time and attention because he or she already knows it, so the teacher can concentrate on remediating the ones who don't get it.

Your idea is part of what's wrong with modern education. The kids who need a lot of time and attention to get it need to be in environments and with teachers who can properly focus on teaching them rather than having teachers whose attention is divided by groups of kids who are in three or four or more different stages of the learning process.

originally posted by: Aazadan

originally posted by: ketsuko
So ... you want kids with IQs in the 80s sharing the classroom with kids whose IQs are in the 130s and up? and everyone in between ... and served appropriately by one teacher?

Well, IQ is a useless measurement to begin with, but I assume you're just saying that the smart kids and the dumb kids can't be taught together. That's a premise I would disagree with. Some kids just need to put in more work at home to keep up, and if they can't do it, their parents need to step in and help teach as well.

Once kids hit middle school and pick their own classes, this is even less of an issue because students already have the ability to challenge themselves more or less.

Smart kids and dumb kids can't be taught together. It simply doesn't work. I've experienced this personally. I went to a crap middle school. I was pretty much the smartest kid in my classes. I NEVER studied. Teachers basically ignored me while they focused on the ghetto kids who could barely read Dick & Jane... I'm over in a corner by myself reading Isaac Asimov.

Fortunately, my parents were able to get me in a desegregation busing program that sent me across town to a very wealthy, most white public high school. One of the best in the state. My freshman year of high school, I got a 1.0 GPA. It wasn't because I couldn't do the work, it was because I was in culture shock. I didn't know how to study, nor was I used to the expectations of excellence. Anyway, by the end of my sophomore year, I figured it out and graduated with Honors and taking AP classes.

a reply to: Edumakated

My experience was similar.

The only time before I was recognized as gifted that I could actually learn with everyone was the very first, sometimes second time, the teacher explained something new. After that, I was tuned out because I knew it and everyone else seemed to have missed what was then painfully obvious to me.

After the gifted label, things got better but sometimes I still wanted to grab people and shake them for missing the obvious.

originally posted by: Edumakated

originally posted by: ntech

originally posted by: seagull
a reply to: ntech

Wouldn't it be better to have them want to learn?

Pay 'em for an A? What's to keep 'em from cheating? After all, that money is incentive to do that, as well.

No. The answer, as it's always been is good teachers, preferably great ones, who make learning fun.

Over the years, I've had many a teacher, on many a topic, yet the one teacher that I'll forever hold above all others is Mrs. Anderson, my 4th grade teacher.

Almost 50 years have passed since a little boy sat in her classroom, yet I remember, with great respect and affection virtually every day in that classroom. The same thing can not be said for many of the other teachers I had. Many, I can't even remember their names, muchless that she couldn't abide the feel of chalk dust on her hands, so she had a special chalkstick holder, and an undying love of Mark Twain--she read to us in class every afternoon, and the works of Mark Twain featured prominently, it's where my love of Twain originated.

No, the answer isn't money--though that does help--it's having teachers to whom teaching isn't a job...it's a calling from something outside of themselves.

When teacher love their calling, kids will respond, and love to learn.

I coached Youth Soccer for many years, and too often I saw kids not having fun, because the coaches, and too often the parents, weren't there to have fun...

Again, I lucked out on that--My first coach was Mr. Corn, by day he ran a very successful tree trimming business, by night he was a very enthusiastic soccer coach--who knew less about the game than many of us kids

--but what he had was an infectious sense of fun. I was one of those kids who knew more about the game than he did, what I didn't know, and he taught me, was how to be good at it, yet still have fun.

The same can be said for the classroom. Enthusiasm. Fun. Learning. Not mutually exclusive, yet somewhere along the line, that seems to be being forgotten.

Now I'm ramblin'...

But not every kid gets the good teachers. Also there is a number of other factors that can apply as well. If a black kid in a inner city school gets straight A's then the other kids call him an Oreo. Or worse. It's cool to be a failure and a thug when you're black. Then there are bad uninterested parents. And probably a few other factors that would hinder their performance as well.

That's why pay for performance would be a big carrot towards better grades. When the nerds start walking away with free money the thugs and losers would sit up and take notice.

My opinion is that there are kids that are too stupid or uninformed to be thinking about whats going to happen to them years in the future. With the proper incentives they don't have to think about it until High School. And then they would be way ahead of where they would be without the incentives.

What is ironic is that smart kids usually understand being smart leads to more money... in a way, society is already paying kids to be smart. Unfortunately, too many kids and families don't understand that dynamic.

I know my parents told me to do well in school as it would lead to more opportunities and money than they had... so I understood the long term plan.

i'd like to add to your quote:
an education won't guarantee more money. all an education gives you is a key to open doors otherwise locked out to you.
education provides an opportunity. it is up to the student to make the most of those opportunities.

a reply to: Edumakated

It's all about the carrots and the sticks. Some kids don't see the long term carrot. Just the sticks.

They need to stop the sticks and put the emphasis on the carrots.

a reply to: ntech

But not every kid gets the good teachers. Also there is a number of other factors that can apply as well. If a black kid in a inner city school gets straight A's then the other kids call him an Oreo. Or worse. It's cool to be a failure and a thug when you're black. Then there are bad uninterested parents. And probably a few other factors that would hinder their performance as well.

That's a job for the people who are supposed to give a damn. Parents. Teachers/Admin. Not to mention the kids. I've never met a kid yet, whether it was when I was a kid, or now, when I'm supposedly an adult, that thinks being a failure is cool.

Things can be done to fight the "thuglife is cool" BS, as well. There used to be a program called Scared Straight, where at risk kids were exposed to the actual reality of "thug life is cool". Or the version of it that existed in the 70's. As I understand it, it was something of a success. Being told by a lifer that you're going to make someone a good "sweet thang" would be an incredible wake up call...

If it isn't? Well, those kids are probably lost causes, and as cold as it sounds, and as cold as it is, it might be better to concentrate on the kids that are salvageable, or the kids that don't need saving. No child left behind makes for great sound bites...but it caters to the lowest and slowest, not the best and brightest, and those are the ones we should be encouraging at all costs.

That's why pay for performance would be a big carrot towards better grades. When the nerds start walking away with free money the thugs and losers would sit up and take notice.

To my mind, that just give incentive to cheat to get ahead. On the surface, it's something to explore, maybe. But I just can't get by the incentive to cheat... But, I might be wrong. Hardly be the first time.

My opinion is that there are kids that are too stupid or uninformed to be thinking about whats going to happen to them years in the future. With the proper incentives they don't have to think about it until High School. And then they would be way ahead of where they would be without the incentives.

Too stupid? Or just kids?

I was nothing resembling a stupid kid, but thinking about the future wasn't something I did much of before my senior year in high school. I had other priorities...as did many of my peers/friends.

I spent many years working the commercial fishing industry--I don't think there's a facet of it I'm not familiar with. I caught 'em. Processed 'em. Sold 'em, both as a fisherman, and as a processor. Not something I ever, not in a million years, would ever have imagined myself doing... Yet, in retrospect, I don't think I'd change a whole lot of it. Some, sure, but not a whole lot of it.

College is wonderful, I had fun for the two years I attended. But it's not for everyone. I learned a trade, catching and selling seafood. Trades, of all sorts, should be encouraged.

originally posted by: subfab

originally posted by: Edumakated

originally posted by: ntech

originally posted by: seagull
a reply to: ntech

Wouldn't it be better to have them want to learn?

Pay 'em for an A? What's to keep 'em from cheating? After all, that money is incentive to do that, as well.

No. The answer, as it's always been is good teachers, preferably great ones, who make learning fun.

Over the years, I've had many a teacher, on many a topic, yet the one teacher that I'll forever hold above all others is Mrs. Anderson, my 4th grade teacher.

Almost 50 years have passed since a little boy sat in her classroom, yet I remember, with great respect and affection virtually every day in that classroom. The same thing can not be said for many of the other teachers I had. Many, I can't even remember their names, muchless that she couldn't abide the feel of chalk dust on her hands, so she had a special chalkstick holder, and an undying love of Mark Twain--she read to us in class every afternoon, and the works of Mark Twain featured prominently, it's where my love of Twain originated.

No, the answer isn't money--though that does help--it's having teachers to whom teaching isn't a job...it's a calling from something outside of themselves.

When teacher love their calling, kids will respond, and love to learn.

I coached Youth Soccer for many years, and too often I saw kids not having fun, because the coaches, and too often the parents, weren't there to have fun...

Again, I lucked out on that--My first coach was Mr. Corn, by day he ran a very successful tree trimming business, by night he was a very enthusiastic soccer coach--who knew less about the game than many of us kids

--but what he had was an infectious sense of fun. I was one of those kids who knew more about the game than he did, what I didn't know, and he taught me, was how to be good at it, yet still have fun.

The same can be said for the classroom. Enthusiasm. Fun. Learning. Not mutually exclusive, yet somewhere along the line, that seems to be being forgotten.

Now I'm ramblin'...

But not every kid gets the good teachers. Also there is a number of other factors that can apply as well. If a black kid in a inner city school gets straight A's then the other kids call him an Oreo. Or worse. It's cool to be a failure and a thug when you're black. Then there are bad uninterested parents. And probably a few other factors that would hinder their performance as well.

That's why pay for performance would be a big carrot towards better grades. When the nerds start walking away with free money the thugs and losers would sit up and take notice.

My opinion is that there are kids that are too stupid or uninformed to be thinking about whats going to happen to them years in the future. With the proper incentives they don't have to think about it until High School. And then they would be way ahead of where they would be without the incentives.

What is ironic is that smart kids usually understand being smart leads to more money... in a way, society is already paying kids to be smart. Unfortunately, too many kids and families don't understand that dynamic.

I know my parents told me to do well in school as it would lead to more opportunities and money than they had... so I understood the long term plan.

i'd like to add to your quote:
an education won't guarantee more money. all an education gives you is a key to open doors otherwise locked out to you.
education provides an opportunity. it is up to the student to make the most of those opportunities.

One thing that has stuck with me all these years ... When I was 14, my parents made me get a summer job. I worked at Sonic.

I HATED it.

Every time I expressed this sentiment, my parents told me, "This is why you are getting your education. Without it, that will be your life because it will be the only kind of job you will be able to get."

originally posted by: ketsuko

originally posted by: subfab

originally posted by: Edumakated

originally posted by: ntech

originally posted by: seagull
a reply to: ntech

Wouldn't it be better to have them want to learn?

Pay 'em for an A? What's to keep 'em from cheating? After all, that money is incentive to do that, as well.

No. The answer, as it's always been is good teachers, preferably great ones, who make learning fun.

Over the years, I've had many a teacher, on many a topic, yet the one teacher that I'll forever hold above all others is Mrs. Anderson, my 4th grade teacher.

Almost 50 years have passed since a little boy sat in her classroom, yet I remember, with great respect and affection virtually every day in that classroom. The same thing can not be said for many of the other teachers I had. Many, I can't even remember their names, muchless that she couldn't abide the feel of chalk dust on her hands, so she had a special chalkstick holder, and an undying love of Mark Twain--she read to us in class every afternoon, and the works of Mark Twain featured prominently, it's where my love of Twain originated.

No, the answer isn't money--though that does help--it's having teachers to whom teaching isn't a job...it's a calling from something outside of themselves.

When teacher love their calling, kids will respond, and love to learn.

I coached Youth Soccer for many years, and too often I saw kids not having fun, because the coaches, and too often the parents, weren't there to have fun...

Again, I lucked out on that--My first coach was Mr. Corn, by day he ran a very successful tree trimming business, by night he was a very enthusiastic soccer coach--who knew less about the game than many of us kids

--but what he had was an infectious sense of fun. I was one of those kids who knew more about the game than he did, what I didn't know, and he taught me, was how to be good at it, yet still have fun.

The same can be said for the classroom. Enthusiasm. Fun. Learning. Not mutually exclusive, yet somewhere along the line, that seems to be being forgotten.

Now I'm ramblin'...

But not every kid gets the good teachers. Also there is a number of other factors that can apply as well. If a black kid in a inner city school gets straight A's then the other kids call him an Oreo. Or worse. It's cool to be a failure and a thug when you're black. Then there are bad uninterested parents. And probably a few other factors that would hinder their performance as well.

That's why pay for performance would be a big carrot towards better grades. When the nerds start walking away with free money the thugs and losers would sit up and take notice.

My opinion is that there are kids that are too stupid or uninformed to be thinking about whats going to happen to them years in the future. With the proper incentives they don't have to think about it until High School. And then they would be way ahead of where they would be without the incentives.

What is ironic is that smart kids usually understand being smart leads to more money... in a way, society is already paying kids to be smart. Unfortunately, too many kids and families don't understand that dynamic.

I know my parents told me to do well in school as it would lead to more opportunities and money than they had... so I understood the long term plan.

i'd like to add to your quote:
an education won't guarantee more money. all an education gives you is a key to open doors otherwise locked out to you.
education provides an opportunity. it is up to the student to make the most of those opportunities.

One thing that has stuck with me all these years ... When I was 14, my parents made me get a summer job. I worked at Sonic.

I HATED it.

Every time I expressed this sentiment, my parents told me, "This is why you are getting your education. Without it, that will be your life because it will be the only kind of job you will be able to get."

My parents did the same... My dad was a cop. One day he took me for a ride and went to the worst housing projects in Atlanta at the time. He basically told me to look around and if I didn't do well in school, I'd be living there.

Another story, I'll never forget that really had an impact on me. My pops took me to the high school I was being bused to for registration during the summer when school was out. The school was practically empty.

Anyway, I am standing in a hallway looking around and this janitor walks up to me. He is mopping the floor. Literally, it is just me and him in this massive hallway. He is an older black guy. He walks up to me and points his finger in my chest and says "Keep your ass in school! Study and do well or you will end up like me..." And he just walks off.

a reply to: Edumakated

oh man, so much has changed since then huh?

The reality is that all kids can learn, but they can't learn at the same pace.

That means that while one 5-year-old is celebrating figuring out 2x2=4, another will be celebrating just the act of sitting up for the first time. And there will be others at every stage in between give or take.

That doesn't mean that one is more or less deserving of a teacher's time or attention, but it does mean that to put them all together in on classroom is going to be impossible for any length of time if you want to make sure each gets the time and attention he or she deserves in order to receive the best possible education.

And you can argue that this is wonderful diversity, but is diversity worth sacrificing the best education we can give our children? What benefits does diversity in and of itself bestow that replaces the lost education?

a reply to: seagull

As Rush Limbaugh puts it kids are just skulls full of mush. Some kids get it. Some don't. Your brain doesn't fully develop until you are in your 20s so why would you trust them with their future adulthood?

Or to put it differently. You can lead the horse to water but you can't force it to drink. Give them incentives. Cut down on the distractions. The schools can do better.

a reply to: Edumakated

Perhaps the curriculum is formulated on faulty logic by programmed people?

Are we doing it all wrong?

a reply to: ketsuko

But on the flip side of that, if you put together all the kids who need extra attention, the teachers time won't be able to be split between all of them. That's why you have to break them up, every class has a couple kids, and there's teachers to go around.

a reply to: ketsuko
I have a Mennonite family as a neighbor. While all the other children were going to school and leaning reading, writing, and arithmetic, these children were playing outside, with the livestock and watching their parents plant and harvest. I watched these children grow up from the day they were born, and I have to admit that i thought that they were disadvantaged and would have trouble catching up with their peers.

I could not have been more wrong. Those children can run rings around their peers. They not only can read and do basic math, but they can tell you the name of plants, how to plant them, when to plant them, and how to cook them. They can tell you about the livestock, what they like, what they don't, and what you have to do to keep them happy.

They can hold a near adult conversation with you while being funny but innocent, intelligent but not disrespectful. The five year old collected wildflowers, what some would call weeds, and presented them to me as a bouquet, including tiny branches from the holly tree for contrast, it was beautiful, and was such a pleasant surprise. Even her parents were surprised with her collection.

I think that sometimes we are too quick to push children into being tiny adults instead of letting them enjoy their time being children. The adult world is long and difficult enough. I think skipping the childhood phase does not make for a smarter more prepared child. I think it steals from their potential and stunts their possibilities.

originally posted by: Aazadan
a reply to: ketsuko

But on the flip side of that, if you put together all the kids who need extra attention, the teachers time won't be able to be split between all of them. That's why you have to break them up, every class has a couple kids, and there's teachers to go around.

More like ... you let kids learn at their own pace. If all the kids in a class are approximately at the same level of learning, not age, level of learning, then the teacher isn't giving anyone special attention or having to pay much special attention because no matter what age the child is, they're all either learning to sit up -or- learning their multiplication tables and how to do it.

But, of course, that is called tracking which is an evil word because then someone has to feel bad because their little Johnny is still sitting in a class with kids younger then himself while the neighbors' kid is sitting classes with kids who are older.

Parents get jealous and are sure their little Johnny has to be at least as smart as the neighbors' kid.

Smart, as you say, has little to do with it. If Johnny isn't ready to add, then he isn't and needs to keep sitting that class until he is ready.