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The investment that the USA makes in gifted children is in maintaining the most impressive system of colleges and universities in the world. This fact is frequently acknowledged when foreigners are polled about what is best about America. I question whether something in primary and secondary school is needed.
Yes-and our own students are often unable to attend those fantastic universities because they are unprepared.
I advocate education for ALL. ALL includes the top.
College courses are not free to the school district. They have to pay the tuition. In these budget tight times, many districts are reluctant to do so. Parents often have to advocate for their children to be allowed to enroll. Even then it means that they have to sacrifice class time to travel back and forth. Often this means the parents have to provide a car for them to do so. I have never heard of a public school that provides this transportation.
That a few students can take college courses their senior year in high school is too little, way too late.
I'm surprised that no one is advocating for the bright kids from low-income families. The ones from families who don't have the wherewithal to provide enriching experiences outside of school, who don't have the financial resources to send their kids to private schools, who aren't able to provide cars so their kids can take college classes in high schools.
We seem to be pouring a lot of resources into educating the less capable kids without any evidence that we are making much of a difference. The literacy rate hasn't changed in ten years. 19% of high school graduates can't read. Apparently we are celebrating a 40 year peak in graduation rates. However, considering that 25% of kids don't graduate it isn't much of a celebration.
We are doing a pitiful job of equipping all students for successful lives.
But the college courses are free to the students, and cry me a river about the transportation. My district does provide transportation for kids at one level taking classes at a higher level, say ele kids taking middle school math, middle school kids taking HS courses. I don't know about the college courses. And "too little, too late"??? For crying out loud, high school isn't supposed to be teaching college level courses!
I question your stats, coming as they do from The Atlantic; it's not a research journal. You might think graduation rate was something easy to calculate, but it's not. How do you track students who've moved or gone elsewhere in the district? Just a few of the problems. When you look at census bureau stats for % of adults with a HS diploma, it's generally far more than 75%, and the figure for the entire US is 85.7%. http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/00000.html
Quote:
Originally Posted by markg91359
The investment that the USA makes in gifted children is in maintaining the most impressive system of colleges and universities in the world. This fact is frequently acknowledged when foreigners are polled about what is best about America. I question whether something in primary and secondary school is needed.
If a school district has ample funding, I don't object to them investing in gifted and talented children. However, what I haven't heard one of you supporters of G & T education acknowledge is that the overall scarcity of resources in many school districts means that running a G & T program means there will be fewer teachers and larger student/teacher ratios for average kids and kids in resource. My position is that I'm unwilling to make the sacrifice you say is desirable for gifted children until the needs down the ladder get met.
I don't remember there was a G & T program when I went to school at all. Yet, my school and graduating class turned out large numbers of doctors, lawyers, engineers, business leaders, military officers, and educators. Looking back on my educational experience, even though we didn't have a G & T program, we did have teachers who frequently assigned difficult books to students like myself who read at a college level in seventh grade. We had other teachers who made good students classroom aides and had them do special science projects. The overall program designed for average students was a good program and our district wisely focused the money it had on keeping it that way.
This sounds very much like my husband's high school, all those doctors and lawyers! My own HS, in a steel mill town, produced a lot of nurses and teachers.
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Originally Posted by GotHereQuickAsICould
We used to sort kids out into groups and classes by ability to do the work. We didn't load classrooms down with SpEd students who needed a ton of extra time and attention. The kids who needed special attention were in classrooms where they got that special attention. We didn't expect teachers to meet the needs of students who couldn't read, stay in their seats, or pay attention for more than two minutes at a time while teaching average students and top students.
Teachers had time to develop special science projects for advanced students, find out what difficult books would engage them, etc.
Today we are sacrificing the education of the average and gifted learners. Every classroom I've seen assigns good students as science buddies, reading partners, etc. So instead of learning new material, they are being used as teacher's aides for the slow students.
We have some misguided notion that this will all work out if we only test them enough, if we only have a sufficient amount of I.E.P.s Teachers are leaving the profession in droves in many districts. Bureaucracy is often cited as one of the main reasons. Constant paperwork and demands to do things other than teach.
We still are turning out folks who are becoming doctors, dentists, and lawyers... But we are also turning out students who can't read or add and subtract well enough to take a community college class. One third of those admitted to community colleges have to take remedial courses.
25% of high school students don't graduate. Nearly 20% of those who do can't read at a fifth grade level.
This system isn't working. We're not challenging the top students. We are not educating the bottom ones. And we are paying as much or more per student as any nation in the world.
When was this? I'm older than most of the posters on here, started kindergarten in 1954, graduated from HS in 1967. I don't remember any such thing. Elementary school was everyone together. In fact, for most of elementary school, I was in a small multi-age school where the teachers taught three separate grades. Somehow, they accomplished this. There were a few special ed students who got some pull-out services occasionally. Junior high had an honors group in grades 7 and 8, but there was no "low achiever" group. High school had its college prep classes in a few subjects. The separation was mostly in the courses students chose, not all sorts of "tracking".
Again, if The Atlantic is your source, I'll take it with a box of salt.
Yes-and our own students are often unable to attend those fantastic universities because they are unprepared.
I advocate education for ALL. ALL includes the top.
That is not going to happen until you pull the bottom out of their classes. It's not that we need to single out the top. It's that we need to stop teaching to the bottom. I can't tell you how many times I've been reminded by my principal that I need to teach to the bottom because that's where we can gain the most on the standardized tests. Pulling the bottom out into specialized classes for them would allow us to get back to normal pacing in the remaining classes. If you take the kids who can't read, sit still, do math or are disruptive out of my classes, I can handle classes of 30 because the other kids want to learn. The bottom is costing EVERYONE else not just the top.
Gifted children do grow up to be gifted adults. They don't walk around with signs around their neck that shout "gifted" but they are there. They haven't changed. They may go on to take ordinary jobs but they are still gifted.
In order for society to be successful it has to invest (money/time) in its most promising citizens. I think that the refusal of the US to invest in anything except the bottom students is short sighted. It is not the least intelligent who drive innovation. Students don't just "bloom brightly" where they are any more than plants do. Plants need tending and so do students. ALL STUDENTS. And ALL includes the top.
I would disagree. I know several people who were "gifted" as children but are simply smarter than average as adults. I also know people like myself who were considered below average as children who are now right up there with the formerly gifted children. I think to a large extent, gifted just means being an early bloomer and others catch up later when they bloom. Of course I'm not talking about the top 0.3% here. Those who think differently than the rest of us. They seem to stay gifted at adults.
If a gifted child takes calculus in high school and her peers take calculus in college, is she still gifted compared to them after they have also taken calculus? I think gifted is relative to your peers. Once your peers can do what you do, are you still gifted?
As a teacher, I see the truly gifted blooming brightly where they are planted. They are the kids who ask deeper questions and strive to learn more on their own. I don't find that they need to be pushed because they push themselves. Every year I have one or two students who are like this and they go farther than other students just because of who they are. While I to think the uber gifted need a separate track, I don't think the garden variety gifted students do. I do think we need to get the bottom out of regular classes because they slow down education for everyone but that is a different issue. I see no advantage in the long run of pulling out the top. Said top tends to pull themselves out as they choose to take AP classes in high school. We had one young man who had so many AP credits that he entered college as a Junior a few years back.
That is not going to happen until you pull the bottom out of their classes. It's not that we need to single out the top. It's that we need to stop teaching to the bottom. I can't tell you how many times I've been reminded by my principal that I need to teach to the bottom because that's where we can gain the most on the standardized tests. Pulling the bottom out into specialized classes for them would allow us to get back to normal pacing in the remaining classes. If you take the kids who can't read, sit still, do math or are disruptive out of my classes, I can handle classes of 30 because the other kids want to learn. The bottom is costing EVERYONE else not just the top.
This sums it up frighteningly well.
Schools are focused on the bottom students because that's where the emphasis is these days, that's where the gains in the standardized test scores come that everyone is focused on.
Sorting students so that teachers could focus on the unique needs of each group would be a boon to all concerned.
Instead, we try to pretend that a teacher can engage the brightest kids in mind expanding learning while reaching the kids who can't read, sit still or behave as well as teach the middle of the road kids.
It's an impossible task as any teacher can tell you.
When the focus is the bottom students, what happens to everyone else?
It's sink or swim time for a lot of kids in public school. But it doesn't need to be that way.
This is why I had to look for options outside of regular public schools for my kids. Teachers just look for ways to occupy the smart kids.
That was our experience and the current experience of several of our neighbors. Teaching top students is not just a matter of "letting them bloom" or knowing they will make it because they ask insightful questions. It's figuring out what sets them on fire. It's knowing what resources to direct them to. It's helping them dig deeper into subjects.
The current educational attitude seems to be that the top students will make it anyway so why bother to support them.
The posts on how in high school bright students will get opportunities for advanced learning so why bother in elementary and middle schools are stunning. Do folks not understand how brain development works?
The posts about how their schools turned out teachers and nurses so that was good enough are equally mind boggling. We not only need teachers and nurses but research scientists and people who can solve problems at a global level.
By ignoring the educational needs of the top students, we are wasting precious resources and dooming our nation to second or third class status in an Age of Information.
What we are doing is not nearly good enough. And those who have given it any thought or taken a serious look at the stats know this is true.
That was our experience and the current experience of several of our neighbors. Teaching top students is not just a matter of "letting them bloom" or knowing they will make it because they ask insightful questions. It's figuring out what sets them on fire. It's knowing what resources to direct them to. It's helping them dig deeper into subjects.
The current educational attitude seems to be that the top students will make it anyway so why bother to support them.
The posts on how in high school bright students will get opportunities for advanced learning so why bother in elementary and middle schools are stunning. Do folks not understand how brain development works?
The posts about how their schools turned out teachers and nurses so that was good enough are equally mind boggling. We not only need teachers and nurses but research scientists and people who can solve problems at a global level.
By ignoring the educational needs of the top students, we are wasting precious resources and dooming our nation to second or third class status in an Age of Information.
What we are doing is not nearly good enough. And those who have given it any thought or taken a serious look at the stats know this is true.
The orginal post was how we were SPENDING MONEY on programs for slower students and not for bright students.
The argument was that slower students needed special programs. In other words, they NEED a seperate classroom with specially trained teachers and customized materials.
Are you arguing against that, because without that it leads to what... leaving them in the regular classroom? That's exactly what Ivory is arguing against, and you seem to agree with her! So do you want to spend the money on them or not?
Folks are not arguing that smart kids should be ignored. They are arguing that if you spend the money on getting a special SEPERATE program for troubled kids at the elementary level, the needs of the bright and average kids can be met by the same teacher while they are all in the same classroom, provided there is not 50 of them in there with one teacher and no aides.
Excluding ACTUAL geniuses, which there may be one or two a year in your average school, most kids can get the instruction they need IF THE TEACHER IS FREED UP FROM HAVING TO DEAL WITH THE KIDS WHO ARE WAY BEHIND.
The only way to have BOTH programs for slower students AND seperate classrooms/programs for the "smart" kids is to spend more money on education period. Then it wouldn't have to be either/or.
You keep arguing for tracking as a solution, which was dropped for many good reasons, not the least of which is what we've all been talking about... a lot of "gifted" kids are not actually all that "gifted" but temporarily ahead developmentally. Pulling them out, labeling them as "gifted", and pouring money into them to nuture an advantage that largely disappears by high school? Exactly why would we do that? And the kids that don't get labeled '"gifted" because they are not there yet (or didn't score high enough on a test when we know testing has limited value with young kids, or don't have a personality the teacher thinks associates with bright, or whatever) what happens with them? Part of the issue with tracking is the process by which we determine who gets tracked where can be hugely problematic and innacurate.. plus kids develop as such wildly different paces that students can make huge leaps mid year in a single subject.. what do we do with them then? How does tracking help that reality? What about the child that excels at science but is only an average reader? Which track do they belong? And how many special gifted programs are needed? There's a lot you can do you know... who determines what kind advanced programs are important?
Besides, kids thought of as average actually do better in the room with the "smart" kids... do you not care about those kids?
I was tracked all my life, in the "SP" all through elementary in middle school. I skipped grades, did a 2 year middle school program, went on to atttend a specialized high school. I grew up to go into education myself. I have seen this from all sides. And I am telling you I do not believe all most of us "gifted" kids were gifted. We didn't need a special classroom or a special school. We needed customized academic asignments and to be around other kids withat our level of emotional, social and physical development. There are a lot of ways to set up a school where they can accomodate multiple ability levels without tracking them or creating expensive seperate programs.
I would disagree. I know several people who were "gifted" as children but are simply smarter than average as adults. I also know people like myself who were considered below average as children who are now right up there with the formerly gifted children. I think to a large extent, gifted just means being an early bloomer and others catch up later when they bloom. Of course I'm not talking about the top 0.3% here. Those who think differently than the rest of us. They seem to stay gifted at adults.
If a gifted child takes calculus in high school and her peers take calculus in college, is she still gifted compared to them after they have also taken calculus? I think gifted is relative to your peers. Once your peers can do what you do, are you still gifted?
As a teacher, I see the truly gifted blooming brightly where they are planted. They are the kids who ask deeper questions and strive to learn more on their own. I don't find that they need to be pushed because they push themselves. Every year I have one or two students who are like this and they go farther than other students just because of who they are. While I to think the uber gifted need a separate track, I don't think the garden variety gifted students do. I do think we need to get the bottom out of regular classes because they slow down education for everyone but that is a different issue. I see no advantage in the long run of pulling out the top. Said top tends to pull themselves out as they choose to take AP classes in high school. We had one young man who had so many AP credits that he entered college as a Junior a few years back.
But you teach in an upper middle class suburban school.
Go teach for a year at an inner city school and try to say the same.
But you teach in an upper middle class suburban school.
Go teach for a year at an inner city school and try to say the same.
Indeed.
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