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There was a well-known case where my 2nd grade teacher told a student's mother that her son is "retarded". That kid ended up becoming a doctor.
Anyone can be mistaken for not very bright if they are acting out and there is no other evidence. But coschristi said it was known she was reading at high school graduate level! Weird.
This is something I've pondered from time to time and it came up again today reading the local paper. This country in general seems to have an active dislike of those who are academically gifted. We constantly find ways to put them down, both large and small. But with athletics, it's different. As a culture we admire athletic prowess. We shower adulation and money down on them. Even at the lowest level of sport, the kid who is just a tiny bit stronger or faster gets all the attention.
I know this dichotomy is real having experienced myself and with my kids. But I can't explain it, nor even understand it. And the more I read about it, the less it makes sense. Our schools put effort into supporting and bringing the lowest performers up to the minimum, but pretty much ignore the gifted assuming they will just be fine on their own. An example from my own schooling is being berated by the teacher for reading ahead "how are you going to learn to read if you don't keep the place!!!" when I already knew how to read, as evidenced by the fact I was a couple chapters ahead while the class was stuck on one paragraph.
Sorry for the stream of consciousness, it just kind of flowed out after reading the paper this morning.
I understand your points, I just perceive it as a more complicated situation.
I think there has been some positive change over the years and gifted students are more likely to get the recognition and at least some of the resources that they need.
There is something very basic, instinctual, in the human psyche that causes many people to either participate in or serve as spectators in athletic events. Why are professional sports so popular? Why are the Olympics carried by networks and shown during prime time? Why do so many fathers spend hours teaching their sons (and sometimes daughters) to throw a baseball, shoot hoops, or catch a long bomb football pass?
I can promise you that at my high school that football games gathered a 1000 or more spectators and no one came to watch the debate team argue about "resource depletion".
Culturally, its simply more acceptable for children in blue collar families to put their energy and time into sports than it is into academics. Maybe that is wrong, but it is a question of dealing with the world the way it is, rather than the way someone like myself thinks that it should be.
It concerns me, because I do think that relative to other nations, the state of education in America is pretty mediocre. In a more perfect world, students who do well in English, math, and science would receive more praise and attention. However, that world does not yet exist.
It's hardly baseless. Did you not read the links I posted earlier? Or a quick Google will bring up tons of them. Everything from news articles to direct attempts to abolish or cut back on gifted education. The number of attacks on it certainly point toward a negative view. Why does every athlete who goes to college, even if it's the local CC get a picture in the paper but where are the pictures of the kids from the same high school who are attending Yale, or Stanford, or Service Academies or the like? Why does the paper print the names of National Merit finalists or Dean's list students from various colleges on the back page next to the classifieds, yet catching a touchdown pass gets a full page spread with color photos. The evidence is all around to be seen.
Or as someone posted, athletes get parades. Academic students get .....
Are you from the South? I truly think your observations are based on local experiences. Our academic achievers do get more publicity than our local athletes unless they get into the olympics or some other prestigious event. Our local paper features HS valedictorians every June. The Scripps Spelling Bee is on ESPN.
I'm sorry, but I have to respectfully disagree with that. Would you or any reasonable person have told an African American during the Jim Crow era that they should just be happy that they are not slave? I seriously doubt it. Would you or any reasonable person tell a woman who is being sexually harassed and/or discriminated against in the workplace to just be happy that she is out of the kitchen? I seriously doubt it. So why should people who suffered abuse from teachers just suck it up and be happy that they got an education?
Because your posts are completely about your personal experiences, which I am not discounting. Just that you tend to apply your perceptions from the point of view of a child (which may or may not be accurate) to everyone. This is not about slavery or the harassment of women, which applied to millions. There is nothing wrong about writing about your personal experiences in blog style, but please don't expect everyone to have had the same type of experience in school. And for what it's worth, you seem to have turned out pretty O.K.
Because your posts are completely about your personal experiences, which I am not discounting. Just that you tend to apply your perceptions from the point of view of a child (which may or may not be accurate) to everyone. This is not about slavery or the harassment of women, which applied to millions. There is nothing wrong about writing about your personal experiences in blog style, but please don't expect everyone to have had the same type of experience in school. And for what it's worth, you seem to have turned out pretty O.K.
If I read your post correctly, you said, in Post #63, that your parents (not me) dealt with corporal punishment and racism from teachers, and seem to be ok with it. That attitude I do not agree with. Has nothing to do with myself or my experiences.
Trying not to get political, but it will get worst unless we do something about our current government. They want to push for more factory and coal mining jobs. These menial jobs are not the future of America. These are the jobs for the uneducated that will eventually go to robots.
Almost all jobs will eventually be done by robots and computers anyway. I don't have a problem with bringing back factories to US soil and coal mining. People who work low paid jobs are not always "uneducated", either. Sometimes these jobs are badly needed on a temporary basis, at least. No, the people working them aren't doing rocket science but they still need to put food on their table and feed their families.
Are you from the South? I truly think your observations are based on local experiences. Our academic achievers do get more publicity than our local athletes unless they get into the olympics or some other prestigious event. Our local paper features HS valedictorians every June. The Scripps Spelling Bee is on ESPN.
Kids get lots of honor and recognition these days for all kinds of things. There is a trophy for everything now.
Yes, I agree. That's why you can't say that "The smarter kids at least in 1967-68 and before tended to be from more disciplined and disciplining households. The parents would never have tolerated that kind of in-school conduct. The parents would have heard about it either from the school or from the victimized child's parents" as you did, in reference to someone putting chewing gum in your hair. You seem to think this wouldn't happen in an honors class of middle-schoolers. I was in plenty of honors classes in jr. high (1961-64) and I find that completely plausible.
Are you from the South? I truly think your observations are based on local experiences. Our academic achievers do get more publicity than our local athletes unless they get into the olympics or some other prestigious event. Our local paper features HS valedictorians every June. The Scripps Spelling Bee is on ESPN.
What's on ESPN the rest of the year?
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