Kindergartner Becomes Mensa Member (has IQ of 147)
abcnews.go.com
abcnews.go.com
“I know there’s no money for gifted programs in Illinois,” he said.
That's unfortunate, I count testing into a GT (gifted and talented) program in elementary school on the short list of the best experiences of my life.
What I don't understand is why general public education isn't structured more like the GT program I went through?
"Gifted" programs are a start, but these often include children with wildly varying skills, from extreme right-brain thinkers (highly artistic, under-developed math and language skills) and left-brain thinkers (highly analytical, poor artistic skills) means it's very hard to keep all members of that group sufficiently challenged. What is effortless for some students, is nearly impossible for others, and vice-versa.
I went through a program like this. The learning experience was terrible, but at least as a collective group you didn't have to be too concerned about being an outlier. You were in a whole group of them, safety in numbers and all that.
Unfortunately, the best plan for the parents is to move to a better school district.
Maybe.
I came up through the public school system and worked in it for a while as an adult. Based on my experience, I'd say you're overstating that that liability a bit.
>"Gifted" programs are a start, but these often include children with wildly varying skills, from extreme right-brain thinkers (highly artistic, under-developed math and language skills) and left-brain thinkers (highly analytical, poor artistic skills) means it's very hard to keep all members of that group sufficiently challenged. What is effortless for some students, is nearly impossible for others, and vice-versa.
Again, I I'm not sure how you would qualify saying "often".
>I went through a program like this. The learning experience was terrible, but at least as a collective group you didn't have to be too concerned about being an outlier. You were in a whole group of them, safety in numbers and all that.
Of course we're different people and programs, but that surprises me.
My social experience was miserable at times, but the teaching was great with few exceptions.
It takes an exceptional teacher to be able to deal with an exceptional group of students. The class sizes need to be smaller, the material needs to be broader and often disconnected from the content strictly required by standardized testing.
I really would not want to be in a class that's subjected to the insane No Child Left Behind standards. Nothing is more demotivating than having to do something remedial in order to pass and where absolutely no incentive is given for moving ahead of schedule, learning at your own pace.
Maybe with distributed networking being so prevalent, where a video conference call or distribution of video lessons is a practical reality, that alternate channels of education will open up.
Many of the school systems out there, under-funded as ever, can barely keep up with the 80% of the kids squarely in the middle. The 10% outliers on both ends with "special needs" are just left to fend for themselves.
How can we avoid things like the allegedly "World's Smartest Man" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Langan) working as a bouncer in a bar? Is something like the Khan Academy a step in the right direction?