5 ms·

The only thing distributed along the bell curve is adults who are willing to help the kids. Yes for some kids it will come pretty easy, even at very young ages,

The only thing distributed along the bell curve is adults who are willing to help the kids. Yes for some kids it will come pretty easy, even at very young ages, but even very young children can learn these concepts if you would just spend some time teaching it to them. When you have a system set up to force one adult to teach 30+ children you will never be able to spend the time required to ensure everyone gets the concept, but that neglect comes at the cost of compressing the learning in later years which still only benefits those who have high aptitude. Which is exactly why they are pushing it back further, not because it will help kids learn more, but because more children will have the ability to learn it without much interaction from an instructor.

ryan93 5y ago
Incredibly uncommon for 30 kids a class in elementary school. Also many students can barely handle arithmetic without massive handholding. Algebra in elementary school is out of the question
- dkhenry 5y ago
  You are correct that 30 is on the high side, but I have seen classrooms in Philadelphia with 30 students to a single teacher ( 3rd grade, during the 2005 school year so it may have changed since then). However even at lower ratio's the point remains, you need to hand hold the kids, and we don't give our teachers the time or flexibility to do that.
csa 5y ago
> but even very young children can learn these concepts if you would just spend some time teaching it to them. Many decades of cognitive science disagree with you. See Piaget for one of the earlier researchers on this topic. Even though his original ideas have been refuted or refined, the basic premises of his ideas are still prominent among the large group of modern researchers that some people dub neo-Piagetians.
- dkhenry 5y ago
  Many decades of the lived experiences of children in other countries disagrees with that research. Children in eastern European countries learn advanced concepts from as early as second grade. In asian countries they are introducing Algebra in 6th grade or earlier. This is the problem California finds its self in. They have wonderful "research" showing that kids pick up the concepts better if you wait till they are older, but they ignore the lived reality of the rest of the world, that with the correct teaching you could actually have them doing this work at a much younger age. Even here in America, tutoring schools such as Russian Math or Kumon are successfully teaching advanced topics to children at much younger ages than the public schools. I know the temptation is to just say its its high aptitude kids that are being sent to these after school programs, but it's not. It is just rich kids whose parents want to give their children a leg up. Almost all children could learn the topics, but we won't put in the effort
  - csa 5y ago
    > Many decades of the lived experiences of children in other countries disagrees with that research. Based on your reply, I’m fairly certain that you are not familiar with the research and your not familiar with what is actually happening in Eastern Europe, Kumon, etc. in relation to that research. As a professional in this area of research, I feel fairly qualified to say that I am. I am happy to agree to disagree about what the problem is here, but I strongly encourage you to look deeper into what is actually happening in the research and the learning environments you are praising/promoting before you propagate a loose collection of anecdotes as data that points to a clear solution.
    - dkhenry 5y ago
      I am glad that we can disagree, and I hope you would spend some time considering that while the research has progressed we have experienced a rapid decline in the subjective and objective quality of education. Just because I completely reject the ideas you may be involved with researching doesn't mean I am ignorant of them, I just haven't been convinced that they are based in reality.

ryan93 5y ago

Incredibly uncommon for 30 kids a class in elementary school. Also many students can barely handle arithmetic without massive handholding. Algebra in elementary school is out of the question

dkhenry 5y ago
You are correct that 30 is on the high side, but I have seen classrooms in Philadelphia with 30 students to a single teacher ( 3rd grade, during the 2005 school year so it may have changed since then). However even at lower ratio's the point remains, you need to hand hold the kids, and we don't give our teachers the time or flexibility to do that.

csa 5y ago

> but even very young children can learn these concepts if you would just spend some time teaching it to them. Many decades of cognitive science disagree with you. See Piaget for one of the earlier researchers on this topic. Even though his original ideas have been refuted or refined, the basic premises of his ideas are still prominent among the large group of modern researchers that some people dub neo-Piagetians.

dkhenry 5y ago
Many decades of the lived experiences of children in other countries disagrees with that research. Children in eastern European countries learn advanced concepts from as early as second grade. In asian countries they are introducing Algebra in 6th grade or earlier. This is the problem California finds its self in. They have wonderful "research" showing that kids pick up the concepts better if you wait till they are older, but they ignore the lived reality of the rest of the world, that with the correct teaching you could actually have them doing this work at a much younger age. Even here in America, tutoring schools such as Russian Math or Kumon are successfully teaching advanced topics to children at much younger ages than the public schools. I know the temptation is to just say its its high aptitude kids that are being sent to these after school programs, but it's not. It is just rich kids whose parents want to give their children a leg up. Almost all children could learn the topics, but we won't put in the effort
- csa 5y ago
  > Many decades of the lived experiences of children in other countries disagrees with that research. Based on your reply, I’m fairly certain that you are not familiar with the research and your not familiar with what is actually happening in Eastern Europe, Kumon, etc. in relation to that research. As a professional in this area of research, I feel fairly qualified to say that I am. I am happy to agree to disagree about what the problem is here, but I strongly encourage you to look deeper into what is actually happening in the research and the learning environments you are praising/promoting before you propagate a loose collection of anecdotes as data that points to a clear solution.
  - dkhenry 5y ago
    I am glad that we can disagree, and I hope you would spend some time considering that while the research has progressed we have experienced a rapid decline in the subjective and objective quality of education. Just because I completely reject the ideas you may be involved with researching doesn't mean I am ignorant of them, I just haven't been convinced that they are based in reality.