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Bucketing children by age and not developmental milestones has always confused me. No matter how you slice it, some kids are more advanced in verticals than ot

Bucketing children by age and not developmental milestones has always confused me. No matter how you slice it, some kids are more advanced in verticals than others (emotional, math, reading, problem solving, etc.) and there aren’t tracks in the U.S. to accommodate that so we end up forcing all these square pegs into round holes - everyone loses.

kwere 4y ago
from a social development standpoint it makes sense, a lot of "geniuses" had/could develop problems growing up with people emotionally/socially more mature, altough keeping gifted people with underperformers and lowering education level to keep them "afloat" is a disservice to both groups
- nerpderp82 4y ago
  People are not underperformers, you can't and shouldn't segment the population across some quantitative boundary. Each individual should learn at a difficulty gradient for them that is positive and engaging for each subject. For everyone this will be a different value. What you are describing is a form of damaging elitism.
  - s1artibartfast 4y ago
    People absolutely can and do underperform relative to a standard or mean. Perhaps they should also learn at an optimal rate for personal growth. This doesn't negate the statement above, and it certainly isn't an argument for grouping children together where they can't learn at a personally appropriate rate.
    - nerpderp82 4y ago
      Are you addressing the my statement relative to the GP? They are making the elitist assertion that the gifted kids should be separated from the chaff. Having been in gifted programs, I have not found the removal of "underperformers" to be anything other than classism.
      - s1artibartfast 4y ago
        I agree that gifted kids should be "separated from the chaff". I don't see how you reconcile your belief that students should go at their own pace with the idea that students should not be separated. Lack of separation forces all students to progress at the same rate, either high or low. Having been in gifted tracks and standard tracks, I saw a clear difference in the capabilities of students and coursework. If I had been forced to stay in the standard track, I would prefer to drop out. Last, I reject your idea that no student can underperform. At best it is a meaningless empty statement. At worst it is a delusional denial that any differences or lines of comparison exist. Nobody is talented, untalented, tall, short, fast, slow. They just are what they are, unique and incomparable. There is absolutely a class component to gifted programs, but the vast majority of the time this results from the additional support and nurturing upper class parents give their children. I don't think egalitarianism is a sufficient rationale for stifling and handicapping the progress of those children.
        nerpderp82 4y ago
        > At best it is a meaningless empty statement. At worst it is a delusional denial that any differences or lines of comparison exist. Nobody is talented, untalented, tall, short, fast, slow. They just are what they are, unique and incomparable. Disingenuous hot take, you are putting words in my mouth. Done.
        s1artibartfast 4y ago
        I gave a range of possibilities and my genuine opinion on them. I'm putting words in my mouth, not yours. I'm not the one boldly claiming it is impossible for students to underperform.
  - kwere 4y ago
    public education is tailored to the class-level and school-year not individual performance, using underperformer is correct and they should be grouped by level of teachability and put on separate lanes than other students while obviously limiting self-limiting beliefs / segregation factors (like having a mixed classes of physical education or projects). I radically believe one of the most damaging factor for education outcomes is (lack of) family support, most people dont have it in their most important formative years, so the state should put all highschool kids in oncampus communities for the 5 day week and let them use only earned cash (also by remunerating grades), while seeing family on weekend and vacations (vacation time should be connected to academic output)
- r3trohack3r 4y ago
  All children of the same age aren't equally emotionally/socially developed. By your own argument we shouldn't be bucketing by age but by emotional/social development. Bucketing kids who are emotionally/socially more mature than their peers into the same cohort is is a disservice to both groups. Take any vertical you want and you'll find the same argument. The progression by age seems to be approximately correct when you average development across all verticals across an age group when you look at it from a high level, but once you zoom in it's an absolute mess.
preommr 4y ago
Because school isn't about maximizing education; it's a daycare so that parents can work and children can come out with a uniform education that will suffice to do basic things in society like read/write/taxes etc.
- r3trohack3r 4y ago
  This is my pet theory for why education in the US is the way it is. Socialized child care is unpalatable. So public school starts at exactly the moment that research can come close to justifying having kids in school. But parents need to work - so there is pressure once kids are in school to have a school day that matches the work day. You might be able to get away with a 3 hour school day, and have the rest be dedicated to unstructured play/exploration. But you can't have child care, so if kids are in school they need to be "doing school." So we have 8 hours of school and we need kids to be doing _school_ during that time because it can't be child care. So we create these gulags where kids move bricks from one pile to another and back all day and call it education because we've got to keep up this illusion of education. And then we pay teachers child care wages because, under the hood, it's really just child care that nobody can call child care.
- mwambua 4y ago
  You hit the nail on the head there. It's hard articulating everything that feels off about it - but I felt the same way about the CHIPS Act forcing companies to provide cheap childcare to workers. I think for one, it emphasizes cheap childcare over quality childcare (and this doesn’t seem like the sort of situation where the free market will sort that out). There’re also these conflicting ideas of children both a) being necessary/important enough that workers will sacrifice their own productivity for them; b) being a little like cattle and not requiring anything more than the bare minimum to develop into productive human beings.
lostmsu 4y ago
This might not be as bad as it sounds: bright kids need to learn to study on their own, otherwise they will eventually hit the ceiling when there's no tutor available to raise their level further.

kwere 4y ago

from a social development standpoint it makes sense, a lot of "geniuses" had/could develop problems growing up with people emotionally/socially more mature, altough keeping gifted people with underperformers and lowering education level to keep them "afloat" is a disservice to both groups

nerpderp82 4y ago
People are not underperformers, you can't and shouldn't segment the population across some quantitative boundary. Each individual should learn at a difficulty gradient for them that is positive and engaging for each subject. For everyone this will be a different value. What you are describing is a form of damaging elitism.
- s1artibartfast 4y ago
  People absolutely can and do underperform relative to a standard or mean. Perhaps they should also learn at an optimal rate for personal growth. This doesn't negate the statement above, and it certainly isn't an argument for grouping children together where they can't learn at a personally appropriate rate.
  - nerpderp82 4y ago
    Are you addressing the my statement relative to the GP? They are making the elitist assertion that the gifted kids should be separated from the chaff. Having been in gifted programs, I have not found the removal of "underperformers" to be anything other than classism.
    - s1artibartfast 4y ago
      I agree that gifted kids should be "separated from the chaff". I don't see how you reconcile your belief that students should go at their own pace with the idea that students should not be separated. Lack of separation forces all students to progress at the same rate, either high or low. Having been in gifted tracks and standard tracks, I saw a clear difference in the capabilities of students and coursework. If I had been forced to stay in the standard track, I would prefer to drop out. Last, I reject your idea that no student can underperform. At best it is a meaningless empty statement. At worst it is a delusional denial that any differences or lines of comparison exist. Nobody is talented, untalented, tall, short, fast, slow. They just are what they are, unique and incomparable. There is absolutely a class component to gifted programs, but the vast majority of the time this results from the additional support and nurturing upper class parents give their children. I don't think egalitarianism is a sufficient rationale for stifling and handicapping the progress of those children.
      - nerpderp82 4y ago
        > At best it is a meaningless empty statement. At worst it is a delusional denial that any differences or lines of comparison exist. Nobody is talented, untalented, tall, short, fast, slow. They just are what they are, unique and incomparable. Disingenuous hot take, you are putting words in my mouth. Done.
        s1artibartfast 4y ago
        I gave a range of possibilities and my genuine opinion on them. I'm putting words in my mouth, not yours. I'm not the one boldly claiming it is impossible for students to underperform.
- kwere 4y ago
  public education is tailored to the class-level and school-year not individual performance, using underperformer is correct and they should be grouped by level of teachability and put on separate lanes than other students while obviously limiting self-limiting beliefs / segregation factors (like having a mixed classes of physical education or projects). I radically believe one of the most damaging factor for education outcomes is (lack of) family support, most people dont have it in their most important formative years, so the state should put all highschool kids in oncampus communities for the 5 day week and let them use only earned cash (also by remunerating grades), while seeing family on weekend and vacations (vacation time should be connected to academic output)
r3trohack3r 4y ago
All children of the same age aren't equally emotionally/socially developed. By your own argument we shouldn't be bucketing by age but by emotional/social development. Bucketing kids who are emotionally/socially more mature than their peers into the same cohort is is a disservice to both groups. Take any vertical you want and you'll find the same argument. The progression by age seems to be approximately correct when you average development across all verticals across an age group when you look at it from a high level, but once you zoom in it's an absolute mess.

preommr 4y ago

Because school isn't about maximizing education; it's a daycare so that parents can work and children can come out with a uniform education that will suffice to do basic things in society like read/write/taxes etc.

r3trohack3r 4y ago
This is my pet theory for why education in the US is the way it is. Socialized child care is unpalatable. So public school starts at exactly the moment that research can come close to justifying having kids in school. But parents need to work - so there is pressure once kids are in school to have a school day that matches the work day. You might be able to get away with a 3 hour school day, and have the rest be dedicated to unstructured play/exploration. But you can't have child care, so if kids are in school they need to be "doing school." So we have 8 hours of school and we need kids to be doing _school_ during that time because it can't be child care. So we create these gulags where kids move bricks from one pile to another and back all day and call it education because we've got to keep up this illusion of education. And then we pay teachers child care wages because, under the hood, it's really just child care that nobody can call child care.
mwambua 4y ago
You hit the nail on the head there. It's hard articulating everything that feels off about it - but I felt the same way about the CHIPS Act forcing companies to provide cheap childcare to workers. I think for one, it emphasizes cheap childcare over quality childcare (and this doesn’t seem like the sort of situation where the free market will sort that out). There’re also these conflicting ideas of children both a) being necessary/important enough that workers will sacrifice their own productivity for them; b) being a little like cattle and not requiring anything more than the bare minimum to develop into productive human beings.

lostmsu 4y ago

This might not be as bad as it sounds: bright kids need to learn to study on their own, otherwise they will eventually hit the ceiling when there's no tutor available to raise their level further.