Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement • Hacker News Board

Re: Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

#201

Post by pdonis » Tue, Nov 05, 2019, 4:59 AM UTC

hackerrenews wrote: post #9

I was fourth picked for g&t. First and second pick ended up being quite successful, as did the third picked. One has a high up, prestigious position at Amazon and the other retired from Microsoft wealthy. Me, I smoke weed and that’s about the only thing I’ve really done consistently since high school.. more consistently than music, and programming, even. Frankly, I wish I had been better separated from the other kids…

> I wish I had been better separated from the other kids. I would have been far happier in middle school just hanging around other nice, smart people.

As someone who had both experiences--being in classes that were separated for more advanced students, and being in classes that were not--I second this observation. I was much happier in the separated classes and got much more out of them.

Re: Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

#202

Post by chimi » Tue, Nov 05, 2019, 5:00 AM UTC

solveit wrote: post #120

koolba wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution is not to pull out a handful of high performers, it’s to kick out the even smaller number of disrupters.

Yes, but how would that work in practice? Special schools for high performers is much more palatable than special schools for quarantining children who aren't going to amount to anything (no matter what you call it and how you design it, this is how it will be perceived).

Just such a thing is done in Season 4 of HBO's The Wire. It profiles just such a class where the disruptive students are pulled out. Yes, it's fiction but you can see how it'd work and it's pretty interesting to see the changes in attitudes among the "gen pop" class and the special class.

Re: Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

#203

Post by shantly » Tue, Nov 05, 2019, 5:06 AM UTC

ChristianBundy wrote: post #139

barry-cotter wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s illegal. https://educationrealist.wordpress.com/2019/08/06/public-sch... > Wonder what allows a school to at least consider permanent expulsion? The student has to be convicted of: > murder drug dealing aggravated assault rape possession of a deadly weapon > But expulsion can be permanent if and only if he or she is over 16 or older. And of course, forget all those criteria for the disability manifestation exc…

> murder drug dealing aggravated assault rape possession of a deadly weapon Without punctuation, this sounds like a ridiculously specific and esoteric crime.

To be fair you're lucky if murder-drug merely deals aggravated assault. The means by which the deadly weapon became possessed (who knew this was going to take a turn for the supernatural?) is pretty distasteful, though.

Re: Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

#204

Post by eloff » Tue, Nov 05, 2019, 5:06 AM UTC

yters wrote: post #192

eloff wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But would bring other problems. The cure is likely worse than the disease.

Most of history? I'd argue three Rs is the basics everyone needs, and then they can find their own way.

If you look at the opportunities and statistics for high school dropouts, it makes a compelling case to the contrary.

And I argue this as an education system skeptic and college dropout myself.

Re: Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

#205

Post by Mirioron » Tue, Nov 05, 2019, 5:07 AM UTC

bigger_cheese wrote: post #197

ryandrake wrote: post #47

When I was in middle school in the 90s, I think around 7th grade (~12yo), the school district experimented with a new way of organizing the student body where they separated us into six distinct, equally sized cohorts based on some evaluation of each student's performance and capability. From what I could tell it was rougly: 1. Gifted / clearly university-bound 2. Potential college prep 3. Community college 4. Normal…

My high school in Australia (years 7-12) was structured similarly, there was a gifted program for the high performing students. I don't think there were other tracks, it was pretty much just high achievers classes and than the regular pool of students. I can remember vividly my parents wanted to send me to private (Catholic) high school after Primary school. I begged not to be separated from my existing friends who w…

>I always felt like such a fraud compared to him. I got good grades because my parents leaned so hard on me to put in the work, even at the time I was conscious of that. He got good grades because he was naturally gifted and school came 'easily' to him.

I wonder if he might not have felt the same way because he put in so much less effort, but still did well. If you put in a lot of effort regardless of the outcome you can think back that you tried your best. If you half-ass it and things go well, then you might feel that you don't deserve it, but if things don't go well, then you feel bad for not trying.

Being able to work hard is a talent itself. In many cases it's the most important one.

Re: Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

#206

Post by Spooky23 » Tue, Nov 05, 2019, 5:19 AM UTC

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #196

Spooky23 wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that you are picking winners at a young age based on bullshit metrics and favoritism. The kids in the middle get screwed. How would you like to be tracked as only worthy of community college because of how you did in 4th or 5th grade?

Why would it have to be a one-time selection? Put kids in a class based on their current level of academic performance. If you're doing better than the other kids in your class then you go to the more advanced class.

Sounds good, but once you’re in the dumb caste you tend to stay.

Re: Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

#207

Post by shantly » Tue, Nov 05, 2019, 5:29 AM UTC

zaroth wrote: post #99

lutorm wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your assumption here is in exact opposition to the article. Unless you can successfully argue that the numbers in the article are wrong, it appears that what seems like a preferable situation is, in fact, not.

The article seems to dance around some carefully crafted statistics. Students are “happier,” or more kids are taking classes which are labeled as advanced. I see very little in the form of college admissions rates, SAT scores, etc. It’s also possible that tracking does in fact lower the average performance while increasing the high end performance. One things which would help regardless is for Administrators which pe…

> she doesn’t understand why everyone else in the class can’t just listen the first time it’s explained

Hey look, it's me!

Make sure she knows how to study. And doesn't see needing to study as a sure sign of failure, and the act of studying as something adjacent to cheating ("well yeah so-and-so got an A-, but only by studying"). It seems dumb as shit with the distance of [mumble] years but when I finally got around to introspecting re: what exactly went wrong with me starting in 7th or 8th grade—yep, turns out I held those attitudes, even if I might not have phrased it that way at the time.

Mind, I have no idea how to do this effectively. Likely we'll be facing the same problem with our eldest at some point, but we're not there yet so I don't have any battle-tested how-to advice.

Re: Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

#208

Post by AnthonyMouse » Tue, Nov 05, 2019, 5:35 AM UTC

toast0 wrote: post #175

ryandrake wrote: post #47

When I was in middle school in the 90s, I think around 7th grade (~12yo), the school district experimented with a new way of organizing the student body where they separated us into six distinct, equally sized cohorts based on some evaluation of each student's performance and capability. From what I could tell it was rougly: 1. Gifted / clearly university-bound 2. Potential college prep 3. Community college 4. Normal…

So, I think tracking like this becomes unpopular because of treatment or perception of treatment of the kids in your higher numbered tracks. Not a lot of parents are going to be thrilled to hear that their third (or 7th) grader is probably going to drop out. And they're going to wonder if the teachers are just going to give up on the kids in that track. To do this in a way that would be perceived as positive for all…

> To do this in a way that would be perceived as positive for all tracks, you'd need to put more resources towards the higher numbered tracks, and make it clear that's what's going on. Smaller class sizes / more instructional aides / better teachers go to the kids who need more help

The problem is the reasons kids end up in the bad classes are all different.

Some kids have a learning disability that requires individualized attention. You need more teachers for that, or more parental involvement.

Other kids have a different learning disability where the only thing they need is more time to do the same work. You can put them in a normal sized class with other students who work at the same pace and everything is fine.

Some kids have a bad home life and what you can do for them is to get them into after school programs so they have more time at school to do homework and interact with other students and less time at home where everything sucks. But in that case you don't need smaller classes, you need longer hours. More after school programs.

Some kids used to have a bad home life and now it's better, but the experience affected them and now they act out. What those kids need is counseling.

Some kids have been exposed to environmental toxins at home that predispose them to violent behavior. They needed prevention -- lead abatement etc. -- because once it has already happened they're pretty much totally screwed and there is not a lot the school can do about it.

All of these kids have to be separated from the other kids or they'll disrupt the class, but "pour money on those classes" doesn't fix most of it because most of the problems don't come from the classroom to begin with. The school can't fix the fact that some of their kids are living in apartments with lead paint, so spending money on smaller class sizes for kids with lead poisoning is a lot less effective than spending the money on lead abatement.

Problems in school generally have causes (and solutions) outside of school. Treating the classroom is treating the symptom.

Re: Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

#209

Post by scintill76 » Tue, Nov 05, 2019, 5:41 AM UTC

jacobsenscott wrote: post #177

Getting classified as G&T is a joke and severely damaging. All it means is your parents taught you to read a little earlier than most other kids. It's mostly about giving your parents and school administrators bragging rights. Everyone calls you a genius for the next 10 or 12 years. You incorporates that as the most important part of your identity. Then people level out. You aren't the best at everything anymore. Som…

Agreed. This thread showed me a new level. Top comment: "I was fourth picked for g&t. First and second pick ended up being quite successful, as did the third picked." I don't know if it's normal to know everyone's ranking (one other commenter knew their own rank), but it doesn't sound healthy. Feels like it would compound the problems you mentioned -- not only were you G&T, you were 2nd-best of the G&T... until one day you're barely average, let alone in the top 2.

Re: Separating gifted children hasn't led to better achievement

#210

Post by panda88888 » Tue, Nov 05, 2019, 5:43 AM UTC

Comparing the approach to high school sports and academics really reveals how intellectual ability is not treated as a talent to be developed, at least in the US. In high school, there are junior varsity, varsity, and sometimes amateur level sport teams officially organized and recognized by school. They have formal tryouts, limited in the number of people accepted, resources dedicated to develop the talents, and school-wide recognition by other students. Rather than a gifted and talented program for students, perhaps there should be "varsity" level teams (i.e. classes) for subjects such as math, science, and literature, etc. There would be tryouts. And once a student is accepted into the program, official support for coaching, practice, development, competition, and official recognition with a varsity jacket, similar to that of sports.