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Smart Kids Should Skip High School

sonyaellenmann.com

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Re: Smart Kids Should Skip High School

#51

Post by corser »

nphang wrote: post #29

Well this is a load of drivel. And all yall are agreeing with it because every single person on this forum considers themselves smart so you like agreeing with people who claim to be smart and know smart people stuff. "so I took California’s GED test in June, 2012. It was dead easy." If that's your basis for calling yourself smart then I'm not impressed. I took the GED high as a kite and got a perfect math score (kno…

Elite universities are not for expanding the gentry class. They are so that the elite can meet other elite as they are extremely distributed geographically, get married and continue on the class system. The lower class people that go there are aiming to join the elite, but the vast majority of them simply become highly paid servants to the owning class. We like to think that startups made by dropouts establish that anyone can make it big, but for the most part these startups are children of millionaires living off trust funds until they break through; like Trump, no one should consider these rags to riches stories, accomplished though they may be.

The main point is that for elites, their schools are so that their girls can bring a nice boy home and not some trash from main street while their boys can find a wife that actually stands a chance at domesticating them.

It's really just that most geeks are so focused on their projects that they forget that there are more important things, like their family. Hence why we constantly hear incredibly talented but socially awkward people call for the repeal of school. Because social things don't mean anything to them. They generally become tools of the elite class.

I generally agree with the idea of creating environments where people can meet their future family because finding a quality spouse is extremely difficult without expensive and fool-proof filters in place. Connecting it with education is inevitable because children and young adults are nearly useless in a modern economy. We can't make it excellent education because there is a lot of economic and social pressure for truly talented individuals to abandon academia in favor of the market. My main complaint is that the elites are no longer virtuous so they do not deserve to exist anymore.

Re: Smart Kids Should Skip High School

#52

Post by LyndsySimon »

In the context of the article, my wife and I are being even more extreme - our kids are skipping all of it. We're unschooling.

Our oldest is seven, and shows a ton of potential. Instead of trying to sit her down every day and "teach", we literally just gave her a pile of books and told her to have fun. Two or three days a week she tends to sit down while her younger sister is napping for the sole purpose of learning. That's usually math, but it could be anything. She's starting to take on small projects of her own design as well, which is exciting.

For example: we were out walking on a popular trail last week, and she emptied her water bottle. She decided it would be a good idea to sell water and snacks on the trail. Without input at all from us, when we got home she started listing out all the things shed need to set up a mobile food cart of sorts, with cold drinks and snacks. Then she shared it with me and we worked together to polish the idea a bit - I suggested she use a wagon instead of a stroller, and limit herself to bottles of water and prepackaged trail mix.

She will probably see that particular project through to completion, break about even on it, and move on to something else. She did that in the past with a lemonade stand at our apartment complex.

As for her progress, her math skills are significantly ahead of her peers. Her reading ability is something I think needs improvement, but we test her twice a year and they show that she's at parity with her public-schooled peers. She's picked up reading very quickly in the past 2-3 months though, and I'm very interested to see how she places this time around.

So, yeah, skipping high school doesn't sound all that crazy to me. What the author calls "smart kids" - which are in reality intelligent kids with the advantages of a good familial support system - can make much better use of their time than sitting in a classroom waiting for the bell to ring.

Re: Smart Kids Should Skip High School

#53

Post by MustardTiger »

coldtea wrote: post #32

The best thing about school is it being a forced social experience -- preparing one for life itself, and even having them interact with others even if that's not their "thing" (it wasn't for me either). Not the learning.

What makes that the best thing? All available evidence suggests it is not a relevant thing at all, since home schooled children are indistinguishable in social skills to regular schooled children. The forced social experience of a typical school is very artificial, and does not apply well to many other social settings. The only real similar setting is prison. Unless the goal of school is to prepare children for the social experience of prison, I don't see how that could be the best thing about it.

Re: Smart Kids Should Skip High School

#54

Post by LyndsySimon »

1stop wrote: post #19

Is this like saying "Rich people should hoard their wealth"? There is something to be said for Smart kids being at school both receive and PROVIDE benefit to/from the other students. But I guess, who cares about dumb kids, who had less opportunity than the smart ones? They'll get a better draw next life!

Even if for the sake of argument we assume your assertion that "smart kids" benefit their classmates is correct... on what basis do you assert that those "smart kids" owe their classmates anything at all?

Why are their classmates entitled to an education at their expense, and what do the "smart kids" get in return?

Re: Smart Kids Should Skip High School

#55

Post by brudgers »

[US centric]

Some kids should skip some part of some high schools. Smart is orthogonal to the issue. "Skip" is a sliding scale. Early admission to college, home schooling, and starting in a trade are all on it. So is just getting the fuck out of a bad situation.

The people who should skip are those for whom the "these are the sizes we carry" [no high school is actually one-size fits all] doesn't carry a healthy size. The likelihood that a part that should be skipped is inversely proportional to it's length: senior year is more broadly appropriate than 9th grade.

Re: Smart Kids Should Skip High School

#56

Post by joesmo »

High school in the US is a joke. What did I learn? I learned math is horrible. Wait! What? Yes, school actually killed my passion for math. When I wanted to do matrices, they wanted to do arithmetic. When I wanted to do trigonometry, they put me in 3 (THREE) years of pre-algebra. How much fucking pre-algebra can you have?

Everything I attained during and after high school was DESPITE school, not because of it. I taught myself how to program like many here, 3d graphics, sound, music, writing, etc. I wrote a book that got me a full tuition scholarship (despite having no official extracurricular activities) in my spare time. High school was so useless, I went a whole semester doing homework only one time and getting all A's and the occasional B+.

And this is at one of the best public schools in New Jersey. Seriously, what a joke. What a waste of time. What torture to be put in there with all the rest of the kids, most of them unlikable idiots. And worst of all, what lost potential during those days. How much more could I have done had I not been forced into this elaborate babysitting scheme we call high school? How many books would I have written? What software would I have developed? What animations would I have created? If only I hadn't been so tired from the daily bullshit of high school ...

Re: Smart Kids Should Skip High School

#57

Post by PretzelFisch »

dalke wrote: post #38
PretzelFisch wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

high school does not provide motivation. That comes from the students that know what their next step is and want to get into college.

Umm, you realize a lot of people are motivated to graduate from high school because they have career plans which don't require college, right? There are entire high school programs of vocational, technical, and career education for those whose idea of a "next step" is different from an academically oriented career that most colleges teach. There are also people who graduate from high school because their goal is to e…

I thought I had more emphasis on next step when I wrote the reply. I don't believe school is ever the motivation. Those that are motivated in school see it as a means to an end.

Re: Smart Kids Should Skip High School

#58

Post by dalke »

PretzelFisch wrote: post #57
dalke wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Umm, you realize a lot of people are motivated to graduate from high school because they have career plans which don't require college, right? There are entire high school programs of vocational, technical, and career education for those whose idea of a "next step" is different from an academically oriented career that most colleges teach. There are also people who graduate from high school because their goal is to e…

I thought I had more emphasis on next step when I wrote the reply. I don't believe school is ever the motivation. Those that are motivated in school see it as a means to an end.

In my school district, school was only required until 16. Some did leave school then. Everyone who remained had some sort of motivation, because it was voluntary.

Re: Smart Kids Should Skip High School

#59

Post by s_m_t »

dalke wrote: post #33
s_m_t wrote: post #14

I agree. Despite going to one of the best public high schools in the country I don't remember learning much of anything. Looking back on it it was more like a very pleasant teenage internment camp. Parts of it were fun, the drugs and alcohol being a highlight. Going to school high or getting high at school was pretty fun. Sometimes competing with other students on the tests without studying or doing any of the homewo…

I went to one of the better public high schools in my district, so not one of the best schools in the country. I learned quite a bit. Both the US history and European history teachers were very good, the calculus and differential equations courses were an excellent base for college physics and applied math, the computer class marked the start of my transition from an avid hobby programmer to a software developer, and…

I did most of my learning outside of school, but I did have a few classes that I liked, all of my history teachers were very good, my chemistry and biology teachers were awesome. I appreciate those classes and I'm glad I took part in them but I don't think it made up for the rest.

Perhaps we had similar experiences but we contextualize them differently. Do you think the classes you mentioned were worth everything else? Do you not think you could have had similar experiences to those classes if you had done something other than high school?

Re: Smart Kids Should Skip High School

#60

Post by coldtea »

MustardTiger wrote: post #53
coldtea wrote: post #32

The best thing about school is it being a forced social experience -- preparing one for life itself, and even having them interact with others even if that's not their "thing" (it wasn't for me either). Not the learning.

What makes that the best thing? All available evidence suggests it is not a relevant thing at all, since home schooled children are indistinguishable in social skills to regular schooled children. The forced social experience of a typical school is very artificial, and does not apply well to many other social settings. The only real similar setting is prison. Unless the goal of school is to prepare children for the s…

>What makes that the best thing? All available evidence suggests it is not a relevant thing at all, since home schooled children are indistinguishable in social skills to regular schooled children.

I, for one, very much doubt that "available evidence".

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