Posted on 03/20/2014 8:33:23 PM PDT by CorporateStepsister
In a recent paper, Lubinski and his colleagues caught up with one cohort of 320 people now in their late 30s. At 12, their SAT math or verbal scores had placed them among the top one-100th of 1 percent. Today, many are CEOs, professors at top research universities, transplant surgeons, and successful novelists.
That outcome sounds like exactly what you’d imagine should happen: Top young people grow into high-achieving adults. In the education world, the study has provided important new evidence that it really is possible to identify the kids who are likely to become exceptional achievers in the future, something previous research has not always found to be the case. But for that reason, perhaps surprisingly, it has also triggered a new round of worry.
(Excerpt) Read more at bostonglobe.com ...
I was also reading before I reported for kindergarten, which was a boring waste of time for me. There were no special classes and my elementary school teachers were either too lazy or too unprepared to deal with a gifted child. I raced ahead of the other kids in class projects and got bored. So I spent a lot of time out in the hall. That’s what they knew what to do with a gifted child who was bored and therefore not conforming to “hands on desk, sitting still” mode. Put them out into the hall. There were no enrichment classes or honors classes available until high school. Today, I would certainly have been earning college credits while still in high school, but they did not have those programs around in the sleepy Midwestern town where I grew up.
They didn’t have kindergarten for every kid when I was growing up in the 50s.
I am entirely self taught, as far as it goes... according to regular standards, I am a failure, as I am very poor. But I don’t feel poor as I have many varied interests which I avidly follow and have taught myself many things from herbalism to various musical instruments to writing many poems and have more plans and ideas than I can do in my remaining years. I’ve only had a tv 2 years in my adult life and never watch movies. Too boring, and life’s too short.
I do spend too much time reading news on the internet, though, I need to fix that!
As I recall from one of the original surveys of this kind, one of the subjects took a downward arc, and ended as a recluse obsessed with his collection of subway tokens.
I wholeheartedly believe that in these last days, God has a particular purpose for those who are gifted yet have been shut out by the world.
Who knows how many of them are out there. Bored and unchallenged from birth, with unmet potential. Perhaps wired from their school experiences to be slack and unproductive, simply because their intellect and gifts were never realized much less encouraged or engaged.
God Himself is going to harness this untapped resource to fight the forces of Amalek (read: Obama). Finally challenged and tasked with a *God-given* righteous purpose, these "misfits" will rise to the occasion. God bless and keep them.
Obama and his malevolent hordes have no idea what kind of army they will face. FUBO.
The scene in Addams Family Values, when the lowly camp "rejects" burn the village to the ground, is a good window into the future. Nice touch with the Jewish kid. ;-)
Try switching off to video games ... just go light on the energy drinks !
I have known several brilliant people who have chosen very normal lives. Intelligence isn’t the only indicator of exceptional success.
Yeah. I grew up in a lower middle income household with parents who did not expect too much and didn’t really push me to excell at anything, God bless them. They didn’t come from that kind of stock either. Neither one went to college. Couple that with being socially awkward (very shy possible aspergers) and having hormonal problems that caused some cosmetic issues. I didn’t have a very happy childhood. Always picked last for gym teams, unless it was my best friend choosing. Got snickered at by boys, looked down the nose at by girls, or they wanted to beat me up for some/no reason. I always wondered what I could have gone on to acheive with a better environment. I think a lot of people do:)
Thank you; I just want the US to stop promoting ignorance in women, as if being scientific is something to be ashamed of. Even the Russians had female snipers during WWII. I just wish the US would utilize the scientific half of our country more, in women. We need to value and appreciate the need for our finest minds to be tapped and nurtured.
It’s all about the environment and really, I believe that you in some ways described my life in a nutshell. Minus physical attacks, my daily crucifixion was when I had to go to Interior Design class.
The unabomber was a bright lad
Yeah, and I just want the Venusians to stop beaming bad thoughts into my head.
PING
Ping.
Both a homeschool and another reason to homeschool ping.
Hence one of the main reasons for homeschooling.
My kids were reading at 4 and 5 and by 6 were easily reading at a 6th grade level.
No way was I sending them to public school with the kids next door who didn't know their colors, couldn't count, who could hardly put together a coherent sentence, and were being molested by mom's current live in boyfriend. (who was eventually thrown in jail for it)
You don't need to have any health issues to have endured that.
Simply being new in a school district entering 7th grade is enough for that.
Junior high was hell and senior high wasn't much better.
Simply another reason to homeschool. I wouldn't put my kids through that for anything.
Sadly, those who are too capable are handily rejected by those who are not. If they have not managed to become the cool person to be emulated, they will be shoved aside, even violently rejected by a social circle which finds them threatening. Mediocrity has its way of prevailing, and the fat part of the bell curve will win out in the scrum. Either the gifted are practically worshiped or they are marginalized, especially in school systems which are not geared to deal with those who can learn far more far faster than the teachers and administrators can cope with.
I thank The Almighty I finished High School in a private school where most courses were taught on the Keller Plan (master a packet of material and move on to the next). I was among a few of my classmates who finished chemistry and physics about halfway through the school year. We had enough else to keep us occupied and out of trouble as well.
I am hoping my daughter does not put my grandson in the public school system when the time comes. But I know she won’t homeschool, and he’s an only child so he would not get enough stimulation anyways. I am hoping we can find a private school that doesn’t cost an arm and a leg. I assume that even though they aren’t perfect it would be a better alternative?
But yeah, looking back there was really no good reason I was picked on. The only “problem” was being a sensitive and introverted child. I don’t know if it’s our culture or the same around the world...but it does seem like one must be outgoing and confident if they want to escape ridicule.
My wife, a former school nurse, has said the real losers are the average kids. The talented and gifted students will succeed on their own, but with massive amounts of school resources being spent on the learning disabled it is the average kids who are being shortchanged.
As a school nurse, my wife had to provide nursing care to special needs students at almost a hospital level. She spent part of each day traveling by cab to the student's home helped load the student into the cab and monitored them in transit by cab to the school. This was repeated after school completed for the day. She monitored several students who were functioning at little more than a vegetative state. Yet these students were "mainstreamed" into regular classrooms with their "work" being done by teacher's aides. She often said that the school district was simply providing free babysitting services to these students until they were 21.
that's exactly what is being done.
There is no other reason to put these kids in school.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.