The takeaway from this story is a condemnation of US higher education tbh. Exquisitely gifted 13 year old graduates from college with a major in physics & a minor in math — wants to apply for PhD programs but his parents can’t afford it https://abc11.com/elliott-tanner-college-graduate-university-of-minnesota-physics-major/11788944/
I think a lot of people could. But I think there's little-to-no advantage to jumping ahead, and it tends to negatively impact social and emotional development.
I actually work with "profoundly gifted" kids for a living now, and our school strongly advises against skipping grades, and (especially) against graduating early. There are virtually no benefits to doing so, and tons of drawbacks.
Suppose everything goes according to plan, and this kid gets into a physics PhD program next year. Let's say it takes him 5 years (pretty middle-of-the-road) to finish all the coursework, do the original research, and defend his dissertation. Great--now you're 20, and you're on track to get a tenure track job...about ten years early. 25 years down the line, you're 45 and tenured; someone who took the normal track is maybe 55 and tenured. Now you're middle aged and a tenured professor, just like you would have been if you hadn't rushed through. Probably nobody remembers that you were a child prodigy. You likely do good work, but so do all the other people at the top of your field. What did you really gain here? For the privilege of getting to the end of your academic track about a decade early, you sacrificed your whole childhood, all the normal experiences you'd get as a high school, college, and graduate student, and a lot of social development.
We strongly recommend that instead of grade promoting, kids just take classes and do work that they're intellectually ready for. There's no reason why this kid can't stay in high school normally, but also take graduate level math and science courses at the university. This gives him some semblance of a normal life, lets him do work he finds engaging, and doesn't rob him of his entire childhood and early adulthood development.
At least in my experience, it's basically never the kids who want to do this--it's always the parents. The kids just want to learn cool and interesting shit, which they can do while also being allowed to be kids. If they can take classes at an appropriate level in their area of interest, and maybe engage in some research, they're happy. They don't give a fuck if they get called a grad student or not, unless mom and dad have manipulated them into thinking that graduating from high school at 12 is the only thing to make them interesting.
I have never met someone emotionally stable who skipped a year. Parents should just encourage their child to do research and learn on their own if they are excelerated, not jump ahead to where they cannot connect to their peers.
independent learning!! I paid attention to about 10% of my classes for my 17 years of education. I'd do homework or read or whatever during class.
on my own time, I'd read, write programs for my calculator, go to museums and zoos, talk with friends and family members (this is definitely an example of privilege--not everyone has the opportunity to just discuss medicine, law, economics, history, politics, etc with experts as part of their upbringing.)
There are also sometimes opportunities to take courses at a local community college alongside regular education, such that you save money on college and get advanced content, but aren't graduating college before 18 and are still spending most of your day alongside developmental peers your own age.
I mean, I mostly thought school was boring as shit, but I think the vast majority of kids feel that way. It wouldn't have occurred to me to blame my parents for school being boring any more than it would have occurred to the average kid to resent or blame their parents for school being boring. I think pretty much every kid ever has gone "ugh, why do I have to spend 13-22 years doing this shit for 6-8 hours a day???"
The education system could and should absolutely be improved in many ways, but I don't think the answer, even in the short term, is to have kids spend less time in the only real communal environment they'll get for their entire lives.
I'll also say that, like most people, I remember a small fraction of what I learned in school. Getting to certain content sooner or getting through content faster wouldn't change the fact that by 25, I had a general base of knowledge, a lot of practice "learning how to learn", and specialized knowledge in my field. As a kid, I didn't really conceptualize forgetting things, since I basically never forgot anything. I knew it would happen. And I worried about it even. But I couldn't really understand what it would be like to have my brain prune unused/underused neural pathways. But it's important because it contributes to the conclusion that more doesn't necessarily equal better.
So, as I'm thinking through this, I could maybe see an argument for accelerating people with truly eidetic memories, because getting through more content will actually result in them knowing more, but that's a very special and rare case. Plus, people with eidetic memories are that much better at independent learning, and also far more likely to need additional social and emotional support that would come from not skipping ahead.
The place I teach is attached to a university, and all the kids are technically university students. They take some classes with us, and then pursue whatever it is that they're incredibly good at with the university. These kids' development tends to be very "spiky:" they'll be (say) doing graduate level math at 14, but only modestly better--and sometimes worse--than their age-peers at literary analysis. Giving them the opportunity to do high level work in their area of strength while also operating in a (relatively) normal high school environment with other kids who are like them is a huge boon, and results in kids who are dramatically less fucked up. We're an unusual school, but we're not singular; the options are out there (we're also public and free).
I'm never a fan of the "kid skips 7 grades and goes to college instead middle school" thing whenever it crops up. Let kids be kids.
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I think a lot of people could. But I think there's little-to-no advantage to jumping ahead, and it tends to negatively impact social and emotional development.
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I was put in a math class one year above my grade in elementary school. I dropped out after a few weeks because the class skipped morning recess.
I actually work with "profoundly gifted" kids for a living now, and our school strongly advises against skipping grades, and (especially) against graduating early. There are virtually no benefits to doing so, and tons of drawbacks.
Suppose everything goes according to plan, and this kid gets into a physics PhD program next year. Let's say it takes him 5 years (pretty middle-of-the-road) to finish all the coursework, do the original research, and defend his dissertation. Great--now you're 20, and you're on track to get a tenure track job...about ten years early. 25 years down the line, you're 45 and tenured; someone who took the normal track is maybe 55 and tenured. Now you're middle aged and a tenured professor, just like you would have been if you hadn't rushed through. Probably nobody remembers that you were a child prodigy. You likely do good work, but so do all the other people at the top of your field. What did you really gain here? For the privilege of getting to the end of your academic track about a decade early, you sacrificed your whole childhood, all the normal experiences you'd get as a high school, college, and graduate student, and a lot of social development.
We strongly recommend that instead of grade promoting, kids just take classes and do work that they're intellectually ready for. There's no reason why this kid can't stay in high school normally, but also take graduate level math and science courses at the university. This gives him some semblance of a normal life, lets him do work he finds engaging, and doesn't rob him of his entire childhood and early adulthood development.
:penguin-love:
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At least in my experience, it's basically never the kids who want to do this--it's always the parents. The kids just want to learn cool and interesting shit, which they can do while also being allowed to be kids. If they can take classes at an appropriate level in their area of interest, and maybe engage in some research, they're happy. They don't give a fuck if they get called a grad student or not, unless mom and dad have manipulated them into thinking that graduating from high school at 12 is the only thing to make them interesting.
I have never met someone emotionally stable who skipped a year. Parents should just encourage their child to do research and learn on their own if they are excelerated, not jump ahead to where they cannot connect to their peers.
stealing the best years of their life to fast forward to shitty adulthood
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independent learning!! I paid attention to about 10% of my classes for my 17 years of education. I'd do homework or read or whatever during class.
on my own time, I'd read, write programs for my calculator, go to museums and zoos, talk with friends and family members (this is definitely an example of privilege--not everyone has the opportunity to just discuss medicine, law, economics, history, politics, etc with experts as part of their upbringing.)
There are also sometimes opportunities to take courses at a local community college alongside regular education, such that you save money on college and get advanced content, but aren't graduating college before 18 and are still spending most of your day alongside developmental peers your own age.
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I mean, I mostly thought school was boring as shit, but I think the vast majority of kids feel that way. It wouldn't have occurred to me to blame my parents for school being boring any more than it would have occurred to the average kid to resent or blame their parents for school being boring. I think pretty much every kid ever has gone "ugh, why do I have to spend 13-22 years doing this shit for 6-8 hours a day???"
The education system could and should absolutely be improved in many ways, but I don't think the answer, even in the short term, is to have kids spend less time in the only real communal environment they'll get for their entire lives.
I'll also say that, like most people, I remember a small fraction of what I learned in school. Getting to certain content sooner or getting through content faster wouldn't change the fact that by 25, I had a general base of knowledge, a lot of practice "learning how to learn", and specialized knowledge in my field. As a kid, I didn't really conceptualize forgetting things, since I basically never forgot anything. I knew it would happen. And I worried about it even. But I couldn't really understand what it would be like to have my brain prune unused/underused neural pathways. But it's important because it contributes to the conclusion that more doesn't necessarily equal better.
So, as I'm thinking through this, I could maybe see an argument for accelerating people with truly eidetic memories, because getting through more content will actually result in them knowing more, but that's a very special and rare case. Plus, people with eidetic memories are that much better at independent learning, and also far more likely to need additional social and emotional support that would come from not skipping ahead.
The place I teach is attached to a university, and all the kids are technically university students. They take some classes with us, and then pursue whatever it is that they're incredibly good at with the university. These kids' development tends to be very "spiky:" they'll be (say) doing graduate level math at 14, but only modestly better--and sometimes worse--than their age-peers at literary analysis. Giving them the opportunity to do high level work in their area of strength while also operating in a (relatively) normal high school environment with other kids who are like them is a huge boon, and results in kids who are dramatically less fucked up. We're an unusual school, but we're not singular; the options are out there (we're also public and free).