I have a sneaking suspicion that Sara Mead's new Early Ed Watch blog at the New America Foundation is going to become this site's go-to source for early education news and analysis.
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Early Ed Watch
27 Feb 2008 02:43 pm
Comments (9)
I winced before I clicked, because New America has historically produced the ugliest + most cumbersome blogs in the wonkosphere. I hadn't known about their redesign. A pleasant surprise.
Nepotism! Sort of.
Sara might be interested in Stanford University's EPGY (Education Program for Gifted Youth).
Their computer-based instruction program in math is Fantastic -- I enrolled my son in it when he was in the first grade (he had complained of being bored by his public school math class.)
He was soon testing at two years above grade level and could have gone even higher but the school district discouraged it -- they argued that they would run out of math courses for him well before sophomore year if he continued.
He ended up going to Phillips Exeter Prep and was one of the National Merit Scholars there.
The EPGY math program is also used by the six?? other universities who work with gifted children (Northwestern?, Duke, John Hopkins, Etc)
In my opinion, ANY child can test as "Gifted" if they receive interesting education that motivates them. I think that life experience and nurturing in pre-K and K-3 years plays a far bigger role in performance on academic or "IQ" tests than any genetic endowment.
What my son liked about EPGY is that it ran at HIS pace -- if his testing showed that he was having problems in some area, the computer program went back and reviewed the material with him.
If he tested well on the material, on the other hand, then the computer let him continue on to more advanced material. HUGE difference from a classroom.
Don: Thanks for the tip. Some of my colleagues and I are quite interested in the idea of technological innovation to increase customization in education--this sounds like something along those lines--I'll check it out.
Don,
It seems to me that the program you mentioned is successful because it is analogous to ability grouping.
If it wasn't for the program, many children wouldn't have the opportunity to accelerate far past their peers, and since the majority of the programs participants are white and asian, doesn't the program further exasterbate the achievement gap?
Additionally, the course are rather expensive which probably excludes lower income children from participating.
1) Re Rory's comment "It seems to me that the program you mentioned is successful because it is analogous to ability grouping."
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NOT at all -- the children in EPGY are admittedly tested as gifted before admission to the program -- but that's not something required by the computer software.
2) Re Rory's comment "If it wasn't for the program, many children wouldn't have the opportunity to accelerate far past their peers, and since the majority of the programs participants are white and asian, doesn't the program further exasterbate the achievement gap?"
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As a parent, I didn't give a hairy rodent's posterior -- I wanted to give my son every advantage I could.
Plus the only "achievement gap" that US students have is that they regularly get their asses kicked in the International Math Olympiad and other measures of math performance.
The one child that was as good as --or better --as my son in middle school was a Chinese student whose father was here in America on an exchange program. That Chinese student (and I'm speaking of nationalty , not ethnic group) went on to MIT from the eleventh grade.
I don't think the performance is due to racial intelligence -- I think it is due to motivation. Chinese students still grow up in poverty --but they are encouraged to work hard at their studies in order to build a productive career. They're told That math is good for something other than counting how many bags of crack you've sold this morning.
3) Re Rory's comment "Additionally, the course are rather expensive which probably excludes lower income children from participating."
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How so? Yes, Stanford charges a fee to support their research and development. And to pay some education students to be backup tutors if a kid gets stuck on something and calls in to EPGY for help.
But the current educational system has NO mechanism for improving productivity. It works (or not) the same as 200 years ago.
It costs roughly $10,000 per 9-month year to educate a child. To educate 100 students, it takes 100 X $10,000. Two teachers always cost TWICE as much as one teacher. (Actually, the teachers unions are strong here in Pennsylvania so two teachers actually cost THREE times as much as one -- because you will have to also hire an Administrator to "develop study plans" or some such rubbish. )
But you can make a MILLION copies of EPGY's computer software for very little cost. And it would only cost about $150 per year to give the kid a computer. ($450 computer amortized over 3 years.) That's a hell of a lot less than $10,000 per year. Plus computer software doesn't grow old, lazy and in need of retirement health care and pensions. (Although live teachers do reproduce themselves for nothing.)
$150 /year for computerized software is also a hell of a lot less than we spend to incarcerate the education system's failures. We could send our inmates to HARVARD for what we are paying to keep them locked up in cells. See
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/02/29/america/29prison.php
Comments closed March 12, 2008.
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Heads in the Sand
Pinch me, I must be dreaming......
Posted by Don | February 27, 2008 2:57 PM