[110101001010100]

Maybe we just set the bar too low. By doing so, not only do we hurt the bright kids by boring them to tears, but we presume based on test scores(?) that certain children could through sheer effort never exceed what level we presume they are capable of reaching- we lower our expectations of them. We deny the "bright" kids a reasonably stimulating education and the other kids the chance to prove what they can do.

Standardised testing does not test for ability to improve.

It's one thing if a kid fails because he didn't try hard enough. That can be explained to him. And it's a good lesson. But it's another thing to give him a standardised test and decide a priori what's he capable of. That just creates a strange value system where all kids, bright or not, may be denied an opportunity to show what they can do and they learn to think of ability as fixed. And it creates a lot of fascination with "innate" ability.

Is it true there's growing evidence that ability is perhaps not as "fixed" as we think?