[timr]

"Only four states currently mandate services for gifted students and fully fund those mandates. The failure to develop the talents of our children deprives all of us of a stable of future innovators, creative thinkers, leaders and outstanding performers."

Except that clearly, it doesn't. We know this because a) we had plenty of "genius" before we had any "gifted education", and b) the nature of the thing implies exceptionalism that overcomes cultural boundaries. (I also strongly suspect that "gifted education" has never been demonstrated to increase "genius", but that's just my speculation.)

If you look at what public education is designed to do (provide for a well-educated populace), it makes sense that most of our resources should go toward the under-performers: it's far more important to have a baseline level of literacy and numeracy for 95% of adults, than to nurture the development of the top 5% of people who will probably excel regardless.

I say this as someone who did "gifted education" in elementary and middle school, and found it to be mostly useless. In retrospect, I'd rather that my school district invested the money spent on gifted education in more AP classes, better funding for the arts, computers or early language instruction. It's almost negligent that a school system can afford to pay a full-time "gifted" instructor, but not provide for foreign-language instruction starting in kindergarten.

[nicholas73]

I was also put into a "gifted student" class in elementary school - it was little more than extended play time. The problem is alluded to in the article - it's not really agreed on how to systematically produce brilliance. At most a school does is shunt the smarter kids into classes a bit higher than their level. That might save those kids from some time wasting, but still isn't developing them above from what they naturally are. IMO brilliance is a mix of ability, effort, long term planning, and guidance - and each have dozens on variables for maximization. Frankly I wouldn't want public schools as they are doing any long term planning and guidance for my kid. They aren't doing well enough teaching the basics as it is.

[CrankyPants]

Not my experience. The gifted classes I attended were far better than the regular ones, and allowed me to study some JHS and HS-level material. The major failure in my education happened during that wasted period between elementary and college.

[timr]

There's a world of difference between "gifted" classes, and classes that cover more advanced material. You'll notice that I said I would prefer AP courses over gifted education -- there's real value to allowing all qualified students to take advanced coursework.

The situation gets messy when you try to segregate "gifted" kids into special education from a young age. Of the kids who ended up in AP courses with me high school, way less than half were pre-identified as "gifted" at the elementary and middle-school level. We're just not good at identifying intellectual potential in first graders.

[CrankyPants]

Sorry I wasn't clear. These were classes set aside for so-called "gifted" children. Not just classes that covered more advanced material. (Though they did.) Nearly everyone in there was really, really smart. I'm sure many kids fell through the cracks and weren't selected, but other than the odd inclusion of some musically gifted children who quickly fell behind and dropped out, we didn't really have any false positives.

That said, I totally agree that all students who can and are interested in advanced coursework ought to be able to benefit from it. I don't really understand why elementary school isn't more like college. If a 3rd-grade student reads at a 9th-grade level, but only does math at a 3rd-grade level, why compromise his experience?

And, as one who had teachers who couldn't always answer my questions, I don't really think asking one person to teach many types of subject matter is always a good idea, either.

[fusiongyro]

I agree, but regarding foreign language instruction I have to bring up Mark Rosenfelder's article on why people learn foreign languages: http://www.zompist.com/whylang.html

In high school, I was in "honors" classes but had been passed over for "gifted" classes because my parents refused to have my IQ tested. The gifted classes had a reputation for spending most of their time planning parties.

I don't have a clue how to "fix" America's schools, though I suspect standardized testing belongs more to the problem set than the solution set.

[shardling]

>I say this as someone who did "gifted education" in elementary and middle school, and found it to be mostly useless.

That makes little sense -- you can't use an anecdote to compare the experience you did have to the one you didn't.

[timr]

What now?

I did gifted education, and plenty of "regular" education. The gifted education was basically useless.