I am reading the blog now… and I guess the main idea there is that the problems with education are caused by IQ differences.
This doesn’t match my experience. I was teaching at a high school for gifted children, where all students must have IQ 130 or more. But I have seen there some of the problems that this blogger attributes to low IQ. (Specifically: learning something, and then forgetting it completely.) Because of this, I think the author’s analysis is wrong. Although I admit that with lower IQ, those problems can be much greater than what I saw.
Specifically, for the “learn and forget” learning style, I think the cause is not enough repetition. Repeating is essential for remembering. But the modern trend for teachers is doing creative things and discussions at classroom, not giving homework, not giving too much tests. In other words, reducing repetition as much as possible. Because the repetition is boring, and there is no worse sin for a teacher than being boring. But this is how our brains are built; remove the repetition and you remove the remembering. -- If your parents are smart and talk with you a lot, you get some of the information repeated informally at home. If they make you learn at home, you repeat the information formally.
EDIT: This is made even worse by many people saying that doing homework should not be reflected in your grades; only what you know. I agree with the argument… but the unfortunate consequence is that if you say homework is optional, most students won’t bother. And then, predictably, they will not remember the lessons. (And then, predicably, if this happens to most of the class, it will be considered the teacher’s problem. But the teacher will often not be allowed to fix it by giving a lot of homework and making it mandatory. Instead, they are required to do some miracle. And judging by the general situation in education, most teachers are pretty bad at making miracles.)
On the other hand, the article about Asians cheating on exams was very interesting. I just propose an alternative hypothesis that it’s not just Asians, but pretty much everyone except for Americans. I would bet that immigrants from Slovakia would be cheating as much as possible… and if not, then the reason wouldn’t be honesty, but merely lack of strategic coordination. So perhaps “not being (culturally) an American” and “being good at cooperation” are the two necessary ingredients, and the children of Asian immigrants are the most visible example of both.
I am reading the blog now… and I guess the main idea there is that the problems with education are caused by IQ differences.
This doesn’t match my experience. I was teaching at a high school for gifted children, where all students must have IQ 130 or more. But I have seen there some of the problems that this blogger attributes to low IQ. (Specifically: learning something, and then forgetting it completely.) Because of this, I think the author’s analysis is wrong. Although I admit that with lower IQ, those problems can be much greater than what I saw.
Specifically, for the “learn and forget” learning style, I think the cause is not enough repetition. Repeating is essential for remembering. But the modern trend for teachers is doing creative things and discussions at classroom, not giving homework, not giving too much tests. In other words, reducing repetition as much as possible. Because the repetition is boring, and there is no worse sin for a teacher than being boring. But this is how our brains are built; remove the repetition and you remove the remembering. -- If your parents are smart and talk with you a lot, you get some of the information repeated informally at home. If they make you learn at home, you repeat the information formally.
EDIT: This is made even worse by many people saying that doing homework should not be reflected in your grades; only what you know. I agree with the argument… but the unfortunate consequence is that if you say homework is optional, most students won’t bother. And then, predictably, they will not remember the lessons. (And then, predicably, if this happens to most of the class, it will be considered the teacher’s problem. But the teacher will often not be allowed to fix it by giving a lot of homework and making it mandatory. Instead, they are required to do some miracle. And judging by the general situation in education, most teachers are pretty bad at making miracles.)
On the other hand, the article about Asians cheating on exams was very interesting. I just propose an alternative hypothesis that it’s not just Asians, but pretty much everyone except for Americans. I would bet that immigrants from Slovakia would be cheating as much as possible… and if not, then the reason wouldn’t be honesty, but merely lack of strategic coordination. So perhaps “not being (culturally) an American” and “being good at cooperation” are the two necessary ingredients, and the children of Asian immigrants are the most visible example of both.