Where have all the Thick Kids Gone?

[Jonty]

Has anyone noticed the inflation in the intelligence of children? Everyone seems to describe their offspring these days as a genius, highly gifted, gifted, highly intelligent, intelligent or above average although most of these little Henry(s) and Henrietta(s) couldn't have got into a grammar school 50 years ago even if supported by a small army of private tutors.
Statistically of course there must be a similar number of below average children in terms of intelligence as there are above average, assuming the distribution is normal.
I've only come across one child descibed as average. This was the verdict of an educational psychologist and the boy- a nice lad - was clearly as thick as 2 bricks - and in my school days would have been classed as borderline retarted.
Of course this political correctness as a downside: many parents over-estimate the abilities of their children and put too much pressure on them, with the result that they develop low self-esteem and disengage from the educational process.
jonty

[meic]

There is a school of thought that you must always encourage.
Any negative comments are highly destructive to a child's development.
This is fine and works well for the childhood period so validates the theory.

When they grow up and hit the big wide world they find out the truth and turn to drugs, alcohol, get depressed or string themselves up.

[glueman]

Intelligence seems to be as evenly shared out as it ever was, it's the opportunity to fail that's been denied the current generation. Our teachers would direct their observations to the top 5% and if you got it, you got it, and if you didn't hard luck old chap. Modern teachers seem hell bent on explaining things in a way children can understand, ours targeted Oxbridge entrants and planned their holidays from the staff room, leaving the rest of us to cause havoc.

[meic]

That was certainly the theory and one that I fully supported when I was doing my teacher training.
However when i went to the real world in a modern school, I found that the middle 80% are left to their own devices as before and the attention is still given to the top performers but that attention is now being taken by the"uncontrolables".

[eileithyia]

To all please be careful how you term some of your comments.
My son is classed as Moderate Learning Difficulties, something that has been extensively investigated for a cause including some genetic irregularites. He has never had a conclusive diagnosis; it would be easier for him if he had a diagnosis such as some form of Dyslexia, Dysphagia.

We were told if he had not been at one of the "nicer" schools in town he would not have been diagnosed just assumed to come from a low achieveing household.
It is hard work ensuring he does not get drawn into the type of idiots we would prefer him not to mix with, more intelligent kids are drawn together, with the wasters making their own gangs and Andrew is drawn to the fringes of these, easily led he, could be led into the less savoury side of society.

Thankfully our education system has not let him down, from diagnosis he has had 2 hours/day one-to-one input. His senior school has specialist courses for non-exam candidate students (inc the time wasters) with emphasis on practical course; Building skills, Painting/Decorating, Car maintence, Hair, Beauty, Childcare, Animal Care (inc equestrain or small animals), and Horticultural. I do not believe his school was the only one operating such schemes, and he went on a pathway that has led him to a specialist horticultural course at college.
Such practical skills help channel energies of those who may well disengage from formal learning for whatever reason.
I seriously believe we should not have raised school learning age to 16 and should still give space for 15-16's who are not exam hopefuls to find another way in the world such as practical courses. It certainly never harmed my cousin who went directly into hairdressing apprenticeship at 15 and never took a CSE, GCSE or whatever, in her life.

But please please please do not use terms as thick or borderline retarded unless you know all the facts about a child.

[Si]

Well, speaking as a thicko (sorry eileithyia ) who, had I been at school today, would be regarded as Special Needs, I'm all for giving all kids a chance rather than just concentrating on the top 5%. I was given special tuition on account of not being able to read'n'write properly, and I admit to still having difficulties (thank heavens for spell and grammar checkers!). Having been given the chance, rather than being tossed on the scrap heap before big school, I now ave better academic qualifications than most of my teachers ever had, not to mention having had a successful career out in the so-called real world (tm) where I made it to the top of the tree in my particular chosen line.

I found that in school I went on to do best in the subjects that I was encouraged in. In the ones that I was shouted at for being thick I did a lot worse. So, encouragement obviously helped for thick old me. However, I believe it to be an extreme over-simplification to try to group all kids into one approach - some will thrive on encouragement, while others work best when given a kick up the back side to get them going. A good teacher will realise this and adjust their style accordingly (well, if they are not swamped by massive class sizes, spending all their time doing paper work or preparing for waste-of-time SATS).

Likewise, people who try to measure intelligence just on exam results are pretty blinkered. For instance, love him or loath him, you have to admit that someone like SirAl has had to show some intelligence to get where he is today, but give him a GCSE paper to do and he'd probably crash and burn. And, of course, comparisons between today's exams and those of "when I were a lad" are pretty ridiculous too. Education these days has a different ethos. It's not about memorise and repeat, it's about teaching kids to think and learn. Alas, noble principle as it is, it does seem to have gone astray a bit due to factors such as those listed above. It's all very easy to say that any modern kid put into a class room of X years ago would be seen as a dunce, but the same is also true - I best a good number of the older users of this forum would struggle in today's schools (just look at the panic shown by many modern parents when faced with helping their off-spring with homework)!

All in my humble opinion, of course

[meic]

Unfortunately the world of education is still very academic-centred, so when non-academic alternatives are offered it is condemned as failing the children and not offering them a proper education.
So often ending up in classes where children are getting pushed through the sausage factory even though they have no chance of doing what is required. Not surprisingly some rebel and mess the class up for everyone. Afterall if they are having 2 years of their lives wasted just for the sake of it, why should they co-operate?

So pragmatically I am a supporter of Children being the option of leaving school at 14, with an option to return to education when they are ready. Yet over the border I believe you are going to raise the age to 18, I am so glad not to be a teacher in England when that happens.

[ferrit worrier]

A few years ago a young lad joined our caving club, unfortunatly academicaly he didn't have a lot going for him, but what he did have was a cheerfull personality, a willingness to work and help out and bags of common sense, far more than some adults. It didn't take long for us all to warm to him. I'd like to think that because we treated him as an equal his confidence grew, he certainly got our respect. several years ago working underground in an old mine I suffered a nasty injury to my left thumb which required immeadiate hospital treatment. the quickest way out of the mine for me, was to be hauled up the shaft on the winch. the only way he could communicate with the surface was to use the winch bell code. He'd got everything organised and within minutes I was on my way up. We all shine in different ways, I personaly would go anywhere undergorund with that lad. Sadly he doesn't come up any more, time marches and he's moved on but every now and then someone will ask how he's doing.

Malc

[dodger]

Personally I wouldn't want to try a lot of the homework they get nowadays and the kids I've seen at the local Junior School are so much more confident and prepared to speak up these days, not like when I was little and you were "taught" with shouts, a ruler on the knuckles and little encouragement.
I'd say glueman got it right in that intelligence is still distributed to the same degree and at least the lesser able kids have more chance than before, rather than being shunted into a "special" school and never encouraged.

[jan19]

Intelligence can be measured in many ways.

We currently have a girl with Asperger's working with us. She was a fish-out-of-water in the branches as she just doesn't deal well with customers (why she went into a profession dealing with them is something of a mystery). However, as we work "behind the scenes" after a bit of a bumpy settling down period she's doing well - mainly because, as Ferrit Worrier found, we treat her as an equal. There is nothing whatever wrong with her intelligence - she went to the local super-selective- she just can't cope well with people she doesn't know. She's a wizz on the computer and you never need to show her how to do anything twice.

She's with us until June - I really hope she's found a permanent place as she's an asset to us and she's thriving in a situation that suits her.

Jan

[kwackers]

I'd say glueman got it right in that intelligence is still distributed to the same degree and at least the lesser able kids have more chance than before, rather than being shunted into a "special" school and never encouraged.

Is that a good thing? The average child now gets a university education.
The qualifications required for fairly menial tasks are climbing and the lower end jobs can only be filled with immigrants.
A whole generation of children will underachieve in life because they have expectations that cannot be fulfilled.

In simple terms the average child should hold the average job.

[Jonty]

I take the point about being careful about use of language and if I offended anyone I apologise. I'm basically on the side of the child or young person who may be about average or below average intelligence/ability but still has a lot to contribute. After all we have many highly intelligent politicians and bankers and sometimes one wonders what some of them contribute.
IMHO euphemisms like "mixed ability" or "slow learner" can hinder rather than help personal development as such terms can be misleading and confusing to parents who may not be able to "read between the lines" and translate what is being said into plain English. We are all slow learners if the subject is difficult enough: I'm a very slow learner at differential calculus to name one of many subjects which are at or above my intellectual threshold.
The term "retarded" was commonly used to describe a child who had not reached the intellectual/ability level commensurate with their age. So a child aged 9 with the ability of an average 7 year old was "retarded" by 2 years whereas a 9 year-old with the ability of an 11year-old was "advanced" by 2 years. This convention seems very helpful to me but of course the word retarded is now unacceptable.
Now we have "slow learner" which implies that they learn anything so long as they have enough time which is clearly misleading nonsense.
If we start openly accepting that many children and young people have below average intelligence/ability and use terms accordingly, then we're more likely to address their educational needs.
jonty

[NUKe]

where are you coming from with this one Jonty?
Giving someone a lable like retarded certainly does not help. understanding children's needs assessing there level properly does. The new system of continuous assessment allows pupils to be continually assessed and where necessary appropriate action can be taken this applies to gifted children as well as the ones that fall behind. I see the great work teachers do with children of all abilities.

It is very easy to say the vast majority would have not got into Grammar schools, but that was a system that left the vast majority of people on the scrap heap. It was educational elitism. each year more youngster are given better opportunities.

[goatwarden]

Intelligence seems to be as evenly shared out as it ever was, it's the opportunity to fail that's been denied the current generation.

This was exactly my feeling when I trained as a teacher at the ae of 36. The secondary system has become all about churning out product with some GCSE "grades".I got sick and tired when I came to mark project work (which in my subject essentially determined their ultimate grade) to be unable to fail any child. I had many horrible little oiks who should have been allowed to fail (not generally a function of intelligence but of behaviour and attitude.) Instead they went out into the great wide world, proudly clutching their "grade F", thinking how tallented they were, given they had done nothing to deserve it. I hope the great wide world gave them a sudden awakening and helped them understand that achievement actually takes effort because school had certainly let them down there.

Frustration and anger at the pointlessness of it all led me not to tarry long as a teacher.

[mw3230]

I'm concerned at some of the terminology used in this thread and think that some of the posters need to reflect on how they are describing young people. My wife was a SENCO in a large inner city secondary school and she specialised in dealing with the section of school society some (including some of her colleagues) seem keen to write off. It's partially thanks to blinkered, disengaged teachers that there are so many disengaged kids.

Other posters have illustrated that if we treat young people with respect they will show that they are not simply "thickos" or "retarded". Strange that the poster who used the word retarded couldn't spell it. Should he/she be labelled as a 'poor speller' for that or do we recognise it as a simple mistake and respect a fellow member. Labelling is akin to stereotyping and in my opinion should be used with caution