The Common Core “Deep Learning” Message that All Students are Gifted is Wrong
…in the ordinary elementary school situation, children of 140 IQ waste half their time. Those of 170 IQ waste practically all their time.
— gifted education pioneer Leta Hollingworth, found in Genius Denied, by Jan and Bob Davidson
A recent report implied that with the right kind of environment and “deep learning” everyone can be gifted. The belief is that students have these capabilities just waiting to be actualized with the right curriculum. The idea is that if the right projects and innovations are used, all students will be enlighten and giftedness will, I guess, cease to be. I mean, if everyone is gifted, no one is gifted. This kind of thinking causes harm to both the gifted population and those who are not gifted.
Deep learning appears to be a spinoff of Common Core State Standards indicating that students can finally be provided deeper thinking about what matters because…well, after all, how many first graders have you known who understood Mesopotamia?
This train of thought jumped out at me recently in a description of one of the High Tech High (HTH) schools in California. I have written about High Tech High before (Bill Gates loves them) and I am not sure what they are doing with Common Core. They appear to push for curriculum unlike the current one-size-fits-all being foisted on traditional public schools.
But they criticize gifted education by describing some of the worst practices that have been used by public schools to address the needs of gifted students. Let’s face it, few public schools have ever done gifted education right.
Many elementary schools have once-a-week pull-out programs where gifted children do activities all students would love—a fact that HTH likes to highlight. Of course, this evokes envy by other children, and many teachers resent the disruption.
In high school, most gifted students are relegated to advanced placement classes (AP), or International Baccalaureate (IB), never designed for gifted students in mind. Both AP and IB are better than nothing but not good enough. While HTH may do their The Common Core “Deep Learning” Message that All Students are Gifted is Wrong: