> her mother had taught her that naturally smart people don’t have to study.
Of all the parts of the article, that little bit stands out.
Because I see my older kid do that all the time, as if putting in effort to do something is somehow not the real thing. As if things learned from mistakes and practice is not progress - a substitute for talent.
It's related to pride, in my experience tutoring high school and college kids. That was my own experience while growing up as well, there's a sentiment that "natural" smartness and hard-working smartness are two seperate things.
I feel like kids have been moving away from this mindset, but maybe it's changed names. Growing up being a "nerd" was uncool, and studying was "nerdy". After college, I talked to some of the people who were the "naturally" smart kids and I found out they lied so much about how much time they spent not studying. Everyone lies. Part of it, I learned, was that my graduating class ended up with a lot of cut-throat people, they lied about how much work they put in to gatekeep. I don't speak to a single person from my graduating year now even though I am friends with some teachers as well as kids from other years. A similar concept but less isolated to academics has been kind of a popular "insult". I sometimes hear the concept of "sweaty" being uncool among the youngest ages I teach. Sweaty, as in working so hard towards something that you work up a sweat. It's doesn't have to be a physical activity, you can be called sweaty at video games, or sweaty at math.
Education is a weird place to use the word talent, looking back. You can't wake up knowing new information. Everyone has to learn, the people who look talented just learned it earlier than everyone else. I am not sure why hard working is seen as uncool at that age. I wonder if it's different in other parts of the world, I learned that I have a very typical north eastern USA experience.
You can't wake up knowing new information. Everyone has to learn, the people who look talented just learned it earlier than everyone else.
Of course you are correct that the "naturally smart" people learned it faster. As in, new information was provided to them just once or twice and they instantly grasped it and were able to apply it.
As knowledge accumulates in people they may also actually "wake up with new information" nobody taught them. As in their brains may make associations and conclusions without someone teaching them. The proverbial "I had an idea while showering". There's your "talented" guy.
"there's a sentiment that "natural" smartness and hard-working smartness are two seperate things."
This is a huge problem in the dating market too. "Self improvement" implies that at one point one was a singificantly less high status individual... And that they are at risk of backsliding.
People who are naturally gifted or don't have to try have less risk of becoming unattractive later.
It's sexier, cooler, and more successful to be good at something without trying. I don't blame your kids.
You're not strictly describing intelligence, you're also describing symptoms that relate to ADHD. I wonder if there's a bias to categorize someone as more intelligent based on the contrast between someone's ability to focus and their ability to grasp complex ideas quickly. I struggle severly with ADHD and notice it all of the time, in how people's perception of me changes when we end up on a topic I know well and enjoy talking about.
As someone who neither took notes nor studied for basically anything I disagree. I cannot study effectively. I would cram some facts in 30 minutes prior to a test and that’s it. I don’t think I was alone. It had nothing to do with looking uncool.
Most stuff is simply taught in class and if you pay attention and remember it you will be fine. Teachers tend not to test stuff they did not teach.
I always thought studying was for kids who either did not pay attention or wasted their time taking notes without actually learning. I’ve softened that opinion since but many people absolutely do not need to study much.
How much of it do you remember now? How much of it do you care to remember long term? I know you weren't alone, I was one of those kids too, at certain times and certain tests. For most people, it was about pride, being able to say you didn't study or social standing and "coolness". Later in life I learned I have ADHD and that went a long way to explain a lot of my bad habits. I think it depends on the level of curriculum too. 11th and 12th, the last two years of HS for me, six out of my eight classes were AP/college weighted, the only exceptions were english and physical education.
Teachers absolutely tested stuff they didn't teach and they barely assigned homework, there was a lot of self-learning. I think it's relatively uncommon for schools to do this, but in 12th I took AP Physics C, calculus based physics, and we did both semesters over the school year, both Mech and E&M. We matched college pacing, and on both AP test I got 5s. I am so grateful to that teacher for getting that experience before starting college, he had a PhD in theortical physics. My science education was filled with teachers with PhDs while I was in high school.
People absolutely have to study when they are being challenged at an appropriate level. If I was in a non-accelerated curriculum, I think I would have agreed with you, because it would have matched my experience. But I took my first AP class in 10th grade, the second year of high school. There's no way to be successful in a hard science AP class without studying in one way or another. I remember some of my friends used to do the homework from one class in another and then say they didn't study. I am not disagreeing with your experience, I am disagreeing with your generalization.
Imo I remember it very well. At least conceptually. History is the hardest.
I took 11 AP tests, 3 of them without taking the class over two years. My teachers were generally not PhDs but think these classes were better than my undergrad classes. I suspect you are right on the hard science assessment. Those do require simply memorizing many facts. I avoided those classes.
Wait so after a lecture on the principles of, say, kinematics you would then be able to nail an exam that required you to compute against those principles? I think that's unusual.
For me in class even if I could follow the teacher perfectly, only through applying concepts in study (read: solving many problems) could I gain the deeper level of insight and comfort with the material that it took to ace exams.
I mean yeah. I sat in the front. I listened and took no notes.
If you’re being tested on details from a book you need to read the book. Think English tests that really just want to Make sure you actually read.
If you’re being tested on the gist of what was taught then you can probably just pay attention in class. Think… biology or history.
If you’re being tested on your ability to apply things you just need to be confident in your understanding of the mechanics. If you understand a math formula, and it’s reasoning, there’s not often a need to practice it. Some exceptions apply where the math is just weird hacks and patterns like finding function roots or calculus patterns. Physics is pretty hard for people because it really asks you to be able to apply things to real world thinking. I recall a question that requires you to consider the distance to the moon to get an answer. This distance was not provided. If you understood the formula and the problem, it was apparent that the distance would be so large it would not affect the answer. Hard to study for.
> I mean yeah. I sat in the front. I listened and took no notes
The reason I commented is because I also did all of those things! But only through adding in study could I sit exams and make 0 mistakes.
I was a bio major -- the gist was not enough. For example I needed to memorize every reactant and product of the Krebs and Calvin cycles. And the exam would have so much more to both memorize and process then just that. I just couldn't have stuck that knowledge through one-shotting class, and never imagined anyone could.
As someone else who was the same: Yes. The teacher would be demonstrating sample problems to the class at a much slower rate than I could apply it, so I was checking that I understood the material in real time.
Homework was sometimes useful (the repetition ensuring it wouldn't fade like cramming before a test does), but I didn't need as much as was assigned and never studied beyond that.
It’s a protection mechanism for ones ego. Because if you “don’t try” you always have an excuse for why you’re not doing as well as the “nerds” at school.
If you do “try” but you don’t get a top result, what would that say to a kids fragile ego ? They might think they’re not good at all.
By trying, you reveal your capabilities (as well as your limitations), and that can be terrifying for a kid with a fragile ego.
The correct mentality is to focus on the process, rather than the result.
The result doesn’t matter (especially for kids) as long as you focus on training and improving yourself.
A problem with this attitude is how schools and their grading systems are teaching children the exact opposite. What matters are your grades in the end.
I feel like judging myself by my results and not by the process im going through was so deeply ingrained in me that even after years of trying I cannot get rid of it.
SO is a high school teacher. This is her primary complaint about how we do things today. She talks a lot about the book Grading for Equity.
I'm of the opinion that traditional schooling is a bit of a zombie. There just isn't a way for an institution with that much inertia to keep up with a world that releases generalized search and chat-capable LLMs within 20 years of each other. Especially considering they're so underfunded that in places you don't even need to know a subject to get a job teaching it, because they don't have enough SMEs willing to work at the pay.
My kid is pretty smart, not genius smart, and he falls into this trap too. He loves succeeding at stuff, but hates putting effort into it. If he tries and fails once, he says "well I'm just not a ____ person" and digs his heels in. If we cajole him into trying, he'll intentionally flub it.
Naturally smart kids really don’t have to study in high school because the material is so easy for them. Just staying awake in class and doing the reading once is sufficient if not moreso. Often times exam answers can be inferred from other exam questions with only partial knowledge of the material. There’s often a rude awakening in store for them though when they hit the second or third year of college and encounter challenging material for the first time while having no experience studying.
How are you dealing with this? I used to feel that way too but now that I actually want to put more effort, I cannot being myself to do that. I cannot focus and get easily distracted whenever I try.
Of all the parts of the article, that little bit stands out.
Because I see my older kid do that all the time, as if putting in effort to do something is somehow not the real thing. As if things learned from mistakes and practice is not progress - a substitute for talent.