Gifted kids have been neglected, ignored and discriminated against by our educational system ever since the hey-day of John Dewey, who realized he could only achieve his dream of a socialist America with a dumbed-down populace who couldn’t read.
I taught myself how to read when I was four. Not saying I was “gifted”, but I was read to a lot, and decided to learn how to read on my own.
I was sent to first grade, kicking and screaming, at age 6. Because I already knew how to read, the teacher didn’t know what to do with me, so I spent the entire year bored out of my mind and viewed school as a combination torture chamber and penitentiary. She’d hand out reading books every couple months, I’d sit there and read it in a few minutes, and that was it.
It still gives me the major creeps to even remember that. I hated every day of my entire school career. They did let me skip 2nd grade but that didn’t help. I felt liberated the day I got kicked out in 11th grade.
Yes they have.
Now we’re feeling the effects, but we won’t feel the reality of it until we realize that Russia and China will be telling us what to do from here on out.