This is actually more what I had in mind:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14642211/site/newsweek/

I, for one, think that Kindergarten should concentrate more on socialization and less on learning to read, to write, and to do math. Some kids are ready for it; some aren’t. I had an interesting discussion with DS#2’s first Kindergarten teacher, who kept him late because he didn’t finish writing his numbers from 1-100. I asked her what was the value to him to learn to write “100″ if he didn’t know what that meant? And he really didn’t have a concept of how many 100 was. (Ten, however, was easy–he had ten fingers and 10 toes! )

“My daughter is told constantly that she is so white by her peers because she is in AP/Honors classes. Why is that looked down on by black students? White people didnt teach them that. ”

Uh, yes white people did, hundreds of years ago.

However, it is still up to us to make the change.

Newt’s ideas on how to win elections. He is usually correct, and he is right this time. Daily Pundit Will ABC collapse under Clinton pressure? Doubt it. How would they look? Wizbang/ Clearly some people like to try to suppress speech… SingletonThe o…

I was waiting for someone to say it.

Sounds similar to blaming an entire group for slavery and Jim Crow with complete disregard for the millions who had absolutely no part in it and those who fought and died to abolish it.

The article from the link below relates to the comment above. Read it if you have the time.

“The New First Grade: Too Much Too Soon?” – (Newsweek-Sept. 11, 2006 issue)

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14638573/site/newsweek/

That’s interesting.

1. The SAT is not an IQ test. So I don’t understand why you provide a quote that references IQ when the Stereotype Threat is not about IQ.

2. You wrote: What happened to the idea of proving critics wrong and defying stereotypes?

Given your believe in IQ, specifically, g, and the innate nature of same, and how it relates to cognative abilities, why would you write such a thing when ‘g’ dictates, that as a group, the stereotype of Blacks, as a group, being dumber than whites, as a group, would hold true. So there would be no need to even try to prove the critics wrong, because even on an individual level, Blacks who are smarter than whites, are by definition, outliers.

3. There still exists the wonderful inconsistency of categorizing Blacks as a group for the benefit of chastising the group, but looking at individual Blacks when it is convienient to do so.

What struck me was the difference in educational expectations the parents had for their children. Lower s-e classes tended to see their responsibility as strictly physical (food, clothing, shelter) and education as the responsibility of the schools & teacher. Middle class parents took responsibility not only for the physical, but also took responsibility for their children’s education: reading, conversing, enriching their environment.

I’ve seen, first hand, the difference in this between the way I was raised vs. my husband’s family. We are now seeing it in the difference between the high school DS#2 attended last year vs. his current one.

If the study is correct, then doesn’t that point to a way out: educate the parents, especially when their children are infants & toddlers? Why isn’t this being given wider discussion?

Yes indeed, you have. Philosophy and its branches have looked into the human condition for a very long time. The Bible, Aesop’s Fables, the Vedas, Confucius, and on and on have lent us reasoned observations which we can cleave to through practical experience and the wisdom derived therefrom.

Sociology is a recent construct parading as a science. You need only look at social Darwinism or the hoax played on Margaret Meade by her Samoan cohort to realize that sociology as science flat out does not hold water.

Naturally, you can employ the techniques of scientific observation to posit a few possibilities or theories. To a small degree, those understandings are useful in certain settings. But when you try to reach a conclusion that is larded with “fact” you have an entirely different ballgame.

Malnutrition and damaging eating patterns can be scientifically studied and the resultant damage is real and provable. The same is true with the genetic weaknesses related to the practice of incest. Many types of abusive behavior that involve chemicals or physical injury also can be scientifically mapped.

I do not reject sociology and psychology as useful study methods. I categorically reject them as junk science. When you are told the characteristics and outcomes of diversity training, you are being wall papered with some one’s bias and junk science. When you are given a chance to consider cultural differences as a way of making your approach more likely to succeed, you are benefiting from useful information.

A lower socioeconomic person in the mean streets of a large American city and a lower socioeconomic person in a South Seas Island village are different entities in a huge variety of ways. That should be obvious. Yet sociological research tracts invariably paint their subjects with an enormously wide brush. That is to say, not all poor are alike throughout American cities or share the same traits as the country poor.

I am quite comfortable calling out the bulk of the theories of sociologists and psychologists as being based on junk science. And that goes for political science as well.

The hospital I work with has studied the demographics of the region. We have psychologists in our employ. Armed with training and a good intuition, psychologists are a very important part of the healing team. But be assured that there are a bunch of them out there who are “alternative healers” and little more than frauds. A good sociologist and good psychologist knows the boundaries of their research and they keep it simple.

I usually review the references you cite, and I must say you seem to have an affinity for polemics. There are enough Ward Churchill types out there to muddy any discussion. If you come upon some research that seems to resonate with you, you must peer review it. That means, you must read it all and chase down its sources. Then you must find the reasoned opposition to it and do the same.

#25: “Psychology and sociology are pseudo-science in a league with phrenology and astrology.”

I’m no major fan of various disciplines within psychology, sociology and other ‘ologies’, but I couldn’t, in honesty, agree that they are broadly worthless and ‘pseudo’. Also, I can’t figure how your dismissal of these disciplines squares with further comments in #28:

1. “Many children in lower socioeconomic circumstances suffer from a long list of developmental problems”

2. “When you examine the habits of many in the lower socioeconomic groups, it is not much of a mystery why so many of the children have multiple problems.”

Isn’t the study of socio-economic groups an arm’ sociology’? And isn’t the study of developmental problems related to environment/economics/nutrition the very same ‘psychology’ and ’sociology’ that is being refuted on this post?

Further, how is it reasonable to describe Geoffrey Cohen’s psycho-social study as ‘no different’ from a Nazi doctor who both sent Jews to their deaths and butchered captives; yet on the other hand perfectly reasonable to state that ‘blacks’ have lower IQ’s, (partly?) because of psycho-social factors?

It just doesn’t all square up. Or have I missed an important key factor?

Regards,

John

Not necessarily. Let’s say that your children score better intellectually than 99.9% of black children nationwide. This would mean that they score better than the vast majority of white children. But if they score 15 points less than those white children who score better than 99.9% of white children nationwide, then they actually support the rule.