Placement of Students in Classrooms - Research Paper Example

Placement of Students in Classrooms Child prodigies are not a new phenomenon. For centuries, if not millennia, extraordinarily intelligent children have been mentored exclusively or with more personal attention offered to them by their teachers. In olden days, this was practiced by the rich or the nobles alone, as they were the ones who had access to education. However, with the advent of public schooling, government sponsored free schooling, education came within the grasp of everyone. With the beginning of public schools came various issues that needed to be resolved, whether it was desegregation, modern day teaching techniques, school syllabi and school funding – these topics have been (and are being) discussed ad infinitum. One such issue is whether children should be placed in classrooms based on their age alone, or should their IQ also weigh in as well. There are various ways through which children with higher IQs are catered to in various educational institutions. Some techniques entail placing the “gifted” children in the same class as their peers, with specialized activities being created for them, different from those of the rest of the class. Still others involve having the gifted children take special classes after school hours, for instance private tutoring. There are certain schools that provide separate classrooms for gifted students altogether, whereas there are institutes that only cater to gifted children. This paper discusses the technique that advocates providing separate classrooms for children based on their IQ. This issue has two sides – with one side advocating that children should not be limited by their age when they can achieve so much more based on their IQ potential, and the other side stating that children should not be subjected to such segregation as it leaves the door open for many other problems to creep in that the children are too young to deal with. Both sides cite various factors as basis of their respective stance. The supporters of IQ based segregation in classrooms claim that when children are placed with students who are not similar to them in intelligence, it can cause a lot of frustration for them. Children with higher IQs tend to get bored in regular classrooms, where they are forced to hold back their intelligence, so to speak. This results in them not achieving their full potential. On the same note, children with average IQs, when placed with gifted children, will also experience frustration and confusion. Such feelings can often result in children either lashing out or withdrawing within their own selves. What is more, with the present public school system geared towards improving the standards of the average or deficient/lacking children, the needs of gifted children are often ignored. Assigning gifted children to separate classrooms enables them to challenge themselves and cause them to utilize their maximum potential, something not possible in a regular classroom. Placing such children in regular classrooms may even cause disruption as the gifted child, out of boredom or frustration, may cause distractions in class, thus disturbing the learning of other students. The proponents opine that as gifted children are lesser in number, therefore, in a bid to “fit in” they may end up playing down their intelligence, whether for the teachers or for their classmates. It is a normal phenomenon in a classroom that the teachers often do not call out children who they think would already know the answer, instead focusing on the average or lacking students. All these factors may cause the children to drop out of school altogether (Cloud, Badowski, Rubiner, & Scully, 2004). Once again, students at both ends of the spectrum will benefit greatly from being assigned to classrooms based on their IQ level. On the other hand, the opponents state that the system of measuring IQ, first of all, is not an exact science and often such tests have been proven to be biased in favor of the advantaged classes of the society without room for various subgroups. What is more, a high IQ is not equivalent to outstanding performance, in such a case students, despite having high IQs, will perform badly in their classes irrespective of where they are placed, and no advantage would come out of assigning them to a separate classroom, only resources will end up being wasted. Moreover, the detractors claim that such an assignation bears the marks of elitism, as often such IQ based classrooms and/or schools cannot be fully government sponsored, entailing that the parents also contribute something as tuition fee, thereby resulting in only the rich being able to spend their children there. Such elitism should not be fostered. Furthermore, gifted children, when placed in separate classrooms, do not get to live through a normal childhood. They feel pressured to perform, and can end up being totally disillusioned as adults. What is more, such children can have stunted emotional development as even though they are geniuses, they are emotionally not mature enough to handle the immense pressure that comes with being enrolled in such an IQ based classroom. Placing children in separate classrooms based on their IQ level can also result in school bullying. Those who have been sent to the “average” or “low” IQ classrooms will feel resentment and anger towards the students who are assigned to the “gifted” classrooms, as the former most probably will perceive it to be an indication of them being told that they are inferior to the latter. This will cause them to lash out at the gifted children. This can also foster a feeling of inferiority in the hearts of the students not being sent to the gifted class, a complex they might not come out of throughout their lives. The opponents also point out, as Rosenthal & Jacobson did (1966), that often when you place students in a situation where the teacher expects them to do well, they will. Therefore, it is no wonder that those placed in special classrooms for being gifted perform well. More individual attention is given to them and the programs are tailored according to their interests and needs, it is no wonder, therefore, that such students do well. Hence, if a student is expected to perform a certain way based on his placement in a classroom, which is in turn based on his IQ, s/he will most certainly come up to those expectations. Therefore, it is best if students are placed together and if such attention and freedom of choosing the content and speed of their syllabus is left to them, it will produce good results irrespective of the student’s IQ. After perusing the arguments of both sides, it seems as if it is better to place students in classrooms according to their IQ levels. Students will benefit greatly if their classrooms are assigned in this manner. Not only will children not feel frustrated or held back, they will also be able to set their own pace when it comes to learning. While it is true that students will do well when it is expected of them, however, there is no denying the fact that placing students in classrooms based on their IQ level is not based on how well they will do in their classes, but rather on how easy or difficult learning can be for them. Tasks that are formulated keeping in mind the IQ level of the students, will always result in more success than those that are assigned to the students irrespective of their mental prowess. Since the classrooms will be different based on IQ, so will the tasks assigned to the students of these classes. Moreover, IQ tests have greatly improved from what they were before. The racial and ethnic bias that was found therein has been removed, and efforts have been made to make them as ethnically neutral as possible. Also, while it is true that often gifted classes end up costing more than regular classes, it is so because there are not many government sponsored (or school endorsed) programs available to the students, therefore, funding has to come from the parents. However, if the policy of assigning students to classrooms based on their IQ level is adopted, it would necessarily entail that the government funds it, thereby reducing its costs. It will be something similar to the present schooling system of the United States – where before schooling was only available to the select few who could pay, with government funding it has now become a reality for everyone. Interestingly enough, certain learning techniques that were established for gifted children have also been shown to be helpful for marginalized groups (Robinson, 2008). The bullying of gifted students is actually carried out in the present scenario as well, where students pick on those who have a higher IQ and thus, inevitably, end up having all the answers in the class. The present classroom assigning system actually ends up creating more bullying than if classrooms were assigned based on the IQ level of the students. What is more, it is indicated through research that many of the emotional or social problems associated with gifted children fade away when they are placed in classrooms that cater to their specific learning requirements; Neihart, Reis, Robinson & Moon also reaffirm this (2002, p. 282). Also, research suggests that while it placing students in separate classrooms based on their IQ level may not be beneficial at a young age (Lleras & Rangel, 2009), however, studies have discovered that children learn more in a homogenized setting, where their classmates consist of students who share their IQ (Adam-Byers, Whitsell, & Moon, 2004). With the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, it has become mandatory on schools to bring the proficiency of their students to a certain level at the risk of being penalized. In such a scenario almost all attention is given to the children who are lacking or “behind” their studies, whereas those who do well, or exceptionally well in cases of gifted children, get completely ignored. The students, it seems, have to be brought up to average; while it may be good for those who are below-average, however, it holds back the students who have above-average intelligence. In order to help them reach their potential, it becomes necessary that the classrooms be assigned based on IQ levels. This would not only benefit students with higher IQs, but it would also give the teachers more time to spend with the students who have problems or who are lacking. References Adams-Byers, J., Whitshell, S. S., & Moon, S. M. (2004). Gifted students’ perceptions of the academic and social/emotional effects of homogeneous and heterogeneous grouping. Gifted Child Quarterly, 48(1). 7-20. Chenoweth, K. (2004, May 20). 50 years after desegregation ruling, equality still elusive. The Washington Post. Retrieved from http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A40151-2004May19.html Cloud, J., Badowski, C., Rubiner, B., & Scully S. (2004, September 27). Education: Saving the smart kids. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,995204,00.html Lleras, C., & Rangel, C. (2009). Ability grouping practices in elementary school and African-American/Hispanic achievement. American Journal of Education, 115(2). 279-304. Marland, S. P., Jr. (1972). Education of the gifted and talented: Report to the Congress of the United States by the U.S. Commissioner of Education and background papers submitted to the U.S. Office of Education, 2 vols. (Government Documents Y4.L 11/2: G36). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office. Neihart, M., Reis, S. M., Robinson, N. M., & Moon, S. M. (Eds.). (2002). The social and emotional development of gifted children: What do we know?. Washington, DC: Prufrock Press, Inc. Robinson, J. P. (2008). Evidence of a differential effect of ability grouping on the reading achievement growth of language-minority Hispanics. Educational Evaluation and Policy Analysis, 30(2). 141-180. Rosenthal, R., & Jacobson, L. (1966). Teachers’ expectancies: Determinants of pupils’ IQ gains. Psychological Reports, 19, 115-118. Winerip, M. (2006, April 5). No child left behind? Ask the gifted. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2006/04/05/nyregion/05education.html Read More