Monday, October 23, 2017

The Importance of Early Nurturing

A gift that Jerry posted on G2A The Guessing Game.  By the way, something about that post has made it the most accessed link on G2A during the last month...
"I am going to post something that actually supports your argument. But I would hate for that to absolve the schools of their responsibility. YN These two brains both belong to three-year-olds, so why is one so much bigger?
On an unrelated note, Jerry and I have been continuing our gun control difference of opinion.


31 comments:

  1. Jerry left this over at guessing game.

    "What we are addressing here is the matter of causation. I suspect there is a wide range of disparity in brain function, ranging from this "severe neglect" case up through "minor impairment." Nonetheless, this lends credence to the numerous studies that conclude that social economic status is the best predictor of academic success.

    Other studies suggest that the best predictor of academic success is "a good teacher."

    This raises perhaps the critical question: Suppose that we, by the usually assumed government magic, managed to eliminate this neglect and the brain impairment that follows.

    When they reach school age, they will be better able to learn, but will they have a good teacher to learn FROM? Evidence indicates that, right now, those kids who have not been impaired still fall behind if they go to school with those kids that are.

    If we started today magically transforming these young brains, it would be at least six years before we would see any results, if then, and a whole generation before the benefits would start to flow.

    But if we started today allowing school choice and holding all schools accountable, we could see results in one or two years, and benefits would gradually accumulate.

    The costs of the former are huge while the cost of the latter is modest or even lower than what we do today.

    I am not saying we should not be doing parent training as a part of welfare reform, quite the contrary. But I think education reform is equally necessary, and with wider benefit."

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  2. The following statements are fascinating...

    "those kids who have not been impaired still fall behind if they go to school with those kids that are"

    "allowing school choice and holding all schools accountable"

    You continue to want to make it easier for people to run from the children who need the best peers, parents and others in their school...

    And then you want to hold the schools accountable, even those whose situation has been made worse by your actions.

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  3. Now this statement I think needs to be tweaked slightly.

    "wide range of disparity in brain function, ranging from this "severe neglect" case up through "minor impairment."

    Maybe...

    wide range of disparity in brain function, ranging from this "severe neglect" case up through "minor impairment" to "normally developed" and on to "ideally developed".

    Now of course the children who have developed normally and ideally are twice blessed, first they had a Parent(s) who got them to that point and likely have a supportive parent(s) who will help them do good in school.

    Where as things are unlikely to get better for neglected / impaired kids, their mamas/papas were not capable of or responsible enough to nurture them properly, and it is unlikely they are going to change significantly without some serious intervention and support.

    This is a sad and complicated problem.

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  4. I'm not sure I buy the notion of "twice blessed." I still believe that the great majority of parents WANT what is good for their children, but many do not know how, and far more simply do not have a choice in what education those kids get.

    And I am becoming suspicious of your notion that putting "lucky" kids in with the unlucky ones benefits anybody. We know the lucky kids (in the home life sense, not the economic) get less than they might elsewhere, but I have yet to see where the unlucky kids benefit. It was the whole idea behind racial bussing, and all it did was put the unlucky kids in with kids that made them feel like idiots. Either the class was "dumbed down" so the unlucky kids could pick it up, making the lucky kids into bored troublemakers, or the lucky kids were advanced at their pace, meaning the unlucky kids got nothing out of the class at all. Would it not be better if the whole class was unlucky, and the teaching pace could be set to where the median ability was, with techniques designed to teach to that mental ability?

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  5. Yes the path to hell is paved with good intentions...

    Many of those mamas and papas may want what is best for their kids even as they are neglecting and/or abusing them. The reality is that some of those mamas / pappas are screwed up, some are immature, some don't know any better, etc. That is where parent education, early childhood education and a society that holds them accountable as Parents should enter the picture. Unfortunately you resist all three of these things.

    Somehow you think that every person that can have sex and make babies is capable, responsible, mature enough, capable enough and psychologically healthy enough to be a good responsible parent.

    And since that is not true, you want to compensate for your flawed view by "holding the schools accountable" for fixing all the kids that the mamas / papas and their community screwed up.

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  6. Now how can one great kid and family make a difference in a challenging classroom?

    For better or worse, the teachers say my daughters are nearly perfect in every way... (they must behave better in school... :-)) Therefore the Teachers would place my children near students who struggled behavior wise or academically.

    This helped the struggling children to stay focused and gave them some one who could help answer questions. As I always say, positive role models and positive peer pressure works just like negative ones.

    Now as long as the positive role models significantly out number the negative, things are good. When they approach an equal number or worse, things go down hill quickly.

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  7. Haven't you just proved my point? Once a school passes that "tipping point," (according to you, at 70% "unlucky kids") Then it is beholden on good parents to send their kids elsewhere where they WILL get a better education. If they cannot afford to move or otherwise choose, they should be given that voucher that you seem to hate. Yes, that leaves the whole school full of unlucky kids, but the school can then adapt to that situation far better, and maybe actually improve results. Now, if some of the kids on that continuum have parents who care enough (AND who haven't been so discouraged by the lack of choice so far) want to try another school, shouldn't THEY be allowed to do so as well? Mind you, in exchange for the allowance of free choice, I would allow the public schools to institute better discipline policies, altered curricula and other changes that the private schools can, freed of government regulation.

    Now, if on top of all of that you can magically transform the society so that we don't have so many "unlucky kids," more power to you (but not to government, please). And don't expect the schools to do it through ECFE or some such. They have already proven they cannot do what they already have the responsibility for (and should be held accountable for) doing.

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  8. At least you are consistent in your opinions. :-)

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  9. I am sorry to be consistent, but simple logic dictates no other path.

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  10. It must be the logic of selfishness. By that logic I should have moved my girls long ago...

    Fortunately for my community, I and many others choose to fight for our communities and schools, and all the less fortunate children in them who benefit from our efforts.

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  11. It is not selfish to want your kids to get the best education available to them, it is GOOD parenting. And it is a curious dichotomy. You claim to be a good parent by keeping your kids in a less-ideal school though you have a choice to go elsewhere. Then you condemn other parents who keep their kids in a less-ideal school when they HAVE NO realistic choice. So, when you do it it's a virtue, and when others do it, it's a sin and mark of moral failing?

    Look, I'll give you a way out of your hypocrisy. I'm simply going to assume that your school has not yet reached the "tipping point" where the unlucky kids and their various pathologies substantially impact the school's ability to educate the "lucky" kids. Then, keeping your kids there becomes a value judgement as to whether the move has greater benefit/cost than staying. But please don't claim you are sacrificing your girls to help the schools and community. That would be despicable.

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  12. I don't think I have ever:

    "you condemn other parents who keep their kids in a less-ideal school when they HAVE NO realistic choice."

    I just say they all have choices and options, they are responsible for their life choices.

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  13. Please remember that I believe that kids can succeed well in almost any school as long as they have 2 good responsible Parents.

    And sacrifice is relative. In this case my daughters lost and gained things:
    - they may have learned even more academics else where.
    - they may have been safer and exposed to less bad behavior else where.
    - they developed skills to deal with all kinds of different kids
    - they learned the importance choosing to associate with people who make good decisions.
    - they truly love diversity

    In essence they are so more mature and knowledgeable than I was at their age.

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  14. Now speaking of hypocrisy...

    You say that we should help the people who need it. And yet you want to make it ever easier to leave them behind and isolated. And remove the funding from their local schools.

    I think "logic of selfishness" is a good term.

    I mean this exactly how N Mpls ended up in such dire straits. Those "responsible parents" ran for the better life in the Burbs, which left a large percentage of unfortunates behind...

    I wonder what N Mpls would look like if more people had fought for their community, instead of run from it.

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  15. Yes, I say we should help the people who need it. So tell me, who needs it? We have said, as a glittering generality, that "lucky kids" will succeed almost in spite of the school they are in. But unlucky kids? Where they are concentrated in a given school and neighborhood, and have been for a generation or more, how much have "we" helped?

    And you continue to insist that they all have choices, but quite obviously that does not include any realistic choices of school, or these failed schools would cease to exist. You say you have a choice of schools, yet a two-parent family struggling out of poverty does not, and I do not see how you can believe they do. What is so sacred about the public school system that we must sacrifice whole generations of children's futures to its continuance? If it's a good public school and universal vouchers are given out, they will survive. If it's a bad public school it will be obsoleted by competition. Why is that a bad thing?

    As for North Minneapolis, my belief is it would be exactly the same as it is now, because the education system would continue to produce people who could not escape the poverty of their surroundings. Public schools are supposed to be the great equalizer of opportunity, not perpetuating misery.

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  16. The children who need the most help are those born to Mamas and Papas who simply are not mature, capable, sane, motivated, self disciplined, etc enough to raise them effectively.

    You choose to deny the reality of how many of the kids in poor neighborhoods live in totally dysfunctional families.

    And unfortunately your plans leave them in even worse straights. While doing nothing to hold these Parents accountable for improving / changing.

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  17. I don't see how you can characterize my ideas in such a way. We both recognize that kids in poor neighborhoods come from families afflicted in various ways and to various degrees. You seem to believe that this is an immutable situation created by "bad choices" someplace along the line, and that this one particular social pathology applies to 70% of the kids in certain schools. I believe the number of kids whose parents have CHOSEN this poor education for their kids is substantially lower than that, and would like to try a) offering them a better choice and b) helping them take advantage of it. Then c) would be a holistic solution to the problem, which has not happened in 40 years of government initiatives.

    My plans would leave them in better STRAITS, especially if we were to help "educate" them out of their abject poverty-- both economic and social. But "holding them accountable" just smacks of punishment and is in no way "helping" them or their children. It's like the Obamacare individual mandate. I saw a piece today which worried that repeal of the individual mandate tax would leave millions of people uninsured. Ridiculous. People pay the penalty because they are ALREADY uninsured and are paying the penalty because they cannot afford to buy, do not want or need and cannot afford to use, Obamacare insurance. Especially after paying the penalty!

    So, let's hold these Baby Daddy's and such accountable, and tell them that they have to pay extra to get a better school for their kid (even though the public school already spends twice the state average for half the results). Problem solved?

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  18. It is easy for me to characterize your views that way.

    You wish to make it easier for more people to run away from the children who need the most funding, good role models and help... Then as you do today, you will continue to blame others for the problem you have helped to create.

    The whole while the kids who need the most help will be ignored by you because you are adamant that schools are what matter most. And you totally have ignored the point of this post.

    We need to help these children in the first 5 years... No where do you address this reality... It is the parenting that matters most BY FAR...

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  19. You are completely mis-characterizing my views, but my attempts to clarify have been unsuccessful so far. So let me just rebut.

    1. I do not "wish" any such thing. I would like families to stay together and successfully raise their children. =I= have not created this problem. I will agree to blame parents for their "choices" in child-making, but please allow me to blame GOVERNMENT for incentivizing it, and for not DE-incentivizing it over the last 50 years. Maybe the "culture" is responsible for most of it, but government is responsible for not fixing it.

    2. The kids who need the most help ALREADY EXIST, and they are in the schools today. At this point, the schools ARE what matter most to their ability to get an education, up to their (possibly irreversibly reduced) potential. I'm not ignoring them, I am adamant the schools should do their job!

    3. OK, "we" need to help in the first 5 years. So how do "we" (and if by that you mean government, which you certainly do) do that? Quite obviously, government incompetence has created this situation. or at minimum allowed it to persist, for many, many years and I see no indications of any turnabout in approach. Nowhere do I "address this reality" because imagining that government can fix this problem quickly or easily is NOT reality. It is magical thinking.

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  20. 1. You are adamant that you "do not want government to fix it"...
    - You are against free easily accessible birth control
    - You are against sex education in the schools
    - You are against parent education programs
    - You are against early childhood education programs
    - You are against Teachers / Social Workers grading Parents
    - etc

    With people like you out there, it is no wonder millions of kids live in questionable to bad homes and enter the school systems screwed up.

    2. I agree and yet I accept the fact that they need our help. Expecting them to be Parents, Social Worker and Educator is too much. Our society has to find a way to get school ready children with responsible Parents to them.

    3. See answers to number 1.

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  21. Wrong.
    1. I am adamant that government has SHOWN NO ABILITY to fix it.
    -- free birth control only works if people choose it. Gov't can make it free but should not mandate it, which is what you want.
    -- I am against /valueless/ sex education in the schools. The best "choices" are made when there is a value judgment to support it. You wouldn't teach a kid to use a 30-clip semi-auto rifle without talking about the value of human life, would you?
    -- I am all for parent education programs when offered as a means to "help," taught by people who really care, and with the resources to follow up as needed. I really doubt that is what you have in mind, because it probably involves private charity rather than some government entity that you can throw other people's money at and say you have done good. Sorry, but that is what I see as the liberal position.
    -- I am against early childhood education programs that do not work. I strongly favor those that do, and that parents may choose. Better yet, having parents who can do this at home, at least to supplement.
    -- I am against Teachers and Social Workers "grading parents" because that is simply doling out punishment, or setting the criteria for it. Teachers, especially, shouldn't even be involved in that unless the shoe is on the other foot, parents grading teachers. Social workers should be "evaluating" parents to see how they can be helped to access economic, cultural and educational opportunities. Heck, government and society already "grades" these people by calling them "irresponsible," Baby Daddys, etc. It doesn't help one whit.

    With "people like me" who do not have ANY kids in bad homes, and who will exit school not only not screwed up but with their heads screwed on straight, I think you will have to blame someone else, either the parents who screwed up their own lives, or the culture/government that failed to coax them in the right direction. Perhaps it would be best to blame the people who WANT the government to "do something" and then consider the job done, while the government totally screws it up.

    2. I agree. Expecting teachers to grade Parents is beyond their job description and expertise. Expecting teachers to be social workers is also extraneous and, for the most part, simply giving teachers an excuse for their own failures. Expecting teachers who cannot teach first graders to read to teach 4-year-olds their letters isn't realistic. Educators should educate, to the best of their ability, every child, to the best of THEIR ability. It rarely happens in our inner city public schools.

    3. I reiterate: where is government's magic wand? Leaning against the magical money tree?

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  22. As I said, you are the obstacle guy...
    - tie governments hands behind their back and then blame government...

    No wonder we can not get this fixed...

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  23. When has any obstacle ever been placed in front of "government compassion"? K-12 is fully and increasingly funded, charter schools limited, ECE gets lots of money and nobody in education is the least accountable for the miserable results, welfare is unimpeded, government "forcing morality" is a big no-no, etc.

    Instead of vagaries, tell me exactly what it is that government CAN do, and do well, that fixes this problem? Because over the last 40 years, I haven't seen it. OTOH, a few private initiatives seem to be doing pretty well. Maybe "we" should try /that/.

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  24. The obstacles I noted above... The ones you support...

    And I am pretty sure the folks in the education business would disagree with you regarding "fully fund". Especially given the special ed mandates they are required to meet.

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  25. What obstacles? The things I support are not obstacles to educators educating, not in the least. You err in suggesting they are. Now, if you wish to suggest ways in which the obstacles you see as obstacles can be removed and public education improved, spell them out rather than just imagining some vaguely-defined miracle that we have awaited for the last 40 years.

    And I have no problem giving the education establishment even more money, beyond the 2:1 premium they demand now for producing half the results, IF they would tell us EXACTLY how many dollars were needed to improve academic results by x% and THEN be accountable for actually delivering that improvement. That is essentially what the original NCLB did, before it was gutted by the education lobby and their pocket politicians. Improve, or we give the money to the parents and let them find something better. Why shouldn't schools offer "satisfaction guaranteed or your money back"?

    Your point here is that demography is destiny for these crippled kids, and while I agree on the one hand, I don't see anything "we" are currently doing that will change that sad situation. What I DO see is that many of these kids are not crippled beyond repair and that a proper education, while not making them completely equal, could do FAR more towards making them productive citizens. If "we" want to do something, let's do THAT. It's easier.

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  26. You keep ignoring our need to address the root cause of the problem...

    Irresponsible mamas / papas...
    How to do we educate / force them to perform?
    How do we help them to not make unplanned babies?

    Trying to fix the baby after five years is really hard...

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  27. I've been thinking about that. Let's say little Rashawn, here, who is eleven years old, isn't learning as he could be. He's way behind and a little disruptive of the class at times. Do we:
    1) Arrest his mama and throw her in jail?
    2) Find his daddy (assuming) and send him to a work/reeducation camp?
    3) Order forced sterilization for his 17-year old sister or,
    4) Just for mama?

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  28. If the Mama / Papa are not taking Rashawn's issues seriously:
    - showing up at Parent / Teacher conferences
    - ensuring homework is done
    - ensuring he is at school
    - etc

    Yes there should be consequences and support for the Parents. You seem to believe in the modern model...

    Google Search Education Then and Now

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  29. Words mean things. I'm all in favor of "support." I don't believe "consequences" benefit anybody, unless they are natural consequences of one's INFORMED choices, and that does not apply here because the consequences fall on the innocent third party-- the kid. Of course, "support" would start with a school system willing to discipline, enforce rules of conduct, offer a challenging curriculum tailored for the level of students in the class with additional assistance tailored for the student(s) still not keeping up, and to keep "good teachers" in the system.

    There used to be teachers who cared enough to go visit the home, and truant officers who might do the same. Now it is "too dangerous," apparently, and an "easy" way of solving the problem one-on-one, which worked well, has been replaced by a huge, indifferent government model that does not.

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  30. Yes, I realize that you have NO DESIRE to help young children who have ineffectual incapable irresponsible and/or generally piss poor mommas and papas...

    And that you are willing to let the children bear the negative natural consequences of having these individuals not held accountable.

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  31. I am all in favor of helping these disadvantaged kids AND their "poor" parents. I just want to do something that WORKS, and the government interventions you (I presume) propose are not even close to that essential standard.

    And I am very worried about the negative natural consequences the children bear while you are "holding their parents accountable." What form does that take, exactly? Jail? Work Camps or "re-education camps"? Who looks after the kids while you punish Mama?

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