Such a great piece on the uselessness and danger of IQ tests by Carl Wieman of Stanford Graduate School of Education: The bulk of the research is now showing that, excepting the lower tail of the distribution consisting of students with pathologies, the predictive value of any such early tests of intellectual capability [IQ tests] is very limited. From an educational policy point of view, the most important research result is that any predictive value is small compared to the later effects of the amount and quality of deliberate practice undertaken by the learner. That predictive value is also small compared to the effects of the learners’ and teachers’ beliefs about learning and the learners’ intellectual capabilities. Although early measurements of talent, or IQ, independent of other factors have at best small correlation with later accomplishment, simply labeling someone as talented or not has a much larger correlation. It should be noted that in many schools students who are classified as deficient by tests with very weak predictive value are put into classrooms that provide much less deliberate practice than the norm, whereas the opposite is true for students who are classified as gifted. The subsequent difference in learning outcomes for the two groups provides an apparent validation for what is merely a self-fulfilling prophecy. Given these findings, human capital is clearly maximized by assuming that, except for students with obvious pathologies, every student is capable of great achievement in STEM and should be provided with the educational experiences that will maximize their learning.
Posted on: Tue, 28 Oct 2014 06:27:33 +0000
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