Assumptions and ideology. How psychology took a wrong turn. Scott Meier describes it in a few sentences: 
James Mill on intelligence, a small quote that says it all goo.gl/qrEib6
An 18th century skill: critical thinking. The Enlightenment: instead of following the dogma’s of the church and the state, put your trust in human reason. Reason juxtaposed to dogmatic following of church and state dogma. Makes sense, doesn't it? [see: Lenders 1988 p. 132]
The concept of critical thinking of the late 20th and early 21st centuries might be a descendant of the concept of human reason of the Enlightenment, its semantics having changed drastically in the meantime. Unless educational content is supposed to be dogmatic nowadays? Israel?
“Enlightenment philosophy tends to stand in tension with established religion, insofar as ... daring to think for oneself, awakening one’s intellectual powers, generally requires opposing the role of established religion in directing thought and action.” plato.stanford.edu/entries/enligh…
[Quote in Dutch] Dutch ed researcher Philip Kohnstamm recognized, before WO II, the belief in innate intelligence [IQ] to be a ‘primitive and long overdue nativism’, placing intelligence outside the educational and didactical realm.
“De standaardisering van een basispakket vaardigheden dat voor iedere burger moest gelden, heeft tot de schepping van het 'echte' lager onderwijs geleid, waaruit gaandeweg elk spoor van meer bijzondere praktijk- of beroepsopleiding is verjaagd, en wel naar een later stadium.”
De quote is uit p. 29: Willem Frijhoff (1983) ‘Van onderwijs naar opvoedend onderwijs. Ontwikkelingslijnen van opvoeding en onderwijs in Noord-Nederland in de achttiende eeuw.’ In: Werkgroep achttiende eeuw ‘Onderwijs en opvoeding in de achttiende eeuw’ (3-40). isbn 9030214015
This. Seems to me to be a crucial factor in school effectiveness, and therefore also in fair schooling. Keep away from individualized coaching!
“Dr. Bloom contends that much of individual differences in school learning may be regarded as man-made and accidental rather than fixed in the individual at the time of conception” Benjamin Bloom 1976 Human characteristics and school learning. McGraw Hill. benwilbrink.nl/projecten/fair…
There is no such thing as deliberate practice in generic problem solving. Or generic understanding of text. Generic creativity. Subjecting children to these fictions is kind of criminal, robbing their time and fair chances of an education. …derwijs2032sciencecheck.wordpress.com/2016/07/24/wha…
‘Criminal’: “Overigens, ik vind het persoonlijk bijna misdadig als je kinderen kennis onthoudt.” Henriëtte Maassen van den Brink, voorzitter Onderwijsraad. In Monique Marreveld (28-11-2016). ‘De toekomst van het leren’. Didactief didactiefonline.nl/blog/redactie/…
It goes against the grain of psychological codes of conduct to routinely use aptitude tests that are not curriculum aligned (that’s typically the problem with aptitude tests). Among those codes of conduct: the Standards apa.org/science/progra… not open acces, I am sorry to say.
However, there is 30 Mb scan of the 1999 Standards chapters on reiliablity and validity ben-wilbrink.nl/standards_1999… Testing pupils on anything else than explicit curricular content is a threat to fair schooling; e.g. see A. D. De Groot 1970 benwilbrink.nl/publicaties/70… [in English]
The nature-nurture debate (intelligence, talent) is an oldie
In the early nineteenth century, in Russia:
At the end of the twentieth century, in America
Big influencers: industrialization and the world wars
For the understanding of fair (primary, secondary) schooling it'll prove profitable to study elite education's history, e.g. Marcia G. Synnott 1982 'The Half-Opened Door: Researching Admissions Discrimination at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton' americanarchivist.org/doi/pdf/10.177… open access
Asymmetric warfare in class society France. The way a country’s elite manages to keep its position in society must of necessity be also the mechanism or one of the mechanisms to perpetuate inequalities in its society, isn’t it? press.princeton.edu/titles/2004.ht…
Suleiman p. 57.1968: “The grandes écoles were attacked for draining the universities of the most capable students, for being elitist and undemocratic, and for serving the bourgeois class that supported them.”
Abram de Swaan 1988: (Hfdst 3) Het lager onderwijs als code voor nationale communicatie dbnl.org/tekst/swaa005z…
[English edition: In care of the state, Health care, education and welfare in Europe and the USA in the Modern Era. Reviewed: cambridge.org/core/services/… ]
[English edition: In care of the state, Health care, education and welfare in Europe and the USA in the Modern Era. Reviewed: cambridge.org/core/services/… ]
Industrial revolution and child labor. “.. the coming of the industry cannot be shown to have brought economic oppression and exploitation [of children, b.w.] along with it. It was there already.”
"Rawls compares the difference principle to the maximin principle for individual choice uncertainty. For in any choice among alternative practices the difference principle selects the one best for the worst off 'representative man'." That's the way to choose instruction methods.
A top influencer of our thinking on nature and nurture of human capabilities is the author of (if ever there was a book title framing its subject in a particular direction, it is this one) 'Hereditary Genius': Francis Galton, Darwin’s cousin. 2nd half of the 19th century.
“ . . . in psychometrics the concept is inferred from the measuring instrument, rather than having the measurement technique dictated by the concept.” Earl Hunt 1995 The role of intelligence in modern society. American Scientist, 83, 356-368. psych.utoronto.ca/users/reingold…
Some definitive statements on mathematical thinking, 21st c. skills like problem-solving, and, in the same vein, intelligence. 'Definitive': its author is John Carroll. Wow, three controversial subjects cleared up in one masterly stroke.
Robert Sternberg’s rendering of the theme of my ‘fair schooling'
A characteristic that in itself already explains a lot of the difficulties of lower class children to get a fair education (competitive middle class parents—collateral damage: frustrating fair schooling for lower class children):
Zoveel is zeker, waar de een geboren wordt voor het gymnasium, en de ander voor het beroepsonderwijs, in een land met zulk oneerlijk onderwijs zou je misschien niet geboren willen worden. Met een knipoog naar de theorie van John Rawls over wat eerlijk of rechtvaardig is.
Een van de sleutels voor eerlijk onderwijs is dat het mogelijk moet zijn op zo'n manier onderwijs te geven dat verschillen in intelligentie vrijwel geen rol spelen. Zie dan eens wat Dirkzwager concludeert uit zijn promotieonderzoek, 1966. Stof tot discussie.
J. McV Hunt (1972). Heredity, Environment, and Class or Ethnic Diferences. files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED079… [published in ETS Invitational Conference 1973] My annotations:
In a strange way, though not quite unexpected, this book by Caplan elaborates on the above theme: Bryan Caplan 2018 ‘The Case against Education: Why the Education System Is a Waste of Time and Money’ press.princeton.edu/titles/11225.h… Education as a race to the bottom—positional competition
You may never have seen such a spectacular listing of articles in one journal issue before, edited by Stephen J. Ceci, some time ago but the issues are still with us: ‘IQ in Society’ in ‘Psychology, Public Policy, and the Law’ psycnet.apa.org/PsycARTICLES/j… [no access? try sci-hub]
