The Smartest Kids in the World - a Book to Read by Amanda Ripley

The smartest kids in the world and how they got that way Amanda Ripley

“In the early twenty-first century, the debates about education in the United States had become, in my opinion, so nasty, provincial, and redundant that they no longer led anywhere worth going.” Page 201

Author and journalist Amanda Ripley followed students in the United States and in other countries in an attempt to discover the differences in schools for students.  Her travels with students to Finland, Korea and Poland uncovered similarities and differences.  The book is a series of stories of her and her students’ experiences.  One, Eric, is from Minnetonka and transferred to a high school in Korea.

Ripley’s conclusions follow numerous research studies and in some cases, common sense.  Regardless of country, rigor is her conclusion.  The next important characteristic is the importance the children feel about their own education.  Is education important to the child and the family?  Interesting and inspiring teachers are important.  Homework, resiliency and perseverance generate the personal traits that result in higher levels of learning.

Ripley’s book is worth the time and effort.  Too many current education reforms are focused on gimmicks and shining boxes.  The content of subjects doesn’t change much.  How teachers and students deal with the content are the important factors.  Can the formulas be applied?  Does the bunch of facts lead to “new” learnings?  Do the students use the information to display understanding?

“We were not looking for answers to equations or to multiple choice questions,” he [Andreas Scheicher, creator of Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) said.  “We were looking for the ability to think creatively.”  Page 15

“In essence, PISA revealed what should have been obvious but was not: that spending on education did not make kids smarter.  Everything – everything –depended on what teachers, parents, and students did with those investments. .. Excellence depended on execution, the hardest thing to get right.” Page 18

The smartest kids in the world are sitting in our classrooms today.  What are we doing to support them?  More testing is not the answer.  Continuing reduction of standards in academics and behavior is not the answer.  More excuses to blame teachers is not the answer.  Gimmicks and fancy slogans do not match strategies that support thinking, creativity, exploration and discovery.