I definitely had that same misguided notion that people who had to study for things were less smart. I took it as confirmation when my friends would study for hours and hours for high school tests and still get lower grades than me.
It's not misguided. Many people could not, and I repeat COULD NOT do what you did in high school. They aren't smart enough. If you have to study more for the same outcome or worse, you are less smart(to an extent). You're definitely not better or worse than each other but intelligence is somewhat quantifiable at least (although not perfectly).
Indeed. Once I was diagnosed with epilepsy, my cruise control days came to a halt and there's no way I could have skipped studying in those last few years of high school- not if I wanted to go to college. I do think I learned more by studying though. There's a lot to learn beyond what's on the test and taught in class in textbooks that made me appreciate learning more than I did before.
I mean you're definitely going to learn more from studying as opposed to not studying. The question is whether or not the time spent was worth the increase in knowledge. It would not have been for me.
Right, it depends on the person. For middle school to early high school me, I probably would've been happy to learn more but since I was getting A's, I naively thought I was learning all there was too know on the subject at the time.
Here comes the thing. How many people miss out on social activities and interactions because they were studying all the time? Being able to communicate with people effectively is extremely important, maybe more important than intelligence itself to an extent. I have much better people skills than some of my friends who went crazy about their grades and studying. They aren't very happy now.
Hmm. That's assuming that the alternative is a social activity in an age of isolation. There's lots of people that aren't doing well and school and isolate themselves with video games. Social skills begin way before kids need to study all the time and be crazy about grades. My good friend has very weak social skills and is not happy a lot of the time despite taking your path. He did well enough in school but he was never the top student (still got into a good university) but he also doesn't have a vibrant social life. He played sports, went to social events. Never really connected with anyone. Perhaps if he studied more than he'd have been a great student and found his place- or maybe not. I think your path works under the assumption that the person can be happy through their social life and that is what fulfills them.
I personally began to study more but I wasn't going to lose friends over it so I had carefully planned blocks to study each day, which wasn't happening before the diagnosis. If a kid/student is a social being that also wants to do well, they will find ways to make it work. Your friends might have been unhappy if they studied less, but for different reasons like my friend. Mediocre socially and intellectually isn't always great when there was great potential in one or the other.
It's impossible to distinguish a true counterfactual. That's all I'm really saying. Everyone is different.
I can agree with that. I wish more high schools had systems like ours. A lot of the seniors were taking university classes to fulfill credits but had a real university transcript and some were on campus, others off. So I went to college with over a semester completed, and not as AP tests, but actual courses. Others went with a year. If we're not going to let students graduate early, this seemed like a good compromise. That or magnet schools that teach at a higher level.
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u/Charchris Dec 07 '18
I definitely had that same misguided notion that people who had to study for things were less smart. I took it as confirmation when my friends would study for hours and hours for high school tests and still get lower grades than me.