Going parental: Testing at age 4 to determine your kid’s future?

Apparently, early childhood testing is becoming more and more common. This article ^[1] in New York Magazine ^[2] is a must read for anyone with children. Whether you plan on enrolling your kids in private school or not, it’s an incredibly insightful and interesting look inside the world of testing children at a young age and the implications of allowing those tests to further determine the future of these kids.

I’m not sure where I stand on this, but I will say that this article made me look at myself as a parent and even re-consider some of the decisions I had made regarding my daughter’s academic future. Because yes, I’ve made some predictions in my head and I’ve dreamt of sending her to private school — but only if it was a Montessori ^[3]-based learning center. I went to Montessori and am a huge proponent of its methods.

Does that make me as bad as some these crazy New York City parents that are grooming their 4-year-olds for early admission to Yale ^[4]? I don’t know. Maybe it does.

All I know is that when I was 8 years old and in third grade at Rockland Learning Center’s Montessori school, I learned sign language… because this little deaf bastard in my class was always taking my fruit roll up. Talk about hands-on learning. Sink or swim, kids!

Going Parental appears every Thursday. Asshole parents who think their kid is better and smarter than yours are all around you… I know, because I’m one of them.