so i guess the dumbing down of america is in full swing.

[barbtries]

walking through the lobby just now i read on the CNN ticker that 2011 SAT scores for reading were the lowest ever.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/21/opinion/bennett-education/index.html?iref=allsearch

[Liberal_in_LA]

1. maybe the test got harder

[Ineeda]

2. Right,

Uh, huh.

[Bandit]

8. Certainly the tests are harder if you don't know the answers.

And I would guess more don't know the answers now than a few decades ago, so we would have to say yes the tests are harder.

[geardaddy]

3. I'm not surprised Bill Bigot, I mean Bennett

is the author. And why does he have a picture of African-American elementary school students in the article?

[barbtries]

6. i didn't see the article

only the feed while passing by. then i ganked the link because i felt bad about not having one. sorry should have looked before i leapt.

[49jim]

4. SAT Scores

The test has gotten more difficult and more minority students have been encouraged to take it.

[Bandit]

9. Bigoted are we?

:shrug:

[TwilightGardener]

5. I know I sound like a crazy old crank, but kids today only read Facebook

and texts. If it wasn't for Harry Potter and Twilight, they'd be illiterate. I have teenagers (one of whom is a senior and got a decent ACT score, thankfully), I see what they do all day. It ain't reading.

[poverlay]

10. My kids were raised on video games, computers, Facebook and the like. My 16 year old

Daughter always loved reading and of course we encouraged it. She got a 2156 on her junior S.A.T.'s and is going to graduate with a 4.0+, all A.P. Classes and more college offers than you can imagine. My 15y.o. Son hates reading and can count on two hands the number of complete books he has read. Classic video game obsession. No amount of pressure has ever been successful in inducing a willingness to read. Regardless of this he is still very curious and intelligent, maintaining a solid B average, and constant improvement. My point is that, while my daughter is very organized and driven and my son is certainly not, they are both fully immersed in our tech culture and and nothing their very interested, concerned, and caring parents have done has had any effect other than to encourage and support their natural abilities and inclinations.. I've had a rude awakening on nature vs. nurture & I now know that if a kid wants to learn, nothing parents, video games, or society can do is going to have a major effect.

[TwilightGardener]

11. My kids are also obsessed with video games. That's their main hobby.

When I was a kid, people were worried that my generation read less because of TV and Atari (showing my age, LOL)--but that was all we had. We saw our friends at school and on Friday nights, we had to use the family's phone to gab (which limited calls), and there just wasn't much else to distract us. I read books constantly for entertainment, and still do. For this generation, there are just so many ways to fill up their time, I think actual book-reading is considered quaint. My kids manage pretty well in school, but I am saddened by their attitude toward reading something longer than a paragraph. It doesn't seem likely that one can build and maintain college-level reading comprehension and writing skills by doing the bare minimum in English class, and reading virtually nothing else that isn't written by a friend or isn't about a celebrity.

[benld74]

7. Idiocracy begining in 3,2,1

[SheilaT]

12. Back in the day, meaning

up to about 1965 or so, the only high school kids who took the SATs (or the ACT test) were those who were definitely going to go on to college, and back then a noticeably smaller percentage of high school graduates went on to college.

In the meantime, it's become and accepted truth the EVERYONE has to have a four-year college education, and so more and more students take the tests and go to college whether it's a good idea for them or not.

And over that same time a lot (but by no means all)high schools have dumbed down the curriculum. Add in No Child Left Behind where a lot more time is spent taking tests and practicing to take tests and you lose a lot of actual classroom content.

It all adds up.

Meanwhile, the top tier schools are not exactly hurting for smart, well-qualified kids who want to attend, and all of them turn down thousands of kids who really would succeed there.