Why Can't We Let All Kids Do Cool Stuff?

Image Credit: DrBacchus

This post is not about a tech tool or website. It's just an editorial from me. Feel free to skip it if you're not interested in my philosophy on education.

Over the weekend I saw a Twitpic from someone showing off a group of  "gifted" elementary school students doing some dissections. This follows a pattern that I see a lot, the students identified as gifted participate in the cool hands-on activities while the other students are prepped for the next standardized test. When I see this pattern I can't help but ask myself, "why do only the gifted students get to participate in the cool stuff?"

In my experience it is the students labeled as gifted that are already engaged in school. It's the struggling students who need the "cool," hands-on experiences to get them excited about school. And by the time they get to high school the students who need the "cool," hands-on projects the most are the students who are on the brink of quitting school. So why can't we let all students participate in the cool experiences? Is it because we're spending time making sure all students are ready for a standardized test and don't have time to do the cool stuff and the test prep stuff? That's my hunch, what's your answer? Please leave a comment.