Why Do We Continue to Have Same-Aged Classrooms?

It’s primarily because we’re used to it. That doesn’t make it good, though.

For gifted children, being grouped day in and day out with your same-aged peers — your age-mates — can leave you in the position of rarely fitting in, having trouble staying awake and cooperative during many of the day’s lessons, and wondering why anyone thinks school is good for helping you learn. It just gets in the way! Or as one of my own children said, “It just takes so much of my time!” He was in kindergarten when he said that.

It’s especially not good for most highly to profoundly gifted youngsters.

“The only reason schools and education policy are designed around age-banded grade levels is historical legacy. In the mid-1800s, before we knew much about human development, learning, and the brain, European thinkers committed to developing an efficiency-based “science” of education.

Among other things, they assumed separating children by age would be the most efficient way in which to transmit “age-appropriate” bodies of knowledge. The system they built has perpetuated itself despite growing evidence that age alone tells us very little about what any given child can do or the support they need to develop more fully.”[1]