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From: gwyn@smoke.BRL.MIL (Doug Gwyn )
Newsgroups: comp.edu,sci.math,sci.physics
Subject: Re: Student and Course Integrity
Keywords: pace
Message-ID: <9173@smoke.BRL.MIL>
Date: 14 Dec 88 07:55:59 GMT
References: <4550@homxc.UUCP> <4847@phoenix.Princeton.EDU> <2082@imagine.PAWL.RPI.EDU>
Reply-To: gwyn@brl.arpa (Doug Gwyn (VLD/VMB) <gwyn>)
Organization: Ballistic Research Lab (BRL), APG, MD.
Lines: 13

In article <2082@imagine.PAWL.RPI.EDU> mccombt@turing.cs.rpi.edu (Todd McComb) writes:
-So, I am basically saying that many students who are capable of
-excelling are at least partially held back in order to keep the other
-students from falling too far behind.  I hate that as a philosophy,
-but I am not sure of an ideal solution.  In a bad mood, I just think
-"forget the people who don't understand, let's move on--it's dragging
-already."  But, that doesn't last; since, after all, no two people learn
-at exactly the same pace.

The solution for that is to challenge the assumption that all the
students have to be instructed as one large parallel batch.  There
are several techniques for allowing individuals to proceed at the
pace that best suits them.  If you haven't read Mindstorms (Papert)
yet, that would be a good starting place.