Giftedness, talent, and genius can be evident even at age 4 year. Listen to Mozart's compositions K.1a through K.1d that he did at age 5 (which some scholars say were at age 4):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nannerl_Notenbuch#Wolfgang_Moz...

I don't know how New York City's test works and if it really measures anything; maybe it's completely bogus. But it's a shame that you can't even talk about gifted education without it becoming a political liability.

I was one of those kids, school was boring and slow, finished the school library within year, got into arguments with teachers. Was not allowed to skip years, it was a drag, I skipped school and did other stuff. They did tried to forbid me to do high school exams because my school grades were low (missed a lot of tests and would drag down their stats). Did the exam anyways and had the second highest score of the country.

Not every kid is the same, there needs to be a place for kids that are (far) ahead.

Sorry, I guess we're supposed to be crabs in a bucket.

Putting 4 year olds on an advanced track seems pretty ridiculous. So does throwing our hands up and saying “no one ever gets to be in advanced class except by random luck”. But both may be a pretty honest reflection of how life would be for a middle class family in NYC.

> growing opposition to the high-stakes exam the city has used to evaluate 4-year-olds.

I thought this story was about the gifted program in general which I feel very different about. 4 year olds should not be taking standardized tests. They shouldn't be on different tracks. That is insanity. I actually fully support this in this limited case.

I am pretty sure I did standardized tests at 4 or 5 years old. It was one-on-one with an educator and was basic things like how many ways can you classify these random blocks (shape, size, colour), or how to arrange image tiles to tell a chronological story. We didn’t do reading or pencil-in-the-bubble until grade 3.

No disrespect but first 5 years of a child’s life is critical to their development- it can be very noticeable how enriched a child’s environment has been -

That's not untrue but it also doesn't even begin to justify standardized testing for 4 years olds.

How much of that is demonstrated to come from advanced track education? To what degree has it been shown that there are differences in outcome from advanced track education at this specific age? None of these correlations are givens.

How are the previous generations not a bunch of bumbling idiots with their horrifying lack of 4 year old advanced track education? What does a advanced track even look like for a 4 year old? Advanced toilet training? Advanced snack time? Advanced color identification? Advanced not taking the other kid's toy? Advanced not throwing a tantrum?

What a load.

Do you have children? It seems possible you don’t

It’s pretty simple for a teacher to sit with a four year old and do a basic eval. This is not fill in a bubble standardized testing.

Your type of attitude also explains I think why needed tailoring doesn’t happen earlier. These same screenings can identify kids who could use extra support, need glasses, need a hearing aid and much more. It’s fascinating to see these so resisted.

Well off kids get tons of this eval naturally from neurotic parents, pediatrician visits and more.

Your challenges for a 4-year-old seem more like those for a 2-year-old. So, I'm going to assume you have had little exposure to children. That, or the children where you live develop very slowly.

using lotteries instead of merit is a one futile attempt to keep the cream of the poor, poor.

But it doesn’t really matter. School is mostly glorified daycare anyway.

top rare percentage are top and rare by definition, and will get found by people looking to pay and partner with them.

Equal outcomes is bull. No matter the age.

Yeah, just teach kids that effort and skills are meaningless and it's all luck. That will result in a really pleasant and productive generation of people.

I thought public schools were broken when I was in High School but I think the latest changes might actually do more harm than good to your child.

Isn’t it luck anyway? I mean, whether or not you’re born gifted. I get that it’s important to teach kids the value of hard work but these kids are getting into the gifted schools at age 4! I wouldn’t expect any 4 year old to demonstrate much in the way of study habits.

But from a societal perspective, I'd say it's in everyone's interest to make sure the people with the most natural ability can stretch that ability as far as possible.

(This is, of course, assuming it's actually possible to determine the future potential of one 4-year-old over another, and I'm skeptical of that!)

There might be a perverse incentive to treat some people like they are special in the hope that their self-perception actually leads to special potential.

Do you know any 4-year-olds?