Individual Differences, in Children

The melting pot metaphor has long been cherished in American life and lore. Generations of immigrants [Page 505]arrived in the United States with dreams of a new life in the land of opportunity. The new immigrants were expected to “fit in” and lose their ethnic backgrounds and languages. At the same time, the western frontier beckoned newcomers willing to strike out on their own, relying on their own skills, strengths, and knowledge to overcome obstacles. This other face of American identity valued rugged individualism with its ethic of independence, determination, and selfexpression. It focused on individual differences and the unique characteristics of individuals, their abilities and contributions.

When educators used the melting pot metaphor, schooling was aimed toward everyone learning the same curriculum. Those students who failed, dropped out and went to work on farms or in factories. But when educators used the metaphor of individualism, they differentiated instruction, and that called for a method to identify potentially successful students. Alfred Binet's intelligence tests, developed at the beginning of the twentieth century and later refined in the United States, established standards of verbal and numerical reasoning skills to determine a mental age. He then correlated these data with chronological age in formulating a set of norms for average intelligence. Students with a low intelligence quotient (IQ), a score based on chronological age and mental age determined by the test, were considered unlikely to complete their academic work successfully. The expectations were that low IQ students could not learn academic curricula and that they should be trained to work rather than continuing in school.

Intelligence tests gave educators information about the differences in academic ability that they could use for school placements, but they did not explain why these differences existed. Later, Piaget's work emerged with theories about cognitive development to explain the differences in children's intellectual performances at different ages. He interviewed children, giving particular attention to their explanation for their decisions. From these conversations he identified several levels of cognitive development.

The first stage, sensory-motor, focused on the child's growing awareness of the surrounding environment. Following was a period of preoperational thought characterized by the acquisition of language and increased interest in social behaviors that led toward the next phase by age 6 to 7. At the next stage of concrete operations, Piaget found that children learned to reverse operations, follow transformations, and build schemata for development of concepts. By adolescence, children acquired the cognitive structures for formal operations and logical thinking that led them into adulthood. These stages have strongly influenced the sequencing of instruction with children.

Other researchers turned to alternate criteria for assessing intelligence. Some suggested that the speed at which people processed information was an indicator of their intelligence, while others focused on the strategies they used in problem solving. More recently, researchers relied on brain research and technology, such as EEG, MRI, or CAT scans to track specific mental functions under certain conditions. Over time such research suggested patterns of development within age groups and broadened the understanding of normative intellectual benchmarks. Variance from these norms identified individuals who learned in different ways, and some found that students were more successful when instructional strategies were modified for their individual needs.

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