G is for Genes E-Book

Kathryn Asbury

• Herausgeber: John Wiley & Sons
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Serie: Understanding Children's Worlds
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 314

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2013

Beschreibung

G is for Genes shows how a dialogue between geneticists and educationalists can have beneficial results for the education of all children—and can also benefit schools, teachers, and society at large.

• Draws on behavioral genetic research from around the world, including the UK-based Twins’ Early Development Study (TEDS), one of the largest twin studies in the world
• Offers a unique viewpoint by bringing together genetics and education, disciplines with a historically difficult relationship
• Shows that genetic influence is not the same as genetic determinism and that the environment matters at least as much as genes
• Designed to spark a public debate about what naturally-occurring individual differences mean for education and equality

Leseprobe

Table of Contents

Series Page

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Acknowledgements

Part One: In Theory

Chapter 1: Genetics, Schools, and Learning

The Aims and Assumptions of Education

Diverse Opportunities to Draw Out Individual Potential

DNA in the Classroom

In Summary…

Chapter 2: How We Know What We Know

Twins: A Natural Experiment

DNA Sequencing

Chapter 3: The 3Rs: Reading, wRiting…

From DNA to ABC

Environmental Influences on Reading Ability

Struggling Readers

The Genetics of Writing Ability

Chapter 4: … and 'Rithmetic

So, Why are Some People Better at Math than Others?

How does Nurture Affect Mathematical Ability?

Chapter 5: Physical Education: Who, What, Why, Where, and How?

Genes, Sports, and Smoking

Obesity, Genes, and Environment

The Heritability of Fitness

Gym Class Heroes

In Summary…

Chapter 6: Science: A Different Way of Thinking?

Differences Between the Sexes

In Summary…

Chapter 7: How do IQ and Motivation Fit In?

IQ + Genetics = Controversy (and Name-calling)

Self-Confidence and Motivation

Improving Confidence and Cognition in the Classroom

Chapter 8: Special Educational Needs: Ideas and Inspiration

The Expansion of Special Educational Needs

Personalized Learning in Action

In Summary…

Chapter 9: “Clones” in the Classroom

Positivity and Achievement

Clones in the Classroom

Chapter 10: Mind the Gap: Social Status and School Quality

Low SES: What Does It Look Like?

What Does the Heritability of SES Mean?

School Quality

Chapter 11: Genetics and Learning: The Big Ideas

Big Idea #1: Achievement and Ability Vary, Partly for Genetic Reasons

Big Idea #2: The Abnormal is Normal

Big Idea #3: Continuity is Genetic and Change is Environmental

Big Idea #4: Genes are Generalists and Environments are Specialists

Big Idea #5: Environments are Influenced by Genes

Big Idea #6: The Environments that Matter Most are Unique to Individuals

Big Idea #7: Equality of Opportunity Requires Diversity of Opportunity

Part Two: In Practice

Chapter 12: Personalization in Practice

So, What Can Be Done to Make Teaching and Learning More Personalized?

A Good “Mindset” for Learning

Other Ways to Personalize Learning

In Summary…

Chapter 13: Eleven Policy Ideas

1. Minimize the Core Curriculum and Test Basic Skills

2. Increase Choice

3. Forget About Labels

4. Teach the Child, As Well As the Class

5. Teach Children How To Succeed

6. Promote Equal Opportunities from an Early Age as a Foundation for Social Mobility in the Future

7. Equalize Extracurricular Opportunities at School

8. Create a Two Stage PE Program

9. Change the Destination

10. Train New Teachers in Genetics and Give Them the Tools to Put it Into Practice

11. Big Is Beautiful

Chapter 14: Education Secretary for a Day

Index

Understanding Children's Worlds

Series Editor: Judy Dunn

The study of children's development can have a profound influence on how children are brought up, cared for and educated. Many psychologists argue that, even if our knowledge is incomplete, we have a responsibility to attempt to help those concerned with the care, education and study of children by making what we know available to them. The central aim of this series is to encourage developmental psychologists to set out the findings and~the implications of their research for others—teachers, doctors, social workers, students and fellow researchers—whose work involves the care, education and study of young children and their families. The information and the ideas that have grown from recent research form an important resource which should be available to them. This series provides an opportunity for psychologists to present their work in a way that is interesting, intelligible and substantial, and to discuss what its consequences may be for those who care for, and teach children: not to offer simple prescriptive advice to other professionals, but to make important and innovative research accessible to them.

Children Doing Mathematics

Terezinha Nunes and Peter Bryant

Children and Emotion

Paul L. Harris

Bullying at School

Dan Olweus

How Children Think and Learn, Second Edition

David Wood

Making Decisions about Children, Second Edition

H. Rudolph Schaffer

Children's Talk in Communities and Classrooms

Lynne Vernon-Feagans

Children and Political Violence

Ed Cairns

The Work of the Imagination

Paul Harris

Children in Changing Families

Jan Pryor and Bryan Rodgers

Young Children Learning

Barbara Tizard and Martin Hughes

Children's Friendships

Judy Dunn

How Children Develop Social Understanding

Jeremy Carpendale and Charlie Lewis

Children's Reading and Spelling: Beyond the First Steps

Terezinha Nunes and Peter Bryant

Children and Play

Peter K. Smith

Peer Groups and Children's Development

Christine Howe

Children and Social Exclusion: Morality, Prejudice, and Group Identity

Melanie Killen and Adam Rutland

G is for Genes: The Impact of Genetics on Education and Achievement

Kathryn Asbury and Robert Plomin

Not Yet Published:

Children and Lying

Kang Lee and Victoria Talwar

Children's Memory

Gabrielle Principe, Stephen Ceci, and Maggie Bruck

This edition first published 2014

© 2014 John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Asbury, Kathryn.

G is for genes : the impact of genetics on education and achievement / Kathryn Asbury and Robert Plomin.

pages cm.—(Understanding children's worlds ; 13)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 978-1-118-48278-0 (hardback)—ISBN 978-1-118-48281-0 (paperback) 1. Learning ability–Genetic aspects. 2. Academic achievement. 3. Behavior genetics. I. Plomin, Robert, 1948– II. Title.

LB1134.A83 2013

370.15′23–dc23

2013017491

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

Cover image: © nathan Knowles / Getty Images

Cover design by www.cyandesign.co.uk

Acknowledgements

This book began as an idea several years ago, and its writing has been informed and inspired by discussions with generous colleagues at London's Institute of Psychiatry ever since, for which we thank them. Our field, behavioral genetics, is developing at considerable speed and we look forward to continuing and extending those discussions in tandem with new developments in both genetics and education.

The writing of G is for Genes was made possible by funding from the British Academy in the form of a Postdoctoral Fellowship awarded to KA, and our research into the school environment is funded by the US National Institutes of Health. We thank both bodies for believing in the importance of this endeavor.

We thank Peter Tallack of The Science Factory, and Professor Judy Dunn for their invaluable support and encouragement as we prepared to submit our draft manuscript for publication. Both contributed ideas which have made G is for Genes a better book, and both were a pleasure to work with. Thanks also to Nick Asbury for coming up with our title.

A particularly special thank you is owed to Jonah Asbury who helped in ways too numerous to mention but, in particular, we thank him for his generously given editorial advice which was always “on the money.” Finally, we thank the thousands of families who make up the Twins' Early Development Study (TEDS). We have dedicated our book to these families because, although we have become accustomed to their generosity, it really is astonishing that they find time in their busy lives to contribute to science and society on such a regular basis. They make our research possible and we are eternally grateful.

Part One

In Theory

Chapter 1

Genetics, Schools, and Learning

The science of genetics is changing our world at an ever-increasing pace. We can now analyze and modify DNA to test for serious illnesses and treat them before they become life-threatening, to catch criminals and exonerate the innocent, and to create energy sources that will protect our planet. Geneticists have cast their nets far and wide to influence and inform medicine and public health, agriculture, energy and the environment, law, and social policy. Education, however, is glaringly absent from this list, and schools remain untouched by the lessons of genetics. This, we believe, needs to change.

One way of helping each and every child to fulfill their academic potential is to harness the lessons of genetic research. We now know a great deal—though not by any means everything—about the ways that genes influence learning, and about how children's DNA interacts with their experiences at home and school. It's time for educationalists and policy makers to sit down with geneticists to apply these findings to educational practice. It will make for better schools, thriving children, and, in the long run, a more fulfilled and effective population. That's what we want schools and education to achieve, isn't it?