The largest problem with the SAT may be its only goal - to assess pure intellect. How well it achieves this can also be argued, but more importantly, a sharp intellect is not the only part of the whole mental capacity. As Gladwell mentioned, creativity plays a part, and in my opinion so does communication. In a society as dependent on interactions as ours, the ability to effectively transmit ideas and theories is just as crucial as having a solid theory in the first place.
If these three 'categories' are used as the basis for mental capacity, what methods are most useful for aptitude tests? I feel like there is no easy way to test for all three in one shot, and instead there need to be various ways of determining the entirety of a student's capacity.
So this hits home for me in an interesting way. A couple of months ago our youngest son was nominated for the Explorers program by his teacher. Explorers is WW's support program for gifted and talented kids. As part of the nomination, he had to take a series of tests: the MAP tests for Reading and Math, which I think were the tests that essentially provided the original evidence for his teacher's nomination, and the CogAT tests. The CogAT tests were administered for verbal, quantitative, and non-verbal aptitude. This was not a test I am especially familiar with, but since the time we've received his scores back I have become more and more curious - particularly in light of Eric's question: what methods are most useful for aptitude tests? I'm not sure how a question about how a piece of paper that is folded into quarters with holes punched in to it tells us about one's ability to read, write, or do arithmetic, but it does, for those who correctly answer it, demonstrate that their brains work in ways that many folks brains don't. When our son first started doing puzzles, he did them like everyone else: corners, edges, like colors, etc. He quickly became bored and then spent an entire year of preschool doing 500# puzzles in the corner, cardboard side up. Shortly thereafter he started doing puzzles from four pieces that he quickly fit together outward. I don't know about you, but his brain doesn't work like mine. While I have extreme visual preferences, Kelson's brain works in the realm that at our house is referred to as "spatially spooky". And I mean spooky in only the best of connotations. He is also the child that is willing to try new things, I think in large part because he does not lock in to traditional ways of doing. How is that measured and how do we harness it to enhance one's ability to learn?
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