Aptitude Myth

The Aptitude Myth addresses the decline in American children's mastery of critical school subjects. It contends that a contributing cause for this decline derives from many Americans' ways of thinking about children's learning: they believe that school performance is determined by innate aptitude. The Aptitude Myth traces the deep historical origins, the spread and elaboration, and the eventual triumph of the belief in the determining power of mental abilities "given" at birth and therefore fixed. Covered is 600 B.C.E. until 1926 (when the Scholastic Aptitude Test was administered.) The…