Education for Excellence (Part I)

★★★★★ · Nice children, typical of the time · BinuBird · 2006-02-10

I'm appalled at the criticisms directed both at the children and at the system. Sure, the system is typical of its time : nothing surprising. Should we judge it by today's standards? As for the children, I can but wonder whether those who criticize them, calling them "nerds", are precisely those torturers who pride themselves in being the "nerds"' bullies? The children look polite, well-educated and decent children to me. Why should they instead look "fashionable", and somewhat indisciplined in order to make you feel they're "acceptable"? You know what? There's nothing worse than this…

★★★★ · See Part Two Before Comments · jafran · 2006-02-10

Viewers should see Part II and read the reviews there before making negative comments about reviewers who watched this film.

★★★★ · All about those gifted kids who you gladly picked on while you were in school. · Spuzz · 2003-09-11

Nice looking film with overachieving gifted students, you know, the ones you were always jealous of? spurting out suspiciously scripted-sounding answers to their extremely peppy teacher's questions. I like how one of the teachers wears a furry hat to class while demonstrating how an engine works. THAT'S surreal. Another hilight is the assembly where the students ask experts of many different fields questions. Look for the girl with the EXTREMELY unkempt hair and the army major who looks to be falling asleep. A curious film.

★★★★ · Whoa...Pretty Heady Classrooms · JayKay49 · 2012-02-28

This film shows a very enthusiastic approach to dealing with gifted children. And from the looks of it, they got classrooms full of future Yalies and Harvard kids and probably some MIT'ers in there. Kudos to NYC schools in those days. I'm impressed. This program is better than the "Double Promotion" method they used in my school system...as much employed as it was. You simply wound up in a another class full of uninspiring kids - just like the one you got double promoted out of...and were given less - maybe no - further attention as far as your intellectual needs were concerned. It failed in…

★★★ · Young, Black and Gifted · Wilford B. Wolf · 2006-02-06

Early 1960s film touting New York's gifted student program for elementary schools. Many reviewers feel that the students are giving scripted answers, but I think it's more a different style of presenting information than is the norm in more comtemporary schools. This film is very New York in tone, and the education style is more "stand and deliver." Notice how all the kids, when in class discussions, get up from their seat and stand when they deliver the response. What worries more is the dubious pedagogy on display in this film. The principal at the begining says that students are selected…

★★★ · Propaganda · Steve Nordby · 2003-05-27

This film hypes NYC's public school's gifted children program of the 1960's but shows students as uncritical conformist parrots. Because this film shows much that is wrong with gifted education programs even now, I find it worth viewing but horrific.