RE: The Endless Conversation: For my daughter (part five of six)
Creative, curious children go in, programmed machines often come out.
I hear that a lot. But most children don't strike me as particularly curious, at least in an intellectual way. Children of certain age range are curious about everything and constantly ask questions but that tends peak at around five years of age. If children of school age were naturally intellectually curious, they would absorb the knowledge presented to them in their school books like a sponge. There is nothing wrong with school math textbooks if one wants to learn the basics of arithmetic, for example.
What kids naturally tend to find interesting is not knowledge or anything intellectual but, these days, computer games (boys a bit more than girls but lots of girls are into games these days, too), gossip (predominantly girls), exercising power in a group (both sexes) and eating sweets. The kids whose intellectual curiosity and passion is stifled by school are distinctly in the minority. First of all, it takes an IQ significantly above or below the median. Those in the former group are bored and those in the latter frustrated in class. Secondly, once kids get the hang of certain basics of how the world works before school age, other things will occupy their minds such as social relationships and group dynamics.
I don't think intellectual curiosity ever even needed to be the dominant trait of that many people in a group of humans. What humans really excel at compared to, say, the great apes is imitating other humans in highly complex ways. That is the basis of civilization and not curiosity and a
critical mindset as a mass phenomenon.
If you look at it a little further back than that though it could point to a core reason. Their parents aren't curious either as they have already gone through school. From a young age, many parents start encouraging the school thinking activities rather than the creative focus. There is a 'do well at school, get a good job' attitude. I see many of my friends and familiars training their children for school activities, people training their babies to pass Neuvola tests. Perhaps by five, the kids are fully 'socialized' and ready for school.
At the end of the day, it will always be the minority thinkers who lead the majority in time.
That may play some part in it at least for some people. But there was a time before universal formal schooling. In fact, the average number of years of formal schooling was drastically less in my grandparents' generation than in mine. My grandparents (the three whose lives temporally overlapped mine and whom I knew) did not strike me as any more intellectually curious than their children (seven altogether) or my sister or all my cousins. People born around the same time as them in general did/do not strike me as particularly open minded and intellectually curious.
What I suspect is that open-mindedness and curiosity vary in the population mostly due to genetic factors. Open-mindedness is tied to temperamental factors controlling the balance between novelty-seeking and risk-avoidance.
My daughter is in third grade. There is a lot of creative activity in school these days. There is creative writing in Finnish nearly on a daily basis. There is so much of it that she has begun to dislike those exercises. School is in no way stifling her creativity. On the contrary, it is constantly trying to squeeze it out of her.
I think this is a major reason in Finalnd for many things. It is very homogeneous genetically and culturally and there is a definite difference between some similar cultures. For example, the Swedish. I think (very basically) Swedes are looking to get away from the middle of the group whereas Finns are trying to be top of the pile. Finns spend more time competing with their neighbour than cooperating to build a stronger community together. Before it was fine when Finland was more isolated but in a globalised world, it is a risk.
I have to get to bed but this is something I have lots of various 'theories' about I have developed over the years here.
I have to get to bed, too. But I will say that I'd be glad to hear those theories. Let's see if I can add anything to them or help you refine them.