Originally Posted by Val
Originally Posted by aquinas
Originally Posted by JonLaw
Because at that point, you have learned the skill.

In mathematics, once you have learned the basics of calculus....you have learned the basics of calculus.

Exactly. Mastery is mastery.

I disagree.

Mastering the basics of calculus (whatever that means, TBH) doesn't mean you can do differential equations, and you won't get there if your professor tells you that you're too young for it and that you have to keep practicing the chain rule and the substitution method for another couple years.

This is precisely the situation that gifted kids are in at school, and precisely the situation that this so-called reading specialist is using and advocating: you can't read book x because I decided it's too hard for kids your age. And BTW, your test scores prove it: you're not getting better. Never mind that you had hit the test ceiling last time. So here's a basic reader for you.

I'm kind of surprised to see this reaction from two people here?

Mastery of a skill implies you have knowledge that allows you to access more difficult material. There are only so many phonetic combinations that a child has to learn before virtually any word can be understood (possibly with a dictionary), so mastery occurs earlier in reading than other subjects, like calculus.

I understood Jon to be contrasting reading with calculus. Once you understand the basics of reading, you can apply them to infinitely more difficult contexts. With calculus, mastery of the basics doesn't necessarily imply you have the potential to immediately access more difficult material without more instruction. (Obviously, for some autodidacts, this will be untrue.)

What is to give light must endure burning.