Summary and Response on Outliers Chapter 4

Summary and Response on Outliers Chapter 4 

"the troubles with geniuses, part II"

In Malcolm Gladwell’s Oultiers Chapter 4 “the troubles with geniuses, part II,” Gladwell states that for those high IQ people, their family background determine whether they could be successful or not. He uses the Langan example from last chapter. Langan has extremely high IQ but he is born in a poor family. His parents don't care about his education. Gladwell puts this parenting style as “natural growth”; from a study about students’ behaviors based on their family background done by a sociologist Annette Lareau. It means those parents are responsible for them but let them grow by themselves. Children grow up with this type of parenting usually afraid of the authorities or don't know how to speak up. Langan is one example; the fail of renewing his scholarship and the fail of rescheduling his class period support that. There is another type of parenting called “concerted cultivation;” Robert Oppenheimer is an example. He grew up in a middle class family with he knew how to interact with “authorities” since he is little. He knows how to use his “entitlement.” Therefore, even though he tries to poison his tutor, he gets probation as result. Moreover, he gets himself a chance to work on the atomic bomb. Gladwell thinks that geniuses with both “analysis intelligence” and “practical intelligence” could be success; and the “practical intelligence” is affected by their family backgrounds in chapter 4. (pp. 91-115)

I think Gladwell’s idea in this chapter is said to the point and is insightful. Many geniuses are very smart and many of them are lack of the skill to communicate well with authorities or others. This chapter is well shown the factors for this outcome. People’s family background and their parenting style affect their future; although I think the parenting style is more important. However, the family background is an effect on their parenting style. Not only to geniuses, parenting style is important to normal people. Parents affect heavily on children’s future. Let them grow and develop on their own is good, but guidance from parents are essential. In this chapter Gladwell shows his reader one factor to success, family background and their parenting styles. However, it is not them to choose or change easily. 

Summary on Outliers Chapter 3

Summary on Outliers Chapter 3 “The Trouble with Geniuses, Part 1”

In Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers chapter 3 “the trouble with geniuses, part 1,” he states that a person’s IQ is not so effective to success once they reach a level; it means that people have equally chance to become successful once they pass a high level of IQ. He uses basketball players to explain it and make it easier to understand. He writes that the height matters to the basketball players; however, once it reaches a height, it doesn't matter so much. Any heights over that, speed and skills matter; so does IQ to people. He uses a very high IQ person named Christopher Langan who has higher IQ than most of people even Einstein, but he doesn't have that kind of big achievement as Einstein. There is a study of geniuses which is about a group of geniuses grow up have a normal life without any big achievements to supports Gladwell’s idea. Gladwell believes that there is one thing that affects a person besides IQ; that is imagination. When two people have the same level of IQs, their imaginations affect more to success. (pp. 69-90)

I think Gladwell is right. Although IQ is an important element to success, it is not the only element to success. I like that he uses many interesting study and examples to back up his idea. And the IQ test questions are very interesting too. It makes the readers engage in the reading by thinking how to solve the problems. There are more examples like this, for example, the brick and blanket test and the manhole question. It really makes me think. I even wen online and did a set of IQ test questions. Although he states that IQ is not so important once they reach a level, does he means that everyone below that level can’t become successful? He also mentions the graduate universities of Nobel Prize winners. Although he believes that those rejected by Harvard who are equally intelligent as those accepted by Harvard go to other school and also have the ability to win the Nobel Prize, I think education from the university also matters. Even though they don't get into Harvard, they enter to good college with better education than many of others.

Revision for Essay 3 draft

According to the reading handout “Rewriting is the essence of writing well-where the game is won or lost” written by William Zinsser, revise is a very important step when you write. Revise is not the same as proofread; revise needs the writers to rethink the thesis and reorganize the bodies in order to make the piece better and make sure you are focus on your topic. Revision is all about rethinking ideas and supporting evidences; don't worry about grammar errors at this point. There are some tips I think are useful, use hardcopy when I revise, “read the paper out loud”, and imagine yourself as a reader who has never read your essay as you revise. Moreover, revise takes a pretty long time; it is not a few-minute work. Although you can revise it as you write, the better way is to “look at the essay as a whole.”

Based on what I learned from the handout, I think I will leave my essay for a day and reread it so I can read it with fresh eyes. I am planning to spend an hour or two to revise my essay. When I revise it, I will use the method that read the essay out loud; sometimes I will miss or ignore the mistakes by accident when I read silently. Based on my conference, I will read the Chapter in Outlier again and see what examples or details I can use to support my points. Also I will rethink my thesis and see if all of my points can support it. For the summary of the chapter, I will need to make sure all the details are absolutely needed and see if I miss any ideas. I think I will ignore grammar problems as I revise and proofread the whole essay later. Because I miss the works cited page in my second draft, I will sure to add it.