As my now grown kids tell me, we were such a weird family, they did not fit in at school and it was hard on them (harder than I realized at the time). We were not weird, but our family culture was different.

Our family life revolved around reading, study, work, excursions and adventures including museums, hiking, backpacking, art galleries, lectures, historical places, mines, caves, lakes, rivers, mountains, deserts, science and environmental programs and all kinds of music, etc. We rode public transit and carried sack lunches.

We lived small and simple and did not have cable, or television. We read quietly together, we read out loud to each other, played games, did jigsaw puzzles and all kinds of projects and we talked constantly. In kindergarten my kids started working in our family business. By high school they were doing the books, reviewing contracts, working with clients and supervising events. One enrolled herself in the Student Ambassador program and spent the summer in Australia and another in a language emersion program in Mexico. My kids hated school, so they took the bus to the city for summer school at the junior college, skipped a grade, and in their junior year, they took the high school exit exams, and started college full time.

Colleges and universities are often behind, and there are no degreed programs in emerging disciplines. My kids kludged their educations together at different universities. One of them, stayed an extra semester and now she has five degrees (UCDavis) and none of them are in her field. My kids still do not have cable, or TV, they still live small and simple, they still read a lot, work on projects, and are always off on some adventure with their partners/spouses.

Sure, my kids are smart, but I'm convinced that Jewish and Asian family cultures explain more than IQ, grades and test scores ever will.