Schools failing to spot classroom talent

Writing as a parent of children identified as "gifted and talented" and once having been so identified myself, this is an area that really interests me as a novice teacher. People have been talking about this for about 30 years and I feel I'm only now seeing it begin to be taken seriously at a national level. Adonis is right in what he is quoted as saying here.

Lord Adonis said it was "a terrible waste and all our educational policies are intended to put an end to this failure". Gifted children must not be left to their own devices and required just as much support as other pupils, especially those from backgrounds with low educational aspirations. "No child should ever feel isolated because their classmates might regard enthusiasm for learning as 'uncool'," he said.

In reality this is yet another driver really crying out for, in my view, a more radical overhaul of education towards personalised learning and replacing the whole concept of 'teacher' as we tend to define it now in popular culture with 'learning facilitators. It will take a radical change also in what society looks for in an education 'system', but we already know that education is really more than qualifications; we're just too scared as a nation to act on that knowledge. So I guess that 'softly, softly' is the name of the game and another generation is sacrificed to untenable models of learning.

Of course, the real interesting thing for me is also how this pans out when you transfer the insights into the domain called 'church' ... What is the real meaning of 'teacher' in those new testament passages ... I will be looking out for more information on that question over the next year or so. Let me know if you have some interesting things to follow that question/issue up with.

Schools failing to spot classroom talent, says Adonis | News crumb | EducationGuardian.co.uk: Filed in: gifted, children, education, personalised, learning