Tuesday, February 2, 2010

The myth of the gifted child


Good article in this week’s New York Magazine by Jennifer Senior, about the myth of the gifted child – with only about 25% of children who were tested at age four as “gifted” repeating at 17.

It also reveals the unfairness of the administration's current admissions policies, based on strict cut-offs on high stakes tests, because the results are so highly biased in terms of race and class.

As one expert says, “Sometimes,” he says, “you look at a big city’s decisions to do this and wonder if it’s about nurturing giftedness or if it’s about keeping middle-class families in the city limits.”


No comments: