Educators are gathered this week at the University of Connecticut for Confratute – a professional development conference that explores ways for teachers to apply gifted and talented teaching methods towards whole school improvement.
Monday’s keynote speaker was Dr. Carmen Farina, Chancellor of New York City’s schools which serve 1.1 million children. New York City is the largest school district in the world.
Farina told participants that students have too often been labeled as gifted based only on IQ or test scores. "That I think is a big mistake," Farina said. "One of the things that we've done in New York City this past year, we've invested an additional $23 million in the arts, because I believe that there are a lot of kids [who] are gifted."
Farina said the other area New York City is investing a lot of money in is dual language learning.
"We're in a country that I think for a very long time assumed English was the only way to go, and I'm here to tell you that as someone who speaks two languages fluently, that I have embraced the fact that speaking a second language also gives you a bi-cultural view of the world," said Farina.
Farina talked about the benefits of assessing students before teaching rather than after – so classes are better tailored to individual students’ needs; and involving students in decision-making in the classroom.
Confratute continues at UConn through Friday. Watch Farina's keynote speech on CT-N below.
