Preservice Teachers

I am currently in the process of preparing to talk with preservice teachers at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point. For the past few years, WATG’s President has done a presentation for Dr. Uzeyir Ogurlu’s classes. The purpose of the presentation is to give preservice teachers some awareness about gifted education and introduce them to Wisconsin Association for Talented and Gifted.
 
While working on the presentation, I can’t help but think how helpful this would have been when I was in college. When I attended UWSP from 2006 to 2010, I had one course about giftedness. This course was a winterim class that was only a couple hours for one week. That is all the education I received on gifted and talented, and this is unfortunately all that most preservice teachers around Wisconsin receive.
 
As new teachers enter the classroom for the first time, they do not have the experience or knowledge of how to best support the gifted and talented students in their classroom, let alone what it even means to be gifted and talented. With the presentation that WATG’s President does each year for Dr. Ogurlu’s classes, preservice teachers will be entering into the classroom with a little more knowledge of the importance of supporting their gifted and talented students. 
 
If you are part of a university and are looking for a way to introduce your university’s preservice teachers to gifted and talented education and Wisconsin Association for Talented and Gifted, please reach out to me at
president@watg.org 
and we can set up a day for me to do the presentation. I look forward to working with you.

Stacy Novak, President
WATG

 
WATG extends a huge thank you to Dr. German Diaz of Milwaukee Public Schools for translating this article into Spanish for our families and educators who speak Spanish. The translation can also be found on our website.