Celebrated Harvard professor at Wellington

Professor Howard Gardner and Dr Anthony Seldon highlight benefits of 'eight aptitudes' approach at conference

At a groundbreaking conference on Monday, to be addressed by the celebrated Harvard professor, Howard Gardner, schools will come under the spotlight for their narrow and narrowing focus in their curricular and extra-curricular lives on testing and exams.

"We have schools badly wrong in Britain," says conference convenor Dr Anthony Seldon. "Schools should be developing the whole child, rather than concentrating just on the testable aspects of their intellect. What is not brought out at school will be unlikely to be developed later in life. We are confining British children to live half lives, if that."

Seldon will be outlining his "eight aptitudes" model which he is introducing into his school, Wellington College, based on the eight faculties which he says every child possesses. These are logical, linguistic, social, personal, moral, spiritual, physical and cultural. "Each school can and should be working to identify, nurture, develop and celebrate each of these eight aptitudes," he said.

Howard Gardner will be talking about his multi-intelligence approach, which has been the major influence on the development of Wellington's eight aptitude approach to curricular and extra curricular life.