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Gifted
and Talented Students
Characteristics
of effective provision in the subject
There are
clearly issues surrounding the provision for more able students
in history. There may be very few 'more able' students within a
classroom; the class might be mixed ability, which makes a
distinctive curriculum yet more difficult to implement for the
more able; there are also issues surrounding the identification
process and some teachers still feel that a distinctive
curriculum for the more able is divisive and unfair. American
research into the effectiveness of a clearly defined gifted and
talented programme make the need to develop these strategies
clear.
Gubbins
(research should inform Practice, The National Research Centre
on the Gifted and Talented, 1997 Spring Newsletter) reports
that:
Delcourt,
Loyd, Cornell, and Goldberg (1994) examined the effectiveness of
various service delivery models on students' cognitive and
affective outcomes and concluded:
· Gifted children in Pullout, Separate Class, and Special
School programs showed higher achievement than gifted students
who were not in programs and, in most cases, than those from
Within-Class programs and nongifted students.
· Although a limited amount of time was spent in the resource
room (approximately 2 hours/week), the emphasis on academics
with the Pullout model appears to have contributed to the
achievement of these students.
· Students from the Separate Class programs scored at the
highest levels of achievement and at the lowest levels of
perception of academic competence, preference for challenging
tasks, and sense of acceptance by peers, internal orientation,
and attitudes toward learning.
http://www.sp.uconn.edu/~nrcgt/news/spring97/sprng971.html
Further to this, she reported that Delcourt, Loyd, Cornell, and
Goldberg found that:
The results of a national survey of middle school administrators
mirror some of the results we gleaned from a focus on elementary
classrooms:
· There is much room for greater awareness of the needs of
academically diverse populations in the middle school and the
specific instructional skills required to meet these needs.
· Classroom standardization and a "one-size fits all"
environment pre-dominate over classroom flexibility as the norm
in today's middle schools.
· Educators' beliefs about differentiating the curriculum
through instructional strategies do not convert into practice.
Therefore, instructional and structural strategies, which
support curriculum differentiation, appear to be under used.
· Middle school practitioners who perceive the middle school
learner as being in a plateau period tend not to create and
deliver high level, engaging curricula, but rather to teach
basic skills, low-level thinking, and less complex reading
assignments. (Moon, Tomlinson, & Callahan, 1995)
http://www.sp.uconn.edu/~nrcgt/news/spring97/sprng971.html
This research, albeit in American middle schools, shows that
programmes for gifted students work and that a failure to
provide a distinctive curriculum for these students often
results in poor levels of attainment. What can a department with
finite resources; time and staff do to provide for the gifted
and talented then?
In the majority of cases, the department will already have a
framework in place that is suitable for effectively providing
for the more able. Structures to allow for the regular
monitoring of work and expectations alongside rigorous
assessment and recording procedures will enable a department to
fulfil it's role effectively. In general, departments providing
effectively will have most of these characteristics:
· An agreed statement of practice with regards the teaching of
the more able student
· An action plan for the implementation and review of a
programme for the more able
· High expectations and demands for students that are clearly
defined within the classroom
· Access to performance indicators and a system for using these
to inform teaching and medium term planning
· Clear schemes of work that indicate where differentiation for
the most able must take place
· Regular assessment opportunities
· Procedure for the moderation of assessment
· Agreed format for providing feedback on work to students and
parents
· A variety of resources suited to the needs of the more able
· Inset programme with regards issues surrounding gifted and
talented education
· Close contacts with other History Departments in the locality
and an agreement with these to pool ideas and resources
The
support of other departments and collaboration with them is also
of course essential. Funding, likewise, is paramount to the
long-term success of the initiative as time and resources are
needed to look at provision in any detail. Monitoring of
teaching and constructive feedback on teaching effectiveness,
which will be done through Performance Management in any case,
is also of great value when evaluating the strengths and
weaknesses of current provision.
Pages
within this article.
Introduction,Defintions
and Identification of Gifted and Talented Students,Characteristics
of effective provision in the subject,Ideas
for classroom provision,Withdrawal
groups,Differentiating
by task,Enrichment,Conclusions
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