Teacher perceptions of differentiating instruction for gifted and talented students

Meeting the Needs of the Gifted and Talented in a Mainstream Classroom Setting

Qualitative research

Does teacher instruction challenge the needs of the gifted and talented in a mainstream classroom?

Special needs instruction for low-performing students has become an increasingly important aspect of the modern national conversation on education, given the growing, evident need for additional support for students with autism, attention-deficit disorder, and ESL students. However, the presence of gifted and talented students at the other end of the differential learning spectrum is often forgotten. Because these students are not evidently being 'left behind' in the debate regarding standardized assessment and testing, their needs are often ignored. Teachers may assign some students more challenging work for 'extra credit' but the specific needs of the gifted and talented, it was hypothesized in this research study, are not fully addressed.

To understand how gifted and talented education is perceived and implemented, a qualitative study of teachers at a middle school (School 'A') with a population consisting of 282 students was embarked upon, to better assess the current state of gifted and talented educational instruction and current needs of the population

School demographics

The middle school population consisted of 178 females and 104 males. The gifted and talented population numbered 72: 38 females and 34 males. Teachers are officially encouraged to identify gifted and talented students, according to the school's stated policy.

Focus group findings

All staff members agreed with the idea of classifying certain students as gifted and talented, or students who were said to demonstrate exceptional natural talent, intellect, and maturity. This emphasis on student maturity in the agreed-upon definition of giftedness suggests that gifted children have an additional perspective and intellectual orientation that requires nurturing. All teachers were aware that they were required to differentiate instruction to meet the needs of the gifted and talented, just as they were for special needs students. However, none of the staff members was aware of any specific district policy regarding students who were gifted and talented. None of the staff members knew that the district had a gifted and talented supervisor or a program for such students. When asked how they identified a student as gifted and talented, they stated that the only way they knew of to do so was using standardized testing results on the NJASK. Those students who scored Advanced Proficient on the test were classified officially as gifted and talented.

The reasons for teacher's lack of awareness should not be surprising, given that none of teachers had ever been offered additional instruction or professional development specific to the gifted and talented. The school / administration did not provide instruction on how to deal with gifted and talented students during staff professional development days. The teachers were given professional development instruction solely to deal with students with special (remedial) needs. Teachers were told to identify the gifted and talented if they felt a student showed a unique aptitude but were not given specific instruction as to how to do so.

For students who had tested as Advanced Proficient on the NJASK, teachers staid they did strive to make their instructional plan more challenging, enlightening, and intriguing to gifted and talented students. They said they tried to group students of similar ability together and give the gifted students more challenging work and when assigning individual projects such as reading novels and open-ended math problems. They said they gave the gifted work that was above grade level, in contrast to the student's peers.

While the teachers claimed to differentiate instruction and said that this was adequately met by in-class tracking, they also admitted to feeling overwhelmed by the differentiated needs of the students in their classroom, and had difficulty accommodating the needs of students above, at, and below grade level within one lesson plan.

Observational results

The lack of differentiated instruction was immediately obvious during the two walk-through observations conducted at the school. Students were not identified as gifted and talented during group activities, despite the fact that teachers said that this was done. When working in groups, all students were given the same amount and type of work. There was no evidence that gifted and talented were given more challenging work. Students who completed the work early often disrupted the class while the teacher was trying to assist others students. Even when working independently, students were not given differentiated materials to reflect their different levels of ability. Even when an inclusion teacher or other resource support was present, teachers focused more on encouraging the special needs students to perform at grade level.

Conclusion

Teachers are under tremendous pressure today to meet standardized benchmarks of achievement set for their students. Their rankings as educators and the performance ratings of the schools depend upon standardized test performance. Thus, there is a great incentive to try to ensure that special education students perform to a higher standard, while students whose performance is expected to be strong are ignored. Balancing the differentiated needs of the gifted and special needs students is a seemingly impossible challenge.

The lack of information about what it means to be gifted and talented is also a barrier. Gifted and talented students are often operating on a higher and more abstract reasoning level then their peers. Even if teachers did give 'harder' books and math problems to gifted children, this does not fully satisfy the demand to make gifted and talented students better able to use critical thinking skills and to explore their creativity. The assignments observed in class tended to be of a 'rote' nature, and students who could easily complete the assignments frequently seemed bored and disrupted other children.

Teachers should not be 'blamed' for failing to accommodate the gifted in their classrooms given the message sent by the administration regarding this challenge. Teachers were given special needs instruction, but not instruction to deal with the specific, special needs of the gifted and talented. This communicates a clear message to teachers what their priorities should be as educators. Districts need to improve professional development in the field of gifted and talented education, and also provide teachers with additional resource support to deal with gifted students. Finally, learning about how to challenge gifted students with more open-ended assignments would not simply be enriching for the gifted and talented, but for all students who could benefit from a 'thinking out of the box' approach to education.