Putting the Research to Use: This study suggests several areas of practical application. One area is in the reality versus the myth of professional development. These data suggest the need for multiple years of professional development, interspersed with observations that track the frequency and efficacy of targeting instructional behaviors. Thus, educational reformers must be clear about what change they want teachers to achieve and set about a 2-to 3-year plan for making it happen at the school level. This study also lends support to more systematic approaches to encouraging differentiation. It highlights the need for monitoring classroom implementation. The use of a wellvalidated observation tool such as the Classroom Observation Scale-Revised provides a venue for ongoing instructional monitoring and improvement. Moreover, embedding content pedagogy in actual curriculum for training reduces the chance for inaccurate teacher inferencing about how to employ a strategy effectively.Abstract: This study examines Title 1 heterogeneous classroom teachers' instructional behavior change through implementing well-designed research-based curriculum units and attending regular professional development activities across 3 years. Employing an experimental design, this study compares experimental and comparison teachers' behavioral changes as measured by an observation scale of differentiated teaching strategies across 3 years. The results show that experimental teachers received statistically significant and educationally important higher ratings than comparison teachers on differentiated strategy use and effectiveness across 3 years. The study corroborates the research literature that shows that teachers' instructional improvement takes 2 years to manifest its effectiveness and to shape belief in student learning benefits.

Forty-five gifted students and 45 regular education students without identified exceptionalities were rated by teachers and administrators on the Clinical Assessment of Behavior (CAB), a third-party behavior rating scale that rates students’ adaptive and behavior problems. The gifted students in this study were rated significantly higher on three adaptive behavioral scales/clusters: Competence, Executive Function, and Gifted and Talented. In addition, the gifted students were rated significantly lower on several clinical scales/clusters, including Anxiety, Depression, Attention Deficit, Learning Disability, Autistic Spectrum, Mental Retardation, as well as the total scale score. The results indicated that gifted and talented students displayed overall better behavioral adjustment than their regular education peers and that the CAB may be useful as part of the identification process for gifted and talented students.

A longitudinal study of student growth gains was conducted in Title I schools to assess growth in reading comprehension and critical thinking. Results suggested that all students benefited from the intervention of Project Athena units of study designed for high-ability learners. In addition, the study suggested that the comparison curriculum also benefited learners. Implications for practice include the use of high-level curriculum with all learners to elevate instruction and enhance critical thinking. Implications for scholarship include the need for studies that examine the specific nature of gains for different types of learners and schools using hierarchical linear modeling techniques.

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This article provides an overview of existing research on 11 curriculum models in the field of gifted education, including the schoolwide enrichment model and the talent search model, and several others that have been used to shape high-level learning experiences for gifted students. The models are critiqued according to the key features they contribute to student learning, teacher use, and contextual fit, including alignment to standards and use with special populations of gifted and nongifted learners. The authors also provide a set of key principles derived from the research studies on what has been learned as a field about curriculum and instruction for the gifted. The article concludes with a set of practical considerations for educators in implementing any of the curricula analyzed and specific district applications of the Integrated Curriculum Model (ICM) that illustrate effective implementation over time.