Gifted and talented' has become the official way of referring to highachieving, able school pupils. The author questions the validity and appropriateness of this label and calls for a more sophisticated and inclusive framework. The notion of a child being 'gifted and talented', popularised in recent years in Government policy and the resulting discourse and practice of teachers and others, can be seen as one manifestation amongst many of a harmful obsession with categorising and labelling children according to socially and culturally determined concepts (Hart et al, 2004). Yet the idea that such pupils exist, together with a search for clarity about the kind of curriculum and teaching which might be appropriate for them, has long been claimed, often as part of professional and parental efforts to enhance their educational provision.A range of terminology for this perceived pupil group has been used over the years. Government and professional literature over the last three decades has 'able', 'highly able', 'very able' and 'exceptionally able'; 'gifted' on its own has been common too. Barry Teare claimed to an ultimately influential House of Commons Select Committee 'some 120 definitions and titles used worldwide' (House of Commons… 1999, p. 66). Professor Joan Freeman indicated similarly: 'Perhaps 100', and highlighted one of the reasons for the variety: 'The way a very able child is defined depends on what is being looked for' (House of Commons… 1999, p. 2). The terminological dilemma remains, fuelled perhaps by desire to reach multiple audiences, for example 'able, gifted and talented' (Bates & Munday, 2005;Montgomery, 2009).Despite (or because of) this variety, recent official and professional usage has been more uniform: the two-stranded 'gifted and talented', adopted in the Government's 'Excellence in Cities' programme of a decade ago (Ofsted, 2001), reinforced in a national strategy for the education of such pupils (Dracup, 2003), and continuing as standard, official educational parlance (Young, Gifted
This month an independent research team from Birmingham University is due to report to the Department for Education on its assessment of the first three years' work of the Birmingham Institute for Conductive Education. Its findings, if published, will arouse wide interest. Meanwhile, Mike Lambert, director, Centre for Research and Development at the Birmingham Institute, reviews the way the National Curriculum has been introduced and how far it seems compatible with conductive education. This is the first journal article to examine this issue.
Conductive education is a distinctive style of teaching and learning for pupils with physical difficulties. It is practised in the UK in some maintained, non-maintained and independent special schools and centres (here collectively termed ‘conductive-education schools’). In this article Mike Lambert investigates the extent to which these conductive-education schools have links with mainstream schools, and the purposes and nature of such links It discusses what conductive-education schools may need to do if they are to develop effective and valuable roles in respect to mainstream schooling This report has relevance for all schools, but particularly for those special schools with an interest in, or practising, conductive education and for mainstream schools interested in working with them
The use of questionnaires to evaluate educational initiatives is widespread, but often problematic. This paper examines four aspects of an evaluation survey carried out with very able pupils attending out-of-school classes: ethics, design, bias and interpretation. There is a particular focus on the interpretation of pupils' answers to open questions. Conclusions are drawn from this analysis which will help teachers and others to take a careful and critical approach to their use of questionnaires in educational evaluation.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
hi@scite.ai
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.