An Evaluation of Alternative Screening Procedures

Abstract

Disproportional minority membership in special programs has become a major issue in gifted education programs. Identifying students who are gifted has traditionally been grounded in criteria emphasizing unitary measures of intellectual ability. An alternative perspective with promise for addressing concerns related to disproportion and bias in placement practices has emerged from the theory of multiple intelligences (MI; Gardner, 1983, 1993). While perspectives and opinions regarding multiple intelligences are plentiful, research on the effectiveness of assessment and instructional practices grounded in MI theory has been sparse. This research was designed to shed light on the problem-solving assessment (PSA) procedure, an application of MI theory focused on identification of students for gifted education programs. Scores and decisions grounded in PSA and more traditional criteria were described, compared, and analyzed. As in previous research, positive correlations were evident among scores for different types of intelligences and applications of another identification criterion. More important, different groups of students were identified when using each approach; a more diverse population was identified with the problem-solving-assessment procedure.

Examining the Probability of Identification for Gifted Programs for Students in Georgia Elementary Schools: A Multilevel Path Analysis Study

“…The numerical underrepresentation of African American, Hispanic, and Native American students in gifted programs has been frequently cited in the gifted education literature (Bernie & Beilke, 2008;Ford, 1998;Naglieri & Ford, 2005;Reid, Romanoff, Algozzine, & Udall, 2000;Sarouphim, 1999;Scott, Perou, Urbano, & Hogan, 1992). The topic of underrepresentation is of critical importance to the field of gifted education.…”

Teacher Education Standards for the Field of Gifted Education

“…For gifted educators, assessments are vital for decision making when working with gifted students in terms of identification, monitoring academic process, and adjusting instruction. Researchers have suggested using multiple measures and alternative assessments in the identification process (Frasier, 1991) because different groups of children who have different areas of gifts and talents require different assessments (Reid, Romanoff, Algozzine, & Udall, 2000). Specific assessments have been designed that measure creativity (Hunsaker & Callahan, 1995;Torrance, 1984), music and dance (Oreck, Owen, & Baum, 2003), visual arts (Clark, 2004), leadership (Karnes et al, 1987), domain-specific areas, and general intelligence.…”

“…Assessments suggested for identification of gifted students, particularly those from culturally and linguistically backgrounds, include dynamic assessment (Borland & Wright, 1994;Kirschenbaum, 2004), peer nomination (Cunningham, Callahan, Plucker, Roberson, & Rapkin, 1998), nonverbal tests (Naglieri & Ford, 2003), alternative screenings (Reid et al, 2000), performance assessment (VanTassel-Baska, Johnson, & Avery, 2002), problem-based tasks (Maker, 1994), observations (J. A.…”

Complete Issue (Merle Richards, editor)

“…En somme, aucun consensus n'émane sur le type de tests à privilégier dans le dépistage des difficultés d'apprentissage au niveau de la langue et des mathématiques (Reid et al, 2000). Certains chercheurs privilégient l'utilisation de tests standardisés qui offrent l'avantage d'avoir été expérimentés sur un très grand nombre de sujets de recherche (Gray et al, 1999).…”