Classroom Practices Used with Gifted Third and Fourth Grade Students

Abstract

The Classroom Practices Survey was conducted by The National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented (NRC/GT) to determine the extent to which gifted and talented students receive differentiated education in regular classrooms. Six samples of third and fourth grade teachers in public schools, private schools and schools with high concentrations of four types of ethnic minorities were randomly selected to participate in this research. The major finding of this study is that third and fourth grade classroom teachers make only minor modifications in the regular curriculum to meet the needs of gifted students. This result holds for all types of schools sampled. It also holds for classrooms in different parts of the country and for different types of communities. Implications of these findings for researchers and gifted education specialists are discussed.

The Use of Consultation to Improve Academic and Psychosocial Outcomes for Gifted Students

“…Another issue that may occur with this model is poor integration between the gifted curriculum and the regular education curriculum. Students may not experience conditions that encourage the optimal transfer of learning (Archambault et al, 1993). These issues provide fertile ground for consultation to make a positive impact on the outcomes of gifted students' education.…”

“All Kids Can Learn”: Masking Diversity in Middle School

“…National studies indicate that little appropriate differentiation of instruction for academically diverse learners currently takes place in classrooms (Tomlinson et al, 1994;Archambault, Westberg, Brown, Hallmark, Zhang, and Emmons 1993;McIntosh, Vaughn, Schumm, Haager, and Lee 1993;Tomlinson In press). The paucity of differentiation has a multitude of causes: our own long histories as students in one-size-fits-all classrooms, our own experiences as practitioners of one-size-fits-all instruction, our general lack of preservice and inservice preparation in teaching academically diverse learners, teach-to-the-test mandates that cause us to drag all learners through the same content, over-dependence on text-driven curricula, discouraging student-teacher ratios, choppy time blocks that invite dealing with students as a herd, and lack of administrative and policy support for the long-term change process that is required to alter habitual teaching behaviors.…”

To No Longer Educate the Gifted: Programming for Gifted Students Beyond the Era of Inclusionism

“…This leads us to the most important counterargument, the fact that gifted children are rarely served in inclusive settings because teachers make no or few modifications of instruction to assist them and almost never incorporate differentiated or individualized instruction (Archambault et al, 1993). For the most part, inclusionism in actual practice means no appropriate education for the gifted whatsoever, much less an education that is specifically geared to their abilities or needs.…”