DNE: Lecture 8***

• Giftedness


  Significantly higher intellectual ability compared to average, demonstrate outstanding aptitude or competence in one or more domains
• Areas of Giftedness


  • Intellectually (cognitively) gifted
  • Academically gifted
  • Creatively gifted
  • Artistically gifted
  • Leadership capacities
  • Athletic giftedness
• Most Prevalent Characteristics of Giftedness

  • Learn rapidly
  • Have extensive vocabulary
  • Have excellent memory
  • Reason well
  • Are curious
  • Are mature for their age at times
  • Have an excellent sense of humor
  • Have a keen sense of observation
  • Have compassion for others
  • Have a vivid (生動) imagination
  • Have a long attention span
  • Have ability with numbers
  • Are concerned with justice and fairness
  • Have facility with puzzles and legos
  • Have a high energy level
  • Are perfectionistic
  • Are perseverant (毅力) in their areas of interest
  • Question authority (權威)
  • Are avid readers
• Characteristics of Giftedness in four areas

  • Learning style
  • Affective characteristics
  • Creativity
  • Leadership
• Learning style of gifted children

  • Advance in language development and language abilities compared to peers
  • Enjoy reading, scope and content are broader and deeper than peers
  • Observant, highly inquisitive (好奇); raise questions and articulate in expressing ideas and opinions; advance in comparison to age; "show off"
  • Exceptionally good memory, comprehension and information processing abilities
  • Able to analyze subtle cause-and-effect relationships
• Affective characteristics of gifted children

  • Can concentrate intensely on things that interest them and carry out investigations persistently
  • Seldom satisfied with their own performance since they pursue perfection in everything
  • Value fairness, justice, right and wrong, and criticize people and things frequently
  • Stubborn, firm behavior
  • High expectations for themselves and others
  • Difficulty establishing good relationship
• Leadership of gifted children


  • Enjoy directing or leading others
  • Highly confidence in role
  • May confuse roles of themselves and adults
• Some gifted students may have special educational needs and social emotional issues like isolation, perfectionism, underachievement, depression
• Gifted students possess certain characteristics which enable them to learn at a fast pace in appropriate learning environment and teaching resources available
• Characteristics of gifted students may become obstacles to learning and social development or adjustment difficulties if needs not properly met or challenged
• Characteristics of gifted students that can lead to conflicts in classrooms

  • Bored with routine tasks
  • Resist changing away from interesting topics or activities
  • Be overly critical of self and others
  • Disagree, argue with others or teachers
  • Make jokes or puns at times adults consider inappropriate
  • Emotionally sensitive and empathetic
  • Ignore details and turn in messy work
  • Reject authority, be non-conforming, stubborn
  • Dominate or withdraw in cooperative learning
  • Be sensitive to environmental stimuli
• The mission of education is to ensure that the educational needs of all students are met so that their potential, no matter where they lie in the ability spectrum, can be maximally developed
• It is the responsibility of schools, not special school, to stretch and nurture gifted students with appropriate learning opportunities and challenges
• Principles of Gifted Education

  • Gifted education as part of quality education; the needs of gifted students, like their less able counterparts, should basically be met in their own school
  • A broad definition using multiple intelligences instead of a restrictive one, confining only to the academically gifted should be adopted
  • Nurturing multiple intelligences is fundamental goal of quality basic education and should be the mission for ALL schools
  • Special provisions will be made for the very exceptionally gifted students whose learning needs cannot be fully stretched in school, and gifted yet with emotional/behavioual or learning (e.g. dyslexic) difficulties
  • Teachers are to identify and select students for extension work and enrichment activities in schools
  • Enrichment and extension activities should be seen as one way of catering for individual learning differences at the upper end of the ability range. The label "gifted" should not be used to name child joining these activities
  • Resources from various stakeholders should be pulled together to support schools in stretching the potential of gifted students
  • A more generic approach is recommended especially in primary school
• Basic conditions required for the effective implementations of gifted education

  • Strengthening and enhancement of existing curriculum and school activities
  • Training for teachers and school heads
  • Networking various stakeholders
  • Developing assessment guidelines and related tools for use by teachers and professionals
• Three Core Elements in Gifted Education

  • Higher Order Thinking skills
  • Creativity
  • Personal-social competence
• Ways to help gifted children

  • Help children form positive peer relationships
  • Help children manage intensities
  • Help children deal with perfectionism
• Ideas to teach gifted children

  • Variety of instructional activities according to the child's interests and preferences, celebrate diversity
  • Variety of activities like field trips, guest speakers, demonstrate practically, other enrichment activities
  • Encouraging higher-level thinking skills and creative problem-solving
  • Provide Information/advanced content and assign independent reading, project etc.
  • Provide opportunities and encourage learning independently
  • Provide opportunities and an environment for sharing ideas / practical solution
  • School extension activities; hobby classes
  • Enrichment programs (Expanding the learning experiences or activities that are beyond the existing curriculum; study topics in depth)
  • Compacting (e.g. Remove materials from the curriculum that the child has already mastered)
  • Self-pacing (e.g. Allow the child to have input in deciding the allocation of classroom time)
  • Acceleration (e.g. Skip grades; enrol in higher-level course)
  • Pull-out programs (e.g. special class in a subject)
  • Cluster grouping
  • Separate classes
• Changes to Lesson Plans for gifted children

  • Application to classroom
  • Alternative assignments
  • Assistants; demonstrations
  • Open-ended questions
  • Inferencing; prediction questions
  • Ask what-if questions
  • Ask how to rather than what questions
  • Alternative thinking