Applying gifted education pedagogy to total talent development for all students

As a scholar-researcher, I have seen a teacher in one of our inner-city schools in Chicago bring her class to instant attention by threatening them: "If you kids don't settle down, we won't do science!" The ways in which students respond to enriched learning experiences should be used as a rationale for providing all students with advanced-level follow-up opportunities. This approach reflects a democratic ideal that accommodates the full range of individual differences in the entire student population, and it opens the door to programming models that develop the talent potentials of many at-risk students who traditionally have been excluded from anything but the most basic types of curricular experiences.

The application of gifted program know-how into general education is supported by a wide variety of research on human abilities by Bloom (1985), Gardner (1983; Gardner & Walter, 2002), Renzulli (1978, 1999), and Sternberg (1984, 2000). This research clearly and unequivocally provides a justification for much broader conceptions of talent development. These conceptions argue against the restrictive student selection practices that guided identification procedures in the past. Lay persons and professionals at all levels have begun to question the efficacy of programs that rely on IQ scores and other cognitive ability measures as the primary methods for identifying which students can benefit from differentiated services (National Association for Gifted Children, 1997). Traditional identification procedures have restricted services to small numbers of high-scoring students and excluded large numbers of at-risk students.

Special services should be viewed as opportunities to develop gifted behaviors rather than merely finding and certifying them. In this regard, we should judiciously avoid saying that a young person is either gifted or not gifted. It is difficult to gain support for talent development when our rationale includes such statements as "Elaine is a gifted third grader." These kinds of statements offend many people and raise the accusations of elitism that have plagued special programs. But, note the difference in orientation when we focus on the behavioral characteristics that brought this student to our attention in the first place: "Elaine is a third grader who reads at the adult level and who has a fascination for biographies about women of scientific accomplishment." And, note the logical and justifiable services provided for Elaine. Under the guidance of her classroom teacher, Elaine is allowed to select more challenging books in her interest area; she leaves the school two afternoons a month to meet with her mentor, a local journalist specializing in gender issues; and during time made available through curriculum compacting in her strength areas (i.e., reading, language arts, and spelling), the Schoolwide Enrichment Teaching Specialist helps Elaine prepare a questionnaire and interview schedule to be used with local female scientists. Could even the staunchest anti-gifted proponent argue against the logic or the appropriateness of these services?