Who are
the Gifted?
How can we help them?
Linda Deal
Gifted Consultant
lindajdeal@gmail.com
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What it means to be Gifted in PA
Chapter 16.1 Definition
Mentally gifted—
1.Outstanding intellectual and creative
ability the development of which
2.requires specially designed programs or
support services, or both, not ordinarily
provided in the regular education
program.
Note – 2 prongs to the definition
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Gifted in PA
PA Code § 16.21 (e) Multiple criteria indicating gifted ability
include (but not limited to):
A year or more above grade achievement level
1.
for the normal age group in one or more subjects as
measured by Nationally normed and validated achievement
tests …..
1.
An observed or measured rate of
acquisition/retention of new academic content or skills
that reflect gifted ability.
1. Demonstrated achievement, performance or
expertise in one or more academic areas as evidenced by
excellence of products, portfolio or research, as well as
criterion-referenced team judgment.
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4. Early and measured use of high level
thinking skills, academic creativity,
leadership skills, intense academic interest
areas, communications skills, foreign
language aptitude or technology expertise.
5. Documented … evidence that intervening
factors such as English as a second
language, disabilities defined in 34 CFR
300.8…, gender or race bias, or
socio/cultural deprivation are masking
gifted abilities.
Only 3- 5% of the population
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BELL CURVE & ASYNCHRONICITY
AVG. RANGE
GIFTED & TALENTED
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HIGHLY GIFTED &
TALENTED
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HIGHER THE ABILITY
HIGHER THE ASYNCHRONICITY
(OR SCATTER) IN DEVELOPMENT
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Asynchronous Development
Social
Emotional
Academic
Like a tuner on a stereo system
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Gifted Traits in the Classroom
 Asynchronous Development *
 Fast Rate of Acquisition (ahead of plans)
 Strong Rate of Retention
 Intense (Can stick with or beat an interest or issue to
death)
 Complexity of Thought (make connections)
 Creative Thought (“left field” ideas)
 Social and Emotional Traits
 (Gifted Underachievement)
 2 handouts
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Positive and Negative Sides of
the Same Trait….
“Sometimes your gift takes you to a
place that your character is not ready to
handle.”
Quote from former Detroit Mayor, Kwame Kilpatrick, who
went to jail for 38 counts of extortion, bribery and fraud.
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Differentiated Instruction
Rather than taking students
through a lock - step curriculum,
teachers modify their instruction
to meet students’ varying readiness
levels, instructional
preferences, ability and interests.
NCLB - Regular Ed - Gifted
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 You may already be doing many of the
strategies about to be presented.
 It may mean adapting the strategies for
use with different lessons, adding choice
of requirements, using different
emphasis of time or a different level of
material.
Content
Process
Product
Handout – Principles of Diff Curr
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Suggestions for Advanced Student Lessons:
• Use higher order thinking skills – not fact
regurgitation
• Be cross curricular, complex
• Go above grade level standards
• Be replacement work, not additional work
• Have limited Instructions, Open-ended: Less is More
• Involve rigorous and abstract concepts; BIG IDEAS
• Use pre-assessment, formative and summative
assessments for placement
• Teach them to be autonomous problem solvers
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Content
Product
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Process
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Rates of Acquisition
 Most students can take material from their
short term memory to long term memory
after 7 repetitions.
 Gifted students may retain information after
1 - 3 exposures to information.
 Slower learners may need more repetitions
through different learning styles and
approaches.
Handout curriculum
continuuum
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Pacing lessons is a challenge.
 You will have students who are done the
assignment before you finish the directions.
 You will have students who need repeated
practice presented using multiple strategies.
Giving students in the first group
more of the same problems to do
will be viewed as punishment for
completing work quickly.
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Three Levels of Pacing
 Daily Pacing Changes: repetition to
enrichment (one day activities)
 Chapter or partial chapter
replacement activities (1 - 2 week
activities)
 Acceleration or academic support
(whole year changes - less than 3% of
the population)
Handout enrichment/math notebooks
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Assessments Help Differentiate
Pre - assessments
 Determine current level of readiness - even mastery
 Provides data for learning options
Formative assessments
 Data gathered to determine on-going progress during unit
 Provides data on misconceptions or lack of understanding
Summative assessments
 Determine mastery of content, may be exit grade or score
 Should align with curricular objectives, standards,
benchmarks
 Should parallel formative assessments - does not always have
to be a test.
Handout - assessments
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Steps for grouping students.
 Pretest students for the chapter or topic
 Analyze the results - do an error analysis
 Group students according to the level of expertise that they
bring to that chapter
 Students can be grouped by:
 total number correct: over 80% only do sections
 types of errors: which sections of the chapter do
they need to study?
 learning style, reading level or your own criteria for
class
 rate of acquisition: speed of understanding
CEILING EFFECT
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Grouping Suggestions
 Use heterogeneous groups for open-ended problem
solving or when a concept is new to all students.
 Homogeneous groups are appropriate for brief
review, skill development or different level work.
 Depending on your goal, students should be allowed to
work independently according to their preference.
 Students should occasionally have opportunities to
select their own groups based on common interests.
 All students need to learn skills for working together
before cooperative learning activities can be successful.
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 After pre-assessment, which students do
not need to cover the objectives you have
listed?
 What alternative activities, extended
processes can you add?
 Look at the Standards. Can you teach
skills/processes for the next higher level?
 Processes can include: applications,
analysis, creativity, evaluation type
activities, research skills.
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Some Comments
 Gifted students may not need the first 3
chapters of the math book each year. Substitute
enriched activities with depth.
 Provide classroom options of higher level
replacement reading for content areas.
 Gifted students respond to choice of
assignments even if much harder than other
work.
 Do not use gifted students as tutors long-term.
This can be frustrating for both students.
 Teach the hardest part of the lesson first – then
assess
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HOTS
SCAMPER
6 Thinking Hats
Tiered Activities
Think Tac Toe
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REPLACE
NOT JUST MORE….
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Gifted Curriculum Generally…
At a faster pace (rate of retention)
At a higher level (change content)
Offer opportunities for complexity (depth
and breadth)
Be cross-curricular (provide other
applications, flexible, make connections)
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How do we Implement the Standards at a
Gifted Level?
 Recognize that many of the standards focus
on higher level thought.
 Select core models to use in implementing
key process skills embedded in standards.
 Address the skills in the standards
repeatedly (use models over and over).
 Select materials that address the intent of
the standards, not just the content.
 Always consider ways to integrate learning
across standards.
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How do we Implement the Standards
at a Gifted Level? (cont.)
 When gifted students exceed standards at given
stages, accelerate them to the next level within or
across subjects; within or across levels. Use
relevant materials to enhance extended learning
opportunities.
 Read and interpret standards across grade levels.
Be familiar with the standards 1-3 grades above
yours for developing advanced task demands.
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Criteria for Selecting Curriculum
1. Can all students in your class
complete this activity?
2. Have pre-assessments determined
correct instructional levels?
3. Is flexibility built into the content,
process and product requirements?
4. What other criteria would you add?
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Adaptation and modifications
Differentiating
Instruction
• Content (Placement changes)
• Process (Instructional Strategies)
• Products (Alternative Assessment)
• Learning Environment
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Curriculum Adaptations (Content)
 Abstract thought rather than concrete
(HOTS)
 Complex – open-ended, no clear solution
 Multi-disciplinary – cross curricular
 Organization – non-sequential or
accelerated
 Study of people – math series, science
 Methods of inquiry – Socratic
 Cross grade-level content
Curriculum Adaptations (Process)
 Higher order thinking, critical skills training,
problem solving
 Open-ended thinking
 Proof and reasoning
 Value of group production/individual
 Discovery, shared inquiry, problem- based
learning
 Testing out, multi-grade grouping, nongraded class
 Simulations, programmed instruction
Curriculum Adaptations (Product)
Real world products
Real audiences/authentic
assessments
Systematic, corrective feedback
Individual benchmark setting –
beyond the grade level
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Higher Order Thinking Skills
Regular Bloom
Time
emphasis
evaluation
synthesis
application
Comprehension
knowledge
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Higher Order Thinking Skills
evaluation
synthesis
application
comprehension
Gifted Bloom
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Knowledge
A
different
emphasis
of time.
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Inductive and Deductive Thought
 Stories with holes
 What’s my rule?
 Book Activity – handout
 Six Thinking Hats
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Creativity - teach what it is!
Thinking
Fluency
Flexibility
Originality
Elaboration
and
Feeling
Risk Taking
Complexity
Curiosity
Imagination
And Ways to do it!
S. C. A. M. P. E. R.
Analogy – Metaphors – Force Fit
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Techniques to be creative
Substitute
Combine
Adapt
Modify: magnify or minify
Put to other uses
Eliminate
Rearrange, reverse
Activity: shoes, books, movices
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Techniques
to be
creative
http://themes.pppst.com/6hats.html
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WHITE: facts
RED: emotions
BLACK: negative aspects
YELLOW: positives
GREEN: creative
BLUE: summary
http://www.learnerslink.comquestioning_card.htm
(Bookmarked)
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Tiered Activities
 Use an assignment or activity and take it to
different levels or approaches.
 Students may have a choice to select the
level at which to work or the project
 Differentiation may follow ability level,
learning styles, content, process, product
changes.
 Great for heterogeneous classrooms.
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Tiered Assignments should be…
Different work, not more or less work
Equally active
 Equally interesting and engaging
 Fair in terms of work expectations and time
needed
 Requiring the use of key concepts, skills, or
ideas

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Tiered Assignments - gifted range
 Use advanced
 Allows for explor-
materials
ation of principles
 Make certain the highest  Encourages broader
activity is complex
knowledge
 Students must
 Can focus on
transform ideas, not
problem solving
reproduce them
 Provides meaningful
 Activity can be open
work at right level
ended
 Can develop creative
talents
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Cross Curricular Sites and Ideas
 Future Problem Solving
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_Problem
_Solving_Program_International
 Current Events: New York Times Learning
Network
http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com/
(bookmarked)
Think Tac Toe
handout
 You Choose book
Directions for TTT:
http://teach.fcps.net/trt7/Think%20Tac%20Toe.htm
Sample TTT boards:
http://daretodifferentiate.wikispaces.com/Choice+
Boards (bookmarked)
http://2differentiate.pbworks.com/w/page/860118/Thin
kTacToe
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Learning Contracts
Vary student work
by creating
contracts (goals)
that include
complex skill and
enriched content
components
(objectives). Handouts: Sample Independent Contract
Rubric from slide 3
Ind Study TTT
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A
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B
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Open
Ended
Picture
Study
 Write a caption for this picture from your content area
 Write one question/problem from your content area
about the picture for students to answer
 Select 3 vocabulary words from your content to go with
the picture
 Use this approach with students: creative, open-ended
and high order thinking
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Webquests
 Can easily be searched by grade level through college on
any topic
 Easily leveled to differentiate for your class using similar
topic
 Provide excellent alternatives to traditional curriculum if a
student or group of students “test out”
Sample Resource sites:
http://www1.smsd.org/staffdev/middle/middleweb/web_que
sts.htm
Search: webquest + topic + grade level
Object Day
 All lessons in the school for that day are focused
around the same object
 Teachers innovatively develop a lesson in their content
area on the topic of the day around the object
 The object for today is: pencils
 Within your group, develop in 5 minutes a lesson for
pencils…..
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Rationale for Curriculum Compacting
 Students already know most of their texts before
“learning” it.
 Textbooks have been “dumbed down.”
 The needs of high-ability students are not often met
in classrooms.
 Compacting frees time for more challenging
learning experiences.
 Pace of instruction and practice time can be
modified.
 Compacting guarantees educational accountability
and equity.
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Compacting
Identify the need for compacting
2. Compact the regular curriculum
3. Provide alternative activities
4. Keep records of the process
1.
Handout: Mechanicsburg info for Compacting
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COMPACTING
1. Pre- assess student
knowledge (not all students
need to be pre-assessed)
2. Determine what can be
skipped because
mastery is demonstrated
3. Teach what is not
known
4. Frees time for
indepth work, enrichment
activities, or
acceleration.
Repetition in curriculum is frequent
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Requires Teamwork of Staff
• Administrator
 Classroom Teacher
– Budget funds for
 Determine curriculum
enrichment materials
goals
– Oversee schedules for
 Assess student
teacher coaching
mastery
– Provide time
 Plan enrichment
to develop materials
 Teacher of Gifted
– Reinforce change
 Organize, coach
with positive
teacher training
comments
– Allow for flexible
 Assist teachers in
approaches
locating materials.
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Recommended Resource sites
• googlelittrips.com or
http://www.googlelittrips.com/GoogleLit/Home.html
This site is an experiment in teaching great literature in a
very different way. Using Google Earth, students
discover where in the world the greatest road trip
stories of all time took place.
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Literature
• www.shelfari.com
bookshelf – add books to talk
about books; put on a book, rate it and summarize it
• www.battleofthebooks.org/ - Battle of the books –
then do a quizbowl activity at the end
•
• http://bookbuilder.cast.org/
Use this site to
create, share, publish, and read digital books that
engage and support diverse learners according to their
individual needs, interests, and skills.
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Virtual School Options
 Florida Virtual School – high school level, accredited
nationally, flexible, advanced/remedial
 Internet High School, tuition free
 On-line university level courses
 Keystone School, advanced middle and HS course
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Make a list of 5 fundamental
requirements for teaching gifted
 Get out index card started with
 Would you add or change anything to what you know
about teaching gifted kids
 Hand in your cards when done
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Tips for Making Changes
 Start Small - experience success!
 Select one area to change, one activity
 Find a variety of alternatives
 Choose the best options
 Decide how to document
 Place in plan book for use each year
 Alternate plan should take 2+ classes
 Share with each other!
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Additional Information
Pennsylvania Association for Gifted Ed
http://www.penngifted.org/
National Association for Gifted Children
http://www.nagc.org/
The Hoagies’ Site
http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/
Handout: web resources
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Have a great school year!
Linda
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