FAQ

I am wondering if my student could be gifted. What are some of the characteristics? 

There are many definitions of giftedness. The definition that most Australian education jurisdictions use, is the explanation embedded in Francoys Gagne’s Differentiated Model of Giftedness and Talent (2008).  Gagne’ states that giftedness exists on a continuum and across various domains, such as intellectual, physical, creative and social-emotional; indeed, giftedness can cross domains. Giftedness can also be found in diverse groups. Some examples include Aboriginal children, children from low socio-economic backgrounds, children from various language and cultural groups, as well as children from different geographical locations. Gifted students with disability, or twice exceptional students will present differently yet again, due to added complexity. As giftedness spans these diverse areas, it makes it difficult to present a prescribed list of characteristics. One characteristic that all gifted students will have in common, however, is that their potential exceeds those of the same age cohort.

Gifted students can also present with characteristics that perplex families, peers and teachers. These can include 

• perfectionism
• challenging authority (often observed, but not only, in 2e children)
• frustration and meltdowns
• overly sensitive to injustice

These characteristics manifest when a child’s development is asynchronous i.e., their mental, emotional and intellectual development is uneven.

Giftedness presents at an early age. During the years of parallel play, these traits may not be so obvious. Around the age of four, some gifted children may present as ’loners’. When considering early entry, early childhood educators should note this may not be because these children are immature or lack social skills, but often because they cannot find a ‘like mind’. Their interests are usually different from those of their peer group, and they are more intense about these interests. They often prefer the company of adults. Michael Sayler’s ‘Gifted and Talented Checklist for Parents (Things my young child has done)’ suggests parents write down examples of behaviours such as deep knowledge, intense curiosity, accurate recall of information, empathy, advanced vocabulary, early reading or advanced facility with numbers, as evidence to share with educators.

During the primary school years, gifted students display many traits, however it is important to understand that these are often related to developmental processes. Different traits will be evidenced at different times and will vary according to context. There are common traits that are justifiably used as an ‘alert’ to teachers. These include advanced ability in one or more domains, rapid progress in learning, mastering concepts in a different way and intensity in areas of strengths and passions. 

The traits listed below should not be used as a checklist and may not apply to all children but all have been observed in gifted children:

intellectual

• asks complex and interesting questions
• signs of creativity and abstractness in the thinking process
• makes connections easily
• enjoys hypothesising
• identifies different points of view
• analytical
• concentration and perseverance
• mature sense of humour
• creative and critical thinking skills
• astute observation skills

Social-emotional

• leadership skills
• empathy
• participation in social justice issues
• strong communication skills
• problem solver

Creative

• strong imagination
• thinking ‘outside the box’
• ability to engender many ideas
• strong visual memory
• flexibility and divergence in thinking 
• ability to express ideas through dance, music, art and/or drama
• develops more than one solution to a problem

Physical

• early gross and fine motor development
• well-coordinated and well-controlled body movements
• high levels of physical energy
• endurance, stamina and persistence in physical activities

When considering these lists of characteristics for a possible gifted child, use them as the step before the identification process. If many of these characteristics are observed, approach your learning support team and/or school counsellor and request a deeper investigation using the identification processes that the school or the state/territory has in place. At some point, psychometric testing, as an objective, valid and reliable tool should be administered. 

• extra-curricular activities or interests
• samples of work produced at home
• external assessment reports, including areas where the child may be struggling e.g., Occupational therapy intervention, psychologist’s reports, paediatrician’s reports
• academic strengths e.g., early reading
• awards, competitions, or special achievements.

• disengagement
• lack of motivation
• inadequate access to opportunities
• disability
• social disadvantage
• lack of English language proficiency
• geographical isolation
• health or wellbeing issues.

Identification of giftedness can help schools and parents determine their child’s academic and social emotional needs. Identification can occur formally and informally, both at home and at school. This response discusses formal identification and the instruments that can measure levels of intellectual giftedness. 

Miraca Gross (2000) created a table showing IQ and levels of giftedness, which can be used as a guide. 

Levels of giftedness               IQ range                              Prevalence

Mildly                                        115– 129                              >1:40

Moderately                               130 - 144                              1:40 – 1:1000

Highly                                       145 - 159                              1:1000 – 1:10 000

Exceptionally                           160 - 179                               1:10 000 – 1:1 million

Profoundly                               180+                                      <1:1 million

Educators in the field of gifted education recommend multiple assessment strategies to be used in the classroom to determine giftedness. Formal identification showing levels of giftedness, however, can only be administered by a registered professional. These can include school counsellors and school psychologists, as well as private educational and clinical psychologists. 

Commonly used assessments in Australia include:

• Stanford-Binet V (Age 2 - 85+) 
• Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children WISC-V (Age 6 -16) 
• Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence WPPSI-IV (Age 2 -7.7) 

The challenges in administering these tests vary. They take several hours to administer and score, which makes them expensive.  The verbal component scores may be impacted by culturally or linguistically diverse student groups and so they can be less effective. They do not measure other forms of giftedness, such as creative giftedness.

The strengths of these tests are that they are written for targeted age groups. They also have rigor in standardisation, rigor in the medium of measurement and consistency in administration requirements. These tests, therefore, are reliable, valid, and objective.  The assessments have a long history based on large normative samples and validity has been established in multiple countries. These instruments measure both verbal and non-verbal reasoning. They are administered individually, and the reports not only give a test score but also observations about behaviours during the testing process such as levels of attention and emotional dependence. This individual administration may reduce anxiety levels for the student. 

You will have students in your group or class who upon entry, will already know how to read/or have an inherent knowledge of numbers and their patterns. It is vital for you, as a teacher, to understand student mastery of concepts, which is best done through pre-assessment and talking to the student’s parents. This will guide you to plan appropriate adjustments to meet each child’s learning needs. Every student has the right to learn something new every day. A question, that you, as a teacher, can ask yourself is: Am I meeting the needs of ALL my students, or just some of them? 

While it is vital that teachers know their students and how they learn, this response focuses on the overall classroom learning environment. The learning environment must meet the needs of all students in an inclusive, safe, and accepting way. All student contributions should be valued and respected equally by both teachers and classmates. Play based structures are one way of meeting these needs. 

Activities, tasks, lessons and enrichment, for this age group, are best done incorporating play, discovery and inquiry. Consider the unit you are currently teaching. Consider the main concept and translate that to ‘big picture’ ideas. Gifted students love ‘big ideas.’ Some examples (F-2) using the Australian Curriculum HASS (Humanities and Social Sciences) units include: 

My personal world: Key concept Identity

How my world is different from the past and can change in the future: Key concept Change

Our past and present connections to people and places: Key concept Connections

Science-based tasks and activities where creativity abounds, lend themselves beautifully to this ‘key concept’ scenario. This way all students can access the activity, but the gifted students will take it to a deeper level. Observe these students and create annotations, which can be used as just one identification tool. This will provide data for recommending further identification measures. 

You could have several activities grouped under one theme e.g., Change. Provide the activities as part of play-based choices but extend student thinking by providing provocative questions. These could be written on large cards. This provides the students with choices, which is a strategy to meet the needs of gifted students. 

Some examples: 

1. How can we change plastic bottles so they can grow plants? (Adult supervision will be needed for cutting)

Provide: plastic bottles, pictures, plants and other relevant materials.

Design: Arrange plants and rocks in a way that people will be able to see them all clearly. 

Provocative questions:  You are making a terrarium. In a terrarium you do not need to water your plants. Where will the plants get their water from? How has changing the bottle to a terrarium helping the environment? What other objects could we make out of plastic bottles?

Adjustment to the core curriculum: Complexity

2. How can we change a torch into a communication device?

Provide: torches, a dark space and a Morse code chart

Design: Choose a word to send to a friend in Morse code

Provocative questions: Invent a new method of communication. How will your new method of communication change people’s lives?

Adjustment to the core curriculum: Choice

3. How can we change a paper glider to turn left or right or loop the loop?

Provide: templates to make paper gliders, cardboard, plasticine, paperclips, sticky tape, scissors

Design: Add weight and/or folds to change flight trajectory. Test and modify.

Provocative questions: How is the way my glider flies, similar to that of birds? What makes you say that?  (Provide a way to observe bird flight e.g., near a window, you tube clip)

What other changes could be made to an airplane and why?

Adjustment to the core curriculum: Abstraction

4. How have push/pull toys changed over the years? 

Provide: old and modern push/pull toys, pictures of old push/pull toys and modern push/pull toys, websites that demonstrate the push/pull action, materials to build a toy that moves

Design: Invent a toy that moves. 

Provocative questions: How can your toy be changed to move uphill? How can your toy be changed to carry a load? 

Adjustment to the core curriculum: Critical and creative thinking

 These differentiated adjustments to the core curriculum will give you an idea of the strategies that can be employed for young, gifted children. They may be inspired by the provocative questions, or they may come up with their own. Providing open-ended activities will allow each student to shine, swap ideas respectfully and discuss collaboratively. Allow students to share their thinking and encourage their classmates to actively listen. Promote respect and awe by praising and encouraging innovation and invention in student-constructed products. These strategies will create whole class cohesion and  a safe space for ALL students to thrive. 

What can teachers do in the classroom to ensure they are designing and offering learning experiences for these students that are engaging, challenging and ensure learning gain? 

There is a vast amount of literature related to gifted and talented students and their education. Decades of research has culminated in clear and consistent information about identification, characteristics, underachievement, strategies in the classroom, accelerative options, social/emotional needs, and how to plan appropriately challenging learning programs. Despite this, gifted and talented students remain widely under-served, under-stimulated and demonstrate limited academic growth on school-based, standardised and national testing. Karen Rogers, in her meta-analysis of decades of research in the field of gifted and talented education, identifies five key “lessons” that describe what is consistently known and understood to be key strategies for gifted students.

1. Gifted and talented learners need daily challenge in their specific areas of talent.
2. Opportunities should be provided on a regular basis for gifted learners to be unique and to work independently in their areas of passion and talent.
3. Provide various forms of subject-based & grade-based acceleration to gifted learners as their educational needs require.
4. Provide opportunities for gifted learners to socialise and to learn with like-ability peers.
5. For specific curriculum areas, instructional delivery must be differentiated in pace, amount of review and practice, & organisation of content presentation.

(Rogers, 2007)

The “daily challenge” message makes it clear that classroom teachers are the critical ingredient in ensuring gifted and talented students are learning every day, and this message is reiterated within the AITSL Australian Professional Standards for Teachers Standards. Teachers of abilitygrouped, streamed or mixed-ability classes have strategies available to them as they are planning and implementing differentiated learning for gifted and talented students within their class.

Engagement

In order to maintain engagement in their education, it is important that gifted and talented students are actually learning when they come to school each day, and see school as a place where their prior learning is recognised and new learning occurs. To ensure this happens on a daily basis, we

must:

• Pre and formatively assess students to determine prior knowledge and avoid students practicing and repeating skills, knowledge and understandings they have already mastered. Gifted students often experience school as a place where week after week, topic after topic, and year after year, they are asked to unnecessarily practice and repeat skills. It is important to find quick and efficient ways to find out what students know and have mastered, and to plan class and homework that introduces and builds upon new learning.
• Make sure students are not asked to complete ‘core’ work before they can access the work that is genuinely at their level and will offer challenge. Extension and challenge tasks that are given out after students have finished, fall into this category. A core principle of differentiation is that all students are working at their level from the beginning of a class, rather than having to ‘earn’ the work that they should be able to access from the beginning of a lesson. Gifted students often experience years of being ‘rewarded’ for completing their work by being given more, and over time they become demoralised or learn to avoid the extra work by finding ways to waste time.
• Avoid asking the strongest students to mentor, coach or teach other students. Teachers often do this with the rationale that this helps both students. In reality, neither the weak nor the strong student benefits from this arrangement. It is important to remember that our brightest students deserve to be learning new material rather than being a substitute teacher, just as other students expect to do every day. Gifted students enjoy and should be able to work with intellectual peers on a daily basis, in order to feel accepted, express their ideas without fear of criticism and to be appropriately challenged.
• Avoid asking students to catch-up on missed work if they are out of the classroom to access extension work or gifted programming. This is especially true if the missed work includes unnecessary practice and repetition! Whenever students are involved in withdrawal or pull-out programs, it is important to look for ways to assess knowledge and credit learning between the classroom and pull-out program.
• Gifted students enjoy learning when they can see the big picture and whole-to-part teaching works well to achieve this. Strategies such as introducing an ‘essential question’ or ‘big idea’ at the beginning of a unit of work, can increase student motivation to learn the necessary underlying skills and knowledge, and serve as a reminder to teachers to keep a focus on the high order aspects of the learning. Essential questions or big ideas must be high order and interest can be increased by making them provocative, ambiguous and/or thought-provoking.

Daily challenge

There are a number of ways that teachers can offer daily challenge to students as they plan their differentiated success criteria, learning goals, resources, lessons, activities, assessments and programs.

Level of abstractness – consider extending the thinking that students do, by increasing the

level of abstractness. This can be done through questioning and task design, and can be a simple way to ensure students are thinking about and engaging with learning at a higher level without necessarily changing the activity or resource. Bloom’s Taxonomy (1956) is a good resource to assist with this planning, and research done by Davis and Rimm (2004) found that it is important for gifted and talented students to be working in the top three highorder areas (Analysis, Synthesis, Evaluation) the majority of the time.

Pace – differentiating the pace at which gifted and talented students are able to access and move through new material is vital to ensuring students are engaged and experiencing daily challenge. In order for teachers to differentiate pace, they need to be pre and formatively assessing to determine what students already know and how quickly they are grasping new knowledge, skills and conceptual

understanding, with an aim to reduce the amount of unnecessary repetition and practice.

Degree of complexity – making a task more interconnected with other ideas can increase the rigour of the thinking required from students. We extend students when we ask them to think about multiple ideas and the connections between these ideas, rather than asking them to engage with one idea at a time. The SOLO Taxonomy (1982) is a good resource to assist with planning this type of learning, questioning and assessment, and teachers should aim for gifted and talented students to be consistently working in the top two areas (“Relational” and “Extended Abstract”).

Accelerative options – Extension, enrichment and the strategies listed above are important ways to plan appropriately challenging learning experiences for gifted and talented students, however accelerative options are equally important, if not more so. Accelerative options are any learning material that offers above-grade material or access to this material. For many gifted and talented students, there is only so much differentiation, extension and enrichment that

is possible before they genuinely need to explore and learn above-level material. VanTassel-Baska and Stambaugh (2006) argue that accelerating content must be considered as a priority by teachers when planning learning experiences for gifted and talented students.

Learning gain

As teachers we need to ask if we have the information we need to measure the learning gain of our gifted and talented students. If we can’t measure learning gain, it is unlikely we are offering them daily challenge and may mean they are not learning at all, even if they seem to be achieving. To ensure we can measure learning gain, we need to design our pre assessments so that we can find out the point at which students do not know material. If a preassessment is too easy and students get every aspect correct, then we have not discovered a baseline from which to plan our teaching and we will not be able to measure learning gain if it occurs. We also need to ensure our summative assessments offer enough difficulty to assess the advanced learning that students have been accessing.

Implementing these strategies in no way implies that gifted and talented students deserve more than any other student. Rather, we are endeavouring to level the playing field for these students, to provide the same degree of challenge as other students experience each day at school, to foster the same ability to persevere with tasks that are difficult, to see themselves as learners, and to

experience school as a place where learning occurs on a daily basis.

References:

• Biggs, J., and Collis, K. (1982). The SOLO Taxonomy. New York: Academic Press.
• Bloom, B.S. (1956). Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, Handbook I: The Cognitive Domain. New York: Longmans, Green.
• Davis, G.A., and Rimm, S,B. (2004). Education of the gifted and talented. University of Michigan: Pearson.
• Rogers, K.B. (Fall, 2007). Lessons Learned About Educating the Gifted and Talented: A Synthesis of the Research on Educational Practice. Gifted Child Quarterly, 51(4), 382-396.
• VanTassel-Baska, J., and Stambaugh, T. (2006) Comprehensive Curriculum for Gifted and Talented Learners, 3rd Edition. College of William and Mary: Pearson.

With thanks to  Kylie Bice for this answer.

There are many definitions of giftedness. The definition that most Australian education jurisdictions use, is the explanation embedded in Francoys Gagne’s Differentiated Model of Giftedness and Talent (2008).  Gagne’ states that giftedness exists on a continuum and across various domains, such as intellectual, physical, creative and social-emotional; indeed, giftedness can cross domains. Giftedness can also be found in diverse groups. Some examples include Aboriginal children, children from low socio-economic backgrounds, children from various language and cultural groups, as well as children from different geographical locations. Gifted students with disability, or twice exceptional students will present differently yet again, due to added complexity. As giftedness spans these diverse areas, it makes it difficult to present a prescribed list of characteristics. One characteristic that all gifted students will have in common, however, is that their potential exceeds those of the same age cohort.

Gifted students can also present with characteristics that perplex families, peers and teachers. These can include 

• perfectionism
• challenging authority (often observed, but not only, in 2e children)
• frustration and meltdowns
• overly sensitive to injustice

These characteristics manifest when a child’s development is asynchronous i.e., their mental, emotional and intellectual development is uneven.

Giftedness presents at an early age. During the years of parallel play, these traits may not be so obvious. Around the age of four, some gifted children may present as ’loners’. When considering early entry, early childhood educators should note this may not be because these children are immature or lack social skills, but often because they cannot find a ‘like mind’. Their interests are usually different from those of their peer group, and they are more intense about these interests. They often prefer the company of adults. Michael Sayler’s ‘Gifted and Talented Checklist for Parents (Things my young child has done)’ suggests parents write down examples of behaviours such as deep knowledge, intense curiosity, accurate recall of information, empathy, advanced vocabulary, early reading or advanced facility with numbers, as evidence to share with educators. 

During the primary school years, gifted students display many traits, however it is important to understand that these are often related to developmental processes. Different traits will be evidenced at different times and will vary according to context. There are common traits that are justifiably used as an ‘alert’ to teachers. These include advanced ability in one or more domains, rapid progress in learning, mastering concepts in a different way and intensity in areas of strengths and passions. 

The traits listed below should not be used as a checklist and may not apply to all children but all have been observed in gifted children:

Intellectual

• asks complex and interesting questions
• signs of creativity and abstractness in the thinking process
• makes connections easily
• enjoys hypothesising
• identifies different points of view
• analytical
• concentration and perseverance
• mature sense of humour
• creative and critical thinking skills
• astute observation skills

Social-emotional

• leadership skills
• empathy
• participation in social justice issues
• strong communication skills
• problem solver

Creative

• strong imagination
• thinking ‘outside the box’
• ability to engender many ideas
• strong visual memory
• flexibility and divergence in thinking 
• ability to express ideas through dance, music, art and/or drama
• develops more than one solution to a problem

Physical

• early gross and fine motor development
• well-coordinated and well-controlled body movements
• high levels of physical energy
• endurance, stamina and persistence in physical activities

When considering these lists of characteristics for a possible gifted child, use them as the step before the identification process. If many of these characteristics are observed, approach your learning support team and/or school counsellor and request a deeper investigation using the identification processes that the school or the state/territory has in place. At some point, psychometric testing, as an objective, valid and reliable tool should be administered. 

• extra-curricular activities or interests
• samples of work produced at home
• external assessment reports, including areas where the child may be struggling e.g., Occupational therapy intervention, psychologist’s reports, paediatrician’s reports
• academic strengths e.g., early reading
• awards, competitions, or special achievements.

• disengagement
• lack of motivation
• inadequate access to opportunities
• disability
• social disadvantage
• lack of English language proficiency
• geographical isolation
• health or wellbeing issues.

Identification of giftedness can help schools and parents determine their child’s academic and social emotional needs. Identification can occur formally and informally, both at home and at school. This response discusses formal identification and the instruments that can measure levels of intellectual giftedness. 

Miraca Gross (2000) created a table showing IQ and levels of giftedness, which can be used as a guide. 

Levels of giftedness               IQ range                              Prevalence

Mildly                                        115– 129                              >1:40

Moderately                               130 - 144                              1:40 – 1:1000

Highly                                       145 - 159                              1:1000 – 1:10 000

Exceptionally                           160 - 179                               1:10 000 – 1:1 million

Profoundly                               180+                                      <1:1 million

Educators in the field of gifted education recommend multiple assessment strategies to be used in the classroom to determine giftedness. Formal identification showing levels of giftedness, however, can only be administered by a registered professional. These can include school counsellors and school psychologists, as well as private educational and clinical psychologists. 

Commonly used assessments in Australia include:

• Stanford-Binet V (Age 2 - 85+) 
• Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children WISC-V (Age 6 -16) 
• Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence WPPSI-IV (Age 2 -7.7) 

The challenges in administering these tests vary. They take several hours to administer and score, which makes them expensive.  The verbal component scores may be impacted by culturally or linguistically diverse student groups and so they can be less effective. They do not measure other forms of giftedness, such as creative giftedness.

The strengths of these tests are that they are written for targeted age groups. They also have rigor in standardisation, rigor in the medium of measurement and consistency in administration requirements. These tests, therefore, are reliable, valid, and objective.  The assessments have a long history based on large normative samples and validity has been established in multiple countries. These instruments measure both verbal and non-verbal reasoning. They are administered individually, and the reports not only give a test score but also observations about behaviours during the testing process such as levels of attention and emotional dependence. This individual administration may reduce anxiety levels for the student.