1st World Giftedness Center International Conference
The 1st World Giftedness Center International Conference will launch the World Giftedness Center officially as an initiative by the Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Foundation for Distinguished Academic Performance and will bring together world-renowned researchers and practitioners from across several countries. While scholars will showcase cutting-edge research findings from the fields of gifted education and talent development, practitioners with excellent giftedness initiatives will demonstrate best practice examples. Among researchers and practitioners alike, the event will facilitate an exchange of ideas and experiences through both meaningful discussions, and via a diversity of workshops concerned with the most pressing topics in gifted education and talent development.
One of the biggest questions in psychology asks: are we the way we are because we were born that way, or because we were raised that way? Is it nature or nurture? In the field of giftedness research, there is also the question of whether intelligence is determined by our genes or by our environment. And if both our genes together with the environment affect intelligence, which of the two is the dominant factor? Workshop participants can look forward to gaining a better understanding of what it means for a trait to be inborn or acquired. Participants will learn more about the influence of nature vs. nurture on the development of intelligence – is there an intelligence gene, for example. Or what are effective environmental factors of intelligence? How can we apply this information to everyday life and what are the practical implications of doing so?
Copyright (c) 2023 1st World Giftedness Center International Conference
Creativity is becoming increasingly important in modern society and education. But what is creativity and how do we measure it? In this workshop, the lecturer will provide an overview of various theoretical and research-based approaches to measuring creativity. Participants will learn about methods for measuring aspects of creativity including the creative person, creative product, and creative process. Moreover, the lecturer will also introduce the most commonly used creativity tests, and will provide examples as to how to select and apply suitable creativity tests for different research and education purposes. Upon completion of this workshop, participants will have a good understanding of different approaches, methods, and tests for assessing creativity, facilitating a better understanding of creativity research and for fostering creativity at home and at school
Gifted children have a special learning potential. they often show this potential by performing exceptionally well. However, there are also children whose gifted qualities are not as obvious: the so-called underachievers. How can we support these individuals if we have a hard time identifying them? -is question will be explored in this workshop. In this course, we will define the phenomenon of underachievement along with characteristics of underachievement. We will also discuss the causes of it, possibilities for identification in the plenary session, and work out possible support options for teachers and parents. Among participants, the seminar will facilitate an international exchange of experiences.
Planning and Implementing Best-Practice Mentoring Programs for High-Achieving, Highly Motivated Children and Youths in Scholastic and Extracurricular Programs
Mentoring is an important measure within the talent development toolkit. In recent decades, the use of mentoring for facilitating domain-specific talent development in educational and professional contexts has expanded dramatically. While the potential of mentoring for helping talented children and youths to develop their special interests and talents is great, ensuring that mentoring is effective is not easy. Successful talent development mentoring requires careful planning and implementation as well as meticulous coordination with all educational stakeholders (e.g., schools, teachers, and parents). In this workshop, best practices of implementing effective, accountable talent development mentoring for high-achieving, highly motivated children and youths will be introduced and explained. -e learning outcome for the workshop: Participants will become aware of key issues to be attended to when planning and implementing mentoring programs for the aforementioned target groups.
Twice-Exceptional Children: When Giftedness Meets Challenges
In this workshop, participants will learn what we mean when we talk about students identified as "twice-exceptional" (2e). Attendees will be introduced to frequently observed characteristics of 2e, as well as to possible combinations of giftedness and behavioral problems within the 2e demographic. -e workshop is structured in two parts: During the first part, we provide a brief basic introduction to the classification and identification of learning and behavioral disorders. We will primarily focus on ADHD, specific learning disorders, and autism spectrum disorder. In part two, we will combine the topic of learning and behavioral problems with giftedness, by introducing the topic of 2e. We will focus on combinations of giftedness and ADHD, giftedness and specific learning disorders, and giftedness and autism spectrum disorder. Additionally, possible intervention methods for parents and teachers will be discussed.
Enrichment represents the provision of experiences, services, and activities to extend the breadth, depth, and complexity of a school regular curriculum. _e main purpose of a school enrichment program is to help students and/or gifted students enhance their potentials, gifts/talents, and be successful at schools and in their life in the future. This introductory workshop is intended to introduce the concept of school enrichment, and familiarize the participants with multiple options of enrichment, including the schoolwide enrichment model. -e workshop was prepared and structured to be presented in an interactive mode. Participants will be encouraged to interact with the presenter and with other fellow participants during both large and small group activities. Briefly, participants will be exposed to enrichment experiences through questioning techniques, cooperative learning, self-reflection, and hand-on-the-work experience. At the end of this presentation participants will demonstrate awareness, knowledge, and ability to identify effective enrichment experiences and opportunities.
Mawhiba Gifted Journey: An Accelerator towards the New Era
In the era of AI minds that exceed humans in speed, problem solving, and fast learning algorithms, there is a pressing need for integrative, innovative, and hybrid minds to form super intelligent brains for an/the unpredictable future. this paper aims at highlighting the digital era that has a great impact on preparing gifted individuals to become active contributors to humanity for the purpose of understanding its characteristics, observing its challenges, and paving the way for talent development as human capital for the forthcoming 5th industrial revolution using Mawhiba 5Es Model. -ree main features depicted this era. the first feature is the increasing exponential growth of acceleration between generations and industrial revolutions which demands more innovation from the gifted and creative minds. -e second feature is the digital culture gap among decision-makers and newer generations, which is leading to differences in the “knowledge, attitude, and practice”. the third feature is the digital technology advancement in AI, which is creating great enthusiasm toward future development among the new generations and cyberworld. this paper highlights Mawhiba gifted journey “5Es Model” that adopts early identification and nurturing of gifted students in STEM fields and employs a constructive system-based approach to develop students’ potentials through continuum services: Exploratory, Empowerment, Excellence, Engagement, and Enablement that ensures maximum return on investment for countries. -e paper exemplifies the alignment of talent development portfolios, global challenge, and emerging economies. It opens doors for unanswered questions and unresolved ethical, pragmatics, trust, and integration issues.
Evidence-Based Development and Implementation of Educational Interventions for Educational Practice: Self-Regulated Learning With Gifted Learners as a Case in Point
The presentation summarizes aspects that are important when conceptualizing, developing, and implementing effective pedagogical concepts. As a case in point, the discussion will focus on a paradigmatic pedagogical intervention with great promise for gifted and talented education: self-regulated learning. The presentation will unfold in five steps. First, I will illustrate the development of a pedagogical intervention based on a review of theory and empirical evidence. Second, I will describe important aspects of creating research designs capable of assessing the effectiveness of pedagogical interventions. third, I will show how important it is to consider a broad array of effectiveness measures. Fourth, I will describe what researchers and practitioners can do to ensure that the pedagogical interventions they offer students are of lasting benefit for their students.
Conceptual Framework of the World Giftedness Center: Educational and Learning Capital in Megatopes.
A growing number of countries have a strong interest in assessing and improving the quality of their talent support systems. Although there are many such attempts, there is a lack of coherent conceptual foundations shared within the talent development community. In the World Giftedness center, we use the combination of two concepts. We maintain that exceptional persons require exceptional environments to develop their exceptional abilities. In the following, we will refer to such extraordinary environments as megatopes. In addition to megatopes we propose some further categories for assessing the degree to which larger social units (cities, countries, etc.) have 41 transformed environments with regard to talent development. Second, for comparative analysis of the quality of learning environments for the gifted, we propose the education and learning capital approach.
The Pressures Gifted Children Feel and How to Prevent and Reverse Underachievement
The environments which foster giftedness also make children vulnerable to feeling extreme pressures. The praise and power which cultivate a positive learning environment may become “too much of a good thing.” Gifted children may internalize highly competitive pressures to be perfect, extraordinarily creative and/or popular. -ese pressures can lead to motivation or may cause defensive underachievement patterns. Families and schools can help gifted children cope with these pressures by providing academic challenges and social-emotional support. Best practices for gifted children at Family Achievement Clinic begin with a parent intake meeting to assess and guide united parenting, referential speaking, gradual and appropriate age-related empowerment and an understanding of early childhood home and school history. A student evaluation follows which includes individual IQ and achievement testing and assessments of possible twice-exceptionalities such as ADHD, depression and/or anxiety. A post assessment meeting with parents and teachers is used to set appropriate academic placement, daily study and behavior habits, weekly goals and reinforcements for effort and achievement. Role models and activities are also recommended for confidence and achievement building. Some actions may seem counterintuitive to adults who have acted oversensitively to anxious students or overpunished/overempowered students. Schools which provide for the social-emotional and academic needs of gifted children will encourage them to thrive on challenges, to develop resilience and make valuable contributions toward our world. Research shows that using Dr. Rimm’s Trifocal Model facilitates success for more than half of underachieving students. Practical strategies for this model are provided in Dr. Rimm’s books.
Supporting Advanced Learners Holistically: An Administrator’s Perspective
When a 13-year-old has mastered calculus, or a 15-year-old has taken all of the advanced high school courses available in the school, what educational pathway is best suited to meet their educational, emotional, and social needs? In this presentation, I share a holistic model as a framework for serving the needs of advanced learners who have chosen to radically accelerate their education and enter college early through programs at the Robinson Center for Young Scholars at the University of Washington in the United States. Supports in each element of the framework include attention to academic growth, social and emotional support, parent and teacher engagement, and college and career planning. Keeping the “whole child” in mind, best practices include maintaining a focus on the family, developing deep understandings of human growth and development, promoting appropriate pedagogical practices, and creating accepting and risk-taking learning environments. Participants will hear specific strategies and stories that describe these practices, as well as suggestions for what to include (or not to include) in their own context and programming for advanced learners. Research on how parents support the academic pursuits of their children entering early entrance to college programs will also be shared.
Best Practice in Advocacy for Gifted Education in the UK
This presentation will consider the educational context within which advocacy for high potential learners takes place in the UK, given that it is in fact for different nations with varying education systems. We will focus on the approach taken by Potential Plus UK to work in partnership with schools and parents to improve the quality and provision of support for young people in both their education, and their social and emotional wellbeing. We will look at the advice and advocacy services required, the need to foster engagement and inclusion, and the good practice of co-designing services and communications to best meet a wide range of needs. In wider UK society there is frequently a perception that clever children will do well in education, regardless of circumstance. We will consider how Potential Plus UK works to strengthen parental and school advocacy and engage societal influencers to campaign for change to such stereotypes. the creation of a community of mutual support is of huge importance for our young people and their families. We will look at best practice in setting up and sustaining communities. Finally, we will look at our work to empower young people with high learning potential, so that they develop self-understanding and become their own best advocates.
Why Networking is Necessary in the Field of Talent Support?
The idea of the European Talent Support Network (ETSN) was articulated in 2011 and it took four more years to officially found the ETSN with the first 14 European Talent Centre in 2015 in the Brussels European Parliament building, in the presence of senior EU officials and MEPs. By 2021 the ETSN has already comprised 26 Centres, including 22 in European countries and 4 in non-European ones and thanks to their mutual work already about 450 Talent Points have joined to it thus ETSN has become the biggest European advocacy group in the field of Talent Support. It became a Dutch registered international civic organisation in 2019. In the lecture network strategy building insights will be shown alongside with steps of the various efforts of the Talents Centres on how to create a living network. What the ETSN has already achieved and the future plans of it will be also introduced. Meanwhile we try to answer the question why networking is necessary in the field of Talent Support and what can be its benefits in the long run.
Equity Gaps in Talent Development: Causes, Effects, and Recommendations
Excellence gaps are defined as “the differences in rates of advanced achievement between various groups of students” and are supposed to “exist in all areas of student activity” (Clark & Roberts, 2019, p. 1). -ey share at least three common features: they 1) point to disparities between groups that 2) violate our notions of equity and therefore 3) require socio-cultural, economic, and pedagogical efforts to close them. Each of these gaps has its own history, leads to individual personal experiences of those affected, and requires specific measures to close them. However, the question arises as to whether these are conceptually completely different phenomena or whether there are also gap commonalities that make it possible to develop more general talent development and gifted education strategies and measures. Three gaps play a special role. We argue from a talent development and gifted education perspective that, taken together, they can provide a conceptual key to better understanding of and bridging between the other gaps: · Achievement gaps refer to the output of (educational) processes, e.g., participation rates, learning outcomes, achievements, rewards. · Opportunity gaps refer to the input of (educational) processes, i.e., resources, opportunities, access to infrastructures, learning opportunities. · Learning gaps refer to individual capacities to take advantage of opportunities, resources, access to infrastructures and learning opportunities These three gaps will be elaborated and illustrated in our contribution.
Creative Giftedness: What Is It, Why Is It Important, How Can We Detect and Nurture It?
This presentation will look at the concept of creative giftedness,also called high creative potential. -is kind of potential refers to original thinking ability and is distinguished from high intellectual potential, measured by intelligence tests and related to “schoolhouse giftedness”. -e history of high creative ability, and tools to detect it will be reviewed. -en, the EPoC battery (Evaluation of Potential Creativity) will be presented and its use to detect creative giftedness will be described. Finally, programs that can help develop high creative potential will be outlined.
How Is Creativity Integrated Effectively in Gifted Programming?
The Fourth Industrial Revolution is forcing researchers and practitioners in gifted education into rethinking of how they should design, shape, and program services for students and individuals with high abilities. -is presentation explores how could creativity be integrated effectively in the system of gifted programming to meet the needs of helping these students to develop necessary skills and knowledge in the fields of their interests. It is vital to understand how creativity influences and is influenced by the mechanism of talent development and their changing environment, resources, opportunities, assumptions, and expectations surrounding them. The main focus in this presentation is on how the environment and other aspects could impact the process and the outcome of creative behavior and product.
Giftedness, Creativity, and Human Possibility
When In this talk I will examine the intersections between giftedness and creativity from a sociocultural perspective. this perspective encourages us to understand the gifted individual in his or her context, as a person whose creative predispositions require a welcoming environment in order to flourish. As such, creative expression is best understood at the encounter between person and world rather than within either of the two taken separately. This approach not only helps us transgress important dichotomies between self and other, psychological and material, creative and noncreative that are equally structuring these literatures, but also calls to our attention the fact that giftedness and creativity alike are phenomena that ultimately expand the space of the possible. At its core, creative giftedness reveals a heightened awareness of what is possible for thought and action and a capacity to explore various such possibilities. I will argue here that both the awareness and exploration of the possible are not rooted in individual-level characteristics as much as in those actions and interactions that open gifted individuals to the world, to other people, and to the future. Implications of this sociocultural framework for the assessment and cultivation and giftedness are offered towards the end.
Mentoring for Talent Development: Global Talent Mentoring as a Cutting-Edge Example
When asked about their earlier talent development paths, eminent experts have at least one thing in common. they almost always describe having had various kinds of mentors during their talent development. Investigations of such reports have revealed that mentoring relationships are crucial as individuals traverse the often long, arduous pathways from novice to eminent expert within a talent domain. Research has also revealed that different types of mentoring experiences are crucial at different times across this trajectory. Moreover, research gives insight into important aspects of effective mentoring for talent development. Yet, oftentimes the hallmarks of effective mentoring for talent development are not implemented in programs. Engaging a research team at the University of Regensburg, in Germany, the Hamdan Foundation has made possible the creation of Global Talent Mentoring, a research-based online mentoring program in science, technology, engineering, mathematics, and the medical sciences (STEMM) for some of the world’s most outstanding and highly motivated youths and young adults. In the presentation, the research-based approach taken to mentoring for talent development by Global Talent Mentoring will be presented, and the audience will discover the potential of a carefully designed and implemented online mentoring program to help our most outstanding youths to grow their enthusiasm and early successes in a STEMM domain into transformative excellence in STEMM that can improve their lives and the prospects of humanity.
A Developmental and Domain-Based View of Mentoring for Talented Students
Despite the role of mentors for talented students varies according to developmental level and domain. Since domains differ as to when they begin, peak, and end, mentoring at the beginning of a talent trajectory may take place in middle school for a science student and in elementary school for a violinist. In later stages of talent development, mentors are more likely to select their protégés than to be organizationally matched with mentees. As mentees gain requisite skills and knowledge mentors place more emphasis on modeling and coaching for psychosocial skills and insider knowledge (access to networks of information, attitudes, and behaviors rewarded by gatekeepers) that allow their mentees to stand out and, if necessary, endure pushback derived from proposing creative ideas or performances that challenge the status quo. these conclusions are derived from studies of mentoring talented students, with an emphasis on identifying similarities across domains, and recognition that mentors’ provision of insider knowledge is particularly important for low-income children and youth.
Learning as Identity Change, Self-Regulated Learning as Identity Exploration: A Complex Dynamic Systems Perspective on the Goals of Education in the 21st Century
Despite The long-held dominant conception of the talented-educated person as a domain expert has served as an abstracted identity that underscored who students should strive to become. _is cultural image has guided curriculum, pedagogy, and assessments that equated learning with developing task mastery, and successful engagement with self-regulated learning: setting task-relevant goals, planning and applying task-relevant strategies, monitoring and adjusting their effective execution towards task success, and reflecting on the learning experience to improve pursuit of task mastery. However, the shifting nature of life and work in the 21st century has challenged the sufficiency of task mastery for personal and collective accomplishments. Traditional domains have been transforming; bodies of knowledge are rapidly shifting; and personal and professional tasks are increasingly ill-defined, require questioning of assumptions and goals, and involve deep value-laden dilemmas. To function constructively in such a volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous world, the conception of the talented-educated person must shift. In this presentation, we use the Dynamic Systems Model of Role Identity—an integrative complex dynamic systems model of identity, motivation, and action—to propose desirable characteristics of 21st century identities as centered on agency and skills in identity exploration. In this conception, learning goes beyond knowledge to reflect identity change, and self-regulated learning goes beyond pursuit of success in predetermined tasks to reflect proactive identity exploration. In this conception, learning goes beyond knowledge to reflect identity change, and self-regulated learning goes beyond pursuit of success in predetermined tasks to reflect proactive engagement in exploring and forming one’s identity to influence contextual change in light of core values. We end by describing design features for environments that promote people’s identity exploration orientation, competencies, and skills.
The Best Practice in Advocacy for Gifted Education of Hong Kong Academy for Gifted Education
Despite Gifted children are often regarded as having exceptionally high intelligence, very focused, maybe great memory and sometimes very creative. But how will these gifted talents prepare these “super children” to excel in the age of the internet and artificial intelligence where the cost of computer memory is almost free and can be stalled in the “cloud” rather than in our head and where A.I. is challenging and even overtaking human intelligence in even corner of our work and life. Are these “gifts” enough for our talented students to stand out and excel in the fast rapidly changing world. In this paper, the author will share their recent practices in gifted education from the Hong Kong Academy for Gifted Education where off-school programs for 10 to 18 years old are provided. A holistic approached is taken in nurturing the most gifted students where both their cognitive and non-cognitive needs are taken care of. Focus will also be placed on STEM education where students are prepared to be the leaders in the fields of science and technology with the necessary 21st century skills equipped for these top talents to face the challenges out the future.
Why it is important to support talented children -- an exploration with the Vice-President of the World Council for Gifted and Talented Children
Talented children have the right to an education that acknowledges, develops and celebrates their abilities. It is the mission of the World Council for Gifted and Talented Children to focus global attention on gifted children to ensure the realisation of their potential to the benefit of humankind. It is important we discuss the needs of gifted children and share best practices in how to identify their unique abilities and qualities, through a range of methods, and then actualize their potential with a continuum of differentiated, accelerated and enriched learning opportunities. -e WCGTC aims to support teachers, researchers, and other professionals in growing our knowledge, skills and advocacy through publications, conferences, position statements, advocacy, networking and support. In this sessions, we will explore the WCGTC’s recently released global principles as part of our discussion on not only why, but how, we can support talented children worldwide.
Best Practice in Gifted Acceleration of the University of Science and Technology of China
Despite Considering the need for “Early training of talents, gaining early results” in China’s development, the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC) creatively established the Special Class for the Gifted Young (SCGY) in March 1978. SCGY enrolls 15 years old or younger students who have extraordinary intelligence and excellent achievements. In order to explore the multi-development mode of gifted education, SCGY was officially upgraded to the School for the Gifted Young (SGY) in 2008. Over the past 43 years, it has always adhered to the educational principles of solid foundation, accurate positioning, accelerated education, and parallel development of skills and morality. Based on the text analysis of the 43-year enrollment and curricula of SGY and trace research on graduates, we found the current characteristics of SGY: the enrollment gives priority to the comprehensive quality, the aim of cultivating talents is developed to cultivate leading talents in various fields, the process of cultivation pays more attention to the multi-direction guidance, and the curriculum mode emphasizes the combination of acceleration and enrichment. As a vivid sample of accelerated cultivation of higher education, SGY has bred a large number of high-level elite talents who made their endeavor to the development of science and technology in China and even the world. It has also provided Chinese experience for the international gifted education.
Acceleration and Giftedness: Best Practices in Australia
Despite decades of research, policy support and examples of good practice, acceleration remains one of the most contentious strategies to meet the needs of gifted students. The key reason that many educators are dismissive of acceleration practices is that they associate it with multiple whole-year skipping that results in students graduating from high school years before their age cohort. Teachers cite socio-emotional concerns as the predominant problem of whole-year acceleration. Nevertheless, the research provides many examples of successful acceleration practices, which provide details of the factors that support implementation. In this presentation, I will provide case studies of various forms of acceleration that provide evidence of best practices in Australia. -ese include early entry to school, whole-year acceleration, subject acceleration, vertical timetabling, and concurrent enrolment. For each of the case studies I will outline the factors that led to the success of the acceleration practice and the barriers that needed to be overcome. The presentation concludes with an analysis of the recommendations that facilitate a sustainable program of acceleration practices to support giftedness and talent development.
Crafting Sport Skill: An Ecological Dynamics Perspective
Action is not simply the displacement of pieces of anatomy in time and space. Action is an intentional relationship the person establishes with particular circumstances. When learning a skill, actions develop into more sophisticated actions. This is the case for common actions such as walking, as well as for complex actions such those in sport, e.g., Artistic Gymnastics. An important aspect for skill learning is that it implies that actions are future-oriented, and thus, learning is the development of prospective control of action. Prospective control, contrary to predictive control, implies the monitoring of environmental information that indicates how an action can be regulated over time to achieve its goal. It is an evolving relationship with the environment, not an estimation from the mind. A theory of skill learning needs to understand how action evolves from the perception of affordances (i.e., possibilities for action offered by the environment) to their actualization in the unique circumstances for performance. This process implies moving from possibilities to potentiality to actuality. Performance implies the unique accommodation of circumstantial constraints, whether skill implies the potentiality to performance, i.e., the conditions that must hold for successful performance to occur. In this talk we present an ecological dynamic theoretical rational for understanding and promoting skill learning using sport skill as task vehicles.
Individual Counseling by mBET & mBETplus – Concept for Counseling the Gifted and Talented in Austria, Trends and Recommendations
Two concepts for individual counseling and support of gifted and talented have been developed by the NCoC ÖZBF. The multidimensional talent development tool mBET (Stahl, Rogl, & Schmid, 2016) addresses pupils from 2nd-6th grade. The mBET combines in two stages a pedagogical diagnostics with a solution-focused interview. Teachers carry out the mBET and use the semi-formal diagnostic tool (multi-perspective: teacher, parents, student) to plan and implement individual support interventions together with their students. In terms of a holistic and systemic concept of talent, the mBET observation-inquiry covers four areas of talent, school performance and five personality as well as environ-mental characteristics that are decisive for the development of talents. In addition, mBET contains a profile sheet for summarizing the observations and a support sheet for preparing and documenting the interviews. A solution-focused interview (Rogl, Schmid, & Stahl, 2013) as 2nd stage enables teachers to develop and target an individually adapted support, cooperatively designed with student and parents based on the specific strengths of the student. For students aged 12 to 19, the NCoC ÖZBF offers mBETplus (Stahl, Rogl, & Bögl, 2019): a solution-focused coaching that specifically addresses requirements for developing an area of expertise as personalized niche. It sharpens the development of talent and excellence including relevant meta-competencies (Olszewski-Kubilius, Subotnik, & Worrell, 2015; Subotnik, Olszewski-Kubilius, & Worrell, 2011). As an introductional framing, the situation of talent promotion in Austria is presented: the strategy paper of ÖZBF with the dynamic approach to talent development, recommendations for change in schools and universities.
Counseling the Gifted at the South German Talent Centre – A Systemic Approach
The South German Talent Centre is one of the two European Talent Centres accredited by the European Talent Support Network (ETSN) in Germany. It subsumes several research and fostering programs, connects professionals in the field and organizes events like monthly online symposia with expert talks reaching several hundred educators and parents. All activities adopt a systemic perspective on talent development. Our individual counseling programs provide support to parents and their children from the age of three on, throughout the school career, up to early adulthood. The systemic counseling approach relies strongly on analyzing and promoting the necessary resources for a client’s desired development (e.g., exploring further developmental possibilities, solving specific problems). The counseling process is designed to create a learning path—a plan of procedure individually tailored to the client’s goal(s) and his/her learning system. The learning path is mutually designed after detailed diagnostics of the current situation and the desired changes taking into consideration the system’s constellation and interaction of forces therein. We then support its implementation over a period of 3 months in average by means of regular follow-up meetings ensuring that families overcome obstacles and finally reach their goal(s).
To meet the needs of high ability students the curriculum needs to be adapted. -ere are different ways to do that; pull-out classes, compacting and enriching the programme, and/or accelerating the pace of the programme. -ere are numerous ways to accelerate a student’s education; some of them are less visible: Early entrance and skipping grades are the primary types of acceleration people seem to consider. Other types of acceleration, like combined classes and ungraded schools, which allow for acceleration, are applied in many educational systems, but are less noticed and documented Despite worries about negative consequences of academic acceleration, expressed by teachers and parents, research shows that acceleration works, although not in any case. It is a fast and uncomplicated measure in gifted education that can prevent the problems that can occur when students are with their age mates in an intellectual inadequate situation. So, how do we know if academic acceleration is the best for a particular student? How do we do it? What do we need to avoid? this is what will be discussed in this presentation, with cases from practice in relation to research findings concerning academic acceleration, an elusive, controversial, yet proven effective measure in gifted education.
Clever Solutions from Complex Environments
Learning environments are complex and the challenge for school leadership is to understand and manage this complexity to ensure that the learning objectives set by the school for their students are achieved. Efforts to understand the complexity within schools have benefitted from the development of the actiotope model of giftedness. Originally used to describe the development of exceptionality, the actiotope model shifts the emphasis from the individual (i.e., the student) to the system (i.e., learning environment). _is shift means that it is just as important to identify and quantify all of the important components within a learning environment and not just focus on those related to the individual. In this keynote, I outline the usefulness of the actiotope model to describe the learning environments in a number of different international contexts. Drawing on techniques in machine learning, I also describe efforts to model the interactions between the main components in a learning environment and the potential for the techniques to predict outcomes based upon changes in these components. The actiotope model represents a significant change in thinking about how schools can better manage their school’s learning environment in order to enhance learning outcomes. More broadly, the actiotope model provides policy makers with the tools to make informed decisions on how best to manage resources, and to evaluate the success of their decisions.
Acceleration: Best Practice for Gifted Children
There are two main options for gifted children: enrichment or acceleration and its combinations. From all the research that is known enrichment is offered and accepted more often, however, acceleration is twice as effective, so this presentation will focus on it. Accelerants report a beneficial effect on their intellectual as well as their emotional well-being. On the other hand, several forms of acceleration are decisions can affect the rest of the school career and life, especially early entry into school and whole grade skipping. It’s possible but not easy to reverse these decisions, so adults have to be very careful when and how to implement it. I did several studies on the subject: I had questionnaires for about 2000 schools (twice, to show the development), for parents and adult grade skippers, and I did interviews with youngsters who had skipped. After acceleration the pupils were intellectually more satisfied and emotionally happier. When there were problems, they were usually caused by adults who had made mistakes implementing it because of a lack of knowledge. In the presentation information will be given when to suggest acceleration. One important question is whether IQ tests are necessary for the decision. They can be replaced by ‘Entscheidungshilfen’ (assistance for taking a decision): Which of the many forms of acceleration is best for which child, what to think of beforehand and how to accompany the pupil, and what to avoid?