Gear up now, to best handle the gifted child

Statistical estimates put gifted children at about 3 per cent of the population. In India, with a population of 193 million school-aged children, about 6 million children may be gifted.

The sheer numbers itself make planning and implementation of a gifted education programme for the country a daunting task! However, schools that have access to about 90 per cent of this population can play an important role.

Critics may question why children on the higher end of the spectrum must be given special attention, when they will anyway succeed as a result of their high potential.

In a country where most children, particularly those with lower-than-average abilities, must fend for themselves, this may appear to be a waste of resources. However, it needs to be borne in mind that the development of any potential occurs in interaction with the environment.

A cognitively enriched environment, adequate intellectual stimulation and emotional bonding are important factors that affect neuronal elaboration which is important for cognitive development.

With several children coming from resource-poor homes, where parents may not be able to provide adequate time or resources, schools can play an important role in ensuring this. Thus, they can potentially be an equalising force, by leveling the playing field of opportunities and access to resources.
  
Further, not all children with exceptional abilities manage to achieve their fullest potential.  Research by George Betts and Maureen Neihart in 1988 showed that there were six different types of gifted children, of which only two were successful and got identified for special programmes and leadership roles.

Among the others, some were more often identified for behavioural issues such as rebellion resulting from the lack of attention paid to their abilities and others for handicaps. Many ran the risk of dropping out of school because their needs went unmet. Some others remained unidentified because of downplaying or denying their gifts in order to blend in and be accepted by their peers.

These types of gifted children may not only remain unidentified and may not achieve their full potential, but may also become highly unsatisfied and emotionally disturbed. Sensitive teachers and responsive school environments can however prevent this by making efforts to cater to their special needs.  

Catering to the gifted requires both adequate planning and preparation on the part of teachers and schools. In designing programmes that meet their needs and interests, both cognitive and socio-emotional needs have to be kept in mind. Several different schooling formats have been developed and tested in the west with variable results.

Options range from setting up independent schools for the gifted, to providing differentiated instruction within regular schools. The former demands separate resources for gifted education, a large number of special educators and risks creating ‘elite’ clubs. Differentiated instruction within regular schools can take many different forms.

They can be designed as pull-out programmes in which identified children spend a portion of their school day outside their regular classroom in a special classroom designed to teach additional skills related to the subject or go deeper into the subject.

Alternatively, the curriculum within the normal classroom may itself be compacted, or children may be accelerated by allowing promotion to higher classes based on their abilities, thereby allowing them to move faster and avoid boredom by repeatedly engaging with topics that they have mastered.

Other options include enrichment where gifted students undertake more activities, projects or assignments in addition to regular classroom work in order to keep themselves engaged and interested. Self-pacing provides children with the flexibility to move through topics and courses at their own speed.

Whatever may be the option chosen, it needs to be carefully planned in accordance with the child’s abilities, interest, and other aspects of personality and development in order to be productive. For example acceleration and separate schooling take away the opportunity for children to grow up with their own age-group. In cases of asynchronous development, children may lack the socio-emotional skills to deal with older peers, and may need exposure and interaction with same-age peers to develop these skills.

Similarly, special schooling and pull-out programmes can lead to problems of labeling or create a sense of superiority in the gifted children themselves. Compacting and acceleration may not cater to those children who are not merely looking to rush through the curriculum, but to engage in creative and exploratory intellectual pursuits.

Therefore, planning requires the development of Individualized Educational Programmes (IEPs) that pay attention to children’s abilities, interests and personality variables, and are developed with inputs from both professionals such as psychologists, special educators and doctors, teachers, and parents. Programmes need to target more than just cognitive-intellectual skills, and also look into issues of behaviour, family, school and peer adjustment, handling frustration, classroom etiquette, peer relations, etc. 
   
In addition to special programmes, schools can play an important role by providing opportunities, information about opportunities outside school and helping students access these opportunities, networks or resources. For example, many parents may be unaware of competitive exams and scholarships such as the National Talent Search, Maths and Science Olympiads, etc.

At the individual level parents may also not be able to access important networks, such as that of scientists who can be important mentors and guides. Funds for small project ideas or resources for the same may also not be available to many children at home.

It is here that schools can play an equalising role by sharing information on and preparing children for scholarship programmes and talent searches; by inviting mentors such as eminent scientists, educationists, administrators and organising meetings and interactions to build students’ networks; by providing resources, lab spaces or small funds for projects, etc.

Teachers can themselves be mentors and guides for students by developing a good relationship with gifted students and their families, sharing their frustrations and emotional problems and by regularly providing guidance and assessments regarding the students’ needs and interests. 

As intimate daily observers, teachers can go beyond standardised tests and academic scores that can bias identification.  Thus, real opportunities to identify and address the needs of the different types of gifted children, and children from different backgrounds and with different resources is possible within the school.

(The author is part of the NIAS Gifted Education Programme Team)
This is the final part in the series on Gifted Children, contributed by NIAS.