Argumentative Essay On Gifted Children

In 2015, I wrote about my personal philosophy of the gifted learner. I stated in my paper that, “Giftedness is not a one, set definition. The definition of gifted must encompass intellect, ability, creative talent as well as emotional awareness. It cannot be micro-managed and be a “one size fits all” definition” (Dauber, 2015). People, who are gifted, need differentiation and opportunity to express, demonstrate and show their giftedness. Educators must be able to provide opportunities for the gifted learner to express his/her abilities and/or talents. Gifted students learn differently and require special educational experiences in order to grow academically and achieve their highest potential. Therefore, the education field must be able to understand not only the cognitive side of a gifted learner but the affective or social/emotional aspects too.

     Since the development of the intelligence quotient, schools in every part of the world have been using the IQ test to categorize millions of students into three groups. These three groups, which are the gifted, the average, and the retarded, are falsifications that perpetuate in our world culture and cause many gifted students to be deemed retarded and vice a versa. Why then is the IQ test so heavily relied on in our school systems? For schools the answer is simple, an I.Q. test is a reliable predictor of a students later performance in academics. This answer is relatively true, but where the I.Q. test falls extremely short is with testing the multiple

A further refinement of the Stanford-Binet scale and translation (for American culture) was published in 1916 by Lewis M. Terman, who adopted Stern’s proposal that an individual's intelligence level be measured as an intelligence quotient (I. Q.). The IQ score presumably represented an individual’s rate of mental development as a quotient, between "mental age" and actual "chronological age" times 100 (to remove the decimal). Terman's test, known colloquially as the Stanford-Binet test, formed the basis for modern intelligence

One of the difficulties in identifying the needs of low-income students is the profound cultural barriers which exist that prevent their strengths and deficits from being identified. Children from low-income homes frequently have poorer vocabularies and a weaker basis of the type of knowledge that is frequently considered 'intelligence' on most forms of assessment. A low-income child's IQ may be high, even though he lacks a framework of accepted middle-class knowledge. "In January 2003, the National Academy of Sciences released a report on the seeming overrepresentation of minorities in special education and underrepresentation of those students in gifted education. The NRC reported that, nationwide, 7.47 percent of all white students and 9.9 percent of Asian students are placed in gifted programs. Meanwhile, 3.04 percent of African-American students, 3.57 percent of Hispanic students, and 4.86 percent of American Indian students are classified as gifted" (GT-minority identification, 2003, ERIC Clearinghouse). The discrepancy, the NAS believed, could not be solely explained by talent alone but was at least partially rooted in the methods of identifying students labeled as gifted. Biases in standardized and other tests identifying student strengths, combined with prejudices, however unintentional, amongst educators and administrators lead to under-identification of the gifted

gifted students within those states, and are not consistent across the United States. “Seven states

Some people believe that intelligence is inherited through genes and that they never change. Giftedness is not one of the inherited talents that are possible to inherit. Giftedness has to be developed and practiced as the child grows out of their early years. They also believe that gifted students read all the time, wear glasses, and are most of the time called “nerds”. This is called stereotyping. Gifted comes in different varieties varying from great athletes, talkative or shy persons, or just normal individuals with gifts. Not one specific type of person is gifted. You might think of the word gifted as bad such as mentally gifted, physically gifted or just gifted in general in a bad

Van Tassel-Baska, J. (2000). Theory and research on curriculum development for the gifted. In K.A. Heller, F.J. Monks, R. J. Sternberg & R.F. Subotnik (Eds.). International handbook of giftedness and talent (2nd ed., pp. 365–386). Amsterdam: Elsevier.

I evaluated the information in the document above based upon Moon’s (2013) nine measures to consider in comprehensive gifted education program. I think that FCCPS does a considerably good job addressing these nine guidelines. However, I believe they should consider more non-standardized materials and data while considering students for identification.

Binet was involved in creating one of the more recent forms of intelligence test, referred to as the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale. A similar test is that formulated by Wechsler (Neisser et al. 1996). These led to the measure of IQ (“intelligence quotient”) being founded, where an individual’s “mental age is divided by their chronological age and multiplied by 100” (Gardner 2006, p. 3). The tests measure intelligence through verbal and non-verbal tasks, assessing scholastic aptitude, school achievement and specific abilities (Neisser et al. 1996, p. 78).

A fifth grader may come in at a “second-grade level” and graduate at a “fourth-grade level,” which is a tremendous achievement on the part of the educators; however, because standardized testing fails to account for such circumstances, the entire year would be seen as a failure from the perspective of the state (Berger). To put it crudely, “poor schools can’t win at standardized testing” because students in areas of poverty start school academically behind and are unable to catch up as there is the lack of resources and funding (Broussard). On the other extreme, gifted students are also hurt by attempts to standardize education, for instance, with the No Child Left Behind Act, an act that many say has “failed our adolescents” (Steinberg). Teachers say that the legislation has resulted in a “race to the middle” that means “talented students have their potential squandered” as schools “[don’t] foster growth” (Weller). In effect, standardization attempts to remove individuality from learning and ignores that students have different capacities for learning, that some students may need more help while others need to be challenged above their grade level - instead it averages it all out to a “standard” that harms both

There are state requirements she has to install in the kids. For over twenty years now, she has had a daycare. She’s mentioned over the years, there have been a lot of changes with state requirements. Students are given a test to measure their intelligence before they are allowed acceptance into the daycare. According to Terrie, the state decides whether or not the students are academically ready. Terrie has mentioned several times that there are students who she perceived showed multiple signs of gifted and talented. When the results came back, there were students who didn’t meet the benchmark. Often, Terrie has said that one test shouldn’t determine a child’s level of brilliance. Before, she has also had students who test above benchmark; they don’t show as much promise as some of the other kids do. According to Schooling America, “Students used to beat to their own drum. Now, the drumbeat demands that all children achieve academically at a high level and the measure of that achievement is tests” (Graham). Children are supposed to learn at the same rate. However, there are many different kinds of learners. Some students don’t test well, but they perform differently in the

Gifted students should be provided advanced opportunities to be challenged, to experience both success and growth, to develop higher level study, creativity, and productivity. To develop their interests and talents their individual characteristics, needs, learning rates, motivations for learning, cognitive abilities, and interests must be taken into account. Differentiation can be included in the curriculum by incorporating acceleration, complexity, depth, challenge, and creativity. Students can also be given fewer tasks to master a standard, use multiple resources and higher-level skills, conduct research, develop products, make cross-disciplinary

This concept will only lead to social problems among the children and social inequality. I would also get rid of the term “gifted” students. All students have the ability to achieve the same academic satisfaction, no one should have the label as being “gifted.” This label would also lead to disparities, social problems, and bullying amongst students. I also do not like the idea of the I.Q. testing, so if I was a school administrator I would not make this a mandatory test for all second graders, I would stick to standardized tests. I feel that if all students are learning the same material, at the same pace, there will be less racial/ethnic inequality amongst students. If I were a school administrator, I would consider all students as being “gifted” because they all have that ability. Just because someone is a different race than Asian or white doesn’t mean that they aren’t equality as “gifted” as they are. Also, just because someone has a higher I.Q. than someone else doesn’t mean that the so-called, black child with the lower I.Q. can’t score higher than the Asian with the higher I.Q. on a science test. Everyone has their own strengths in certain subjects. I do not believe that I.Q. testing is an accurate way to go about classification on who is “gifted” and who

In 1904, a French psychologist (Alfred Binet) created the first intelligence test in order to help the French Ministry of Education segregate children that may have difficulty learning in a regular classroom. At that time, he did not know that his test would be the basis for IQ tests administered over 100 years later. He has a Stanford University psychologist, Lewis Terman, to thank for expanding his work and creating the Stanford-Binet intelligence test that took root in the United States in 1916 and is still popular today. However, along with its popularity came criticism. Critics see the current version of the Stanford - Binet test and other intelligence tests, despite attempts to make them culturally fair, as limiting to individuals who are not from the major social norm. They claim that cultural bias in test questions is why certain races do not perform as well as others on the test.

Before the 1950s, most educators and school systems tended to follow Louis Terman’s example and based most decisions about gifted individuals on IQ and scholastic achievement scores. Standardized group intelligence tests, such as California Test of Mental Maturity, were often used to determine IQ. In these tests, educators were looking for exceptional ability in verbal or performance IQ, or a combination of the two. For the final identification, individual IQ tests such as the Wechsler scales and the Stanford Binet were used. Most school systems around this time considered an IQ of 130 or above to fall in the "gifted" range. This information comes from a book by Frederick B. Tuttle, Laurence A. Becker, and Joan A. Sousa (48).