ERIC Number: ED427494
Record Type: RIE
Publication Date: 1996
Reference Count: N/A
Valuing, Identifying, Cultivating, and Rewarding Talents of Students from Special Populations.
St. Jean, David
National Research on the Gifted and Talented, Spr 1996
This paper discusses the challenges of identifying gifted students from underrepresented or special populations. Reasons for underrepresentation of students from special populations are reviewed and include biases in standardized testing, underreferral of students from diverse cultural and ethnic groups to gifted programs by teachers, and the traditional focus on students' deficiencies rather than on students' strengths. Problems inherent in the identification of gifted students with specific physical disabilities and students with learning disabilities are also addressed, and include language impairments that create barriers to verbal testing, stereotypical expectations about gifted children, delays in specific developmental disabilities that are often used as indicators of giftedness, incomplete information about the child which limits the view of the child's potential, and lack of opportunity to display talents. Educators are urged to address three areas that relate to recognizing talent in students with physical and learning disabilities, including the difficulty in expressing and recognizing talent, the effect of the classroom atmosphere, and integration into the regular classroom. (Contains 28 references.) (CR)
Descriptors: Ability Identification, Classroom Environment, Cultural Differences, Disproportionate Representation, Elementary Secondary Education, Gifted, Gifted Disabled, Inclusive Schools, Learning Disabilities, Minority Group Children, Physical Disabilities, Social Bias, Sociocultural Patterns, Special Programs, Stereotypes, Talent Development, Teacher Attitudes, Test Bias
Web site: http://www.ucc.uconn.edu
Publication Type: Collected Works - Serials
Education Level: N/A
Sponsor: Office of Educational Research and Improvement (ED), Washington, DC.
Authoring Institution: National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented, Storrs, CT.