The Voices of Gifted Students

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I am gifted so whatMartin RipleyDirector and
co-founder 21st Century Learning Alliance
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Outline of presentation

• Students experience in school
• A GnT business model
• Words from some students
• A framework for GnT students learning

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Occasional Paper 20 (1)

• 2006 study investigated 18 students
• 1,828 responses

NB Key is on next slide
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Occasional Paper 20 (2)

• Importance of being identified
• Has NAGTY helped your learning
• Has NAGTY helped your aspirations
• Helped you do new things
• Helped you engage in socially worthwhile activity
• Improved motivation
• Taken into account by your school
• Improved your examination results

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(No Transcript)
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Youve always had gifted and talented children,
but in the past you didnt have to identify them
and provide for them. They were just the clever
kids in the school. But now there are programmes
available, and youve got to be seen to be doing
different things. Its like the buzz word at the
moment, gifted and talented. I can see in five
years time it will be something
different. Teacher without gifted and talented
remit, engaged primary school, north east
It should just fit in to the school like
normal. We provide for the ones that are lower
in ability, so why shouldnt we provide for the
ones that are higher? Its differentiation, and
that should have been provided for anyway, before
the gifted and talented came out. When I looked
at my class Id always think These ones need
pushing. Gifted and talented coordinator,
primary school, midlands
As a group of governors we have decided that we
wont go down the road of purposefully
identifying these kids. Every child is important
to us. All of them are gifted and
talented. Governor, engaged primary school,
south east
I dont think the child should know that theyve
been singled out. I dont mind him being on this
thing, but I dont want him coming home with a
letter. Parent of primary school gifted and
talented learner, north west
7
Youve always had gifted and talented children,
but in the past you didnt have to identify them
and provide for them. They were just the clever
kids in the school. But now there are programmes
available, and youve got to be seen to be doing
different things. Its like the buzz word at the
moment, gifted and talented. I can see in five
years time it will be something
different. Teacher without gifted and talented
remit, engaged primary school, north east
It should just fit in to the school like
normal. We provide for the ones that are lower
in ability, so why shouldnt we provide for the
ones that are higher? Its differentiation, and
that should have been provided for anyway, before
the gifted and talented came out. When I looked
at my class Id always think These ones need
pushing. Gifted and talented coordinator,
primary school, midlands
As a group of governors we have decided that we
wont go down the road of purposefully
identifying these kids. Every child is important
to us. All of them are gifted and
talented. Governor, engaged primary school,
south east
I dont think the child should know that theyve
been singled out. I dont mind him being on this
thing, but I dont want him coming home with a
letter. Parent of primary school gifted and
talented learner, north west
8
Youve always had gifted and talented children,
but in the past you didnt have to identify them
and provide for them. They were just the clever
kids in the school. But now there are programmes
available, and youve got to be seen to be doing
different things. Its like the buzz word at the
moment, gifted and talented. I can see in five
years time it will be something
different. Teacher without gifted and talented
remit, engaged primary school, north east
It should just fit in to the school like
normal. We provide for the ones that are lower
in ability, so why shouldnt we provide for the
ones that are higher? Its differentiation, and
that should have been provided for anyway, before
the gifted and talented came out. When I looked
at my class Id always think These ones need
pushing. Gifted and talented coordinator,
primary school, midlands
As a group of governors we have decided that we
wont go down the road of purposefully
identifying these kids. Every child is important
to us. All of them are gifted and
talented. Governor, engaged primary school,
south east
I dont think the child should know that theyve
been singled out. I dont mind him being on this
thing, but I dont want him coming home with a
letter. Parent of primary school gifted and
talented learner, north west
9
Youve always had gifted and talented children,
but in the past you didnt have to identify them
and provide for them. They were just the clever
kids in the school. But now there are programmes
available, and youve got to be seen to be doing
different things. Its like the buzz word at the
moment, gifted and talented. I can see in five
years time it will be something
different. Teacher without gifted and talented
remit, engaged primary school, north east
It should just fit in to the school like
normal. We provide for the ones that are lower
in ability, so why shouldnt we provide for the
ones that are higher? Its differentiation, and
that should have been provided for anyway, before
the gifted and talented came out. When I looked
at my class Id always think These ones need
pushing. Gifted and talented coordinator,
primary school, midlands
As a group of governors we have decided that we
wont go down the road of purposefully
identifying these kids. Every child is important
to us. All of them are gifted and
talented. Governor, engaged primary school,
south east
I dont think the child should know that theyve
been singled out. I dont mind him being on this
thing, but I dont want him coming home with a
letter. Parent of primary school gifted and
talented learner, north west
10
The English model Deborah Eyre
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Identity and Identification
Identification (a process) Influences teachers
and social values
Academic
Talent
Building Social and Cultural Capital
Learning
Social
Confidence
Identity (psychosocial) Importance of success to
develop sense of self and personal identity.
Aspirations
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Student Voice

• 9 rounds of on-line discussions with student
  councillors
• 3 rounds of focused on Student Academy of the
  Future
• Longitudinal research, published through NAGTY
  Occasional Papers
• OP 14 Whats so different about Gifted and
  Talented Students? Gifted and Talented Students
  and Psychosocial Adjustment
• OP 20 NAGTY Second Annual post-18 Survey of
  Students

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Student Voice

• What is an Academy?
• The purposes of an Academy
• The aims of an Academy
• Learning opportunities
• Social networking

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A Student Academy of the Future Definitions

• a specialised, extra-curricular community
• focuses on developing excellence
• social role as important as its academic role
• throughout the focus should be on learning
• more specialised that ordinary school
• distinctive opportunities for students
• compensate for present shortcomings in GT
  provision in schools

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A Student Academy of the Future Purposes

• The primary purpose of an Academy is to develop
  the talents of its student members. It should
  cover social, academic and vocational areas, and
  the aim should be both to develop the skills and
  the confidence to use them. The academy is
  therefore built on an expectation of active
  involvement, meeting people and developing them.

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A Student Academy of the FutureAims (1)

• Its members should
• develop a strong sense of community and belonging
  (suitably balanced to avoid claims of elitism)
• be actively involved
• have fun
• have the freedom to manage some aspects of the
  Academy.

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A Student Academy of the FutureAims (2)

• Its learning opportunities should
• provide the chance of doing something unusual or
  special
• be successful (ie a popular choice for students)
• build on success
• provide for group-based (and collective)
  endeavour (eg a book, a concert, a performance)
• teach life skills
• help students cope (eg with bullying).

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A Student Academy of the FutureAims (3)

• Its outputs should include
• charitable work
• more confident students, closer to fulfilling
  their potential
• an international reputation for excellence and
  learning.

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A Student Academy of the FutureLearning
opportunities

• It is likely that successful (ie often applied
  for) courses will provide students with
• access to new knowledge
• new friends and opportunities to cement existing
  friendships
• the challenge to develop and extend
• confidence - building self-image and self-esteem.

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A Student Academy of the FutureSocial networking
(1)

• I dont think social networking should be
  facilitated within the Academy, as much as be the
  Academythe Community is probably the most
  valuable thing to me.

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A Student Academy of the FutureSocial networking
(2)

• enable students to make friends and to keep in
  touch
• remove barriers to attending courses, by creating
  and maintaining the student networks before and
  after events
• help students learn like on a residential
  geography fieldtrip, for instance, where the
  social interactions are as important as the
  geographical knowledge that will be learned
• show that students are trusted to make and
  maintain friendships.

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A framework for learning

• Academic development
• areas of interest and high performance,
• investigate academically distinct but related
  studies
• provide interest, develop new ideas and to
  broaden the students mind.
• Talent development
• develop non-academic talents
• performance based activities
• focus on activity, whether team-based or
  individual.
• Social development
• develop a range of social skills working with
  other people, self-confidence, self-discipline
  and sustainable personal commitment, presentation
  and public speaking, communication, negotiation,
  selling ideas (and selling themselves), team
  working and leadership.
• Charitable and philanthropic activity
• making a specific and worthwhile contribution
• structured mentoring of younger children over a
  set period of time
• It might enable students to create and publish
  socially useful web-resources
• running charitable fund-raising activity
• Taking part in important national student
  debates.
• The important aspect of this strand could well be
  to enable students to generate and manage their
  own ideas for charitable/philanthropic activity