Conceptions of Giftedness

Chapter 5 Talent, Expertise, and Creative Achievement

Cross, T.L. & Colema, L.J. (2005).  School-Based conception of giftedness. In R.J. Sternberg., & J.E. Davidson (Eds.), Conceptions of giftedness (2nd pp. 52-63) New York, NY :  Cambridge Press

Key Ideas

• Giftedness, talent, expertise, and creative achievement are inextricably linked concepts; meaning there is no ONE acceptable way to look at gifted

Key Ideas

• The nurturing of gifts and talents begins with efforts to help children come to know and understand their special talents; through work; by seeking educational opportunities
• Recognition of both strong genetic determination of abilities as well as substantial influence of culture, parent and school environment.

Key Ideas

• To be born with high talent potential and later possibly be talented in some career-oriented field means that nature endowed a child with aptitudes, talents, or intelligences above or far above the average child. It also means that, given nurturance at home and school, learning will be easy and faster than it is for most children.

Strengths/Pros/Advantages

• Children with genetic potential learn more easily and faster than others. So if given opportunities in cognitive learning activities earlier than typical age, will produce school achievement at high levels when interrelational

Strengths/Pros/Advantages

• Many schools have embraced the concept of multiple intelligence to identify and are using them to identify individual student strengths in gifted education.

Strengths/Pros/Advantages

• Researchers recognize both a strong genetic determination of abilities as well as influence of the cultural, parental, and school environments on gifted abilities.

Weakness/Cons/Disadvantages

• Many schools make no effort to differentiate curriculum for gifted children. Sometimes gifted students are bored in school or try to learn from whatever resources they can find and continue to do well on achievement and aptitude tests. However, some gifted, because of their precocity, have problems in peer relations and personal and social adjustment

Weakness/Cons/Disadvantages

• The term gifted was originally used for children who exhibited unusual precocity or high IQ's. Not all gifted students exhibit precociousness.

Weakness/Cons/Disadvantages

• Children of poverty-stricken homes may be denied many stimulating educational experiences and suffer lifelong deficits in achievement and cognitive abilities. How can this happen?

Practical Implications

• One issue school divisions may have is the funding it takes to offer gifted services in the creative arts/achievement.
• If funding is available, it enables more students to be identified as gifted and talented.

Practical Implications

• The implication gives opportunities at all grade levels to be engaged in higher-order thinking activities: planning, monitoring, evaluating, and problem solving. This benefits everyone!

Representative Quotation

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