Christine Gillions : ‘Specialist Assistance in Removing the Mask of the Gifted Child'

Christine Gillions : Specialist Assistance in Removing the Mask of the Gifted Child'

Identifying gifted children is a complex task and not always as simple the evidence seems to suggest. This is because often the gifted child is one step ahead of the rest of us and may not want to be known to be outside the norm. Within the first weeks of starting school many gifted children get a sense that being different may not be academically or socially well-received and consequently begin to mask their giftedness.

I recall working with a Year 2 mainstream teacher who had several children showing signs of being gifted. Therefore, as part of the initial identification process, the class teacher and I decided to give a Progressive Achievement Test to a group of average to above average students from the Year 2 class. The children quickly settled into the task without any problems, until about ten minutes in when an average' little girl suddenly put down her pencil and announced firmly and loudly, "I'm not going to do anymore of this!'

The teacher was surprised at this outburst from a normally very well-behaved and compliant average child and so quickly sent the child back to the non-test taking classmates, along with expressing the opinion to me that this little girl was clearly not part of the group we were trying to identify. However for me, my Gifted Education specialist radar started beeping: Here was child who had suddenly realised what this task was all about, that it was to uncover any gifted students..she had quickly realised that her highly intelligent disguise as an average' student would be blown!

Consequently, despite this little girl not meeting the gifted program criteria, she was included in the gifted program and subsequently has gone on to be a very talented student. This case study is just one example among many which demonstrates the importance of a school not only having a Gifted Education policy, a genuine commitment to Gifted Education, appropriate gifted identification resources, Gifted Education professional development for mainstream teachers and a well-equipped Learning Support department, but it also demonstrates the importance of a school having a Gifted Education specialist on staff.

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