Design Of The Hypothesis And Research Method
Research question/ hypothesis
The research question includes analysis of the necessity of inclusion of gifted and talented students in a regular classroom and evaluation of advantages, drawbacks, and limitations of such decision. The present research is aimed at identifying the eligibility status of students for gifted and talented programmes and their curriculum achievements in general and in the framework of specific subjects and areas.
Should all highly achieving students be considered talented and gifted and enrolled into special acceleration and enrichment programmes? Can special programmes be created in the framework of a regular classroom in order not to segregate students and emphasise racial and socioeconomic disparities?
Research method
The research method includes literature review of the relevant literary sources on the problem of gifted and talented children, their inclusion in regular classroom, and pros and cons of segregation of gifted children opposed to pros and cons of inclusion of talented children in regular classroom with special instruction designed for them.
In other words, secondary research is the most cost-efficient and time-saving method that can help achieve effective results within a rather short period of time. At the same time, it can be important to analyse opportunities for conducting a primary research using data from surveys and observations.
However, the primary research requires more time and costs including permission of corresponding institutions and students’ and parents written consent for performing tests, analysing students’ achievements, and changing environment to learn how inclusion can impact the performance.
Reflection On The Research
Identification of a research question/ hypothesis and outline
The research question is clearly formulated though it consists of a few questions that enhance comprehension of the author’s intentions and research hypothesis. In this respect, it is necessary to assess the information collected whether it answers the research question in an appropriate manner or the author failed to accomplish this task.
Justification of a choice of method for the research topic
The research method can be considered the most effective and cost- and time efficient due to the period of time necessary to accomplish it and resources needed for this assignment. As the information required to answer the research question is accessible, a researcher can conduct a research using library materials and online databases to find the relevant information.
Discussion of the chosen research method
The research method is aimed at analysing the research question and answering it with regard to the materials collected. Thus, different researchers in this area support the idea of creating special conditions for talented and gifted students as a part of inclusion in regular classroom and provide specific instruction for them.
Diezmann reports about the importance of creating special conditions for mathematically gifted students and develop their skills with the help of specific content aimed at enhancing their knowledge and potential for future improvement (50).
As indicated in the study by Smith, “In numerous countries, the one-size-fits-all and lock-step approaches to teaching and learning are a legacy of a quite distant past, and teachers nowadays accept and employ much more learner-centred pedagogies” (42-43). Clark and Zimmerman analyse the opportunities given to gifted and talented students in terms of enrichment and acceleration (9).
Some schools advocate the need for incorporation of special programmes for gifted and talented children whereas shifts in racial representation at schools make such opportunities minimal for black and Latino students (Young n. p.).
“The rise of HGT [Highly Gifted and Talented] also demonstrates a return to conservatism in that the creation of this category serves white middle and upper middle class interests”, claims Young and suggests that the rise of such special programmes split the society by labelling some students highly-achieving and forcing others to accept what they are provided with.
Nevertheless, the fear of segregation and elitism arises when talking about special conditions for gifted and talented students. Some authors also note that segregation is not an integral part of participation in a special programme (Clark and Zimmerman 9-10).
At the same time, corresponding materials should be distributed between students with different abilities and skills to foster those who achieve high results without limiting the rights and opportunities that reform less effectively.
Heacox identifies different instruction used for talented and gifted students such as ‘extraordinary amount of information’, accelerated pace of learning’, advanced comprehension’, and other (134).
This means that even talented and gifted children should be involved into different programmes within the curriculum in order to accelerate their comprehension and develop various skills because talents of children differ as well as their learning capacity regardless of their giftedness status.
Though threat of segregation and special needs of talented and gifted students are acknowledged, some authors question the eligibility of talented students for special programmes. Ryan and Cooper question the eligibility of students for special programmes for gifted and talented children because a single skill in a specific subject should not give students a permission to be labelled highly gifted and talented.
Besides, mathematical or language skills can be developed in the framework of the curriculum for a regular classroom. Thus, the authors outline different programmes for gifted and talented children and indicate that there are entire schools for gifted children whereas others are enrolled in separate classes (Ryan and Cooper 81-83).
As suggested by Endepohls-Ulpe, “a lot of programmes, curricula and materials have been developed in the last decades to meet the needs of extraordinarily bright and talented children” (881). However, the author also claims that the giftedness should be assessed to entitle children to participate in the programmes for gifted and talented children (Endepohls-Ulpe).
The importance of assessment is another burning issue of this cornerstone. Winebrenner identifies the needs of gifted students as the following: compacting to reduce the time of learning specific materials and differentiation for “providing gifted students with different tasks and activities than their age peers – tasks that lead to real learning for them” (5).
In this respect, special assessment should be implemented for gifted children that are included in regular classroom. The necessity of assessment has always been the main problem for defining the giftedness.
As such, researchers have introduced a number of various testing systems aimed at analysing the grade equivalents, age equivalents, percentile ranks (Kubiszyn and Borich 356-358), and other irrelevant data that helps to formulate statistics for the educational system of the country and international community.
Inclusion of gifted and talented children is believed to be unrealistic for a regular classroom with regard to the teacher and methods he/she should apply. Nevertheless, some authors advocate the opportunities that can be used in existing system of education with regard to the practices in regular classroom.
In the study by Tomlinson and National Association for Gifted Children (US), the author analyse the effectiveness of practices for a regular classroom with regard to the adaptation of the curriculum and information that should be acquired to skills and abilities of every student individually (60-63).
Though special programmes for talented and gifted children are aimed at acceleration of learning in talented children, regular practices can be (and should be) adjusted to the needs, preferences, inclinations, and capacity of children in a regular classroom.
Strengths of the chosen method include variety of literary sources available on this topic and differences of arguments used by authors to either advocate or oppose the principles of giftedness and assessment of students with the help of standardised tests.
Weaknesses of the chosen method include lack of originality and importance of analytical skills because a researcher has to identify the relevant materials and avoid using sources that are not considered credible for this topic.
Comparison of the method with others of educational and social research can be conducted after thorough examination of literature available on the issue. The analysis of sources for this study demonstrated that many other researchers question the eligibility status for talented and gifted children and threats imposed by segregation of small groups of talented children which emphasises racial and socioeconomic disparities.
Conclusion
To sum up, the method chosen for this research has proven to be the most time- and cost-efficient with regard to the researches needed. Though some scholars advocate necessity of creating special programmes and classes for talented and gifted children, most researchers support the idea of specific curriculum content and individual approach to every student instead of segregation and elitism.
Works Cited
Clark, Gilbert, and Enid Zimmerman. Teaching Talented Art Students: Principles and Practices. New York: Teachers College Press, 2004. Print.
Diezmann, Carmel M. “Challenging Mathematically Gifted Primary Students.” Australasian Journal of Gifted Education 14.1 (2005): 50-57. Print.
Endepohls-Ulpe, Martina. “Teaching Gifted and Talented Children.” International Handbook of Research on Teachers and Teaching. Eds. Lawrence J. Saha and Gary A. Dworkin. Springer International Handbooks of Education, 21.10 (2009): 881-894. Print.
Heacox, Diane. Differentiating Instruction in the Regular Classroom: How to Reach and Teach All Learners, Grades 3-12. Minneapolis: Free Spirit Publishing, 2002. Print.
Kubiszyn, Tom, and Gary Borich. Educational Testing and Measurement: Classroom Application and Practice. Chichester: John Wiley & Sons, 2005. Web.
Ryan, Kevin, and James M. Cooper. Those Who Can, Teach. 12th ed. Boston, MA: Cengage Learning, 2008. Print.
Smith, M. M. Chris (Ed.). Including the Gifted and Talented: Making Inclusion Work for More Gifted and Able Learners. Abingdon: Taylor & Francis, 2006. Print.
Tomlinson, A. Carol, and National Association for Gifted Children (U.S.). Differentiation for Gifted and Talented Students. London: Corwin Press, 2004. Print.
Winebrenner, Susan. Teaching Gifted Kids in the Regular Classroom: Strategies and Techniques Every Teacher Can Use to Meet the Academic Needs of the Gifted and Talented. Minneapolis: Free Spirit Publishing, 2009. Print.
Young, Kathryn. “LD and the rise of Highly Gifted and Talented Programs: Examining Similar Rationales across Decades and Designations.” Disability Studies Quarterly 30.2 (2010). Web. <http://www.dsq-sds.org/article/view/1234/1271#>