Mokhsin Abdul Ghaffar (n6941842)

EXTENDED EDUCATION PROGRAM

Introduction

The development of gifted children are often asynchronous; with their intellectual are often
advance of their physical growth, and specific cognitive and emotional functions are often
developed differently, or to differing degrees of development (Johnsen, 2004). As mentioned by
Porter (1999), gifted students are those who have the capacity to learn at a different pace and
level of complexity that is significantly advanced of their age peers in any domain or domains
that are valued in and promoted by their socio-cultural group. This phenomenon might lead to
students being under challenged and results to students being bored to attend school. Thus, a
special program apart from the standard national curriculum should be implemented in order to
keep them to have meaningful learning experience and to cater their needs of learning which are
recognized as above average. In relation to this matter, the Extended Education Program should
be implemented in the school system in order to better identify, manage and develop the
potential of gifted students and in the same time to offer better learning experience for them in
pursuit of nurturing their talents.

Background

The Extended Education Program is an enrichment program which is adapted and modified
based on the Triad Enrichment Model proposed by Joseph Renzulli (Renzulli, 1977). This
program intended to advance the quality of instruction by providing higher learning standards
and broader learning experiences for all students by developing talents in all students,
complementing standard curriculum with a wide range of enrichment experiences and offering
challenging follow-up activities for students based on their strengths and interests. This will
engage students with demanding yet enjoyable experiences that are constructed around their
learning styles, interests, and the way they prefer to express themselves (Neag Centre for Gifted
Education and Talent Development, 1997).

This program will be carried out in three core level of enrichments which are the Enrichment
Type I, the Enrichment Type II and the Enrichment Type III. In the Enrichment Type I, students
will be exposed to different disciplines, topics, issues, careers and environments which are not
usually available in a formal classroom. These exposures might be in the forms of seminars,
forums, dialogues, field trips, readings, surfing the internet, etc. The experience and findings that

1
Mokhsin Abdul Ghaffar (n6941842)

students gained from the exposures will help them to identify their own interest for the
exploration and research later (Enrichment Type III). The Enrichment Type II consists of skills-
inculcating and emotion affective activities. This will enable the students to be equipped with
different generic skills such as higher order thinking process, learning skills, research skills,
communication skills and resource-retrieval skills. Specific skills such as basic statistical data
analysis will be taught if it is necessary for the students’ research project. This is to bolster their
confidence and prepare them for their research. Lastly, in the Enrichment Type III, students will
conduct their own investigation and research activity based on their pursuit of interest. They
should be able to produce products or solutions which have impacts on the real targeted audience
of their research. This is to ensure that they practiced their skills which they learned in the
Enrichment Type II activities.

This program is proposed to enable students to retrieve and process information, to conduct
investigations and research, to communicate, to make decisions and to solve problems
effectively. It is also will integrate the intellectual thinking skills with learning and in the same
time will decline the sceptical perspectives of elitism and negatives attitudes towards gifted
children. As a conclusion, this program will not only help to recognize, manage and develop
gifted students but also help in developing students’ interests of the school as a whole.

Identification Strategies

Gifted students have different learning needs from those of their age peers of average ability and
therefore require different educational planning in order to develop their potential. The process
of identification is vital if schools are to accommodate for these gifted students’ intellectual and
social-emotional needs. With this program, all students ought to have their educational needs
met, no matter where they fall on the learning continuum. Therefore, in order to cater
successfully for the needs of gifted children, we need to know who they are and where their
abilities lie.

Once a child has been identified as gifted, we can use appropriate educational interventions and
strategies to move them along the learning continuum. In the process we may identify students
whose needs are not being met by the current curriculum, provide evidence for inclusion in a
particular program and identify students who will need extension beyond the core curriculum. It
is important to remember that the purpose of identifying gifted students is to ensure that the

2
Mokhsin Abdul Ghaffar (n6941842)

learning experiences they have in school meet their learning needs. The ways these needs are met
may vary from school to school - hence the combination of tools used will be chosen to suit the
purpose of identifying within your own school population. When identifying gifted students we
also need to know in what domain(s) that they are gifted in. We need to know whether they are
achieving well or underachieving in their current learning situation. We need to know their
relative strengths and weaknesses and this will determine how best we can serve their learning
needs.

It is essential that the identification tools used to identify a student for a particular program or
learning experience are in line with our understanding of giftedness. The careful determination of
program goals will set the direction for the entire identification process (Feldhusen, Asher &
Hoover, 1984). The identification procedures need to allow the fact that some gifted children
freely express their abilities at school, while others may not. With this in mind, we need to
collect information about both the potential and the performance of a child who is being
considered. By focusing on what is measurable (through objective measures) and observable
(through subjective measures) we can identify the areas in which the gifted student excels and
any possible areas of weakness. Identification is the first step in catering for the needs of a gifted
student.

In this program, two types of identification process. The identification process will be divided
into two types which are subjective and objective. Subjective measures allow judgments to be
made on the basis of structured observations of the student. These include teacher, parent, peer
and self nomination, along with anecdotal records contributed by previous teachers and the
child’s family. For the subjective type of identification, the gifted students will be nominated by
their teachers, parents/caregiver, peer and themselves. These measures add a human touch to the
identification process and many adults or fellow students who interact with the individual may
have something important to add to the profile. The main instrument that will be used for this
identification is the Sayler’s checklists. Meanwhile Objective measures are standardized tests of
ability or achievement. These include IQ and other forms of psychometric testing, standardized
performance tests, dynamic testing and off-level testing. Objective identification measures are to
be used to identify gifted and talented students’ aptitude and/or current levels of achievement.
These measures usually assess a variety of elements of cognitive processing and reasoning, or
achievement levels within the school context or compared to a much larger cohort, for example
3
Mokhsin Abdul Ghaffar (n6941842)

verbal reasoning or reading comprehension. Because of the Extended Education Program is a

whole school program, the identification process can be integrated in the Enrichment Type I
where teachers can recognize students who have high inclination and critical inquiries towards
certain disciplines. From there, these students will be put into special attention of the teachers.

SUBJECTIVE
MEASURES MONITORING PROCESS
(Enrichment Type 2)

IDENTIFICATION
PROCESS (Enrichment
Type 1)

EXTENSION PROCESS
OBJECTIVE MEASURES (Enrichment Type 3)

Figure 1: Identification Strategies

At the beginning of the Enrichment Type I, the students will be assessed through several tests.
These tests range from learning aptitude inventories, IQ test and standardised tests. Besides that,
each student will have to be reviewed by their teachers, parents/caregivers, peer and themselves
to determine their inclination in learning. Also, the gifted students will be easily recognized later
when the students were exposed to different experiences as in the Enrichment Type I. Students
who show higher or above average level of inquisitive towards certain disciplines might be
regarded as gifted and will be given possible opportunities to further develop their inquiries.

The monitoring of the gifted students comes in under the Enrichment Type II. After these highly-
inquisitive students have been identified, they will be provided with opportunities to research and
develop their investigation. They will be taught different generic skills to enable them to put their
4
Mokhsin Abdul Ghaffar (n6941842)

investigation systematically. They might also be taught skill to analyse data that they gather
through their exposure to different experiences in the Enrichment Type I to help their
investigation and research. This phase intends to develop the students’ inquiry by providing them
with different opportunities to help them to develop their research. These students might be
given opportunity to have direct contact with individual who are experts in the students’ field of
interest. For example, the teacher might have some professional engineers to help those students
who have high inquisitive towards engineering in order to help them in their research. This is to
ensure that the students have first-hand knowledge and consults from experts of their particular
field of interests.

Later, in the Enrichment Type III, the students will have to come out with issues or problem
regarding their field of interests. Then, they will have to demonstrate solutions to their issues or
problems. They might be required to write a report on their projects or research. This permits
them to illustrate their process of gathering information and data, analysing the information and
interpreting issues based on data analysis and provide solutions to the related issues or problems.
Besides that, they will have to present their research to public where the students will be
interrogated by public audience about their research would be done at the end of the year where
the students’ researches are exhibit to public. Exceptional research of the students will be
selected for more in-depth exploration by the students themselves and they will be fully
supervised by experts of particular disciplines.

TERM 1 TERM 2 TERM 3 TERM 4

ENRICHMENT
TYPE 1
ENRICHMENT
TYPE 2
ENRICHMENT
TYPE 3

Figure 2: A Year Overview of the Extended Education Program

5
Mokhsin Abdul Ghaffar (n6941842)

The Extended Education program is proposed to be implemented according to the school terms.
The program will be for one-year basis where the three core level of enrichment will be divided
and overlapped. This is because it will enable teachers and staff of the program to keep track of
the students’ progress. Teachers and staff will be able to plan activities which will support and
enrich the students’ learning experience. Furthermore, students’ profiling process will become
more efficient and the data collection would be more reliable as the process of identifying the
students’ abilities and learning progress are continuous. This will help the teachers and staffs to
cater the students’ needs at the best approach.

Staff Professional Development

In the Gifted and Talented Students Action Plan 2008-2010, the Education Queensland has
outlined 5 key strategies which are: the Identification process, Collaboration/Partnerships,
Leadership, Teachers’ knowledge, development and skill, and Students (The Learning Place,
2009a). The staff professional development of the Extended Education Program is addressed
based on one of the key strategies outlined by the Education Queensland which is the Teachers’
Knowledge, Development and Skill. Teachers and staff are ought to be familiar with
characteristics of giftedness and plan and apply appropriate differentiated programs to ensure
gifted students are challenged. As outlined in the Framework for Gifted Education, teachers’
responsibilities includes applying appropriate methods for identifying students who are gifted,
enlisting specialists support staff including guidance officers and gifted-education specialists,
challenging students who are gifted to continue their development through curricular activities,
critically reflecting on the effectiveness of their school’s programs and practices in meeting the
needs of gifted students, and undertaking professional learning to enhance knowledge and skills
through dialogue and the sharing of effective practice (The Learning Place, 2009b). Thus, to
ensure that the Extended Education Program to succeed, the teachers and staffs must undergo
special training in order for them to accommodate the needs of the gifted students.

The Extended Education program proposed that teachers and staff must undergo two types of
training. The training will be divided into two sections which are: the internal training and
external training. The internal training will be courses handled in the school where the Extended
Education Program coordinator will be training other teachers and staffs. Besides the program
coordinator, the school will also arrange sessions and trainings handled by the Gifted Education

6
Mokhsin Abdul Ghaffar (n6941842)

officer from the State Education Department. Meanwhile, the external training will be held
outside of the schools where teachers and staffs will be required to attend for extensive training.
This could be any courses, exhibitions, seminars or conferences held by the State Education
Department or other non-government organizations. These two sections of training will provide
the teachers and staffs with wider and broader knowledge and capacity to cater to the need of
gifted students.

Conclusion

The Extended Education Program is designed for students to feel valued and supported in a
learning environment which both challenges and inspires them to pursue excellence and possess
a passion for lifelong learning. The implementation of the Extended Education Program will
demonstrate the school’s commitment to the education of gifted students by building greater
awareness of the prevalence and specific needs of gifted students, the identification of all
students who are gifted regardless of their ethnicity, gender or economic status, by meeting their
needs and improving their learning outcomes, and by cooperation and collaboration among
teachers, parents, students, education administrators and community to ensure that the gifted
students have opportunities to develop their abilities.

7
Mokhsin Abdul Ghaffar (n6941842)

Reference

Feldhusen, J. F., Asher, J. W. & Hoover, S. M. (1984). Problems in the identification of

giftedness and talent, or ability. Gifted Child Quarterly, 28(4), 149-151.

Johnsen, S. K. (2004). Identifying gifted students: A practical guide. Texas: Prufrock Press.

Neag Centre for Gifted Education and Talent Development. (1997). School Enrichment model.
Retrieved October 26, 2009 from http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/sem/

Porter, L. (1999). Gifted young learner: A guide for teachers and parents. Sydney: Allyn and
Unwin.

Renzulli, J. S. (1977). The enrichment triad model: A guide for developing defensible programs
for the gifted and talented. Connecticut: Creative Learning Press.

The Learning Place. (2009a). Gifted and Talented Students Action Plan 2008-2010. Retrieved
October 26, 2009 from http://www.learningplace.com.au/deliver/content.asp?pid=14450

The Learning Place. (2009b). Framework for Gifted Education. Retrieved October 26, 2009 from
http://www.learningplace.com.au/deliver/content.asp?pid=14450