The Role of Domains in the Conceptualization of Talent

In this article we present research concerning important aspects of domain-specific giftedness. Specifically, we address the evidence regarding the relationship between specific abilities and achievement. Empirical evidence suggests that specific abilities have been used widely and validly for identification of exceptional talent in performance domains, and mathematical and spatial reasoning ability have demonstrated predictive validity for achievement in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) domains. We note that domains of talent have unique trajectories and discuss four critical aspects of domain-specific giftedness. These include the developmental nature of giftedness (giftedness moves from potential to competency to expertise and possibly to eminence over time); the temporal nature of giftedness (that domains vary in their starting, peak, and ending points); the contextual aspect of giftedness (societal value of some domains over others, changing of domains and emergence of new domains, and the environmental influences in fostering domain-specific achievement); and the relative nature of giftedness (childhood giftedness is advancement relative to age peers, and adult giftedness is exceptional achievement relative to other domain experts). Finally, we present some implications of a domain perspective on giftedness for educational practice.     

Exploring the structure of digital literacy competence assessed using authentic software applications

Educational technology research and development - Digital literacy competence (DL) is an important capacity for students’ learning in a rapidly changing world. However, little is known about...     

Developing and implementing innovative ICT-supported engineering education and educational services: results of a faculty-wide research and implementation programme

This paper describes the results of a department-wide programme called IMAGO, which was aimed at giving information and communication technology (ICT) a more important and effective role in the educational programmes. The underlying assumption was that students are responsible for their own learning process, and that students are considered to be knowledge- and information-intensive workers rather than passive consumers of information, and need to be facilitated as such. In implementing more advanced and innovative ICT applications for supporting the educational processes and for improving the contents of the courses, we have developed and used an implementation approach that was geared towards managing and steering professionals. The approach respects the role of professionals as highly individual and knowledgeable workers, and suggests the use of specific incentives to stimulate those professionals. The approach used has led to successful results and innovations in the areas of educational administrative processes, such as individual and flexible scheduling software, and in the area of the course contents, such as intensive use of ICT to enhance the students' learning process. The results obtained will be distributed to a wider audience in the near future by means of (inter)national collaborations.     

Development of the Transferable Learning Orientations tool: providing metacognitive opportunities and meaningful feedback for students and instructors

This study encapsulates the development and testing of the Transferable Learning Orientations (TLO) tool. It is a triangulated measure built on select scales from the Motivated Strategies for Learning Questionnaire (MSLQ), together with multiple-choice items adapted from the lifelong learning VALUE rubric, and an open-ended response for each dimension. Select scales from the MSLQ were tested in a range of undergraduate courses, and the TLO (version one) was developed and piloted in a first-year engineering course. Minor refinements were made, and the TLO (version two) was retested with second-year undergraduates. The TLO is designed to engage students in meta-cognitive processes and provide meaningful feedback to students. The dimensions are outcome motivation, learning belief, self-efficacy, transfer and organisation. Results from the second-year group were more consistent and reliable than the first-year group, suggesting that context is an important factor. The scales demonstrate acceptable reliability, and the moderate correlations between scale scores and rubric ratings provide support for concurrent validity. We recommend the TLO be tested with broader populations to confirm psychometric properties and that it be implemented longitudinally to investigate the development of learning skills and changes in orientations over time.     

Rural gifted students who are deaf or hard of hearing: how electronic technology can help

Electronic technology can be used to overcome many of the barriers and other factors that restrict delivery of services to rural schools; it can also expand the world of rural gifted students who are deaf or hard of hearing. Online college and high school Web sites that offer courses are listed, as well as a Web site for tutoring and one offering help for teachers of rural gifted students who are deaf or hard of hearing. Recommendations are made for ways that legislatures and rural school districts can make Internet resources and assistive technology more widely available in rural educational settings.     

Inclusion,Exclusion, and Ideology: Special Education Students' Changing Sense of Self

The inclusion of students with disabilities in the mainstream of general education remains one of the most contested topics in public education today. This qualitative study considered this issue from the perspective of included as well as excluded special education students over an extended period of time. More specifically, it sought to understand how 11 developmentally handicapped students made sense of their experience in a variety of inclusive and segregated classrooms in four urban school settings. It followed these students in two elementary schools and two junior high schools over a period of 6 years. The information from participant observation as well as teacher and student interviews supports inclusive schooling. It suggests that, as the students moved into and out of traditionalist and inclusive classrooms, they presented a changing sense of themselves in relation to ideological beliefs and practices within particular schools and classrooms. Students in inclusive classrooms constructed a sense of themselves that was significantly different (and more positive) from those in either segregated or traditionalist classrooms.     

Prediction of dyslexia in kindergarten boys

This study followed 163 boys from kindergarten through fourth grade. A battery of neurospychological and preacademic tests and electrophysiological measures (BEAM) were administered in kindergarten, and reading tests at grade 4, in an attempt to delineate precursors of dyslexia. Three of the kindergarten tasks (giving sounds associated with letters, rapid naming of numbers, and finger localization) differentiated dyslexics from normal readers with 98 percent correct classification. The tasks primarily involve grapheme-phoneme associations, storage and retrieval of phonological information in long-term memory, and verbal labeling. Results are interpreted as confirming the role played by phonological processing tasks in the prediction of dyslexia. Preliminary BEAM results for visual evoked potential topography suggest a significant increment in the distribution of this potential in the left parietal and frontal region, and, for auditory evoked potential topography, a significant difference between the two groups in the right posterior hemisphere. This work was supported in part by NIHCD grants RO1HD18761 to F.H. Duffy, RO1HD18654 to H. Als, and the Mental Retardation Grant P30HD18655 to C.F. Barlow.     

Rules,Sanctions and Rewards in Primary Schools

Twenty‐four primary schools were randomly selected from all those listed in a local education authority in the West Midlands of England. Heads or deputy headteachers of 21 of these schools were interviewed using a structured interview schedule very similar to the one used for a recent survey of secondary schools. Data were obtained about the general rule structures of the schools and the system of sanctions and rewards used to maintain them. The findings were then compared with those from the secondary survey. Primary schools were less likely than secondary schools to have written rule structures but most were in the process of producing them in response to new pressures. It was more common for all the teachers in the primary school to be considered responsible for seeing that rules were kept. Generally, primary school headteachers identified fewer sanctions being used to uphold their rules than in secondary schools. The number of rewards used in both types of school was about equal. Comment is made on the difference between sanctions and rewards identified as being used in schools and some observed classroom practice.