RESPONDING TO PEERS

As with all effective instruction, proper teacher training is vital (Brulles, Saunders, & Cohn, 2010). Teachers cannot implement strategies or programs without an in-depth knowledge of how to apply them with gifted students. Teachers also need to gather observational and academic data to understand whether gifted students are benefitting from the evidence-based strategies that teachers are using (Eyre, 2007). If students are not demonstrating appropriate performance gains, then teachers need to re-evaluate their instructional strategies and try another strategy.

Acceleration

Acceleration is a process in which students work through materials at a quicker pace or earlier than other students. For example, a student may learn about cell mitosis in one week instead of three. Acceleration may also mean that a student skips a grade in school. Some high school students accelerate their instruction by taking college courses while still in high school.

Acceleration has been shown to be a viable strategy for providing a challenging curriculum to gifted students and for setting gifted students up for later success in life (Gross, 2006; Vialle, Ashton, & Carlton, 2001). To effectively implement an accelerated program, however, teachers need to work with students to prepare them academically and emotionally. Many gifted students experience a drop in self-esteem once they start an accelerated program because the work is challenging and not as easy as they are used to. With proper support, however, students will learn to succeed in their accelerated curriculum (Chapman, 2009).

Whether acceleration that involves skipping grades in school is the best choice for gifted students is controversial. Some experts express concern about the emotional and social needs of the students, while others have demonstrated that gifted students who skipped grades or entered college early seem to be happy and content with their acceleration (Boazman & Sayler, 2011; Steenbergen-Hu & Moon, 2011).

Compacting

To use the strategy of compacting, the teacher assesses (either formally or informally) what a student already knows about a topic and then allows the student to skip known material and move to learning new material (Sutton, 2001; Winebrenner, 2003). Compacting can be used at the elementary and secondary levels (Lewis, Cruzeiro, & Hall, 2007). For example, if a middle school teacher is planning a two-week unit on the core of the Earth, the teacher could administer a pre-test. If a student already knows most, if not all, of the material, the teacher could compact the unknown material into two or three days and then move on to another science unit with this student. Without compacting, many gifted students are bored because they are reviewing material they already have learned.

Enrichment

To provide enrichment, teachers provide extension activities for gifted students. Typically, enrichment activities go into more depth than typical classroom activities (Miller & Gentry, 2010). An effective enrichment activity gives students a choice about what or how they will learn and then provides challenging activities or assignments accordingly (Pereira, Peters, & Gentry, 2010). Enrichment might involve assigning alternative readings that cover a specific topic in greater depth (Halls, 2011). For example, in a classroom unit on Egypt, the student may read books about writing in hieroglyphics and the process of mummifying bodies. In mathematics, students might be presented with open-ended problems that require a variety of upper-level mathematics skills to solve (McAllister & Plourde, 2008). In a history class, student learning might be enriched by research into local history and participation in hands-on activities as well as field trips (Morris, 2005). Students can conduct interviews with people who have lived in the community for years and then write and act in a play about the history of the community.

Enrichment can occur during the school day in a general classroom or a gifted program. It can also occur in Saturday programs or summer programs for gifted students (Pereira, et al., 2010). Some gifted programs are connected with local colleges and universities, rather than a school district; other gifted programs may be connected with private organizations (e.g., an engineering lab, a medical school, or a creative writing center). Typically, these organizations reach out to local schools to help with recruitment of gifted students.

Independent Studies

Students engaged in independent studies investigate a topic in depth with monitoring and guidance from a teacher or mentor. Mentors are often community members (e.g., architects, musicians, journalists) who work in the student's area of interest. Independent studies work well when students decide (or have a choice) about what they would like to learn and investigate (Delisle, 2012; Powers, 2008). Students can also be provided with open-ended tasks that allow them to decide which approach to use to solve a problem (Gadanidis, Hughes, & Cordy, 2011). For example, a student may decide to investigate the effect of recycling on their community. This task does not have a "yes" or "no" answer, and the student makes choices about how to do the research and measure the effect of recycling. Students should also be presented with authentic reading experiences to pursue their independent learning (Moore, 2005). A student can read books, magazines, plays, newspaper articles, or diaries to learn about a topic.