Children With Special Abilities

1. Children With Special Abilities The College Street Normal School Model The Journey - So Far!

2. No right way or template. No magic words! • Key elements - ownership - communication - heaps of reflection and fine tuning - a strong commitment to continuous improvement. ‘What we do well today we can do better tomorrow! • Our Experience - Warts n’all!

3. BackgroundCollege Street Normal School • Decile 10 • Disproportionate numbers of very able children (80% mean, PAT) • Parent Expectations • Challenge

4. Preliminary Research • Auckland Elaine Le Seur - Lincoln Heights Gladstone Mt Eden • Massey University - Don McAlpine

5. Discovery Programme • Withdrawal Programme • One week duration • Teacher Identification • Wide range of giftedness • Outside tutors • Small groups - 10-12 children • Teacher facilitator

6. Initial Issues • Elitism - B.O.T. attitudes • Funding • Fairness of selection • Finding Tutors

7. Evolving Issues • More successful - the more controversial! Identification criteria? • Teacher facilitator - resentment • Pupils missing out on regular classroom learning • Revolving door concept • Needs of Gifted & Talented? Fun Activities? • Class example of doing things back to front! Knowledge > Skills > Passion for Action

8. Discovery Programme - Staff Evaluation • Parent perception - elitist (poor communication with parents) • At best ‘ an expensive enrichment programme’ • Staff felt didn’t know enough about ‘Gifted & Talented’ • Not school-wide - Only Years 5 & 6 Staff Decided: • Needed an intensive whole staff professional development session on all aspects of Gifted & Talented education

9. Anna MuelliAddressed Questions • Who are the Gifted & Talented? • What makes them different? Their idiosyncrasies? • How do you identify them? • How do you best meet their needs?

10. Other Professional Development Outcomes Definition • Howard Fountain ‘One who is able to process & absorb information and skills more rapidly than the average child’ Speed of processing and absorbing? • Renzulli 1500 highly gifted individuals for 30 years Creativity Commitment Above average ability Challenged our thinking about who they were!

11. Other Outcomes • Clear identification processes • Enrichment or Acceleration • Upskilled staff in relation to strategies offered by: De Bono Bloom Gardiner’s Multiple Intelligences Costa Hyerle’s Maps • Establishment of Special Abilities register • Exclusivity or Inclusivity

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13. The Art Costa Factor Previous Encounter Habits of Mind - Essential Skills - Processes Some good work going on - not schoolwide Four staff visited St Cuthberts in Auckland - Jill Hubble

14. What Are The ‘Habits of Mind’? Persisting . Managing Impulsivity Listening with Understanding & Empathy Thinking flexibility Thinking about thinking (metacognition) Striving for accuracy Questioning & posing problems Applying past knowledge to new situations

15. Art’s Visit to College Street Normal School Immediate Impact! Put the pieces of the jigsaw together - made connections (Gardiner - Costa) Draw on research to make some profound statements ‘Above average intelligence need not be the exclusive domain of a few’ ‘If we provide them with the ‘fuel’ to engage in skilful thinking who knows which children might pop out of the woodwork’ Simple message ‘We’re interested not only in how many answers pupils know but also in how pupils behave when they don’t know’ Margaret Mead Parent Evening / Newsletter

16. Teaching The Habits of Mind ‘Children cannot learn that which we choose not to teach’ Costa One or two Habits of Mind per term - grid Video Intelligence can be TAUGHT

17. Outcomes of Costa’s Visit • Process is as important as content • ‘Content can no longer be the end in and of itself but the tool by which people learn to make meaning for themselves or to solve the problems for which they do not have answers’. Costa • Through explicit teaching of Habits of Mind and good teacher modelling we can actually TEACH children to become increasingly sophisticated thinkers • Mark Twain ‘I never let my schooling interfere with my education’ • Adopted a new school motto ‘We Think & Learn Together’

18. Concerns • Not maximising the opportunity for children to apply the ‘Habits of Mind’ • We were teaching the children the skills commensurate with a contemporary problem based delivery system and attempting to apply them to an industrial model of education • Very little opportunity for the children to use their new found skills. No time for children to ask ‘So What?’ • Perkins ‘Not so much a knowledge gap but a monumental USE ofknowledge gap! • Not a good fit!

19. Different Delivery System • We decided that if we really believed that rather than thinking coming after knowledge but that in fact knowledge comes on the coat-tails of thinking, then we needed to allow children to actively use knowledge. • We needed to somehow encourage deeper learning and understanding • As Perkins says ‘When children are thinking about and with knowledge they re truly learning • At this point that our delivery of the curriculum came in for some close scrutiny • Decided we needed to develop a delivery system where the process becomes the content and the traditional content becomes the vehicle for acquiring processes • No prizes for guessing the next step on our journey ...

20. Integration – C.S.N.S. • Integration - Queensland Style • Brisbane - In-Service • Paul Sutton & Megan McWhinney • Development of our own Integration Model • Strategies - Whole Staff In-Service - ‘On’ the job rather than ‘in’ the job - Team release to plan - Sharing successes - failures at Staff meetings

21. Integration - C.S.N.S. Model • Two Integrated Units per year • Big Ideas • Literacy & Numeracy • Curriculum should have a social conscience • Consequences

22. The C.S.N.S. Integration Model Big Idea Context Deep Understanding/s Significant Questions Audience & Dance Assessment Rubrics Links to Productive Pedagogies Links to A/O’s Learning Activity Sequence Teaching of H of M Showcasing How well did the children do in relation to the assessment rubrics and the Deep Understandings

23. C.S.N.S. Integration Model Withdrawal Groups Cross Grouping I.E.P.’s for C.W.S.A. Strategies at C.S.N.S. For Meeting Needs of C.W.S.A. Explicit Teaching of Thinking Skills (Habits of Mind) Projects Integrated Curriculum Immersed in the Habits of Mind More Skilful Classroom Teaching Productive Pedagogies

24. Handouts • Unit • Productive Pedagogies • Assessment Rubrics • Tracking Productive Pedagogy Coverage

25. Changes • Exclusivity Inclusivity • Withdrawal In - class • Content/Knowledge Process Centred School Centred School • Passive Learning Active Learning - Problem based learning Learning that reflects the real world • Haphazard Change Organised, thoughtful change • Traditional School ‘Smart’ School • Only a Very Small Most Children have the Percentage of Children are potential to be Gifted Gifted • Just in case Just in time

26. Mind filling Mind development • Production line A climate that is conducive to • children ‘Learning How To Learn’

27. Summary • We’ve been trying to develop a new lens with which to view the educational landscape. We’ve tried to bring new things into focus and to allow some things that have been in the foreground to recede into the background. Adapted from ‘New’ Knowledges and ‘New’ Ways of Knowing; Implications & Opportunities by Jane Gilbert

28. ‘When we no longer know what to do we have come to our real work and when we no longer know which way to go we have begun our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings’ Wendell Berry