NEW HORIZONS – SCHOOL-BASED CHANGE IN GIFTED EDUCATION
CONNIE HOLZ, CARMEL M DEIZMANN, & JAMES J WATTERS
Education Queensland & Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane

Gifted education is a controversial area of education throughout the world. Australian culture does not exalt the virtues of intellectual giftedness (Gross, 1995). Equality of outcomes is a pervasive philosophy and ingrained in an allegedly egalitarian society, similar values to those found in New Zealand. Thus if we hold the proposition that all children have gifts and talents, then we have to agree with the argument that schools need to develop organisational and pedagogical strategies that are inclusive. Hence, automatically all gifted children are catered for. However, the argument that all children are gifted is somewhat naive and, whilst appealing, is not supported by any sound research. Clearly, there are children who are intellectually exceptional in relation to their peers and have the potential to achieve intellectual excellence. Accepting that these children need the implementation of differentiated educational strategies challenges many strongly held cultural beliefs. Thus, when a school is provided with the opportunity to take a leadership role in this area by developing and implementing strategies that recognise and support the education of gifted children, a number of myths and entrenched beliefs need to be confronted.

The task of providing the most effective educational programmes and experiences for diverse student populations remains a major priority for schooling in Australia. Gifted students are a recognised social justice group but have not had their unique educational needs adequately addressed, largely because the numbers of appropriately trained personnel have been inadequate to meet the special learning needs of these students. Recent systemic initiatives by Education Queensland have begun to address this problem. A substantial development was the announcement by Education Queensland of the GATE Way initiative in 1997.

The GATE Way programme provided funding of the order of $900 000 for initiatives in developing education programmes for gifted children. First, money was provided to school districts and individual schools were able to apply for small grants to support small local programmes that targeted gifted children. Second, eight (four in 1997, four in 1998) schools have received special funding of approximately $80 000 each to develop a focus on gifted education. These focus schools are autonomous in the type of programme they develop but are advised and supported by Education Queensland consultants. Funding has been guaranteed for three years. At the conclusion of this period, schools should be able to demonstrate examples of best practice in gifted education and become leaders for other schools in the development and dissemination of strategies.

GATE Way Focus schools were selected on the basis of potential and existing expertise or experiences with gifted education programmes. Nevertheless, while key teachers have some expertise, most staff are lacking in an understanding of the issues of gifted education. Until recently gifted education was a low priority in the Australian education system and few opportunities were available for formal professional development of staff or pre-service education in this area of teaching. Awareness raising and professional development are early priorities for a school embarking on becoming a focus school. Thus, schools will be involved in substantial change of practices.

As a complete strategy for bringing about real or fundamental change in curriculum initiatives, the special or focus schools model potentially has several limitations. While many of these special programmes are highly effective in providing excellent training for specific individuals and populations, their short -term nature due to funding constraints does not allow for embedding of change once the monies have ceased. Additionally, again because of their special nature, these programmes are essentially developed as peripheral or add-on to the mainstream schooling system and remain outside of the experience of the majority of schools. Indeed, these programmes often become marginalised because they encounter resistance from teaching staff in other schools who view them as affirmative action efforts or as government initiatives to respond to a minority group that many teachers believe do not need special programming. To be effective, this funding has to be applied to developing whole school programmes and accompanying dissemination strategies that ensure the model developed is seen as best practice by teachers and schools throughout the state.

Accompanying the development of focus schools has been substantial expenditure on in-service training through the use of departmental and private consultants and the funding of teachers to attend key conferences. The in-service model has been heavily criticised by both practitioners and researchers. Lieberman and Miller (1990) in a strongly stated critique argue that the in-service approach is based on a deficit model where teachers are seen as objects and not as engaged subjects, and often the result is a reinforcement of the status quo and schooling as usual. Essentially, the in-service model is a top-down, paternalistic, externally imposed approach that results in little or no fundamental institutional change. In place of the in-service model, Lieberman and Miller (1990) suggest the need to create a culture of support for teacher inquiry through study groups, support networks, group curriculum writing, research projects, and other professional development activities.

Within this context, West Hollow State School was selected in 1998 as a GATE Way Focus School and funded to establish a programme for gifted education. This involves the development of programmes within the school and in time becoming an outreach centre for gifted education in the local region. Under the GATE Way policy schools have autonomy to develop models of gifted education to meet their specific needs and to capitalise on local expertise. West Hollow State School caters for 340 children from preschool to grade 7 and has a staff of 27 teachers. The school is situated in a rapid growth area to the west of a large metropolitan city. Whilst initially a school catering for a small farming community, it now is the major community focus for a burgeoning housing development.

The school's administration prepared a strategic plan for the development of gifted education that included a range of objectives and a set of strategies to achieve these objectives in an effective manner that acknowledges the needs of children, teachers and the community. This collaborative project has been developed to assist West Hollow State School to evaluate the development of its programme. Specifically the project addresses the following objectives that cover planning, implementing, and reviewing the implementation of a programme of gifted education:

1. How effective are the strategies in enabling teachers and a school community to identify the important skills, understandings, competencies, and shared vision needed to implement a differentiated curriculum?
2. How effectively can teacher professional development programmes be implemented to assist teachers define and conceptualise gifted education in ways that provide effective teaching for gifted students and continue to meet the needs of all children?
3. How is the West Hollow programme being implemented? How does this compare to their proposed implementation plan? How is programme implementation evolving?
4. What progress are West Hollow participants making toward carrying out the activities and achieving the objectives specified in their action plans? What has helped or hindered action plan implementation?
5. What unanticipated outcomes are accruing as a result of West Hollow Programme?

METHODOLOGY

Design issues

Curriculum writers, policy initiators, and system administrators often ignore many factors in curriculum innovation. Effective implementation must be accompanied by effective professional development initiatives. Professional development is in itself a maligned term. The notion of professional implies a practitioner who has a commitment to their discipline, its advancement, its purpose. Professionals have the capacity to make autonomous and independent judgments about their discipline (Carr & Kemmis, 1983; Houle, 1990). Hence professional development is more than just a technical process of knowledge and skills development and involves a reflective process in which the professional developer and the professional engage in mutual discourse to examine the assumptions underlying their respective practices. Professional development is a process of growth as a person. It is also a hermeneutic process in which ideas and beliefs of the professional developer and the professional are mutually interpreted. The essence therefore of effective professional development involves prolonged engagement with practitioners during which theory and practice are successively explored. The professional developer guides practitioners through the maze of contemporary theory while the practitioners apply and reflect on the effectiveness of theory. The application necessarily must be funned by the idiosyncrasies of the situation and acknowledge multiple contextual issues ranging from economics and physical resourcing to emotional and social realities.

Tobin and McRobbie (1996) found that teacher beliefs provide a strong rationale for maintaining the very practices that reformers believe warrant change. Hence, teacher beliefs will impact significantly on their interpretation of policy documents and consequently on the curriculum as experienced by students. This is a major issue in science curriculum reform (Brophy, 1991). These factors include teacher confidence and self-efficacy (Watters & Ginns, 1997), and the effect of teachers' existing beliefs about gifted education, their current teaching practices and school culture on their interpretation of curriculum initiatives. Other important factors that impact on change include the balance of administrative, institutional and personal support for change (e.g. Fullan, 1993).

Implementation of change and the development of innovative practices are only effective in collaborative settings (Fullan 1993). Similarly, research on the effectiveness of the implementation of change requires a collaborative approach. The development, implementation and effects of West Hollow programme are examined from a participant-observer perspective. The evaluation and research plan blends quantitative and qualitative methodologies, involving objectives-referenced evaluation (Tyler, 1942), discrepancy evaluation (e.g., Provus, 1972), formative and goal-free evaluation (e.g., Scriven, 1972), ethnographic approaches (e.g., Guba & Lincoln, 1989; Patton, 1990) and participatory action research (Atweh, Kemmis & Weeks, 1998; McKernan, 1996).

Data are being collected for programme evaluation and research purposes using a variety of means including surveys, direct observation, interviews, and document review. The purposes of the evaluation and research activities are to provide a historical record showing the evolution of programme implementation, to provide formative feedback to programme staff and participants, and to document the effects of the programme. Instruments to be used will include Stages of Concern survey (Hall George, & Rutherford, 1977) which provides a longitudinal record of concerns with innovation and educational change. In the first four semesters of the programme, Stages of Concern surveys will be filled out to provide feedback about current concerns, satisfaction with professional development as well as suggestions for follow-up or future activities. This feedback will be shared with planning staff and used to develop agendas for succeeding activities.

Additional information is collected through a survey given once a year asking participants to report on action plan activities and progress as well as to describe any effects participation in the project has had on them personally or on their institutions. Representatives of schools will also be interviewed on the action plan progress; these reports are recorded anecdotally. Classroom observations will be made on a regular basis as the individual initiatives are implemented. A case study component will be added to the evaluation by intensively studying the change process at West Hollow through site visits and interviews as the project and the evaluation plan evolve.

STAGES OF IMPLEMENTATION

Change is a slow process with staff and the community growing through various phases during which their knowledge and skills develop and is refined. An overview of the process is given in Table 1.

The beginning: Application for funding
West Hollow commenced its journey towards a GATE Way school in earnest in 1997 through the untiring efforts of a classroom teacher who was particularly interested in the area of gifted education. She attended conferences that were jointly funded by the school and the then existing School Support Centres, and reported back to the school at regular staff-meetings. Attendance at conferences gave her the opportunity to meet with gifted and talented educators from across a wide range of settings. She also organised "Enrichment Days", where students could attend workshops conducted by visiting personnel, such as parents and other community groups.

Once funding was received to implement the GATE Way programme the School's teacher librarian was appointed for two days per week as the gifted and talented co-ordinator. Additionally funding was available to provide professional development and the procurement of resources.

Table 1
Phases in the development of the GATE Way programme at West Hollow

Dates 1997	Activities Application	Process adopted Key Staff mobilised	Outcomes Successful application
April 98	Initiation of Research and Evaluation Project	Formation of Partnership with QUT (Dr Jim Watters, Dr Carmel Diezmann)	Availability of external consultants, critical friends and collection of research data.
July	Initial professional development	GATE Way Project consultant	Awareness raising
July -September 98	Development of Benchmarks	3 staff-members off-line for 5 days	Document in Draft form
October 98	Concerns identified	Stages of concern Focus sessions	Claims, issues and concerns identified
November 98	Developing a vision	Facilitated development of definition	Agreed Definition
January 99	Professional development	Review of nature and needs of gifted children Issues of identification Development of initial curriculum project in	Technical information Perspectives developed Project planning
February 99 and beyond	Review and support	Monitoring of the development of in-class strategies and initiatives and application of these practices in classrooms On-going support for in-classroom application of planning strategies	Classroom Planning and Teaching will reflect some G&T strategies and techniques to cater for some of the “high flyers” in the classes as well as giving every student a chance to excel. (e.g.: “open ended teaching)
January 99 and beyond	Outreach	Inclusion of 5 small schools in the project (In-service sessions, Support etc.)	Staff at these schools are more aware of G&T issues and are using G&T strategies in their planning and teaching

Whole school commitment and professional development

It was recognised from the outset that gifted and talented education could generate considerable controversy. The very definition of "gifted and talented" was as potential source of much discussion and hence was seen as the first hurdle to be overcome by teachers and parents. Further topics to be addressed at an early stage included identification and strategies to cater for students who might be identified as having potential.

To this end it was clear that a "quick fix" approach would not be successful in the long run. One can legislate and direct, but true ownership would only come through lengthy discussions and a co-operative approach to the whole question. "Enrichment" activities such as Chess-clubs, Choirs, and Tournament of the Minds activities are initiatives adopted by a lot of schools all over Australia. Hence, a whole school-approach with fundamental changes in everyday practices in the classrooms was the better way to go. Teachers needed time to work through doubts and questions associated with gifted education. Therefore, in the short term, there were not going to be "amazing" activities happening at the school from one day to the next. A reflective, incremental approach was therefore adopted. Regular consultation with the GATE Way adviser was held and initial in-service sessions held on topics such as Multiple Intelligences, different Learning Styles and planning.

It was also decided that before approaches were made to the parents, the staff had to be very sure of exactly what they were on about, what they were doing, and why they were doing it. The school needed a shared vision and a united approach to gifted education.

Benchmarking - a significant part of a strategy for identification

In order to ascertain exactly where students were in their levels of academic achievement at anyone time, a benchmarking process for English and Mathematics was undertaken. The benchmarking process provided evaluation procedures and instruments which provided evidence that curriculum goals were being achieved, irrespective of how they were being achieved. It also provided continuity across the whole school; a framework within which teachers could operate.

At the moment, benchmarks are expressed as minimum competencies at the different Year-levels. Thus "high flyers" can be easily identified as they would, presumably, operate at much higher levels than their cohort. Measuring their achievements with the benchmarks, thus provides clear evidence, that these students are achieving beyond their Year level. 'Gut-feelings' and professional judgements are complemented with quantitative evidence.

Theoretically it should be easy to identify academic high achievement, which forms part of the identification process of gifted and talented learners. However, there are some gifted children who are underachieving and the identification of these students will be explored in the next phase of the project.

Partnerships

Having established a benchmarking process, the school sought two critical friends from the university. The brief was to:

• Lead the staff through a discussion on the definition of "gifted and talented" and develop a mutually agreed-upon definition
• Lead the staff through a process, whereby they could agree upon and adopt one or more instruments of identification
• Act as critical friends in the evaluation of the development of gifted education at the school.
• Gather research data on the gifted and talented learners in the local context.

Within the spirit of collaborative action research a dialogue was opened between the staff of the school and the critical friends. The initial contact with staff occurred at a pupil free day. Firstly the Stages of Concern Instrument was administered. This was followed by a description of the process to be adopted to support and monitor the development of the school as a Focus school. In the third component, the staff formed two focus groups in which they aired their perceptions of giftedness, their beliefs about the GATE Way programme and the direction in which they should proceed. The discussions were audiotaped for analysis.

The initial Stages of Concern data (Figure 1) revealed a relatively committed and optimistic staff. The stages of concern identify how staff feel about the implementation of a new innovation - namely the development of the school as a focus school for gifted education. The six dimensions of concern include: awareness of the innovation, information about the innovation, concerns about personal commitment, concerns about managing the change, concerns about the consequences of implementation, concerns about collaboration with colleagues and concerns about taking a leadership role in the innovation. The initial survey was conducted in October 1998. Subsequently the school engaged in developing the definition and engaged in a pupil free day of inservice. They also committed themselves to a small scale intervention in curriculum differentiation. Across all dimensions there was a reduction in stated concern. The decrease in the first three dimensions would be expected as more information is provided about the programme and teachers start to engage in professional development. The concern about management is relatively stable but low, reflecting a deal of confidence in the leadership of the programme. A small decrease was noted in the dimension identified as implications. This reflects a lessening in the concern about the impact on children and is corroborated by qualitative feedback, which suggests teachers are interested in what impact the programme will have on children but are less apprehensive. The observation of little change in the dimension of collaboration is not unusual at this stage of a project. The teachers need to develop confidence and a sense of self-assuredness before they are likely to share strategies with other staff. Developing this dimension is a key phase of the project to be addressed. The surprise observation is the large decrease in concern about taking the initiative and refocussing the project to meet their own personal needs. These quantitative data provide confidence that the project to date is developing in a positive direction.

###### Figure 1 here ####

Figure 1
Stages of Concern October 1998-1999

Developing a vision: Reaching consensus

It was believed to be the responsibility of the school community to arrive at a definition and a set of identification procedures. A definition needed to be grounded on a shared vision. A definition was seen to be a statement of beliefs and philosophy, which provided a guide for planning and implementation. It also was seen to represent a statement against which outcomes are reconciled. The importance of the activity undertaken in this phase of the project was therefore, not just the words of the definition, but the process of discussion and debate that accompanied the development of the definition.

The staff was divided into two groups. The groups were provided with an analysis of their concerns and summary of their perceptions of gifted children from the previous session, and a set of definitions from various policy documents. The critical friends facilitated the hour and a half sessions. Each group identified some key elements and words that were necessary and produced a tentative set of words. In the final session of the day, the whole school staff assembled and crafted, with considerable discussion, the final wording. The definition was distributed to staff for further comment. The final wording is given in Figure 2. An evaluation of the day's process and the degree of acceptance of the final document revealed substantial support.

#######Figure here### which says:

West Hollow State School holds that: Gifted and/or talented students are those who excel or have the potential to excel in one or more broad curriculum areas.

1.These gifts or talents should be assessable qualitatively or quantitatively 2.Assessment must show excellence or potential for excellence relevant to age peers 3.The child may: Show significant difference in learning relative to his or her age peers Demonstrate task commitment Strive towards personal excellence Demonstrate innate awareness of his or her potential 4.These children often require differentiated educational programmes or services. Figure 2 School definition

The first pupil free day provided the opportunity for staff to address the next big challenge. This involved a further consideration of the needs of the gifted, preliminary identification strategies and ways to differentiate the curriculum. The questions that remained concerned how more able students in the various areas might be recognised. Identification strategies were important. This question was addressed by a three-fold approach. Firstly, the Gate Way adviser led a workshop which dealt with the nature and needs of gifted children. This provided a broad perspective of the characteristics of gifted children. This was followed by a session in which some theoretical models of giftedness were explored and how these models may be useful in making decisions about whether a child is gifted. The day was completed by the staff exploring giftedness in mathematics and what approaches could be used to develop a differentiated mathematics programme. Resources were also provided to support individual teachers to develop an initiative.

Feedback on the effectiveness or otherwise of the pupil free day was obtained through a simple open-ended survey. The analysis of these data suggested that the professional development day appeared to help staff develop an understanding of identification strategies, strategies for implementation of programmes and raised awareness of the scope of resources available. A common comment was that awareness had been raised of the range of gifted children and the need to cater for individual children. There was also a recognition that gifted education benefits all, as one teacher stated: "I have consolidated my belief that all children can benefit from planning for extension of children's learning - and that we need to address all talents within the classroom."

Concerns tended to be very specific: "how do I find time," and a concern that there may not be gifted children in the class. A remaining concern was would teachers have the opportunity to observe strategies being implemented. Networking, observing colleagues and having the opportunity to use the "critical friends" as sounding boards were seen as important in the future.

Developing projects for differentiation

From the beginning of 1999, staff were asked to incorporate into their planning some initiatives, based on the Professional Development which had occurred up to this point. This was to be reflected in their Term overviews as well as in their teaching. This included not only specific projects but more an approach to each task such as: questioning to leave room for open-ended developments, divergent answers, and a variety of approaches to problem solving. Staff were also asked to start 'identifying' some potential 'high flyers' and to design activities, that were challenging and appropriate for students with different learning styles or strengths. Thus the goal was to provide a more challenging environment for gifted children.

Mathematics, in the guise of "Patterns, Problems and Puzzles", was selected as the basis for the first official planning task. This occurred for three reasons. First, teachers had recently focused on the content of mathematics as part of a school planning process and highly able children are easy to identify because of the inherently sequential nature of mathematics. Second, through this theme, mathematics is easily integrated with other subjects. Such a focus is inclusive of the philosophy of teachers who advocate an integrated approach to learning and the roles of specialist teachers. Third, the topic itself, "Patterns, Problems and Puzzles" provides an orientation to enrichment experiences that is congruent with the curriculum differentiation principles of depth, novelty and complexity.

In planning to meet the needs of gifted students there are two key phases. In Phase 1, when teachers have yet to identify gifted students in their class, the focus is on planning for gifted students at a general level and on providing experiences to identify these students. In Phase 2, teachers' planning should specifically address the needs of particular gifted children. As this professional development occurred prior to the commencement of the school term, when teachers were unfamiliar with their students, the focus was on Phase 1 planning.

As a first step in planning for the potential gifted students in their class, the teachers were asked to focus on developing some aspect of their programme so that it provided opportunities for identifying gifted children, in addition to the benchmarking process, by allowing them to "bubble up". The suggestion provided was to incorporate an aspect of the topic, "Patterns, Puzzles and Problems", into the curriculum, thus introducing depth, novelty or complexity into classroom experiences. This suggestion was accompanied by the opportunity for teachers to explore curriculum resources and to discuss their ideas with other teachers. During the Term 1, the teachers were to develop at least one of their ideas into a "mini project" and to implement it in the classroom. Early follow up interviews with some of the teachers have indicated that some of these "mini projects" are either well formulated and ready for implementation or actually being implemented in the classroom. In the near future, the plans of all teachers will be reviewed and support provided to teachers upon request.

Although some teachers almost intuitively cater for the needs of gifted students others are unaware or perhaps in awe of their needs. The initial planning task, the "mini project", was designed to validate many of the practices of the first group of teachers and to raise awareness and provide some success for the second group of teachers. At a later point, teachers will have the opportunities to share the success of their "mini projects" with their colleagues. During this process, the teachers will have the opportunity to hear about approaches that have been used within their context and how particular children were identified. Teachers will be encouraged to seek confirmation of their identification of gifted children. This may occur, for example, by sharing work samples with colleagues who teach at the same or higher year levels. After there has been some validation of the "giftedness" of particular children, profiles of the gifted children will need to be developed to provide an accurate picture of their strengths and needs. The focus of planning will then shift to catering for specific gifted individuals.

The emphasis remains one of structuring the teaching and learning so that all students have the opportunity to excel, rather than selecting a few from the outset and catering for them. The idea is that the structure of the teaching and learning environment targets potentially gifted students.

CONCLUSIONS

An important component of the GATE Way programme is the role each Focus school plays as a centre for dissemination and leadership. In 1999 the school networked with five small schools in the district. These schools will participate in the inservice and planning sessions. They will then take insights back to their own schools and adapt, implement, trial and review their initiatives. The school sees its role as one of supporter and intends to assist whenever necessary. The aim is to implement classroom practice to such an extent that students can excel in various fields. Classroom planning will be open-ended enough to let that occur.

At this point in the programme parents have not been involved. This has been a deliberate policy. The school believes that the programme needs to be well grounded and a common vision adopted. Strategies to acquire evidence that a child is gifted or talented must be in place before parents' expectations or hopes are addressed.

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