Péter-Szarka Szilvia, PhD University of Debrecen, Hungary

European Talent Centre – Buapest

11 February, 2014, Slovenia

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*National Talent Support Council

Talent Support Councils (78)

Talent Points (1183)

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19th October, 2013:

conference and panel discussion about

important questions:

*Definition of giftedness (- problems, new

perspectives)

*Identification, measures (- problems, new

perspectives)

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Law of General Education, 2011

*A student who requires a special school

support as a result of having above

average general or special skills, high

level of creativity and can be made

motivated and commited to an activity.

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STERNBERG, R., DAVIDSON, J. (2005, eds.): Conceptions of Giftedness. New York: Cambridge University Press

*Talent as potential, as a result of development

*Individual variety

*Interaction with the environment (Ziegler: Actiotope model, Csíkszentmihályi: systems model of creativity)

*Importance of perseverance, motivation (Ericsson: 10 000 hours)

DUCKWORTH, A. L., SELIGMAN, M. E. P. (2005): Self-discipline outdoes IQ in predicting academic performance of adolescents. Psychological Science, 16 (12): 939-944.

*Talent is able to carry out (2) activities

in an (3) outstanding level through (1)

challenging tasks and opportunities, as a

result of which s/he is capable of

outstanding (4) achievement.

(Éva Gyarmathy)

1.Define

2.Discover

3.Develop

1.Develop (action)

2.Discover

3.Define

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*Talent-friendy environment

*Csíkszentmihályi * How easy is it for a person to retrieve the information stored in the culture?

* How easy is it for people to be exposed to different ways of thinking and acting?

* How many institutions are present in a culture for learning and practicing a particular domain?

* How easy it is for a child to pursue his or her interest, and learn to be an excellent biochemist, poet, philosopher — or whatever — and still preserve his or her personal curiosity and vision?

* How much support does the society provide to new ideas?

* To what extent are adults involved in stimulating excellence and novelty in children — preferably outside the classroom, preferably in realistic situations?

* And how many opportunities are there in businesses, universities, civic organisations to express and implement novel ideas?

* To what extent are curiosity, exploration, originality, intense involvement with one’s interests encouraged at the level of various levels of the life cycle?

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*Methods, tools

*Interpretation of the results

*National-level NETWORK, but no national-level

identification

*Regional solutions, Talent Points decide by themselves

*Purpose of identification: to decide who should get

into a talent support program

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* Identification is based on achievement

*Talent points, institutions: wide variety of tools, but the main principles are

* complexity (not to measure only in the intellectual domain)

* specificity (should be related to the examined area)

* flexibility (students are examined from time to time to get the chance for getting into and out of the talent pool)

*multiple perspective (application of different methods: psychological testing, teachers’, peers’ opinion, competition results, school achievement).

*based on a chosen theory of giftedness: Renzulli’s three ring model, Gardner’s Multiple intelligence model

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*Collecting opinion from teachers, peers, family,

themselves: in written forms, interviews or focus

groups

*Observation: at school, at normal classes or with

special tasks, mental, emotional, behavioral, social

characteristics

*School achievement: grades, teachers’ opinion

*Students’ portfolio

*Competition results

*Psychological testing

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*Cognitive Skills: Raven, CAT (Cognitive Abilities Test),

Wechsler

*Motivation: Kozéki-Entwistle (1986), Success-

oriented attitude, attitudes toward learning

*Creativity: Torrance Tests, Creative leisure activities,

Assessment of the Creative Personality (Tóth, 2006)

*Others: anxiety (Spielberger), self-concept, self-

esteem (Tennesee, Rosenberg), learning

characteristics

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*Psychological testing:

*Attention

*Memory (verbal, visual)

*Analogical and logical thinking skills

*Subject tests (H. language, mathematics)

*Teachers’ opinion: questions about learning habits, individual

learning methods, self-esteem, underachievement and special

skills

*Norms: no or old standards; comparison within the group

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*Identification in a low SES region

*“You cannot take part…”

*Measurement = reduction of talent into SOME elements

*Mechanistic, rigid

*Identification .. for what purpose? Measurement for

later development

*Can every special skills be covered?

*Labelling

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*Interest-based characteristics

*Profile tests

*Observation (in action)

*Teacher nomination with guidelines

*Emphasizing development, the need for

effort

*Dynamic assessment

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Fields of interest –

curiosity –

motivation –

practicing –

higher skills

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*20 tasks in 13 areas

*Cognitive skills:

*Vocabulary

*Abstraction

*Memory

*Attention

* Information processing:

*Phonological processing

*Auditive processing

*Visual processing

*Lexical access

*Senso-motoric

*Sequentiality

*School skills:

*Reading

*Spelling

*Counting

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*involves identifying the wide range of

observable characteristics which may

indicate special types of ability in very

young children

*USA, England: underserviced groups

early childhood, low SES, different

culture

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*4 scales (1975): Learning Characteristics, Creativity Characteristics, Motivational Characteristics, Leadership Characteristics

*10 scales (1976) + Artistic, Musical, Dramatics, Communication (Precision, Communication (Expressive), Planning Characteristics

*Revision, statistics, teacher training, new manual (2002)

*14 scales (2009) + Reading, Science, Mathematics, Technology

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*Not for identification, but rather as a state of mind –

what to develop

*Duckworth, A. L., Seligman, M. E. P. (2005): Self-

discipline outdoes IQ in predicting academic

performance of adolescents. Psychological Science,

16 (12): 939-944.

**to modify an individual's cognitive functioning and observing

subsequent changes in learning and problem-solving patterns within the testing situation, by an active teaching process

*is usually administered to children who demonstrate some learning disability, low scores on standardized tests, or some emotional or personality disturbance, come from a low socioeconomic or culturally different background.

*ST is related to passive acceptance (acceptance of a child's disability and accommodation of the environment to fit these disabilities), while DA is based on active modification (active efforts to modify the child's disabilities by intensive mediation and the establishment of relatively high cognitive goals).

*DA development has been motivated by the inadequacy of standardized tests.

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Thank you!

szilvia.peter-szarka@talentcentrebudapest.eu