Defining "Gifted"

A child whose cognitive abilities are markedly more advanced than those of his or her peers is considered intellectually gifted. At one time, giftedness was defined based solely upon an individual's IQ (intelligence quotient) score. Since that time, the definition for giftedness has become complex, with no consensus on a single definition. A variety of criteria are used to define giftedness, including measures of intelligence, creativity, and achievement, as well as interviews with parents and teachers. Often, the decision of how to identify gifted individuals is left up to school districts.

Evangelos Katsioulis

Evangelos Katsioulis is considered to be one of the most intelligent men on Earth, with a Stanford-Binet score of 205. In a normal distribution of scores, this score is expected to occur in only one out of 38 billion people.

Benefits of Gifted Programs

Gifted children often learn faster than their peers, and work more independently. Since their academic achievement is advanced, these students may become bored in a traditional classroom setting. This can sometimes lead to behavioral problems or lack of motivation. Schools face the challenge of how to work with gifted students academically to keep them challenged and engaged.

One way schools may handle this issue is to allow a gifted child to skip grades. The advantage to this solution is that the child will be doing coursework that is appropriate to their cognitive level. The potential disadvantages, however, are substantial: younger students will experience physical development later than their grade-level peers and may experience emotional development later as well. This may lead them to feel self-conscious about being different or to be bullied by their peers.

Another solution is to keep the child in the regular classroom but provide additional assignments and an enriched curriculum. In addition to the enriched curriculum, another option might be pull-out programs where the child leaves the classroom during certain times or days for advanced classes. Finally, some school districts create entire gifted classrooms. 

Gifted programs can be beneficial to the gifted child by keeping the child engaged in learning. Some programs even offer gifted children college-level credit for advanced placement classes (with a passing grade on an assessment test). These programs can provide the child with opportunities to discover his or her potential.

Disadvantages of Gifted Programs

Gifted programs can also be detrimental to children. By labeling some children as "gifted" and others as "not gifted," schools can create a self-fulfilling prophecy where those who are not accepted into the program do not perform as well as those who are accepted. The students identified as "not gifted" may believe they are not as intelligent as those who are labeled gifted, and in turn they may not put forth the same effort at school. The Pygmalion effect is a studied phenomenon in which higher expectations lead to better performance; the golem effect is the opposite phenomenon, in which lower expectations lead to lower performance. Teachers who are told their students are gifted will treat them as though they are gifted, which can result in increased performance; teachers who are told their students are "average" may be less patient when those students struggle than they would be if they thought those students were gifted.

Another detriment to gifted programs is that students who are not identified as gifted are denied the benefits of enriched education. Gifted programs vary widely in what they offer, but some involve activities like field trips, talks from scholars, or cultural experiences, like visits to museums. These enrichment activities would benefit all children, not just the gifted.