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Acceleration allows gifted students to progress through the curriculum at a faster pace than their peers, through early admission to school, grade skipping, and curriculum compacting (Steenbergen-Hu & Moon, 2011).  Acceleration is a research-based intervention and best practice for academically gifted students (Siegle, Wilson & Little, 2013). It has been proven to meet the academic, cognitive and affective needs of students, and will enable students to realise their full potential without compromising their social-emotional needs (Gross, 2006).

This program allows the school to cater to the diversity of its students, provides the opportunity for high-ability students to flourish, and faculty to develop their skills to meet the needs of all their students.

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The evaluation of the gifted program in Assignment 1 showed that acceleration as an intervention is not provided for gifted and talented students.

The program objectives are as follows:

Implement a grade-based acceleration protocol for highly gifted students, namely:

early entry to Kindergarten and Grade 1

acceleration by grade-level

Meet the academic, cognitive and social-emotional needs of gifted students through acceleration.

Educate faculty on the characteristics, academic and social-emotional needs of gifted students, resulting in:

changes in attitudes towards acceleration

changes in practice

change in student outcomes

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How does the program meet teaching and/or strategic planning outcomes?

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How does the program meet teaching and/or strategic planning outcomes?

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The strategic plan of the school includes the following priorities which support acceleration as an intervention in the Gifted Program:

Enhance the curriculum by providing a flexible, responsive educational approach which equips students with the skills and competencies to ensure their success, through:

Empowering and educating faculty.

Foster diversity through a better defined and enhanced approach to diversity and inclusion, through

Continuing to foster an environment where respect for and inclusion of all is the expected behaviour.

The program meets the Gifted Programming Standards (2019) of the National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC), including the following standards:

Standard 5.5.1: Administrators demonstrate support for gifted programming and services through equitable allocation of resources and demonstrated willingness to ensure that students with gifts and talents receive consistent educational services aligned to their interests, strengths and needs.

Standard 5.5.3: Administrators hire a diverse pool of educators with knowledge and professional learning in gifted education and the issues affecting students with gifts and talents.

Standard 5.6: Students with gifts and talents participate in general and gifted education programs guided by clear policies and procedures that provide for their advanced learning needs (e.g. early entrance, acceleration, credit in lieu of enrollment).

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What are the different elements of the program? What does it involve?

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What are the different elements of the program? What does it involve?

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Acceleration

Early admission - Kindergarten or Grade 1

Grade Skipping

Faculty Professional Learning

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Who are the target students, staff involved?

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Who are the target students, staff involved?

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Target students are those who have been identified as highly gifted, according to the gifted identification policy. An individualised intelligence test will provide information about a student’s IQ. Studies suggest that an IQ of about one standard deviation above the mean (greater than 115), is required for a student to be considered for grade-level acceleration (Gagné, 2007). Students will be requested to obtain a psychoeducational evaluation, which includes a WISC-V, in order to be considered for acceleration.

Staff involved in implementing the Gifted Program include:

Language Coordinators

Learning Specialist

Math Coordinator

Classroom Teachers

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Acceleration occurs:

Early admission to Kindergarten and Grade 1

Grade skipping - beginning of school year

Faculty Professional Development

Whole school beginning of the school year

Throughout the school year for selected faculty

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The Gifted Program Committee will meet at regular intervals throughout the school year. Decision-making for the following school year on students to be accelerated, will occur in the February meeting.

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How has the research influenced the decisions for this program?

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How has the research influenced the decisions for this program?

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Whilst it is difficult to find evidence to support acceleration specifically for dual language schools, such as the school in question, there is no doubt of its efficacy in academically progressing students who are gifted in mainstream schools (Rogers, 2004). The benefits of acceleration last beyond school years, and have long term impacts on both social and academic domains (Siegle, Wilson & Little, 2013).

Acceleration in my region

Acceleration through grade skipping and early entry to school is provided in my region. The Gifted and Talented Guidelines of the Maryland State Department of Education include a variety of acceleration options, including whole-grade acceleration. The Guidelines require teachers to be appropriately professionally qualified, have an interest in gifted education, an awareness of the cognitive and affective needs of gifted students, and a willingness to engage in further professional development.

Support for Acceleration

Acceleration of gifted students has long been criticised, despite the wide range of supporting empirical evidence (Gross, 2006). Primary concerns relate to the psychological and social impact on students, and its effectiveness on academic achievement (Steenbergen-Hu & Moon, 2011 ).

Research (Maher & Geeves, 2014) addresses the myths of this intervention and provides that with acceleration:

Students make academic gains and there is no or little gaps in knowledge, as gifted students are quick learners;

Is not harmful to the social-emotional development of gifted students;

Students make positive social adjustments - they make friends with like-minded peers (as they have a similar intellectual level);

It is a cost-efficient intervention, and is easy to implement;

Won’t open the floodgates - if a system is in place; and

Other students will not resent their peers being accelerated.

Gagné & Gagnier (2004) found that there is no evidence that accelerated students have emotional problems compared to their unaccelerated peers. Similarly, Colangelo et al., (2004) found that there is no evidence that acceleration has a negative effect on a gifted student's social-emotional well being. Interestingly, acceleration was found to have small to moderate social-emotional benefits compared to students who were not accelerated, and moderate to significant effects on long-term academic achievement (Steenbergen-Hu & Woo, 2011; Rogers, 2015; Steenbergen-Hu et al., 2016).

Overwhelming support for acceleration through early entrance to Kindergarten and grade skipping comes from the twenty-year longitudinal study conducted by Gross (2006). The main findings of the study are:

Students who have been radically accelerated (more than two years) experience higher degrees of satisfaction than students accelerated by only one year or not at all. All of these students reported positive short and long-term academic and social-emotional outcomes.

Gifted students who were not accelerated were not happy with their educational experience at school, and did not achieve post-school as their accelerated peers. A number of these students experienced social and mental health challenges as adults, due to their social isolation at school.

Accelerated students reported that they did not experience difficulties making friends, on the contrary, they developed lasting friendships with their older peers.

The study revealed substantial differences in social self-esteem between the two groups: those students accelerated experienced elevated social esteem as they had similar interests and were accepted. Conversely, students who were accelerated for one year or not accelerated at all, had very low self esteem.

Professional Learning

Teacher attitudes towards acceleration will greatly influence its success or failure (Croft & Wood, 2016), therefore, an intervention program of acceleration cannot be implemented without educating faculty. Despite significant empirical evidence supporting acceleration, its underutilisation can in part be attributed to teacher beliefs that gifted students will succeed without interventions, and educators prioritising students with learning difficulties (Henderson & Jarvis, 2016). Studies have shown that despite the wealth of research pointing to positive outcomes for students through acceleration, teachers are reluctant to accept acceleration as an intervention for gifted students, and focus more on the potential negative effects, rather than the potential positive outcomes, when considering acceleration as an intervention (Rambo & McCoach, 2012).

A gifted program with interventions through acceleration will only be successful if faculty are involved in the process, and support the process. Therefore it is paramount that they understand both the needs of gifted students, and the acceleration processes to ensure they are able to implement acceleration to enable these students to thrive. Without this knowledge, there is a risk that the intervention will fail.

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Link the key elements of the program to supportive research.

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Link the key elements of the program to supportive research.

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Teachers who are educated in gifted and talented instruction are more likely to support acceleration, understand the academic benefits and feel confident to implement acceleration (Siegle, Wilson & Little, 2013). With education, they are less likely to anticipate social and emotional difficulties for students where they are accelerated, and most teachers see it as a fair and equitable intervention for gifted students, which does not result in gaps in knowledge (Siegle et al., 2013). Siegle et al., (2013) cautions that positive teacher attitudes do not necessarily translate into positive action. Parent advocacy can play a vital role in supporting acceleration, and having informed community members is an essential part of the program (Dare, Smith & Nowicki, 2016).

The goals of faculty professional development are to implement:

changes in teacher attitudes towards acceleration;

changes in teacher practice; and

changes in student outcomes.

Teachers and counselors, who support the academic and social-emotional development of gifted students, will be assisted in achieving these goals through:

professional development;

independent learning opportunities;

professional learning communities; and

Parent and community involvement.

Acceleration

Key elements of the program include that acceleration is open to all students, including Kindergarten, and follow a systematic and equitable process, with open and direct communication with parents and the school community (Colangelo et al., 2004).

The benefits of acceleration through early entrance to kindergarten and first grade include less disruption socially - students have not yet had the opportunity to form close peer relationships and there are not yet any gaps in their knowledge through skipping a year of school (Lupkowski-Shoplik et al., 2015). Gross (2006) found that interventions for gifted students are more likely to be highly successful when they take place earlier in the early years of elementary school, before these students experience social rejection. The risk of rejection increases as they proceed through the upper grades.

Gagen & Gagnier (2004), found that early entrance students were better adjusted to school compared to their peers in the youngest age group, and their academic achievement was significantly higher than all their peers. They were judged to be no more at risk for adjustment issues than other students. In fact, Gagne & Gagnier (2004) found that boys, younger than average students and those with lower intelligence, are more at risk for social adjustment than early entrants.

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Demonstrated consideration of your context and students

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Demonstrated consideration of your context and students

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Language Evaluation

The dual language nature of the school requires that students are proficient in both languages before they will be accepted as a candidate for acceleration. Language coordinators will perform an assessment and advise the gifted program team of the suitability of students as candidates.

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Acceleration consideration will begin in February before the following school year.

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The Gifted Program will be implemented by the Gifted Program Committee. The Learning Specialist will be the Secretary of the Committee, and the Principal/Deputy, the Chair. The Learning Specialist will be required to obtain qualification in gifted education.

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Budget - materials, staffing, training, transport?

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Budget - materials, staffing, training, transport?

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The budget will be approximately $20,000 comprising:

Conferences and professional development

Neuropsychological evaluations

Kindergarten and Grade 1 - Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence Fourth Edition (WPPSI-IV).

Other Grades - Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC-V).

Documentation:

Iowa acceleration scale

Determining Attitudes Toward Ability (DATA) questionnaire

Above-level testing

Possible Constraints:
- availability of professional development
- counsellor availability for neuropsych evaluations

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How will student achievement, growth and/or well-being be assessed?

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How will student achievement, growth and/or well-being be assessed?

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The goal of implementing a grade-based acceleration protocol for highly gifted students by early entry to Kindergarten and Grade 1 and acceleration by grade-level, will be evaluated with reference to student achievement, growth and wellbeing. Teachers, parents, Counsellor and Learning Specialist will meet at least every six weeks to evaluate these through the following measures:

Assessment of Academic performance:

Student portfolio

Products for units of inquiry

Student tests

Grade level learning tasks

Standardised tests (ERB & MobyMax)

Assessment of Academic challenge:

Evaluation of whether acceleration provides sufficient academic challenge

Evaluation of social and behavioral adjustment:

Motivation and Engagement

Attendance

Observations

Interview

Positive impact on behaviour

Self-evaluation

Counselor evaluation

Advanced Learning Plan (ALP):

Achievement of learning goals

Professional Learning

The second goal of educating faculty on the characteristics, academic and social-emotional needs of gifted students will be measured with reference to:

Changes in attitudes towards acceleration

Changes in practice

Change in student outcomes

Evaluation of teacher attitudes toward acceleration and gifted education will take place through a survey at the end of the school year - Determining Attitudes Towards Ability. Changes in perception will be tracked and a subsequent professional development plan will be developed on the basis of the findings.

Changes in practice will be measured through a teacher self-evaluation, focus groups, observations and interviews with teachers.

Student outcomes will be assessed as outlined above - achievement, growth and wellbeing.

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What additional considerations may be needed to ensure the program is successful?

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What additional considerations may be needed to ensure the program is successful?

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The acceleration process will be reviewed by stakeholders, including:

Faculty

Gifted committee

Parents

Students

An anonymous questionnaire will be completed at different points through the process by parents, the community and faculty.

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Gifted Program Team:

Learning Specialist

Principal

Deputy Principal

Math Coordinator

Language Coordinators

Curriculum Coordinator

School Counselor

Classroom Teacher (EY)

Classroom Teacher (Lower Primary

Classroom Teacher (Upper Primary)

Parents

Community Representative

Gifted Program Committee Roles and Duties (see table)

Professional Learning

Reflection: Pre-assessment

Learning Needs Questionnaire

Question Attitudes and Practice

Determining Attitudes Toward Ability (DATA)

validated measure

27 items measures attitudes across six factors:

social and emotional needs

focus on others [rather than on gifted learners]

grade-skipping

problems with acceleration

identification issues; and

gifted education curriculum and policy

Professional Learning Plan

based on results of pre-assessment

develop plan to address attitudes that require examination

knowledge

skill

Specific education in implementing acceleration

Identify Professional Development Opportunities

Topics

gifted characteristics

Affective needs of the gifted

Acceleration by Grade-Level

In February of each school year, the Gifted Program Committee will meet and discuss potential students for acceleration for the following school year (beginning August). Students may be nominated by parents or teachers.

The Iowa Acceleration Scale (Assouline, et al, 2009) will be used by the Gifted Program Committee to evaluate a students suitability for whole grade acceleration. The IAS is a non-biased assessment tool which collects information in relation to a student’s academic ability and achievement (expertise), and appropriate aptitude (problem solving skills) and social skills for acceleration. The IAS includes:

Testing

Observation

Interviews

Documentation of interventions

Assessment of Aptitude

An assessment of a student’s aptitude across different subject areas will give the team information about their capabilities in performing at a higher level. Students who perform exceptionally across subjects are more likely to be successful at whole-grade acceleration. If a student performs highly in single subjects, it may be more appropriate to consider subject-level acceleration.

Presently, students applying for entrance to the school are required to obtain a Wechsler Preschool and Primary Scale of Intelligence Fourth Edition (WPPSI-IV) evaluation, and these results will be used to assess aptitude. Students, who are older and new to the school will obtain an evaluation through the Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children (WISC-V).

Assessment of aptitude requires consideration of the following:

profile of Student’s Strengths

above-level testing (greater than 50%)

aptitude Test

Assessment of Achievement

Achievement testing is used to assess whether actual skills meet potential which is identified in aptitude testing. Mastery of grade-level is an indication of performance, however underperformance may also indicate a potential for achievement. The Iowa Assessments can be used for this purpose. Academic performance from previous years can also be reviewed for assessment.

Student Attitude & Parent Support

Studies show that even if the above criteria are met, acceleration won’t be successful unless the student is willing and desires the progression (xxxx). Meetings will be held with students about acceleration and ensure they are aware of the advantages and disadvantages. Parents of course, also form an integral part of the decision-making decision. Parent support and willingness for their child to be accelerated will be an essential part of the process.

Counsellor Recommendation

Early Admission

If students are selected for early admission to Kindergarten, the following guidelines will be administered:

1. Students are within one year of the cut-off age for admission to Kindergarten

2. Transition before the start of the school year

3. Evaluation thirty days after commencement

Criteria:

Observation

Intelligence, aptitude and achievement tests - maths and verbal

WISC-V or WSSPI-IV

One standard deviation above the mean

Achievement test above 50th percentile to upper grade level

Work samples

Social and emotional development

Social behaviour

Motivation

Fine and gross motor skills

Physical development

Interviews

Parent checklist

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Assouline, S., Colangelo, N., Lupkowski-Shoplik, A., Forstadt, L., & Lipscomb, J. (2009). Iowa Acceleration Scale Manual: A guide for whole-grade acceleration K-8 (3rd Ed.). Great Potential Press.

Colangelo, N., Assouline., S. G., & Gross, M. (2004). A Nation Deceived: How Schools Hold Back America’s Brightest Students. Iowa, IA: The University of Iowa.

Croft, L., & Wood, S. M. (2015).Professional Development for Teachers and School Counselors: Empowering a change in perception and practice of acceleration. In Assouline, S. G., Colangelo, N., VanTassel-Baska, J., & Lupkowski-Shoplik, A. (Eds.), A nation empowered: Evidence trumps the excuses holding back America’s brightest students (pp. 87 – 98). Connie Belin and Jacqueline N. Blank International Center for Gifted Education and Talent Development.

Dare, L., Smith, S., & Nowicki, E. (2016). Parents’ experience with their children’s grade based acceleration: Struggles, successes, and subsequent needs. Australasian Journal of Gifted Education, 25(2), 6-21.

Gagné, F. (2007). Ten commandments for academic talent development. Gifted Child Quarterly, 51(2):93-118. DOI:10.1177/0016986206296660

Gagné, F., & Gagnier, N. (2004). The socio-affective and academic impact of early entrance to school. Roeper Review, 26(3), 128–139, https://doi.org/10.1080/02783190409554258

Gross, M. (2006). Exceptionally gifted children: Long-term outcomes of academic acceleration and non-acceleration. Journal for the Education of the Gifted, 29(4), 404-429. https://doi.org/10.4219/jeg-2006-247

Henderson, L., & Jarvis, J. (2016). The gifted dimension of the Australian Professional Standards for teachers: Implications for professional learning. Australian Journal of Teacher Education, 41(8), 60-83.

Lupkowski-Shoplik, A., Assouline, S. G ., Colangelo, N. (2015). Whole-grade acceleration: Grade-skipping and early entrance to kindergarten or first grade. In Assouline, S. G., Colangelo, N., VanTassel-Baska, J., & Lupkowski-Shoplik, A. (Eds.), A nation empowered: Evidence trumps the excuses holding back America’s brightest students (pp. 52 – 72). Connie Belin and Jacqueline N. Blank International Center for Gifted Education and Talent Development.

Maher, L., & Geeves, J. (2014). Acceleration: Dispelling the myths with research and reality. Australasian Journal of Gifted Education, 23 (1), 39-48.

Rambo, K. E., & McCoach, D. B. (2012). Teacher attitudes toward subject-specific acceleration: Instrument development and validation. Journal for the Education of the Gifted, 35, 129-152.

Rogers, K. B. (2015). The academic, socialization and psychological effects of acceleration: Research synthesis. In Assouline, S. G., Colangelo, N., VanTassel-Baska, J., & Lupkowski-Shoplik, A. (Eds.), A nation empowered: Evidence trumps the excuses holding back America’s brightest students (pp. 19 – 30). Connie Belin and Jacqueline N. Blank International Center for Gifted Education and Talent Development.

Siegle, D., Wilson, H. E., & Little, C. A. (2013). A sample of gifted and talented educators’ attitudes about academic acceleration. Journal of Advanced Academics, 24(1) 27–51. https://doi.org/10.1177/1932202X12472491

Steenbergen-Hu, S., & Moon, S. (2011). The effects of acceleration on high-ability learners: A Meta-Analysis. Gifted Child Quarterly, 55(1), 39-53. https://doi.org/10.1177/0016986210383155

Szymanski, A. & Croft, L.J. (2013, November). Using DATA to improve professional development. Poster presented at the annual meeting of the National Association for Gifted Children, Indianapolis, IN.