Identification of gifted students

As with the various giftedness conceptions, several procedures to identify the gifted exist in the literature. Given that the identification of gifted students is always based on specific reasons (e.g., selection for promotion programs or for a gifted research study), the proper selection of respective identification procedures is very important. For instance, when identifying gifted students for specific promotion programs, the selection of identification procedures should be carefully based on the learning goals of the corresponding promotion program (Steinheider, 2014; Vock, Preckel, & Holling, 2007). However, before further dwelling on this issue (i.e., proper selection of identification procedures), the most commonly used identification measures will be described.

Standardized intelligence tests are a widespread procedure to identify gifted students (cf. Bergold, 2011). Intelligence tests allow for (relatively) objective, reliable, and valid IQ score assessments. Thereby, the tested student cannot only be compared to other students but also to a normed reference score, which reveals whether the student’s ability ranges in the top level of the intelligence distribution. Accordingly, when students score high on the intelligence measure, they may be labeled as gifted, however, only on condition that high intelligence represents an exclusive criterion for giftedness. As already mentioned above, it has been criticized for years to consider only intelligence for describing and also identifying gifted students (e.g., Subotnik et al., 2011; Worrell, 2009). Therefore, intelligence tests do not represent a sufficient identification measure for many giftedness researchers (e.g., Subotnik et al., 2011). Moreover, these tests only measure intellectual potential but do not guarantee outstanding performance, which is, however, considered as important in several giftedness conceptions (e.g., Heller et al., 2005).

Another commonly used method in the gifted identification process, particularly in the United States, is the application of standardized achievement tests (Sternberg et al., 2011).

These tests assess achievement in multiple academic subjects such as, for example, reading comprehension, mathematical concepts, or biological knowledge (cf. Scholastic Aptitute Test, SAT) and are scored according to uniform procedures. Although they validly and reliably assess the achievement potential of a student, they do not disclose his or her true intellectual potential, which still reflects the most commonly accepted component of giftedness (e.g., Sternberg et al., 2011). In this vein, for instance, Pirozzo (1982) claims that about half of the children who score in the top 5% of an intelligence test do not show an equally high school achievement. Consequently, when using standardized achievement tests, these children are less likely to be identified as gifted. This is especially the case for gifted underachievers who

exhibit a great discrepancy between potential (or ability) and performance (or achievement) (Reis & McCoach, 2000).

Another widespread identification procedure is teacher’s nomination, that is, teachers select those children in their class that they perceive to be most gifted (Borthwick, Dow, Levesque, & Banks, 1980; Hodge & Cutmore, 1986; Neber, 2004; Rost & Buch, 2010).

Particularly with regard to gifted selections for promotion programs, teachers’ giftedness screenings play a major role (McBee, 2006; Rost, Sparfeldt, & Schilling, 2006; Siegle &

Powell, 2004). This is not surprising as teachers’ nominations yield several advantages. From a practical perspective, for instance, teachers’ nominations are comparatively economical with respect to organizational issues. Importantly, teachers also see, interact, and assess students consistently, so that they observe a broad range of students’ characteristics over time and in various situations (Borland, 1978; Jarosewich, Pfeiffer, & Morris, 2002; Siegle, 2001).

Moreover, due to their extensive experience with various students, teachers are able to compare among students which gives them a point of reference about who is average and who might be gifted (Baudson, 2010). Particularly elementary school teachers, who can typically assess a student in more than one subject, may recognize a variety of crucial characteristics that discriminate gifted students from other students (Endepohls-Ulpe & Ruf, 2005). Early empirical studies demonstrated that teachers’ nominations did not exactly select those children as gifted who might have been selected with an intelligence testing (Terman, 1924;

Gear, 1976; Pegnato & Birch, 1959). Specifically, in his comprehensive review, Gear (1976) reported that teachers only nominated 30-40% of the students who scored high on an intelligence measure as gifted and nominated about 50% of the students as gifted who did not score high on an intelligence measure. In a more recent study by Neber (2004), it was demonstrated that teachers identified all children as gifted who also scored high on a cognitive ability test. By contrast, teachers still nominated too many students as gifted who did not score high on a cognitive ability test (about 80%). Nevertheless, although teachers might not be able to estimate intelligence test scores one-to-one, correlations between teacher ratings and intelligence tests are substantial (cf. Egan & Archer, 1985; Hodge & Cudmore, 1986; McBee, 2006; Wild, 1993). In this vein, for instance, Wild (1993) reported teachers’

estimations of a student’s intelligence and the student’s true intelligence score to correlate between r = 0.4 and r = 0.59. In a study by Kirk (1966) among preschool children respective correlations were even found to amount up to r = .73. Moreover, as already stated above, current researchers in the field of giftedness criticize the consideration of intelligence as an exclusive criterion for giftedness (e.g., Subotnik et al., 2011) implying that not too much

emphasis should be put on the association between teacher judgments and IQ scores. Instead, recent research claims teachers to be a quite reliable source for gifted identification and recommends teacher nominations to be integrated in the gifted identification process (Gagné, 1994; McBee, 2006; Robinson, Shore, & Enersen, 2007; Worrell & Schaefer, 2004).

Furthermore, as the component of creativity plays a crucial role in several giftedness conceptions (e.g., Mönks & Katzko, 2005; Renzulli, 2005), the application of creativity tests is not unusual when identifying gifted students. Hunsaker and Callahan (1995) reported that among 418 school districts in the United States 69.6% included the term creativity in their definition of giftedness. However, only 34.7% of those school districts who included the term creativity actually applied creativity measures during gifted identification. This might be due to the fact that the construct of creativity is only vaguely defined and has been shown to be slightly unreliable (Sparfeldt, Wirthwein, & Rost, 2009). More specifically, Sparfeldt and colleagues (2009) reported a stability coefficient of only r = .33 for a creativity measure in the course of a longitudinal giftedness study (Marburger Hochbegabtenprojekt, Rost, 1993). Rost (2009) attributed this low reliability to the instability of creativity during adolescence and suggested not to take it as a crucial indicator of giftedness.

Finally, further identification methods such as nominations by parents, peers, and the gifted student him- or herself exist (e.g., Renzulli, 2005). However, these identification procedures have to be critically considered. For instance, with regard to gifted nominations by the students themselves, Neber (2004) criticized that students have a strong tendency to overestimate their own abilities. More precisely, in his study more than 80% of the students considered themselves to be highly gifted although they did not exhibit correspondingly high abilities. Moreover, Lee and Olszewski-Kubiliu (2006) investigated the effectiveness of parents’ gifted nominations. They reported that children who had been nominated by their parents to take part in a talent search testing showed lower performance in various achievement tests than children who had been identified by standardized tests (d = .10 – .31).

Taken together, these identification methods have demonstrated relatively low validity and are therefore rarely applied (e.g., Perleth, Preckel, Denstädt, & Leithner, 2008; Schroth, Helfer, & College, 2008; Wild, 1991).

Considering the variety of identification procedures and approaches, it becomes obvious that there is no state-of-the-art solution for identifying the gifted. In this vein, Carman (2013) compared the identification procedures among 104 research studies. She found a wide variability of used methods with the most commonly used method being prior identification by the schools (reported in more than three quarters of the studies). About 10.7% of these

studies did not further specify this prior identification. Concerning the other studies, 62%

reported having used an intelligence measure, 34.8% reported having used an achievement test, and 22.8% reported having used teacher recommendations. Carman (2013) critically stated that the variety of operationalizations when selecting gifted individuals for research studies leads to lower generalizability of the results and to an inability for researchers in the field to compare the results of different studies (see also Zettler, Thoemmes, Hasselhorn, &

Trautwein, 2014). However, based on the general disagreement about the conceptualization of giftedness (e.g., Sternberg & Davidson, 2005), several giftedness researchers state that there is no single “silver bullet” in identification (Callahan, 2009; Friedman-Nimz, 2009; Worrell, 2009). They agree, however, on the theoretical necessity of multidimensional assessments (Borland, 2008; Friedman-Nimz, 2009; Heller et al., 2005; Mönks & Katzko, 2005). Most importantly and as already mentioned above, the selection of the identification procedures should be carefully based on the specific learning goals of the corresponding promotion program (Steinheider, 2014; Vock et al., 2007). More precisely, if a promotion program aims to support children’s inventive mind by stimulating them, for instance, to generate creative products, identification procedures should amongst others include a creativity measure.

Otherwise, unsuitable children (i.e., not creative at all) might attend these promotion offers but might not be able to actually benefit from them (cf. Zettler et al., 2014). Consequently, the whole promotion project would be foredoomed to fail. This reasoning is in line with the idea of ATI (Cronbach & Snow, 1977) in that learners and learning offers have to be appropriately matched. In the following, the various promotion offers for gifted students will be illustrated in more detail.