Apr 23, 2015 - adolescents who attended the Antalya Science and Arts Center (Bilim ve ... 8 and 8 teachers including the
Vol. 10(8), pp. 1109-1120, 23 April, 2015 DOI: 10.5897/ERR2015.2134 Article Number: 41951D652393 ISSN 1990-3839 Copyright © 2015 Author(s) retain the copyright of this article http://www.academicjournals.org/ERR
Educational Research and Reviews
Full Length Research Paper
A qualitative study to understand the social and emotional needs of the gifted adolescents, who attend the scıence and arts centers in Turkey Defne Yilmaz Department of Counseling and Guidance, Faculty of Education, Akdeniz University, Turkey. Received 11 February, 2015; Accepted 20 April, 2015
Considering all areas of development in education is a key to fulfill the needs of gifted students. This study which was based on qualitative methods aimed to find out the emotional and social needs of the adolescents who attended the Antalya Science and Arts Center (Bilim ve Sanat Egitim Merkezi BILSEM) to develop new ways to help these students. The study was held with the student and teacher interviews to get deeper understanding on these adolescents' experiences. 7 students of grade 6,7, and 8 and 8 teachers including the school counselor who were chosen randomly, and who accetped to join the research volunteerly formed the particippants. After analyzing the interviews via between coders aggreement and testing the reliability by theme matching method, 14 main themes and 111 subthemes in two dimensions were identified (8 main themes and 54 subthemes about being gifted and about experiences in educational settings, and 6 main themes and 57 subthemes about the gifted students' needs and about the BILSEM applications). Between coders Kappa value was .80 for student interviews themes and was .873 for teacher interviews themes. The emerging themes from the findings were discussed under three broad headings: 1) The social-emotional states of the gifted students, 2) The problems they experienced related to being gifted in social and educational settings, 3) Suggestions to implement to fulfill the needs of the gifted adolescents in the educational settings. Comments were represented to give ideas to the educators and counselors in practice, the researchers and parents. Key words: Gifted education, adolescents, emotional - social needs, counseling gifted.
INTRODUCTION In order to support the gifted students in educational settings to learn, grow and fulfill their potentials, it is important to understand how they are different by the means of their abilities, emotions, attitudes and capacity to learn. Starting with identification process and searching for multivariety methods for educational
programs, measurement and schooling system for these students and providing them teachers who are trained to use these methods should be considered (Freeman, 1985; Mills and Parker, 1998; Petersen, 2013). Especially during the adolescence, emotional and social development issues are the main considerations for the
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educators so that the young people could manage to develop a healthy identity and better career plans in a safe environment with their peers (Freeman, 1985; Carper, 2002; Rogers, 2002; Sayler and Brookshire, 2004). While supporting the gifted individuals on this way, it should be taken into consideration that meaning of giftedness is not just to have a high IQ, but an individual also needs to demonstrate high performance at a couple of talent areas as stated by Sternberg (2010). Level and dimensions of the giftedness need to include not only g-based abilities, but also, creative and practical abilities, and in the ideal case, wisdom-based abilities as well. Focusing on the academic skills rather than considering all areas of development prevents motivation and creativity, and decreases the effectiveness of the educational programs (Emerick, 2004; Renzulli, 2004). Intellectually gifted students are able to learn material rapidly and understand concepts in depth; they have particular ways of their own thinking and learning. They can create better and original solutions and can be motivated on a selected subject consistently. Keeping them challenged and learning their capacity can often require an appropriate educational programme for them and a supportive school and family atmosphere (Carper, 2002; Rogers, 2002). Research supports that gifted students have more positive social-emotional characteristics than their nongifted peers. Contrary to the common stigma that the gifted individuals as introverts and nonsignificants in social settings, they are well-adjusted, independent, and they have positive self-concept, have higher level communication skills and have internal locus of control when compared to their average IQ peers (Merrel et al, 1996; Lehman and Erdwins, 2004; Ishak et al., 2014).
Main issues about the needs of gifted students Moon et al. (2004) reported the giftedness specific stressors were intensity, sensitivity, high energy, low tolerance of frustration, pressure of internal and external expectations, family perfectionism, school conditions. All these issues need to be handled within the social settings where they are interacted with peers, families and others. They need to be nurtured with regard to their mental age rather than the chronological age, and this brings some academic and social priorities to the educational setting. They need specific programs, but also they need to feel comfortable with their intellectual peers so that they can have positive self concept (Neihart, 2002; Rogers, 2002; Borland, 2005). Having been labeled "gifted" in the society and among their peer groups causes some specific problems on the relationships with peers and on their self concept. This implies their extraordinary capacity and high expectations affect them related to the jealousy from the non-gifted
peers. Especially adolescent girls may feel the pressure due to the gender stereotyping. Negative self concept can lead to the negative academic self-concept on them (Freeman, 1991; Preckel et al., 2008; Öpengin and Sak, 2012). While gifted females, verbally gifted, highly gifted are the group of the gifted at risk, gifted girls who choose to participate in selective gifted programs or who attend special gifted classes feel more compfortable within the similar peer groups by the means of social acceptance, and they have the chance to show their full capacity (Dai, 2001; 2003; Moon et al., 2004; Henderson, 2007; Preckel et al., 2008). Because achievement and intelligence are different things, if gifted children do not meet their needs, they may not use their potential related to their interest areas and they may become underachievers (Carper, 2002; Rogers, 2002; Majida and Alias, 2010). There is a general agreement among researchers that academic underachievement in intellectually gifted children is linked to lowered self-esteem and self-concept (Gross, 1993). An inappropriate and undemanding curriculum is very likely to impose underachievement on these children and endanger the conditions of low self-esteem and poor motivation which serves to ensure that underachievement continues. Heller et al. (1991), quoted in Freeman (1994), have found that underachieving children were more likely than the others to be anxious and distracted, and to have lower general self-esteem. According to Baum et al. (2004), a variety of factors contribute to the underachievement of students with high academic potential includes emotional issues: dysfunctional families (pressure of parental high expectations, failure anxiety to family and teacher), the students’ extraordinary need for attention, perfectionism, depression; social and behavioral issues: the influence of inappropriate peer group, questioning of social values, lack of behavioral controls and social skills, need for peer approval, social ideals, unwillingness to obey unlogical school rules; the lack of an appropriate curriculum: students not motivated by the regular curriculum, finding no challenge offered in regular curriculum, preferring different style of learning, finding the curriculum “too content based”, should be given to study what they like and have an interest in” “need more time for projects”. Taecher's perception and approach in both identification and teaching affect creative thinking skills and selfconcept of gifted students as well as their academic development (Preckel et al., 2010; Geake and Gross, 2008; Koshy and Pinhero-Torres; 2013; Sahin, 2014). There have been some common problems in identification of gifted students. Research shows that teachers might have difficulties in identifying gifted children, expecially for the younger ages, and for the favor of the male students. Many gifted pupils’ speed of thinking is faster than their recording skills. For this reason, they can be untidy, careless and reluctant to
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write. Teachers need to be aware of this in order to make objective judgements and they have to be patient to look at the underlying vocabulary and knowledge rather than to judge superficially. Many researchers support the idea that in-service training would be helpfull for teachers in the identification and assessment of gifted children (Foster, 1985; George, 1992; Schroth and Helfer, 2009; Petersen, 2013). To ensure challenge for their gifted students, the schools are recommended to have special policies for the education of the gifted and talented students. This policy has to be prepared with the agreement of all staff and has to have a real challenging approach. The staff need to agree on definitions, systems for identification and recognition together with the provision of appropriate classroom activities (Yılmaz, 1997). Eyre (1997) pointed out that sharing this policy with governors and parents is essential for its success. Mills and Parker (1998) stated that knowledge of the particular cognitive styles of talented children also has implications for educational policy. Within the current controversy surrounding ability grouping, there is little discussion of the negative consequences for the majority of gifted and talented students who find themselves isolated and in the minority in the regular classroom as a result of the combination of both their exceptional intellect and their very definite and different cognitive style. This would argue for the grouping together of talented students for at least some portion of the day. At the very least, if students are to be heterogeneously grouped, teachers must be trained to recognize and accommodate not only individual academic needs, but also individual differences in cognitive style. When this does not happen and teachers resort to teaching to the “norm”, our most talented students will be the most “at risk” both intellectually and emotionally (Mills and Parker, 1998). Science and Art Centers (BILSEMs) in Turkey are connected to Ministry of Education and serve specific environment to support the needs of the gifted and talented in Turkey since first established in 1994. The gifted and talented students at primary or secondary education level are educated at the science and arts centers according to "the observation form" criteria which was developed by Ministry of Education. The nominated students are evaluated by group tests and then individual tests. After the registration, students take orientation program and support education programmes for communication skills, foreign languages, studying within group, social activities, awareness of individual abilities, scientific studies techniques, computer education, problem solving strategies, learning strategies, research techniques, development of special talents, project development (Baykoc et al., 2012). Based on the previous research and following the daily practices, the research on the social and emotional needs of the gifted adolescents were emerged. Because education is a part of the whole development, all dimensions of the development should be considered
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while educational plans were done for the gifted (Freeman, 1985; Rogers, 2002). As BILSEMs were the main and common educational support resources for the gifted students in Turkey, it was thought that it could be useful to get wide and realistic information about the ongoing experiences and rising problems of them.
Purpose of the study The purpose of this qualitative study was to investigate the emotional and social needs of the gifted adolescents who attend the Science and Arts Center in Antalya (BILSEM Antalya), Turkey. It was aimed to get deeper understanding on their experiences, feelings and perceptions via interviews with the students and teachers to find out the up-dated solutions to support them to fulfill their needs. The three main research questions of the study were: 1) What are the social and emotional needs of the gifted and talented adolescents according to their own perceptions? 2) What are the problems the gifted and talented adolescents experience due to being gifted? 3) What are the possible ways to fulfill the needs of the gifted students in educational settings? METHOD Research model Qualitative method was thought the convenient approach to get deeper understanding of the gifted students' needs and emotions with their own experiences in the real life setting, and to get ideas about the consistency between their own perceptions about themselves and the perceptions of the teachers about them at Science and Arts Centers (BILSEMs). It was applied to the participants so that they could express themselves spontaneously via the phenomena they stated as the answers. Data in the phenomenological research are gathered from the individuals or groups who actually experience the facts of the research subject and who can reflect these experiences directly (Yildirim and Simsek, 2011). Phenomenological approach reveals the core meaning of the experiences of the people (Moustakas, 1994; Creswell, 2007). It was thought that participants were more likely to share their personal views and practices during face to face interviews.
Participants Volunteer based interviews were done with the 7 students (5 females; 2 males) who were choosen randomly from 241 students of BILSEM Antalya. They were in grades 6,7, and 8 and their ages were between 12-14. The focus group interview was done with the five of these students after all of the individual interviews were completed. Main talent areas of the interviewed students were science, music, fine arts, maths, literature, language an social sciences. 8 volunteer teachers (5 females, 3 males; age beween 29-49) were choosen randomly from the 17 teachers of BILSEM Antalya. Each represented a different talent area (literacy, maths, history, arts, music, design and technology), and the deputy head and school counselor were included. Four of the teachers were regular
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teachers and four of them were working temporarily at BILSEM Antalya. Total service years of the teachers were between 6-25 years, and their experience in BILSEMs in Turkey was between 113 years.
Measures The interview questions were prepared by the researcher, and examined by a research scholar who was experienced on teaching qualitative research in educational sciences. After the rearrangements of the interview questions, pilot interviews were done with two students and two teachers of the BILSEM Antalya to refine the interview forms. After the pilot interviews, 10 questions for individaul student interviews, 4 questions for focus group student interviews, and 8 questions for teacher interviews were used. Some of the questions asked to the students were: "What does it mean to be gifted?", "What does BILSEM mean to you?", and some of the questions asked the teachers were: "What is it like to be a teacher at BILSEM?", "What are your professional and personal qualifications to help your work here easier?"
Data collection Data collection was conducted by the researcher via the stuctured individual interviews with the seven students and the eight teachers, and via a focus group interview with five of the interviewed students to probe key areas in more detail and to gain more detailed insights, interviews were conducted at BILSEM Antalya during the spring term of the 2013-2014 academic year. Individual student interviews took between 20-35 min, focus group interview took 60 min, and individual teacher interviews took between 35-65 min. The interviews were recorded and typed by the researcher.
Data analysis The study utilized a qualitative content analysis method to identify the student and teacher experiences and was based on the three different groups of interviews to provide the triangulation validity. Statements of the interviewees were coded within each interview transcript. These codes were grouped within main themes based on their similarities. The researcher labeled each type of expression and when appropriate, combined different expressions into one broad category related to the emotional, social and educational needs. Following individual coding, main and sub-codes were examined by an indepedent neurologist who was working on lifelong development and working with gifted individuals. The coders met to discuss their respective coding schemes and the potential discrepancies. The following excerpt is an example of the text that was coded as "Need for being into consideration with her own authenticity": "They talk about us as if we are species. If I am not in one of the categorical identifications about gifted stereotypes, that does not mean I am not gifted" (Student 2). In some instances, coders had to agree to re-label specific experiences based on the literature and the context in which the expression was referenced. Following the coding procedure, two dimensions were identified, and main and subthemes were listed for each. After the agreement of the two coders, 14 main themes and 111 sub-themes in two broad heading were identified:1) Students' views (8 main themes and 54 subthemes about being gifted and about experiences in educational settings). 2) Teachers' views (6 main tehemes and 57 subthemes about gifted students' needs and about BILSEM applications). To ensure the reliability of the themes, between coders reliability was tested via theme matching method. The themes and related
interviewee expressions were randomly listed and e-mailed to the two master's students of the Akdeniz University, who were not familiar with the interview and study objective. They idividually coded the themes, and their codes were recorded to calculate the between coders Kappa values on SPSS 18.00. Kappa value was .80 for student interviews' themes and was .873 for teacher interviews' themes (Table 1). As stated in Landis and Koch (1977), Kappa value of .61-.80 shows an important match, and .81-100 shows a perfect match. Based on this information themes which were based on the codings would be accepted as highly reliable.
RESULTS The research findings which were drawn from the interviews with the students and teachers are shown in Tables 2 and 3 as categorized main themes and subthemes. Some of the excerpts with the subthemes from the coded interviews were provided in the examples below to give idea about the interviewees' perceptions and feelings about the gifted adolescents' experiences. "Being extraordinary": "We are not in an ordinary line, we will do something different to shape the future", Student 1; "Being different, being rare; maybe I could do something different from my peers"( Student 3). "Avodiance from being put in a privileged situation": "Being described superior to my peers is disturbing me. I am not superior. I just have my own talents" ( Student 5). "Disregard of emotional and social needs": "They talk about us as a 'term'" (Students 5). "Supportive anvironment for the talents at BILSEM": "There are no compulsory lessons. I get modules related to my talent areas" (Student 2). "Suggested qualifications of the BILSEM teachers have to have": "Should know the psychology of the kids very well" (Teacher 3); "Should be confident, experienced and curious" (Teacher 5). "Problems in emotional and social development": "These students' prosocial tendencies are high" (Teacher 1); "They are fragile"; "The highly gifted girls are at risk" (Teacher 7). "Unrachievement concern":"They are intolerant to failure" (Teacher 8). DISCUSSION The emerging themes from the findings related to the emotional and social needs of the gifted students at BILSEM Antalya were discussed under three broad headings: 1) The social-emotional states of the gifted students 2) The problems they experienced related to being gifted in social and educational settings, 3) Suggestions to implement to fulfill the needs of the gifted adolescents in educational settings.
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Table 1. Symmetric measures of the analysis of the theme matchings.
Interviewee Students Teachers
Kappa Value .80 .873
Asymp. Std. Errora .046 .045
Approx. Tb 47,433 48,434
Approx. Sig .000 .000
N of Valid Cases 55 56
Table 2. Main themes and subthemes which were drawn from student interviews about being gifted and about their experiences in the educational settings.
Main themes Meaning of being gifted
Subthemes Being extraordinary Need for their emotional and social needs are understood Creativity Need for being supported to represent the creativity potential Self-confidence Avodiance from being put in a privileged situation Contribution to the society
Feelings about being described gifted
Not happy with the negative effects of being described as gifted Self-confidence Disturbed by the disregard of their emotional and social needs Need to be a social human being Concern about underachievement
Personal characteristics that makes themselves feel good
Thinking in multipleways Awareness about their emotional and social development Self-confidence Need to be understood Determination Humanitarianism / helpfulness Inner motivation
Problems that come from being described gifted
Ignorance of their emotional and social needs by families and teachers Perfectionist expectations of the parents Concern for the risk of exclusion by the peers
Suggestions for the solution of their problems
Education must include the talent area Developing awareness to their emotional and social needs Parents training to support their unique capabilities and developments Not to make their giftedness on the focus and to the attention
Meaning of the BILSEM
An opportunity for their development Supports their development in different aspects An educational environment where their emotional and social needs are taken care of An educational environment that supports their talent development Evaluation sytstem is not focused on the academic success Supports the creativity potential Provides their contribution to the society Make them feel happy to be there Peers support Do not see a difference
Activities at the BILSEM
Supports multidimentional development Multivariety and experience-based methods in education Supports the potential and the the ability development Regards the emotional and social needs Supports self-expression Provides peer support Supports self-confidence Higher level educational activities Supports creativity Develops problem solving skills No difference from the school except for the personal talent area target
Effect of the BILSEM to their life
Supports the creativity and Authentic development Supports self-confidence Supports emotional and social skills Provides opportunities for intellect and talents compared to the ordinary education Supports school success Causes the risk for being perceieved as privileged Do not see its special benefit
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Table 3. Main and subthemes which were drawn from the interviews with the teachers about the gifted students' needs and about the educational applications.
Main Themes
Subthemes Satisfactory in career and personal life Work environment that provides to express themselves Working with students who are highly good at emotional, social and perception skills Feelings of responsibility for supporting the gifted students Working individually with students in a flexible program Opportunity to use multivariety teaching methods that ensure the students to explore and develop their talents Being aware of the qualifications of the teachers who should have to work with gifted students Wish for all students have the same educational opportunities as gifted students have Experiencing to work with the students who have different thinking skills Exploring and developing multiple potentials of the students Satisfactory working environment Environment that supports teacher's development Working environment that provides to work freely with the students
Being a teacher at BILSEM
Characteristics of the activities the teacher do at BILSEM
To develop emotional and social capabilities For parents to understand their kids To develop skills for mental ability For the students to explore, use and develop their multiple potentials To make the students realize their creative potentials To develop thinking and studying skills in scientific notion To develop visual and aesthetic perception To develop awareness, productivity, and ethical understanding
Personal and professional qualifications that helps to work with gifted students
To have an understanding to support autenhenticity of the students Understanding the students Lifelong development on their own professional area Adjustment skills Being open to the criticism Being experienced To love working and producing To care about the emotions and the perceptions Having studied human psyhology and philosophy Having had good professionalrole models Being aware of their own uncapabilities
Observed problems BILSEM students
of
the
Observed problems about the applications at BILSEM
Balancing the time problem between the school and the BILSEM Pressure of the expectations of the academic success focused parents Pressures of the perfectionist parents Social problems with the peers Drawbacks on emotional and social development Lack of inner motivation towards the studies Fear of underachievement Insufficent context of the policies to ensure the BILSEM notion and applications Lack of a specific model to be used at BILSEMs in coordination Lack of professionally prepared educational programs and materials for BILSEM Lack of permanent gifted education teachers at BILSEMs Lack of capable gifted education teachers Unconvenient and inadequate criteria to define and select the gifted students Need for reaching the gifted kids who have poor conditions and limited access to a better education Pressure of the perfectionist parents
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Table 3. Contd.
Suggestions for the solution of the problems
To rearrange the gifted education and BILSEM policies to regard to the educational rights To prepare specific educational programs for gifted students at BILSEMs To have permanent gifted education teachers at BILSEMs To make arrangements to help these students could organize their time and program between the school and BILSEM Educational plans should be grounded on the developmental understanding and must include systematic and effective follow-up Active BILSEM-school-family communication and cooperation Parent education To announce the BILSEM to all potential gifted students to provide equal opportunities To support all development areas, specifically emotional and social development, of To use variety of criteria rather than the IQ levels to define the students to include BILSEM program
The social-emotional states of the gifted students Based on the students’ and teachers’ views, the gifted students who attended the BILSEM Antalya mostly seemed to have high awareness about themselves and the world around them. One of the main findings of the interviews showed that they were happy being gifted and having the benefits of this situation because their capabilities make their life easier. Their ethical understanding and manners stated by the teachers were highly mature. By the means of using their potentials in educational settings, the need for support to explore and develop their talent areas via an adequate education seemed a priority. It was also emphasized that they needed to be supported to develop their creativity potential. Their higher awareness skills might be helping them to manage the outside pressures they were experiencing. Akça (2010) found that, there was a significant difference between the scores of the highly and average intelligent students in the three sub-scales of emotional intelligence scale. In self-consciousness, managing emotions, and motivating emotions subscales, highly intelligent students had more EI and difference between them was significant. The common need of the participants seemed that they needed to be understood and to express themselves free from their giftedness as ordinary adolescents. This was one of the main issues which were expressed by most of the students and teachers. Hayes and Sloat (1990) suggested that these children had a heightened sensitivity due to their giftedness and were often affected by problems which their non-gifted peers were not even aware of. This sensitivity makes them more aware of their peers’ reactions to errors in a social setting. The likeminded peers and supportive teachers at BILSEM were one of the important advantages of this educational and social setting.
The problems they experienced related to being gifted in social and educational settings The participants may often felt not being understood due to the parents' and school teachers' disregard of their emotions and unique needs. Their unrealistic expectations were one of the significant problems of these students.Almost all of students and teachers stated that parents', school teachers' and society's expectations from the gifted students were mostly about standard academic areas even they were not capable of those abilities and/or they did not prioritize those skills. Once a student was chosen for BILSEM, their personal choices were put aside by the parents. According to the multidimensional conceptions of giftedness (e.g., Gagné, 2004), the potential for extraordinary achievement (as one prominent understanding of giftedness) relies not only on high cognitive ability but also on noncognitive personality characteristics and environmental conditions. Intrapersonal characteristics highlighted in this context are, for example, self-regulatory strategies, control expectations, effort or motivational characteristics (Meier et al., 2014). Preckel et al. (2008) discussed the possibility that selfperceptions of cognitive abilities were more influential for the formation of academic self-concept in gifted students than self-perceptions of academic achievements. Too much emphasis on their high IQ by the parents and even by themselves cause their multiple talents and unique skills fall behind the IQ while making educational and career plans. Inner motivation and taking responsbility is also affected by this misinterpretaton of their IQ (Heller et al., 1993). Webb (1994) implied that supportive family enviroments can counteract unhappy school experiences; but parents need information if they were to nurture well and to be wise advocates for their children. Also, early recognition of the problems of gifted children makes the family an important partner of the teacher. Oğurlu and Yaman (2013)'s research findings implied
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the related problems that over sensitivity, perfectionism, lacks in the talent development programs, attending to much activities, disorganization, stricness on the rules were also the common issues for the parents of the gifted students. These issues were some of the main complaints of the gifted students for themselves, too. Almost all of the interviewed students stated that they did not like to be put in a priviliged situation, although they have found that being gifted was good. They made the distinction between these two facts. Being labeled as gifted and being positively priviliged may cause them to isolated from their peers. Claxton and Meadows (2009) argued that the label and distinction of ‘gifted’ or ‘nongifted’ was damaging as it influences a teachers’ perception of a pupil, as well as the child’s own view of him/her self. The high level awareness, sensitivity and prosocial tendencies of these gifted adolescents may cause them to be affected by the judgements of the others and to experience sadness due to the problems of world more than their peers are. These students may not be nurtured intellectually and also they may have communication problems with their teachers at their ordinary schools. Related to the literature, BILSEM seemed quite advantegous especially for gifted girls to support positive self-concept in a similar peers environment. Consistent to the previous research, gifted girls included in this stdy looked comfortable within the similar same-gender peers group to express themselves. This feeling of being accepted by peers gave them a chance to open themselves and motivated that provide the positive selfconcept (Dai, 2001; Preckel et al., 2008). One of the basic problems of the BILSEM students expressed in the present study was that they have had difficulty to split their time between the school and BILSEM. They wanted to spend more time at BILSEM, but they were stuck between school, BILSEM and central exam preparation courses. They also needed to spend more time with their peers. Although BILSEM gave the opportunity to be with the same level peers, they did not want to get isolated from the wide group of peers at the school.
Suggestions to fulfill the needs of the gifted adolescents in the educational settings It was found that being in the same environment with the similar peers supported the gifted students' happiness and self-confidence at BILSEM. Their important concern was to be excluded by the peers due to be "labeled" as gifted at school. Some interventions in their social environment with the teachers and peers would help to minimize this risk. Hoogeveen et al. (2012)'s study suggested that social-emotional characteristics of accelerated gifted students and non-accelerated gifted students were largely similar. If a student was gifted,
acceleration seemed to be a sound and, in many cases, appropriate measure in gifted education. If the ordinary school teachers were more aware of the gifted students' emotional needs within the peer groups, they could find the ways to create safer atmosphere in the classroom. By the means of problems related to their sensitivity and prosocial tendencies, counseling services and school based social development programs would be helpful. To decrease the risk of feeling different, social skills training would be a good choice. These practices should be a part of their daily life instead of a temporary time-limited program and would be held with teachers and parents as well. Especially parents trainings could lead support to wide variety of these adolescents' problems. Counseling services should be aware of the at risk groups and make preventive programs individually and as groups (Moon et al., 2004). It seemed that the gifted adolescents' educational needs were not completely met in ordinary schools. They needed to find opportunities that their talent areas were taken into consideration at the school. As stated in Koshy and Pinhero-Torres (2013), teachers who taught high ability groups might use more organized course materials and might teach concepts which require extensive critical thinking skills to meet these group of students. Due to the lack of appropriate educational methods and teacher support at the ordinary schools, BILSEM seemed more adequate for them. According to Woolfolk (1995), motivation to learn involves more than wanting or intending to learn and it includes the quality of the student’s mental efforts. Goals are related to the individual’s needs. Appropriate school and teacher selection is very important at this point. Preckel et al. (2010) implied the students clearly differed in the reasons they stated for experiencing boredom in their study. Boredom attributions changed over time and supported the assumption that gifted classes provide more appropriate levels of challenge. Zeidner and Schleyer (1999) stated that compared to their mainstreamed counterparts in mixed ability classes, students in special homogeneous classes for the gifted held more favorable attitudes towards various facets of the school/classroom environment (school atmosphere, level of instruction, teacher-student relations, teacher characteristics) and were also more satisfied with school in general when compared to their gifted counterparts partaking in mixed ability classes. These gifted adolescents needed to develop inner motivation to be self-directed learners as a common tendency of many gifted students. Gifted individuals need to be motivated, mostly to be encouraged instead of discipline or academic success purpose (McCoach and Siegle, 2003; Baum et al., 2004). It seemed that BILSEM provided many opprotunities to fulfill their needs in terms of creativity and talent development, self-expression and being understood and accepted unconditionally. But the limitation of gifted specific programs, teachers and
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materials in general BILSEM applications might lower the benefits of this educational environment. Providing enrichment programs, various student based teaching methods and encouragement help them challenge and meet their needs so that their unique talents could appear (Diezmann and Watters, 2001; Baum et al., 2004; Reis and Renzulli, 2010). Mills and Parker (1998) suggested that the ideal educational program for academically talented students should capitalize on their cognitive strengths and preferences such as mental flexibility, independence, theoretical orientation, and ideational fluency. At the same time, the program should incorporate experiences to exercise and strengthen the processes, like memorization, observation, attention to facts and detail, as well as some appreciation for structure and order. Through the identification and appropriate educational placement procedure, inclusion of all gifted students were found important. Huge number of gifted students did not reach and were not included in the convenient identification to join BILSEM due to the uninformed teachers or location and transportation services. Many teachers were not aware of the gifted students in their classrooms and these students did not have a chance even to be a candidate of the selection to the BILSEM. Every child has the right to reach the opportunities to develop and to access the convenient education. Gifted children are the part of that mission of equality and equity in education (Lopez et al., 1993; Lucas and Claxton, 2010). According to Maltby (1984), teachers must recognise the gifted children in their classrooms and must give attention to them. If they did not, these children may not be understood, may not show their real capacity and they may be perceived as problematic children by the teachers. The children's learning ability and development is influenced by the proper educational placement, opportunities, support and motivation and therefore the performance of able children may vary as they move through school (Eyre, 1997; Oakes, 2005). There were many elements of giftedness and talent and children have to be selected as gifted by taking into account all components of the personality features, not only based on the IQ test results. Multidimensional approaches have to be used to identify more able children in order to prepare appropriate programmes for them (Heller, 2004; Renzulli, 2004). Montgomery (1996) stated that in order to bring some equality to the way in which boys and girls are treated and also disadvantaged young people of all kinds, it was thought to be necessary for educators to use tests, inventories or checklists and curriculum identification strategies to find out who were the able and highly able and what were their needs. In other words, they needed to use the most comprehensive methods available which takes into account levels of ability, talent and creativity. Freeman (1994) stated that the ways in which we measured giftedness had to change. It was not only achievement which counts, but the potential for
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achievement, and this often includes personality factors such as perseverance and originality, so that tests for giftedness should include measures of self-concept as well as aptitude. The teachers' personal characteristics were found important as well as their professional skills. Teachers were recommended to have personal insight and they were expected to be aware of their responsibility as a role model both at the BILSEM and at the ordinary schools. Their open-mindedness, empathy, acceptance and awareness about their own strengths and weaknesses both professionally and personaly would be helpful to work with the gifted students. Especially for the BILSEM teachers, having a comprehensive training on gifted education would be recommended. They were expected to be dynamic, hardworking and creative. Teacher's expertise, abilities, undurstanding and skills to teach in innovative ways, to differentiate the programs for these students, to understand each student separately and willingness to provide better opportunities to all students were the important characteristics that a teacher had to had to work with the gifted students (Smit and Humpert, 2012; Koshy and Pinheiro-Torres, 2013). As quoted in Reis and Renzulli (2010), the lack of teacher training and professional development in gifted education for classroom teachers (Archambault et al., 1993) may result in fewer challenges, less differentiation, more underachievement and dropping out, and lower achievement for all gifted and talented students. Beside the general applications for the gifted education, some specific suggestions to be implemented in BILSEM would be mentioned. Legistative arrangements and revisions on the gifted education policies, BILSEM specific education programs, teacher selection, teacher training, student selection criteria and process, permanent counselor, announcement of BILSEM to all students via the schools , equal opportunities for all to have a chance to join BILSEM were the main suggestions to make the BILSEMs more effective to fulfill the needs of the gifted students. Also permanent teacher availability at BILSEMs, selection process of teachers for BILSEM, inservice training for teachers seemed priorities to be thought. To support the students' development, a permanent counselor was stated by most of the interviewees. The students and teachers aggreed that BILSEM and school programs were needed to be adjusted to each other. Although they would like to attend BILSEM programs without being isolated from their ordinary peers, the central tests oriented school system in Turkey affected gifted students' attendance to the BILSEM negatively. They were expected to get highest success at the central exams, and attending BILSEM in a limited time after the school caused them feel pressured. According to Zeidner and Schleyer (1999), gifted students in special classes were frequently bussed to distant schools outside their own residential district in order to attend a school hosting special classes for the
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gifted. This may distance students from their classmates, without providing them with an alternative social reference group for after-school hours. This process may negatively impact upon students' interactions with peers in their educational environment and be responsible, in part, for the negative perceptions ofgiftedness in students partaking in special classes. The need for a permanent counselor to follow and support their development, and to work with the parents and with the teachers at the BILSEM was strongly recommended. It was important to find out what these children think about themselves personally and emotionally and what affects their psychosocial development because academic success and self-perception interact directly. A permanent counselor would follow these students more effecively and also would help the parents to understand their children's needs. These students wanted to be supported to develop on their own pace and not to be seen different or privileged. Importance of working as a team with the parents and teachers was desired for gifted education. The lifelong achievement is based on nurturing the needs of the students in every step and all areas of development, and it is important for the exceptional capacity of the gifted students (Silverman, 1992; Gross,1993; Henderson, 2007). CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS The need for the appropriate educational and psychosocial programs for gifted adolescents both at BILSEMs and at the ordinary schools were the main conclusion of this study to help them to be understood and to develop their talents and creativity. Starting with identification, their educational plans in general should be supported by educators and parents in consistent with their capacities and preferences. Educators, counselors and parents need to work together to understand and help these students. This kind of comprehensive approach to the development of the gifted students would be the best way to help them explore their potential, fulfill their needs and find their own way for the self actualisation. Taking into account that individuals are different from each other and that every student has different capacity from others with multiple talents are important to recognize and support the gifted students. Not only the BILSEM teachers but also the ordinary school teachers were reommended to be aware of the gifted students' specific talents and needs. This was the key to provide the convenient and equal opportunities to the gifted students starting with identification through continuing education on their own ways. Making the educational places an environment to develop means that all aspects of their development would be considered. There were some important recommendations to make BILSEMs more effective with regard to BILSEMs providing highly satisfying environment and opportunities to the gifted adolescents emotionally, socially and educa-
tionally. Revisions on the policies of the BILSEM by the means of student identification, educational applications and teacher selections were the main considerations. One of the main issues was the need for the full time counseling services to follow the gifted students' developments and needs as a whole. This study aimed to understand and identify the needs of gifted adolescents and to find out possible ways to fulfill their needs via direct information from a target group of students and teachers. The findings of the study were limited with the eight students and the eight teachers of BILSEM Antalya and the results can not be generalized. Similar studies in practice could be done with wider numbers of participants and at the other BILSEMs in Turkey. Also, widening the sample to the ordinary schools' would provide more information about the gifted adolescents to help them develop on their unique ways of self actualization. Conflict of Interests The author has not declared any conflict of interests. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS The author is grateful to the students and teachers of BILSEM Antalya for participating to the research. She also thanks to Dr İlhan Günbayi, of Akdeniz University, Antalya for his support on the research methodology; Dr. Bülent Madi, M.D., Altis Communication and Counseling Center, Istanbul, for the expert view support on codings; Neslihan Gök and Gülden Gökçen, Master's students at the Instıtute of the Educational Sciences, Akdeniz University, Antalya for helping the theme matching process. REFERENCES Akça F (2010). Talented and average intelligent children’s levels of using emotional intelligence. Procedia Social and Behavioral Sci. 5: 553–558. Baum SM, Renzulli JS, Hébert TP (2004). Reversing underachievement: creative productivity as a systematic intervention. in S. M. Moon (Ed.), Social/emotional issues, underachievement, and counseling of gifted and talented students. Essential Readings in Gifted Education Series (Series Ed. S. M. Reis), California: Corwin Press. Baykoç N, Uyaroğlu B, Aydemir D, Seval Ç (2012). A new dimension in education of Turkish gifted children.Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sci. 47:2005– 2009. DOI:10.1016/j.sbspro.2012.06.940 Borland JH (2005). Gifted education without gifted children: The case for no conception of giftedness, in: R. Sternberg & J. Davidson (Eds.) Conceptions of giftedness.New York: Cambridge University Press, 1– 19. Carper AB (2002). Bright students in a wasteland: The at-risk gifted. A qualitative study of fourteen gifted dropouts. (Doctoral dissertation), North Carolina State University, U.S.A. Claxton G, Meadows S (2009). Brightening up: How children learn to be gifted, in: T. Balchin, B. Hymer & D. Matthews (Eds) The Routledge international companion to gifted education, Abingdon: Routledge, 3– 9.
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