Investigating the intersection between the pursuit of well-being and talent development is a critical mission for the field of educational psychology. This study investigated a residential early college program that is theorized to catalyze flourishing as an environmental intervention. This intervention is for highly achieving and motivated young women aged 12–17 across the world. Alumni from this program are notable in both their contributions to their field and humanitarian efforts. This pilot phenomenology investigated participants’ lived experience of emotional, social, and academic/career development within the program. Participant ( N = 9) themes included Meaning, Relationships, Emotions, Engagement, and Accomplishments. Academic and personal autonomy (alongside opportunities for challenge) were important variables within identity exploration and formation, as well as in connection to building a strong sense of belonging and community. These were viewed as key experiences for flourishing.
Academic self-regulation plays a crucial role in student achievement and talent development, yet culturally valid measures for Arabic-speaking populations remain limited. This study developed and validated an Arabic version of the Academic Self-Regulation Questionnaire (SRQ-A) and examined motivational patterns among middle school students. The original SRQ-A was translated using rigorous back-translation procedures and administered to 526 Arab students (Grades 7–9). Exploratory factor analysis on half the sample ( n = 263) revealed a four-factor structure, confirmed by confirmatory factor analysis on the other half with excellent fit indices ( CFI = .987, TLI = .986, RMSEA = .028, SRMR = .042). Internal consistency was strong (α = .943–.957, CR = .953–.963), and validity was established via correlations and heterotrait-monotrait ratio. K-means analysis identified four profiles: Autonomous Regulators (22.6%), High Engagers (25.1%), Moderate Regulators (20.9%), and Controlled Regulators (31.4%). Latent mean comparisons revealed female students exhibited significantly higher introjected regulation, and intrinsic motivation declined significantly across grades for all students. Findings support talent development and culturally responsive practices.
This systematic review examined how variables influencing educator attitudes toward gifted education have evolved since 1994. Utilizing Gagné and Nadeau's Attitudes Toward Giftedness and Its Education scale, 39 studies were analyzed to identify variables to explain attitudes toward gifted education. Findings revealed no single variable consistently predicted educator attitudes, which emphasizes the continuing complexity of this inquiry. The results highlighted the multifaceted nature of educator attitudes, suggesting that a combination of cognitive, emotional, and behavioral components interacts dynamically to shape perceptions of gifted education across different contexts. We further examined studies across successive time periods. The early studies reported largely positive baseline attitudes during the scale development. Attitudes became more variable later as research broadened internationally. The most recent studies showed the greatest heterogeneity, reflecting stronger regional and role-based differences. The study underscored the importance of targeted professional development opportunities, inclusive policies, and cross-institutional collaboration to address the diverse needs of educators and gifted learners. Future research should systematically explore cross-cultural perspectives, longitudinal trends, and the influence of professional training to deepen understanding of how these explanatory variables evolve in diverse educational environments and influence the practice of gifted education.
This systematic review examined how the relationship between giftedness and creativity has been conceptualized in gifted education scholarship from 2005 to 2024. Across eight major journals, we analyzed 133 articles, including 13 core texts that placed the creativity–giftedness connection at the center and 120 articles that engaged it more broadly. We identified 18 recurring core concepts, spanning theoretical, developmental, and applied perspectives. The findings revealed strong continuity with foundational models that position creativity as central to giftedness, but also a tendency in much of the literature to assume, rather than explicitly articulate, this connection. The broader sample of articles emphasized applied conceptions, such as identification practices, classroom environments, and teacher beliefs, whereas the core articles highlighted creativity as a defining conceptual feature of giftedness. Although creativity remains foundational in gifted education theory, its role is inconsistently foregrounded in practice and policy. Greater clarity and explicit integration are needed to sustain creativity's place in gifted education.
Despite adverse socioeconomic conditions, some students achieve high educational performance, a phenomenon known as academic resilience. This paper examines factors associated with academic resilience in a middle-income Latin American country. Using Program for International Student Assessment data, a two-step methodological design was carried out. First, resilient students were identified based on their socioeconomic status and academic achievement. Subsequently, multilevel logistic regression models were implemented to capture the individual- and school-level predictors of academic resilience. At the student level, characteristics such as a high academic self-concept and a strong sense of belonging were associated with a higher probability of being resilient. Moreover, the high between-school variance indicates that specific school factors promote vulnerable students’ success, particularly the implementation of quality assurance measures, teaching processes involving constant teacher support, an appropriate school climate, and bullying control. These results confirm the importance of individual attributes and school environments in helping students succeed despite adversity.
This study examines how advanced professional training in strength-based assessment influences graduate students' knowledge, skills, attitudes, and beliefs about supporting twice-exceptional learners. The study was conducted within a graduate institution dedicated to strength-based, talent-focused education and employed a design-based research methodology to iteratively refine a practicum course in which students learned to administer and interpret the Suite of Tools (TM), a strength-based assessment. Within this context, students were trained to apply theories of ecological systems, self-determination, and talent development to real-world cases of twice-exceptional learners. Quantitative and qualitative data indicated growth in confidence, conceptual understanding, and commitment to implementing strength-based practices. Participants emphasized the need for additional modeling and experiential learning opportunities. Findings illustrate how advanced training can translate theory into professional practice and offer recommendations for developing graduate programs that prepare educators to identify and cultivate the strengths of twice-exceptional learners.
Teachers play a key role in identifying and supporting gifted children, making their understanding of giftedness essential. This study explored teachers’ representations of giftedness, their feelings and self-efficacy, particularly in relation to different gifted profiles, and identify the factors influencing their perceived ability to spot and support these children. Pre-service and in-service teachers from French-speaking Switzerland completed a survey featuring vignettes of gifted children. The main results showed that teachers’ overall perceptions of gifted children were influenced by their own teaching experience and personal exposure to giftedness. However, many felt ill-equipped to support gifted students, and those with higher self-efficacy were more likely to implement tailored interventions. These findings underscore the need for targeted training that boosts teachers’ confidence and addresses biases in recognizing diverse gifted profiles, ultimately promoting more equitable identification and support for gifted learners.
We developed and validated the Debate Skills Scale (DSS), grounded in social cognitive theory, to address the lack of an instrument for assessing debate competencies among high school students, as existing measures primarily assess general critical thinking rather than debate performance. Data were collected from 389 students, and an initial 49-item pool was generated based on literature and expert input. Exploratory Factor Analysis revealed a four-factor structure explaining 50.95% of the variance and reduced the scale to 29 items. Subsequent confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) removed four items, resulting in a final 25-item scale. CFA supported this structure, with internal consistency reliability ranging from acceptable to excellent, although lower reliability was observed for the Speaking Skills subscale. Discriminative validity analyses indicated that the DSS differentiated students based on debate experience and performance. The DSS provides a psychometrically validated self-report instrument for assessing perceived debate competencies and may inform instructional planning.
Gifted children in Paraguay rarely find educational environments that support advanced learning needs and emotional well-being. The first extracurricular program in Paraguay designed for gifted students is grounded in inquiry-based learning (IBL). This study examines families' perspectives on gifted children's creativity and psychosocial development in relation to participation in the IBL program. A convergent mixed-methods design integrated data from parent focus groups and child interviews with assessments of divergent thinking and creative self-concept. Participants included 13 children (aged 5-9) and nine parents. Main parent themes encompassed cognitive activation and curiosity, identity and voice, sense of belonging, and parental empowerment. Quantitative data showed a wide range of divergent thinking scores and a strong creative self-concept. Complementing findings suggest that when Paraguayan gifted children are placed in a context of exploration and collaboration, their creativity and well-being flourish. The IBL program offers a model for meaningful enrichment in under-resourced contexts.
This quantitative study investigated how teachers are prepared to recognize and value creativity by examining the relationship between teacher preparation, demographic and educational variables, and perceptions of creative student traits. Consistent with prior research, educators generally favored academic characteristics over creative ones. However, age, years of experience, and content area taught emerged as significant predictors. Educators over 40 and those with 20+ years of experience showed a stronger preference for creative traits, as did teachers in certain subject areas. Cluster analysis revealed that while individual variables may not independently predict perceptions, the combination of professional learning experiences and preparation pathways significantly influenced attitudes toward creativity. These findings suggest the importance of systemic, standardized training in cultivating teachers' appreciation for creative thinking. Further research is needed to explore how professional development and teacher education programs can shape more inclusive, creativity-centered classroom environments.
In this study, the mathematical creativity of gifted primary school students aged 10-11 was examined, with an emphasis on fluency, flexibility, and originality. Fifty students from a Science and Art Center participated, with data collected via the Mathematical Creativity Problem-Solving Test containing four open-ended questions. Descriptive and correlational analyses were used. Results showed that problem type influenced creativity components differently. Algorithmic problems were associated with lower originality, while open-ended, visually rich tasks encouraged more original responses. A moderate correlation existed between fluency (response quantity) and flexibility (strategy variety), with greater flexibility associated with more original answers. This finding highlights the importance of flexible thinking in supporting originality. Overall, the study emphasizes that both problem type and the ability to think in varied ways play critical roles in enhancing mathematical creativity among gifted students. These insights can guide future instructional designs to better foster creative thinking in mathematics.
Research into high-ability students' educational experiences, aiming at understanding academic talent development, has received limited attention in gifted education studies, despite students being a crucial part of classroom instruction. This article explores how high-ability secondary school students in Tanzania experience schooling to identify their perceived needs for developing their academic potential. It draws on qualitative data from focus group discussions with 73 students. The thematic analysis reveals common educational experiences among students across the study schools, most of which highlight the need for more aligned learning opportunities to help them realize their potential and contribute positively to society. The experiences and practices suggest targeted interventions to enhance learning for high-ability students in schools. The article concludes that students' voices are vital in understanding their perceived needs for developing academic potential, and that these insights should be embraced to enhance the provision of gifted services to high-ability students in Tanzania.
Mathematics should provide space for learners to think, frame mathematics problems, formulate hypotheses, and reflect on mathematical explanations. It is logical to suggest that computational thinking and scientific thinking have an impact on learners' learning performance. Hence, the focus of the study was to determine whether there is an association between computational thinking and scientific thinking in mathematics, and whether scientific thinking mediates the relationship between computational thinking and learning performance. Thirty-eight high-performing secondary learners participated in the study. The regression analysis revealed the following results: first, computational thinking has a significant effect on learners' mathematics performance. Second, scientific thinking has a significant impact on learners' mathematics performance. Third, scientific thinking mediates the relationship between computational thinking and learners' learning performance. Therefore, computational thinking skills should include mathematical and scientific thinking to improve learning performance in mathematics.
This praxis article investigated how podcasting can enhance engagement, motivation, and meaningful experiences among Latin & eacute; elementary students who exhibit gifted potential but remain underserved by traditional identification methods. Conducted in a diverse urban school in the southeastern United States, the four-week project involved four fourth- and fifth-grade students in creating personal podcast episodes, allowing them to explore identity, interests, and storytelling through technology. Data from surveys, observations, and student work suggest that podcasting supports equitable access to advanced learning opportunities by fostering creativity, challenge, and belongingness. The project used holistic identification strategies and emphasized culturally relevant, student-driven learning. Findings revealed increased affective engagement and academic confidence, leading to the identification of three of the four students for gifted services. Results highlight podcasting's value for addressing opportunity and excellence gaps in gifted education. The findings underscore the importance of inclusive instructional approaches that amplify student voice and reveal potential not captured by conventional assessments.
This study develops and validates a multicriteria decision-making framework for assessing the structure and development of academic soft skills in higher education. A total of 241 undergraduate students (104 first-year and 137 final-year) participated in the study. We operationalized soft skills-communication, creativity, and critical thinking-through 15 subcriteria derived from validated instruments, applied objective weighting methods to determine the relative importance of subcriteria, and used K-means clustering to identify structural groupings. Results indicated consistent dominance of communication-related criteria across weighting methods and increased structural differentiation of soft skills in final-year students. Clustering analysis revealed a transition from generalized skill groupings in early academic stages to more specialized and integrated clusters in later stages. The proposed framework enables systematic comparison of soft skill structures and provides a reproducible approach for analyzing their development in higher education.
Grounded in transformational leadership models, this multiple case study explored how elementary and middle school principals perceived the problem of the decline in gifted learners' academic performance in the transition from elementary to middle school. Overwhelmingly, the elementary and middle school principals attributed the pattern of decline in gifted learners' academic performance in the transition to middle school to limited teacher capacity to differentiate instruction. Elementary principals were found to adopt a hands-on approach with individualized support, goal setting, and high expectations, compared to middle school principals who delegated more responsibility and enabled others to lead. Interview data and a document analysis of campus improvement plans indicated that the leadership practices have yet to reverse gifted underachievement during the elementary to middle school transition. The findings offer direction for further exploration as gifted education practitioners and stakeholders advocate for gifted learners during the pivotal transition from elementary to middle school.
Latine scholars navigating graduate school often face unique challenges shaped by cultural differences, institutional barriers, and a hidden curriculum. For first-generation Latine graduate students, relying on complex formal and informal support networks is necessary to cross the borders of academia. Narrative accounts of how Latine students do so are missing from prior research. We leverage Gloria Anzald & uacute;a's concept of la frontera as a generative lens to understand how we, Latine students, navigate institutions of higher education. We explored how Latine students navigate institutional and personal borders, through culturally grounded strategies and mentorship. In this praxis article, we used pl & aacute;tica, a dialogue-based conversation rooted in Latine cultural traditions, to discuss identity, community, and academic survival. Our findings highlight the invisible struggles gifted Latine students face and underscore the need for academic spaces to recognize and support their multidimensional experiences. Incorporating Latine knowledge systems into academic institutions can help support student success.
