Working With Gifted Students

In my summary, I would like to present and describe how I work as a teacher at lower primary level with the gifted and potentially gifted students for many years now. As a coordinator at primary school SladkiVrh-branch school ZgornjaVelka, I spent one lesson every two weeks with the gifted and potentially gifted students. All the activities were realized according to the programme, which I carefully planned at the beginning of a school year and were focused on the individual fields of talent and skills of the students. With acceptance of the Concept for Discovering and Working with Gifted Students in a primary school I was active in the field of individualization and differentiation during the lessons. Working with gifted students the teacher has to be innovative, adjustable and should not feel threatened due to high competence of gifted students. Gifted students stand out due to their potentials and learning abilities and they do not need any help for their progress. However, they need to be motivated to fulfil and realize their skills and talent. Therefore, it is important that a teacher knows how to recognize typical characteristics of the gifted students. The students on lower school level are highly motivated and willing to compete therefore they often apply for school competition. In an annual lesson plan for ISP I planned quite a few lessons for preparing students for the competition. In my opinion, it is necessary to acquaint students with solving the competition tasks and get them thoroughly ready for the competition. I am positive, that active preparations and systematically performed work always lead to success. The experience therefore indicates that the gifted students could efficiently achieve and realize their potential only in the environment which is able to motivate them. We know that such situation does not come out of the blue and we need to create accurate and appropriate strategies when dealing with gifted students. With older students it is necessary to follow and encourage their interests and develop the level of difficulty when it comes to their activities (differentiation, paper and research work, camps, competitions, mentor like relationship). Gifted students are open to intellectual challenges and peer cooperation. Gifted students are the ones who need extra attention. They do not need any assistance, what they need is just a support and this is what differs them from the rest. When they work and perform certain tasks, the gifted students appreciate teaching, which includes humour and allows them to express themselves in their own way and last but not least encourage them to explore.