The nature of gifted education in the regular education classrooms in the elementary schools of a rural western Pennsylvania school district: Implications for a staff development program

The focus of this study involved the examination of classroom practices in regular education classrooms for identified gifted students in the fourth, fifth, and sixth grade levels in seven elementary schools of a rural Western Pennsylvania school district. A survey was compiled and distributed to all of the elementary intermediate level teachers of this school district. Interviews with the district's six elementary principals and four of the elementary regular education teachers were also conducted. The data from the survey and the interviews provided the foundation that lead to implications for a staff development program that would help regular education teachers implement appropriate gifted education pedagogy in their classrooms for their gifted students.; The findings of this study revealed that the regular education elementary intermediate level teachers had not received much preparation to work with gifted students and most of the training they had received was through professional readings they had read on their own. The classroom practices under the categories, Higher Level Thinking Skills, Open-ended Questions/Activities and Creativity/Technology, were implemented the most by the regular education teachers for their gifted students. The experts in the field of gifted education also endorsed these practices. The data also showed that the regular education teachers were only implementing these strategies at best a few times a month and there were many practices supported by the experts that the teachers in this study were not using with their gifted students.; An examination of deterring factors that kept regular education teachers from meeting the needs of their gifted students provided the direction for a staff development program. Included were the following issues. Teachers and administrators need: to accept their responsibilities for their gifted students, more training in gifted education, encouragement to collaborate with gifted support teachers/specialists, and they need to be held accountable for accommodating the needs of gifted students in regular education classrooms.