Welcome to Mrs. DB's Gifted Education Class

"Giftedness appears in many different forms in every cultural group, at every level of society... Yet, it remains a potentiality until it has been discovered and developed. In coming to grips with more effective approaches to identify giftedness, the promise is that educators will better understand how to identify and nurture the potential of all learners."

Fort Rucker Elementary believes that children need a school environment that helps them realize their potential and instills in them a desire to develop their talents and abilities.  To encourage optimum achievement, the school provides varied and challenging learning opportunities matched to the needs and talents of students with high potential.

Identification of Gifted Learners

The purpose of identification for gifted services is to find students whose potential and/or performance is so extraordinary that they require differentiation in their instructional program.

Steps in the Identification Process

1. Referral: Students are referred for consideration either through screening of achievement test scores, transfer of records from a previous school, or nomination by a teacher or parent.

2. Assessment: Data about a student's strength is gathered from many sources which may include grades, tests, formal assessments, observations, rating scales, student accomplishments, and student portfolio of work samples.

3. Eligibility: The Gifted Review Committee determines whether a student is eligible for gifted education services. The Fort Rucker Gifted Review Committee includes the principal, school psychologist, school counselor, gifted resource teacher, and two classroom teachers. The Review Committee follows DODEA Gifted Program Guide, August 2006. No single instrument or test score is used to determine eligibility.

4. Services: The Gifted Review Committee selects the appropriate program services for each student. These services may include: Pullout classes in the gifted resource room; Regular classroom with differentiation of instruction; Regular classroom with content acceleration; Regular classroom with cluster grouping and differentiation.

5. DODEA Gifted Education Web site: For more detailed information visit: 2006 Gifted Program Guide (386 Kb pdf file)

Eligibilty Guidelines for Interpreting Student Data

Eligible students must demonstrate more than one of the following indicators:

1. Qualitative data (observations, anecdotal evidence, narratives, interviews) indicative of highly unusual ability or achievement.

2. A total battery score at or above 97% percentile on a nationally normed achievement test.

3. A total score at or above 95th% percentile on a group ability test.

4. An average rating scale score of 40 or higher from two or more educator raters and specific evidence of gifted behaviors in written narratives.

5. Very strong indicators of gifted behaviors as noted in parent or self ratings and narratives.