Critique or Develop a Policy Involving Collaborative Practices in Special Education Needs - Essay Example

1. What is the present policy? Is collaborative practice on said policy applied? The present policy on gifted and talented quotes among toothers, the following: “ Individual key learning areas will also need to consider developing their own policies, in line with whole –school policies. Teachers may need to modify their teaching strategies to facilitate the emphasis on guided discovery learning rather than direct instruction in faster paced curriculum. (please consult the support package on curriculum differentiation for information.)” The issue of whether collaborative practice on said policy is present is answered by the New South Wales Department of Edcuation and Training( http:www.det.nsw.edu.au/policies/) as follows: “A whole school approach to acceleration needs to be embedded in the school’s policy on the education of gifted and talented students. This is essential so that school staff, students and parents/caregivers have a common understanding of how and why acceleration occurs. School principals and school communities should base the development of policy and subsequent determination of students’ suitability for accelerated progression on the Policy and implementation strategies for the education of gifted and talented students (revised 2004) and the GUIDELINES for an accelerated progression (revised 2000).” Based on the above provision of the policy and implementation strategies for the education of gifted and talented students (revised 2004), available online at http:www.det.nsw.edu.au/policies/ , there is a collaborative approach. 2. What is the rationale of the present policy? The rationale for the present policy is to allow the faster development of students who are gifted and talented as compared to those with normal intelligence and talents. It is an accepted fact that gifted and talented children may find their classes boring if they are treated similarly with the normal children. Moreover, said normal children may not find themselves at par with the gifted and talented thereby resulting to unnecessary conflict which may develop to some psychological disorder like inferiority complex. 3. Does the present policy accomplish its designed purpose? Why or why not? The answer to this question may have to be taken from feedback from those in the industry and other sources like surveys and reseaches. A study conducted by National Research Center on Gifted & Talented(http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/nrcgt/newsletter/fall03/fall032.html) revealed a feed back from the policy as shown below: “A major finding from the study was that third and fourth grade teachers make only minor modifications in the regular curriculum to meet the needs of their high ability/gifted students. This result was the same regardless of the geographic region of the teachers or the type of communities in which they taught.” Based on the above it was found out that only minor modifications are made in the regular curriculum to meet the needs of the high ability/gifted students. There appears to be a lack of implementation of the policy. The study is conducted in 2003 & has a copyright up to 2005, which means that although there exists a policy, there is a problem in the implementation of the same as revealed in the study. 4. What are the advantages of having a collaborative policy on said policy The advantages of having a collaborative policy is the manifest joint responsibility of the students, the parents, the school authorities and the government through regulation of the schools systems which implements the collaborative policy. One of the characteristics of a good policies is its capacity of being implemented. A collaborative approach based on joint responsibility would do much for the implementation of the policy. 5. What should be the educational policy on gifted and talented children? The issue now of what is the educational policy for gifted/talented children is already an existing policy as stated earlier. It only has a problem on the implementation and therefore what is needed is just a refinement of the policy by making things more workable. As study conducted by Karen L. Westberg & Megan E. Daoust of University of St. Thomas, Minneapolis, MN on The Results of the Replication of the Classroom Practices Survey Replication in Two States (http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/nrcgt/newsletter/fall03/fall032.html) concluded the following: “The major conclusion drawn from the replication study is that teachers differentiation practices in third and fourth grade classrooms have not changed in the last 10 years. In fact, when overlaying Figure 1 from this article on a similar figure from 10 years ago, the two graphs are virtually identical. Teachers in the two states selected for this replication have more professional development experiences in gifted education than the teachers across the country reported 10 years ago, but this does not appear to be reflected in their classroom practices as reported on this survey. The report further states: “The researchers concluded: "Teachers reported similar instructional practices regardless of students academic abilities," and "Regardless of the class ability level, teachers reported spending substantial time in preparation for state-mandated tests" (p. 52). They found that high stakes testing appears to have a negative impact on the classroom practices provided to capable students.” The study recommended the following : “To address this concern, professional development experts advocate "job embedded" professional development through the use of cadre groups (sometimes called "critical friends" groups), collaborative action research projects, and peer coaching in schools (Bambino, 2002; McAdamis, 2001). The results from this survey indicate that teachers with formal training in gifted education provide curriculum modifications for high ability/gifted students more frequently. This may be due to the fact that they apply the strategies in their classrooms when completing requirements for gifted education coursework. When attending a brief district inservice on a topic in gifted education, teachers are not held accountable for implementing a strategy or practice. “ “The above statement means collaborative action research projects is one of the approaches to address the present problem. This indicates the policy statement in policy on gifted & talented as per New South Wales on collaborative approach as answered in question no.1 is not really implemented or too broad to implemented because of the feedback of the result of the study by Karen L. Westberg & Megan E. Daoust of University of St. Thomas Minneapolis, MN(http://www.gifted.uconn.edu/nrcgt/newsletter/fall03/fall032.html) Another area that must be looked upon is the state mandated tests which have negative impact on gifted/talented students. The government must look into this reality with an open mind because this could contradict the existing policy statement. Read More