A DISTRACTION OF THE LEARNING PROCESS, OR A SOURCE FOR IMPROVEMENT?

Paper

Most of the teachers who are in the classrooms today had been introduced to children with special needs, and within those also to the talented, at university and later through different courses. Nevertheless, that was merely the knowledge of those students being present. It was quite a shock when almost full inclusion changed our classroom's climate beyond recognition. Most teachers were not prepared for it and coping was somewhat difficult in many ways. For me, it presented a big distraction and after giving it some thought I set a goal to find practical activities that would help me, the students and primarily the talented yet in some cases unsuccessful. That resulted in different approaches such as occasionally sending talented students to higher, more difficult classes. That worked very well. Also making them assistants just for a specific task, a whole topic or even a bigger part of a lesson. Some have proven to be good readers, leaders, gamers, board game creators, cooks, quiz hosts. Other are now magazine editors, writers, illustrators and much more. The talented can express themselves in a variety of activities after the regular lessons or outside the school. However, their inclusion in the learning process through the regular lessons as a source of improvement has to be considered as those represent a rather large time frame in a student's day.