Mission statement

Gifted and Talented

Education

GATE Handbook

Moraga School District

Mission Statement for the Moraga School District

The mission of the Moraga School District is to provide a supportive and challenging academic environment that encourages critical and creative thinking, maximizes individual students’ strengths, and motivates them to be life-long learners and responsible citizens. This is accomplished by a dedicate team of educators, parents, community members, and students striving for excellence.

Philosophy for Gifted and Talented Education

The key feature for the education of gifted students is to design learning opportunities that tap into a student’s strengths, interests, and potential. This is primarily accomplished through differentiated instruction within the classroom. Differentiation refers to the content, activities, and products developed in response to varying learner needs based on each student’s readiness level, interests, and learning profiles. General practices associated with differentiation include acceleration, depth, complexity, and novelty.

Identification of Gifted Students

Within the standards established by the State Board of Education, districts are to define evidence of high performance capability, using one or more of the categories listed below as criteria.

Intellectual Ability applies to pupils whose general mental development is significantly accelerated beyond that of their chronological peers.
Creative Ability applies to pupils who examine assumptions, restructure perceptions, and construct and use new concepts in productive ways.
Specific Academic Ability applies to pupils who consistently function at an advanced academic level in a particular subject area.
Leadership Ability applies to pupils who, in response to varied situations, are able to exert influence on others either positively or negatively.
High Achievement applies to pupils who consistently produce ideas and/or products of excellence.
Visual and Performing Arts Talent applies to pupils who demonstrate exceptional abilities to produce or perform in one or more areas of the fine arts.

The Identification Process

The Moraga School District promotes equal opportunity for all students to participate in GATE projects. Multiple measures are used to identify GATE students and at least two should be in evidence for placement. Students may be referred for screening for GATE testing by an administrator, teacher, or parent/guardian.

Intellectual Ability: This category targets students who consistently produce advanced ideas and/or products and score exceptionally high on ability tests. These are students whose general intellectual development is markedly advanced in relation to their chronological peers.
Scoring 132 or above on an individual test (i.e. WISC or Stanford-Binet), or scoring 98^th percentile or higher on group tests of mental ability (i.e. COGat, Otis Lennon, etc.) will be considered for identification as gifted. All students in the third grade will be given the opportunity to test for GATE identification.
High Achievement: This category targets students who consistently produce advanced ideas and products and score exceptionally high on achievement tests in multiple academic areas over at least a two-year period (better than 95%).

The Moraga School District GATE Coordinator will assess the scores from the mental ability test and the achievement test. A Student Profile Sheet will be requested of the student’s teacher if the scores are borderline.

Once students are identified in the Moraga School District, they remain eligible for GATE services until they graduate or move from the district.

Identification of Transfer Students

When information is received that a transferring student has participated in a GATE program in another district, the Moraga District GATE Coordinator will review the data from the previous school to determine eligibility. Moraga School District GATE qualifications must be met for the student to be identified as gifted.

Curriculum Differentiation

The intent of differentiation is to modify or adapt the core curriculum to be responsive to the needs, interests, and abilities of all students, including those identified as gifted, so that they are challenged throughout the school day.

Differentiation of Content involves expansion of the core curriculum through the elimination of unnecessary repetition; the use of advanced materials, which are more multifaceted, abstract, or complex; or the exploration of student interests to expand the scope of the curriculum.

Differentiation of Process involves the development of higher level thinking skills through a variety of activities designed to take the student beyond his/her current level of expertise.

Differentiation of Product involves allowing students multiple modes of expression in the determination of their learning. Products would demonstrate abstract thought, complexity and depth of understanding, and the application of key skills of the discipline.

Guidelines for Use of Differentiation

In a differentiated classroom, all learners focus much of their time and attention on key concepts, principles, and skills identified by the teacher and state/district standards as essential to growth and development in the subject. Students work at varying degrees of abstractness, complexity, problem solving, and structure.

The teacher focuses on the essentials, extending the core curriculum.
The teachers attend to student differences based on constant assessment, not simply GATE identification.
The teacher modifies content, process, and product to meet the individual needs of the students.
All students participate in respectful work that is challenging and engaging.
The teacher and students collaborate in learning. Students are engaged in making some of the decisions regarding their own learning.
The teacher balances group and individual norms.
Differentiation of instruction should be provided for all students within the regular classroom.

Strategies of Differentiation

Iconic Teaching – Teachers use Socratic Questioning technique to encourage students to think more deeply about a subject. Students may be asked to evaluate the ethics of a character in a piece of literature, or consider a historical event from another perspective.
Compacting – Students are pre-tested prior to the introduction of a new unit. If the teacher is satisfied the student has already mastered the material, the student is "compacted out" of this unit and works independently on accelerated or enrichment activities.
Learning Centers – Students work independently or in small groups through a more complicated project tied to the core curriculum.
Independent Projects – Students who have a strong interest in a particular subject may work with the teacher or a community mentor to design an independent study of their interest area.
Tiered Assignments – The teacher designs a variety of assignments around the same key concept. These assignments are developed based on the different readiness levels of students. While there is some choice involved for students, the teacher may direct specific students to choose more complex assignments. (Tic Tac Toe)
Contracts – Students who do not completely "compact out" of specific units, may design a contract for learning with the teacher allowing them to work on enrichment activities during class instruction that the teacher agrees the student has mastered.

Characteristics of Gifted Children

Learning

Unusually advanced vocabulary for age

Demonstrates a desire to learn

Outstanding memory, large storehouse of information

Produces many ideas, often highly original

Curious, asks endless questions, experiments, and explores

Has many interests, hobbies, and collections

Has rapid insight into cause-effect relationships

Focuses with intensity on a particular topic and is fascinated by new ideas

Grasps quickly, then resists doing the work

Can quickly make valid generalizations about events, people, or things

Transfers concepts to new situations

Sees subtle relationships

Reads a great deal on his/her own

Aware of global issues

Needs to constantly share all he/she knows

Comes up with "better" way

Sees logical and common sense answers

Motivation

Becomes absorbed and truly involved in certain topics or problems, yet resists other work

Bored easily with routine tasks

Prefers to work independently

Requires little direction from teachers

Often is self-assertive and stubborn in beliefs

Likes to organize and bring structure to things

Exhibits high level of energy and activity, involves self in a number of different activities

Creativity

Comes up with highly creative ideas and/or products

Loves to construct with Lego’s or other objects

Makes up rich stories but may be unable to write them down

Appears lazy, often daydreaming

May appear bright but have difficulty learning to read

Highly developed sense of intuition

Excellent mathematical reasoning may be slow at math facts

Often musically talented

Sophisticated sense of humor

Strong visual memory

Highly sensitive of surroundings and beauty

Is a risk-taker, adventurous, and speculative

May have poor fine motor skills

Leadership

Carries responsibility well

Can express himself/herself well

Holds high expectations for self and others

Fears failure

Adapts readily to new situations and accepts change

May dominate others, generally directs the activity

Parent Involvement

Parents of gifted students in the Moraga School District are encouraged to become informed and involved in differentiated instruction. They are also asked to assist in the evaluation of such instruction and assist in developing additional strategies. The Moraga GATE Advisory Committee meets several times a year and includes parents, teachers, and administrators.

The Contra Costa County GATE Council hosts workshops throughout the school year for parents and teachers. The California Association for the Gifted has an East Bay Parent Group offering parent education and a supportive network. The California Association for the Gifted holds an annual conference, which includes a special parent component.