Abstract:

Lebanon is one of the smallest countries in the world where programs for the gifted and talented (GT) do not officially exist. There are some attempts to accommodate for the GT in various private schools that cater for learners from high socio-economic status. These schools offer some enrichment programs and differentiated instruction/activities to high-achieving learners. The programs presented are attempts to nurture the talent and ability of learners with total grade average above 85/100 by providing these learners with a variety of enhancement activities (Sarouphim, 2009). The major cause for this lack of proper education for the GT in Lebanon is that the educational body lacks the basic understanding of what GT is. Moreover, the procedures for identifying, referring and assessing GT learners are not well-known nor easily available. Hence, it becomes imperative to come up with such tools and prepare the educational body for such a task.

The aim of this paper is to share LWIS-City International School-DT (LWIS-CiS) experience in designing and developing a comprehensive system for the GT. Based on the findings of the literature review and LWIS-CiS personal experience, this paper describes the 3 phases of developing and implementing the GT program.

Phase 1: the creation and administration of the Activity Hour, in which all leaners (gifted or not) participate in activities that would build their critical thinking skills and creativity.

Phase 2: the training of teachers to identify and refer gifted learners for formal assessment. This phase also prepares and endows teachers with skills and strategies they can use in their regular classrooms.

Phase 3: developing personalized action plans for the identified gifted learners.

This program can later be adopted in all Lebanese schools-private and public.

Keywords:

teacher training, gifted and talented, program, identifying GT, referring GT, assessing GT