Learning across the continuum: Collaborative projects between Gifted Education and Special Education by Kathryn Fishman-Weaver

“I would see them every day, yet know nothing about them,” writes my advanced placement student Iyas¹ in an early reflection before our service learning project. “I refer to them as them instead of we, yet we are both students. It seems as if special education students go to a different school, yet the truth is they share the very same school we do.”

In this paper, I outline how gifted education-special education partnerships can serve as a powerful vehicle to advance compassion and the social/emotional growth of advanced learners. The results of these partnerships are promising and important. Collaborating compassionately with diverse groups is not a luxury; it is a 21^st century necessity.

This work is informed by a series of collaborative projects I arranged between students in my secondary gifted education program and the students in our special education classes. Unless coordinated by educators, gifted education-special education collaborations seldom happen organically. My gifted education-special education partnerships followed a service learning model. Sedlak et al. (2003) define service learning as “an educational strategy that combines community service with academic learning objectives.” They continue that the benefits of service learning projects include, “enhancing communication skills, strengthening critical thinking abilities, developing civic responsibilities and fostering a sense of caring for others.” (99)  After teaching a chemistry lesson to a community skills class, Shu (a high school junior), expresses this sense of caring by telling me, “I’m humbled at their {the students in the community skills classroom} perseverance.” Our specific projects included partner book making, mentoring at the K-6 alternative school for students with behavioral disabilities, and guest teaching high school chemistry lessons in our high school’s community skills class. All of these projects were conducted in our district’s most restrictive classrooms. In fact, my gifted students were the first volunteers to serve at our alternative school.

Engaging in partnerships with students in special education has had a profound impact on my gifted students’ sense of self, responsibility, confidence, and compassion for others. While this paper’s focus is on the specific benefits these projects had for advanced and gifted learners, I recognize that these partnerships, like all service opportunities, are reciprocally beneficial. As is often the case, my gifted and advanced students gained as much or more from ‘serving’ as the community they served. In their study on the link between civic engagement and high school community service (2007) , Hart et al. write, “ …community service shapes identity…These philosophies provide rationales for service that {students in service learning} can incorporate into their self-concepts as they come to see themselves as persons capable of contributing to the common good.” (213–214) My student, Scott, a high school junior in our gifted education program, spends two afternoons a week as Mr. Scott, a teacher’s assistant in a classroom for students with severe behavioral needs. He tells me, “I think one of the biggest impacts [this project has had on me] is a new understanding and appreciation of the special needs learning and teaching community.” Through these partnerships, I saw my high school gifted students gain compassion, metacognition, diversity education, communication, and self-efficacy.

Tony, a senior in our gifted program, tells me working with students with special needs, “takes exaggerated patience…” He continues with an idea that I hear repeatedly from my students, in short, that the special education and gifted student populations are far more alike than they are different. “I think everybody has an area where they might be considered ‘having special needs’…I think it’s incredible how changing an approach can change somebody’s entire attitude towards an activity. There is a right method for everyone, and it is all about having enough patience and perseverance to find and use it.” Riaz, a participant in the book partnership between AP Language and Composition and Community Skills also writes about the common interests he found working with students in special education. “I worried the community skills kids and I might not have too many common interests as we likely come from very different backgrounds. However, this proved to be completely false, and we spent much of the time socializing about our favorite football teams, what [we did] during the weekend, what movies we have recently seen, etc. I think all of us, both the volunteers and the community skills [students] were surprised at the amount we had in common.” Discovering these commonalities is the foundation for developing empathy.

At some point during each of these gifted education-special education partnerships, I saw the nature of the work relationship change from being teacher-directed (or encouraged) to becoming student-directed. Riaz writes of this important transition in partnering with our community skills program. “What started out as merely an opportunity…in AP Language rapidly evolved, and by the end, we found ourselves going to work with {the students in the community skills class} long after we had exceeded our hours just to have fun. We talked and drew and one day even got out a ball and played two-square in the middle of the room with whoever wanted to [join us].” Pen, a junior in my gifted education program found a sense of purpose volunteering twice a week in the recovery room for students at the alternative school. “A large part of mentoring, particularly young kids, is being a good role model. Children are constantly looking for people to look up to, to mold their identity. Some [of the students I worked with at the alternative school] could use more positive male role models. That’s why I see high school students and boys, like myself, in particular, being important role models.” As his teacher, I saw Pen’s newfound sense of purpose positively impact the way he carried himself and interacted across multiple settings.

Spencer, a junior in gifted education, spent a school year volunteering twice a week in a classroom for students with severe behavioral needs. “I don’t think I realized how much I like going into my class until this new semester. When I walked into the room and [the students] all got excited that I was there, my face lit up… Helping these kids has helped me become better at teaching/tutoring in general and I have become more comfortable with talking to younger kids, which I had no experience with previously. Going to [the classroom] has helped my social skills and helped the kids as well.” Through gifted education-special education partnerships, two student populations who were previously isolated from each other developed friendships and mutual understanding as well as empathy, confidence, and compassion. Iyas, an AP Language and Composition student tells me, “in working with the special education students I discovered a part [of our school] I hadn’t known, and more surprisingly I discovered myself.” The social emotional growth and development my students gained through these partnerships will serve them indefinitely.

References

Cross, Tracy L., and Jennifer Riedl Cross. 2012. Handbook for Counselors Serving Students with Gifts and Talents: Development, relationships, school issues, and counseling needs/interventions. Waco: Prufrock Press Inc. .

Ford, Donna, James L. Moore III, and Deborah A. Harmon. 2005. “Integrating Multicultrual and Gifted Education: A Curricular Framework.” Theory into Practice 44 (2) 125–137.

Hart, Daniel, Thomas M. Donnelly, James Youniss, and Robert Atkins 2007. “High School Community Service as a Predictor of Adult Voting and Volunteering.” American Educational Research Journal, 44 (1) 197–219.

Sedlak, Carol, Margaret O. Doheny, Nancy Panthofer, and Ella Anaya. 2003. ”Critical Thinking in Students’ Service-Learning Experiences” . College Teaching  51 (3) 99–103

Totten, Samuel, and Jon Pedersen.1997. Social Issues and Service at the Middle Level . Needham Heights: Allyn & Bacon, Simon & Schuster Education Group

Additionally this paper is informed by interviews with students in the service partnerships and by my students’ reflective assignments during and after the gifted education-special education partnerships. Specifically, I would like to thank: Iyas, Pen, Riaz, Scott, Shu, Spencer and Tony for their metacognitive insights about this work.