Description
Talented and gifted student coordinators ensure suitable education is provided to talented and gifted students, commonly children and young adults, on various levels. They oversee the implementation of the school’s gifted policy, monitor the student’s progress, and suggest extra activities to stretch and stimulate.
Other titles
The following job titles also refer to teacher of talented and gifted students:
teacher for students with high learning potential
teacher for gifted students
talented and gifted pupils co-ordinator
talented and gifted students lead teacher
teacher for talented students
talented and gifted pupils lead teacher
teacher for pupils with high learning potential
teacher for gifted pupils
gifted pupils teacher
teacher for talented pupils
Minimum qualifications
A bachelor’s degree is generally required to work as a teacher of talented and gifted students.
ISCO skill level
ISCO skill level is defined as a function of the complexity and range of tasks and duties to be performed in an occupation. It is measured on a scale from 1 to 4, with 1 the lowest level and 4 the highest, by considering:
- the nature of the work performed in an occupation in relation to the characteristic tasks and duties
- the level of formal education required for competent performance of the tasks and duties involved and
- the amount of informal on-the-job training and/or previous experience in a related occupation required for competent performance of these tasks and duties.
Teacher of talented and gifted students is a Skill level 4 occupation.
Teacher of talented and gifted students career path
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Essential knowledge and skills
Essential knowledge
This knowledge should be acquired through learning to fulfill the role of teacher of talented and gifted students.
- Counselling methods: Counselling techniques used in different settings and with various groups and individuals, especially concerning methods of supervision and mediation in the counselling process.
- Learning needs analysis: The process of analysing a student’s learning needs through observation and testing, potentially followed by the diagnosis of a learning disorder and a plan for additional support.
- Assessment processes: Various evaluation techniques, theories, and tools applicable in the assessment of students, participants in a programme, and employees. Different assessment strategies such as initial, formative, summative and self- assessment are used for varying purposes.
- Children’s physical development: Recognise and describe the development, observing the following criteria: weight, length, and head size, nutritional requirements, renal function, hormonal influences on development, response to stress, and infection.
- Learning difficulties: The learning disorders some students face in an academic context, especially Specific Learning Difficulties such as dyslexia, dyscalculia, and concentration deficit disorders.
- Learning technologies: The technologies and channels, including digital, to enhance learning.
- Language teaching methods: The techniques used to teach students a foreign language, such as audio-lingual, communicative language teaching (CLT), and immersion.
- Pedagogy: The discipline that concerns the theory and practice of education including the various instructional methods for educating individuals or groups.
- Curriculum objectives: The goals identified in curricula and defined learning outcomes.
- Special needs education: The teaching methods, equipment and settings used to support students with special needs in achieving success in school or community.
Essential skills and competences
These skills are necessary for the role of teacher of talented and gifted students.
- Manage children’s problems: Promote the prevention, early detection, and management of children`s problems, focusing on developmental delays and disorders, behavioural problems, functional disabilities, social stresses, mental disorders including depression, and anxiety disorders.
- Guarantee students’ safety: Ensure all students falling under an instructor or other person’s supervision are safe and accounted for. Follow safety precautions in the learning situation.
- Assign homework: Provide additional exercises and assignments that the students will prepare at home, explain them in a clear way, and determine the deadline and evaluation method.
- Prepare lesson content: Prepare content to be taught in class in accordance with curriculum objectives by drafting exercises, researching up-to-date examples etc.
- Assess the development of youth: Evaluate the different aspects of development needs of children and young people.
- Recognise indicators of gifted student: Observe students during instruction and identify signs of exceptionally high intelligence in a student, such as showing remarkable intellectual curiosity or showing restlessness due to boredom and or feelings of not being challenged.
- Compile course material: Write, select or recommend a syllabus of learning material for the students enrolled in the course.
- Observe student’s progress: Follow up on students’ learning progress and assess their achievements and needs.
- Manage student relationships: Manage the relations between students and between student and teacher. Act as a just authority and create an environment of trust and stability.
- Support gifted students: Assist students showing great academic promise or with an unusually high IQ with their learning processes and challenges. Set up an individual learning plan catered to their needs.
- Support the positiveness of youths: Help children and young people to assess their social, emotional and identity needs and to develop a positive self-image, enhance their self-esteem and improve their self-reliance.
- Adapt teaching to student’s capabilities: Identify the learning struggles and successes of students. Select teaching and learning strategies that support students’ individual learning needs and goals.
- Apply teaching strategies: Employ various approaches, learning styles, and channels to instruct students, such as communicating content in terms they can understand, organising talking points for clarity, and repeating arguments when necessary. Use a wide range of teaching devices and methodologies appropriate to the class content, the learners’ level, goals, and priorities.
- Maintain students’ discipline: Make sure students follow the rules and code of behaviour established in the school and take the appropriate measures in case of violation or misbehaviour.
- Implement care programmes for children: Perform activities with children according to their physical, emotional, intellectual and social needs by using appropriate tools and equipment that facilitate interaction and learning activities.
- Assess students: Evaluate the students’ (academic) progress, achievements, course knowledge and skills through assignments, tests, and examinations. Diagnose their needs and track their progress, strengths, and weaknesses. Formulate a summative statement of the goals the student achieved.
- Assist students with equipment: Provide assistance to students when working with (technical) equipment used in practice-based lessons and solve operational problems when necessary.
- Support children’s wellbeing: Provide an environment that supports and values children and helps them to manage their own feelings and relationships with others.
- Demonstrate when teaching: Present to others examples of your experience, skills, and competences that are appropriate to specific learning content to help students in their learning.
- Give constructive feedback: Provide founded feedback through both criticism and praise in a respectful, clear, and consistent manner. Highlight achievements as well as mistakes and set up methods of formative assessment to evaluate work.
- Perform classroom management: Maintain discipline and engage students during instruction.
- Assist students in their learning: Support and coach students in their work, give learners practical support and encouragement.
- Apply intercultural teaching strategies: Ensure that the content, methods, materials and the general learning experience is inclusive for all students and takes into account the expectations and experiences of learners from diverse cultural backgrounds. Explore individual and social stereotypes and develop cross-cultural teaching strategies.
- Maintain relations with children’s parents: Inform children`s parents of the activities planned, program`s expectations and children`s individual progress.
- Encourage students to acknowledge their achievements: Stimulate students to appreciate their own achievements and actions to nurture confidence and educational growth.
Optional knowledge and skills
Optional knowledge
This knowledge is sometimes, but not always, required for the role of teacher of talented and gifted students. However, mastering this knowledge allows you to have more opportunities for career development.
- Workplace sanitation: The importance of a clean, sanitary workspace for example through use of hand disinfectant and sanitizer, in order to minimise infection risk between colleagues or when working with children.
- Primary school procedures: The inner workings of a primary school, such as the structure of the relevant education support and management, the policies, and the regulations.
- Common children’s diseases: The symptoms, characteristics, and treatment of diseases and disorders that often affect children, such as measles, chickenpox, asthma, mumps, and head lice.
- Behavioural disorders: The often emotionally disruptive types of behaviour a child or adult can show, such as attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) or oppositional defiant disorder (ODD).
- Post-secondary school procedures: The inner workings of a post-secondary school, such as the structure of the relevant education support and management, the policies, and the regulations.
- Kindergarten school procedures: The inner workings of a kindergarten, such as the structure of the relevant education support and management, policies, and regulations.
- First aid: The emergency treatment given to a sick or injured person in the case of circulatory and/or respiratory failure, unconsciousness, wounds, bleeding, shock or poisoning.
Optional skills and competences
These skills and competences are sometimes, but not always, required for the role of teacher of talented and gifted students. However, mastering these skills and competences allows you to have more opportunities for career development.
- Assist in the organisation of school events: Provide assistance in the planning and organisation of school events, such as the school’s open house day, a sports game or a talent show.
- Monitor student’s behaviour: Supervise the student’s social behaviour to discover anything unusual. Help solve any issues if necessary.
- Consult students on learning content: Take students’ opinions and preferences into consideration when determining learning content.
- Facilitate teamwork between students: Encourage students to cooperate with others in their learning by working in teams, for example through group activities.
- Monitor developments in field of expertise: Keep up with new research, regulations, and other significant changes, labour market related or otherwise, occurring within the field of specialisation.
- Escort students on a field trip: Accompany students on an educational trip outside the school environment and ensure their safety and cooperation.
- Liaise with educational support staff: Communicate with education management, such as the school principal and board members, and with the education support team such as the teaching assistant, school counsellor or academic advisor on issues relating the students’ well-being.
- Arrange parent teacher conference: Set up joined and individual meetings with students’ parents to discuss their child’s academic progress and general well-being.
- Monitor educational developments: Monitor the changes in educational policies, methodologies and research by reviewing relevant literature and liaising with education officials and institutions.
- Promote the safeguarding of young people: Understand safeguarding and what should be done in cases of actual or potential harm or abuse.
- Keep records of attendance: Keep track of the pupils who are absent by recording their names on a list of absentees.
- Perform playground surveillance: Observe students’ recreational activities to ensure student safety and well-being and intervene when necessary.
- Work with virtual learning environments: Incorporate the use of online learning environments and platforms into the process of instruction.
- Advise on lesson plans: Analyse policy issues which impact on students’ experience of education. Advise on the ways in which lesson plans for specific lessons can be improved in order to reach education goals, engage the students and adhere to the curriculum.
- Attend to children’s basic physical needs: Tend to children by feeding them, dressing them, and, if necessary, regularly changing their diapers in a sanitary manner.
- Secondary school procedures: The inner workings of a secondary school, such as the structure of the relevant education support and management, the policies, and the regulations.
- Provide lesson materials: Ensure that the necessary materials for teaching a class, such as visual aids, are prepared, up-to-date, and present in the instruction space.
- Oversee extra-curricular activities: Supervise and potentially organise educational or recreational activities for the students outside of mandatory classes.
- Liaise with educational staff: Communicate with the school staff such as teachers, teaching assistants, academic advisors, and the principal on issues relating to students’ well-being. In the context of a university, liaise with the technical and research staff to discuss research projects and courses-related matters.
- Develop course outline: Research and establish an outline of the course to be taught and calculate a time frame for the instructional plan in accordance with school regulations and curriculum objectives.
ISCO group and title
2352 – Special needs teachers
References