Symposium Proceedings »
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S3.7.12 Neuroscience and Gifted Education: Foundation for Practice or Application Gap?
What does neuroscience research offer scholars, psychologists, and teachers who work with gifted and talented students? This symposium will provide an overview of research, including basic neuroscience concepts relevant for education, applications of neuroscience to the development and education of gifted students, and specific findings with twice-exceptional students. The lead presenter will facilitate brief discussion (small group or full group, depending on attendance) at the end of each segment, and there will be time for general Q&A at the end. Dr. C will provide context and background for this area, including use of the term “brain-based,” neuromyths in our field, the depth of the research base for educational practice, and how a focus on neuroplasticity might broaden our conception of talent development, particularly with young children of poverty.
Dr. B will discuss the foundational concepts that educators should know when evaluating research on the applications of neuroscience research to education in general and research related to individual differences in particular. He will describe basic methodology and several important issues to consider including: less than half of the research in cognitive neuroscience is conducted with humans and the studies that do involve humans have small numbers of participants, further, there are few studies conducted with children. Dr. B will also introduce major concepts such as double dissociation and the importance of converging evidence in the interpretation of neuroscience research.
The differences in the cognitive performance of individuals who are identified as gifted and those that are of average ability are profound but subtle. The findings from cognitive neuroscience studies are fascinating but do not necessarily reveal subtle differences. Dr. M will describe what is currently known about individual differences in cognitive abilities related to gifted children such as memory, processing speed, verbal reasoning, spatial reasoning, dealing with novelty, and both aesthetic and general creativity. She will also describe valid ways that these findings can be applied to nurturing the educational development of gifted students.
Much of the research on “neuroscience and gifted” has focused on students who are twice-exceptional. Dr. A will address the neuroscience literature regarding childhood mental health diagnoses and any specific applications among twice exceptional students will be described. Her colleagues are collaborating with respect to the neuroscience of giftedness to bring together the psychoeducational information obtained through the many cases of twice-exceptionality assessed through their clinic with epigenetic research taking place through their neuroscience institute.