1. More than I am
…A life without
risks is just as
good as death,
But in my lifetime
I want to take
risks, I need to,
Is it too much to
ask to want to
become more, Mixed-ability Teaching in HE
More than I am, Dr Linda Rush
more than they Vice Dean (Primary ITE & QA)
tell me I can
be…

2. Structure
 Pre-amble
 Aims &objectives
 Positional Statement
 Key concepts: Gifted; Mediation; Time
 PhD Findings & interim findings of recent enquiry
into tutor and student perceptions of academic
experience
 Discussion Points: Translating practice in schools
to HE context
 Implications for Faculty

3. Pre-amble
Larger classes
Greater spread of ability &
motivation
Under-resourcing
Market-driven courses
(Biggs 2004, p. 9)

4. Pre-amble
The increasing diversity of the
student body in age, ethnicity,
ability and vocational
expectations poses a number of
challenges for academics used to
more homogenous groups of
students
(Biggs 2004, p. 2; Northedge 2003,
pp 17, 19).

5. Pre-amble
PhD study (Rush, 2002) - ‘effective
school teachers’ mediation and
promotion of the ‘more able’
child’s learning in ordinary (mixed-
ability) classroom settings.
To mediate: "all those points where
contact is made between people
[plus other facilitating devices]
which renders learning outcomes
possible" (Fontanna, 1995 p. 283)

6. Pre-amble

7. Pre-amble
The university lecturer is in much the same situation as
the school teacher who deals with gifted students in
the regular classroom, needing to simultaneously with
normative students – who range from those barely
scraping by to those doing well what is expected of
them – as well as gifted learners who grasp the
material rapidly and accurately, who evidence deep
understanding and special insights, and who will be
challenged only by going beyond the material that is
appropriate for the rest of the class…
Robison (1997, pp 226-227 )

8. Objectives are to consider:
 definitions of high ability/giftedness
 what it means to be a successful lifelong learner
 the role of lecturers in ordinary classroom settings
 the use and management of teaching time
 a framework of teaching and learning - an
orientational device which allows teachers to
recognise the boundaries and borderlines of their
interactions with learners, and a prospective
device which allows teachers and learners to
develop the qualities of their interactions in the
future.

9. Positionality:
‘Plasticity’ of the human brain
Ability & environment are deeply
intertwined
Interested in the basis for intellectual
superiority
Belief that everyone can be ‘more able’
Conscious of ‘potential ability’
Prospective view of ability and the role of
assessment in respect of this

10. Key Question/Task
What’s your view of high ability or
giftedness within the context of HE
(Maybe helpful to consider an actual
student or group of students).
Do you bother to identify or make
yourself aware of students with high
ability or giftedness?
How do you go about identifying high
ability or giftedness?
How do we get to know our students?

11. PhD findings: More Able child
profiles – identification
All teachers used tests of intelligence to
identify the cognitive ability of children in
their class & Assessment Tasks
Teachers also made specific reference
to the quality of the children’s work being
a useful indicator of ability
Recognised ability through teacher
observation
Areas of ability highlighted: cognitive;
technical; practical

12. PhD findings: More Able child
profiles – ‘demonstrated
achievement’ & ‘potential ability’
Some teachers stated that the high
performers were not necessarily the
more able…
Teachers also recognised individuals as
having the potential to be more able:
‘needs to be pushed’, ‘doesn’t always do
his best’, ‘doesn’t always give the
extension’, ‘will do as little as possible’.

13. PhD findings: More Able child profiles –
personalities & learning characteristics
 ‘amazing humour’
 ‘very serious . . . an absolute perfectionist’
 ‘laid back . . . very good at seeing patterns and
things . . . he will tease you and kind of challenge
you’
 ‘deep thinking’
 ‘Can be quite difficult, obstructive at times . . .
eccentric in some of his behaviours’
 ‘stolid plodder’

14. PhD findings: More Able child profiles –
personalities & learning characteristics
 most able liked to get their work right and that
they didn’t like failing
 ‘Perfectionism’ was used more than once to
describe these individuals
 tend to give up if he didn’t get what he was
doing right first time
 some enjoyed working with others…
 always challenging things – not to undermine the
teacher but ‘purely out of curiosity’

15. PhD findings: More Able child profiles –
personalities & learning characteristics
 ‘had his own agenda…he will come back at me
with a counter idea’
 enjoyed bringing in his ‘own ideas not directly
related to [in class] projects’
 ability to ‘think of where a problem is going’
 motivated by challenging work
 some were confident to be challenged and
questioned, and to question themselves
 others were quite shy or particularly
 All teachers also recognised that a
straightforward correlation between ability and
achievement does not exist

16. Giftedness:
literature on the more able indicates that
they think differently from others…
they are Gestaltist in their thinking.
'in contrast to the less gifted who use
either atomistic or serialistic strategies of
perceiving information, the more gifted
have an analytic strategy’. (Merenheimo,
1991, cited in Freeman1998, p. 23)

17. Giftedness:
Metacognitive
Self-regulating
Underpinning this thinking is the
notion of 'individualisation’

18. Renzulli’s model of
giftedness

19. Information processing
psychologists see intelligence as
steps or processes people go
through in solving problems. One
person may be more intelligent
that another because he or she
moves through the same steps
more quickly or efficiently, or is
more familiar with the required
problem solving steps.

20. Advocates of this view (e.g.
Sternberg, 1979) focus on:
how information is internally represented
the kinds of strategies people use in
processing that information
the nature of the components (e.g.
memory, inference, comparison) used in
carrying out those strategies
how decisions are made as to which
strategies to use

21. Urban’s model of giftedness

22. Key Points:
No general agreement about the nature
of intelligence and that of being more
able or gifted
An artificially constructed concept
Identification of ability needs to be
carried out in a useful way – not just to
classify individuals
A concern about ability is a concern
about student developing as individuals
so that their potential is translated into
achievement

23. Cigman’s (2006, p. 200) four-
fold distinction:
1. The child who is very bright, and benefits
from propitious environment
2. The child who is very bright, but lacks a
propitious environment
3. The trophy child, who achieves highly as
a result of a pressured environment, but
who seems not bright, and strained or
alienated by the experience
4. The child seems 'not bright', and lacks a
propitious environment.

24. Giftedness: Broader
perspectives
Cigman (2006) Suggest two 'loose' criteria
or 'indicators' of giftedness:
exceptional or remarkable insight,
shown in unsystematic ways...occasional
brilliance, unsteady concentration or
performance
a passion for learning

25. ELLI’s seven ‘learning
dimensions’
1.Growth orientation v being stuck and
static
2.Meaning making v data accumulation
3.Critical curiosity v passivity
4.Creativity v rule bound
5.Learning relationships v isolation
6.Strategic awareness v robotic
7.Resilience v dependence

26. Claxton’s Positive Learning
Dispositions
Resilient Resourceful Reflective Reciprocal
Curious Questioning Clear-thinking Collaborative
(proactive) (“How come?”) (logical) (team member)
Adventurous Open-minded Thoughtful Independent
(up for a (‘negative (Where else (can work alone)
challenge) capability’) could I
use this?)
Determined Playful Self-knowing Open to
(persistent) (“Let’s try ...”) (own habits) feedback
Flexible Imaginative Methodical Attentive
(trying other (could be ...) (strategic) (to others)
ways)
Observant Integrating Opportunistic Empathic
(details / (making links) (serendipity) (other people’s
patterns) shoes)
Focused Intuitive Self-evaluative Imitative
(distractions) (reverie) (“How’s it (contagious)
going?”)

27. Pedagogic implications of teaching
the more able
 Students encouraged to take control of their own
learning
 Teacher to involve the learner explicitly as a
partner in the learning process
 Notion of 'open discourse’
 Assessment is not something that is done to them
but done with and by them
 Collaborative and open-ended enquiry is
promoted
 This type of pedagogy can be seen in terms of a
particular type of mediatory power in
teaching/learning interactions

28. Critical enquiry into academic
experience:
Distance Pragmatic Anxious Vital
Isolated Reluctance Technical Curious
Structurally Detachment Assessment Engaged
enforced
divisions
Lack of Disconnect Nurturing Development
proximity al
Static Transmissive Reassurance Personal
Space Low Shock Connected
expectation
Apprehension Autonomous
Novice Guided
Scaffolded
Integrated
Social
Informative
Space

29. Degrees in variation in meaning &
understanding: Absent
 I don’t know because we never have them for
that long because they, because your modules
are so small that you only say have like a ten
week period at the most with them, you never
really get that close to them.
 This year it’s been difficult, we’ve had a lot of
absences this year, nobody really cares this
year…you sort of get this feeling that no one
actually wants to be there.

30. Degrees in variation in meaning &
understanding: Reluctant
 There’s almost an expectation that they will be spoon fed, tell
me what to read, tell me exactly which bit, in fact photocopy it
for me and give it me but don’t expect me to go and find one.
That independence and that responsibility and that responsibility
of wider learning I don’t see it, I don’t see a love of, in 75%, I
don’t see a love of learning for its own sake.
 I don’t know – I really wouldn’t know what my tutors perceptions
are [of me as a learner], because you don’t really get any
feedback in that area. I mean you get feedback on your essays,
obviously your written work but it doesn’t really comment on
how they see you as a learner.

31. Degrees in variation in meaning &
understanding: Instrumental
 Yes, I mean they do give you, they do give you as much information
as you need to go into your assignment but especially for people
who have never done an assignment before…I mean I have, I feel
that if I hadn’t done an assignment, I wouldn’t know where to start
and you’ll get, every now and then, our group are quite vocal and
we will say ‘look we need some more tuition on that’ we will push for
it and we do get it so I can’t say that they just leave you
completely.
 I find that a lot of them aren’t focused and are sort of a bit scared in
case they don’t do well and there is a lot of statements like ‘ I don’t
think I’m clever enough’, and I’d say that’s probably as much as 30
or 40% who will lack confidence, sort of to the point where you
know I am having to reach out to them and supporting them, you
know, not over the top or anything but just reminding them what

32. Degrees in variation in meaning &
understanding: Vital
 It has but at the moment this year, the 3rd year, we’re doing live
campaign at the moment so though the tutors are monitoring us
they are letting us go for our own devices as well, they are helping
us and at the same time giving us guidance, but at the same time,
we’re 3rd years now, we’ve been in the PR environment, we’ve all
done placements do we’ve got a knowledge of what to do and
what’s right and what’s wrong, what’s ethical what isn’t.
 At the moment they are writing a literature review and we’re doing,
they wrote a research scaffold and we peer-reviewed each others
research scaffold so they, you know, got in to small groups to
[review] each others so that way I was trying to encourage them to
be critical of each others work and encourage them to read each
others work

33. Degrees in variation in meaning &
understanding:
Absent – Reluctant – Instrumental - Vital
 In more complete views, relationships exist not only between
tutor - student but also between student – student. Spaces are
actively constructed – scaffolded situations to generate
autonomous learning.
 In less complete, distance is created by institutional
organisation such as modularisation. Distance between learner
and tutor can be viewed as favourable and less favourable
where it is actively constructed or where it happens
accidentally and unconsciously.
 A sense of movement - from inertia and a lack of recognition of
the potential for transformation - to vitality and active
expectation of meaningful participation.

34. Risk factors that jeopardise highly able
students at University:
A habit at being at the top of the class
with very little effort and, therefore poor
study and time-management skills
“Culture shock” on encountering for the
first time other classmates of equal or
even higher accomplishment and the
stress of coping with one’s first grade B

35. Risk factors that jeopardise highly able
students at University:
 An “entity theory” as opposed to an “incremental
theory” of intelligence, often buttressed by long
experience with too little challenge, which holds
that ability must be less if effort is needed to
achieve one’s ends…
 Not yet having sorted out a clear picture of
ultimate strengths and preferences…
 Because of inexperience in ever having to ask
for help, not knowing how to frame questions…

36. Risk factors that jeopardise highly able
students at University:
 Coming from a family or group outside the
educational mainstream without the tacit
knowledge and skills needed to operate within
the complex systems of undergraduate and
graduate or professional education
 For some gifted students, especially those from
minority groups, dealing with issues of integrating
their academic lives with their social lives
 All the hazards other students face:
homesickness, financial stresses anonymity of
large classes, making new friends, coping with
room mates, using time effectively, selecting
classes and activities judiciously etc

37. Key Question/Task
Do you recognise such students at
Hope?
In what ways do your highly able
students (drawing on earlier identification
and definitions) fit within the above
categories?

38. Pedagogic implications of teaching
the more able
 Students encouraged to take control of their own
learning
 Teacher to involve the learner explicitly as a
partner in the learning process
 Notion of 'open discourse’
 Assessment is not something that is done to them
but done with and by them
 Collaborative and open-ended enquiry is
promoted
 This type of pedagogy can be seen in terms of a
particular type of mediatory power in
teaching/learning interactions

39. Learning through interaction models

40. Learning through interaction models

41. Learning through interaction models

42. Learning through interaction models

43. PhD findings: Involving the more
able as partners in the learning
process
Allowing the pupils to extend in-class
learning further than anticipated or
planned for.
Flexible time – frame for pupils to work
within.
Modification of planning or learning to
take into account the interests of pupils.
Co-operative and collaborative learning
promoted.

44. PhD findings: Involving the more
able as partners in the learning
process
Whole class, self and peer assessment.
Questions asked or problems set allow
for personal interpretation.
Method(s) and solution(s) of problems
set are unknown to both teacher and
learner.
Inclusive use of language.
Interactive displays.

45. PhD findings: Involving the more
able as partners in the learning
process
Availability of independent activities.
Whole class discussion where pupils as
well as teacher have to explain their
ideas, and where the process of learning
is analysed
The promotion and support (in terms of
time and resources) of independent
study, the focus of which is decided by
the student or group of pupils

46. To varying degrees the roles of ‘teacher’ &
‘learner’ were floating:
 Expectations were made clear to the pupils that they
were dual partners in the learning process
 Pupils’ contributions were frequently volunteered rather
than elicited and were always valued
 Pupils were encouraged to co-construct one another’s
learning at whole class and group level
 Discussion was allowed to shift in an unpredictable
manner
 Inclusive use of language was deployed ‘we’, ‘us’,
‘our’
 Manner and tone of teacher whilst demanding was
warm and friendly

47. The transfer of ability from shared to
individual (more able)
Focusing the students on the learning or given
session
Reviewing prior learning
Socratic questioning - here, the questioning is
not used to teach new knowledge, but to help
students to know and use what they already have
Proleptic instruction - involves the learner in
carrying out simple aspects of a task (in context) as
directed by the expert or teacher
Differentiated tasks introduced and discussed
for students to work through independently of teacher.

48. PhD findings: Involving the
more able as partners in the
learning process
Key Points:
• Learners spent a
significant amount of
time working
independently of teacher
• Dyadic interaction
between teacher and
learner was rare
•High proportion of
interaction in context of
whole-class teaching

49. Most effective whole class teaching
practice displayed the following
characteristics:
Teacher
Central to discourse is a problem or issue to
be explored
Method and solution to problem or issue not
necessarily known
Questions raised are immediately probing
Rarely gives answers – children encouraged
to arrive at answers via successive
questioning, drawing on other children to
clarify, synthesise and elaborate

50. Most effective whole class teaching
practice displayed the following
characteristics:
Teacher
Questions raised or problems set allow for
personal interpretation
Assessment is formative and integral to the
process of learning
Maximum reporting, minimal recording
Periodic synthesising and elaborating of
children’s ideas as a prelude to scaffolding

51. Most effective whole class teaching
practice displayed the following
characteristics:
Learner
 Expects to take on a dual role in the learning
process – to work through tasks set in partnership
with the teacher
 Will interrupt teacher talk freely
 Voluntarily support peers
 Expects to explain and share their ideas
 Hypothesises
 Decides to how to progress through tasks or the
learning

52. Key Question/Task
How do you manage to mediate and
promote the learning of your highly able
students during non-contact?
How do you promote interactive
learning during lectures?
Implications for seminar teaching?

53. Teaching the Gifted Undergraduate: Key
strategies
Poerksen (2005) suggests four role models
for tutors who wish to develop and
sustain such an epistemic culture.
1. The Socratic teacher
2. The moderator
3. Learning as cooperative researcher
4. The perturbation agent

54. Teaching the Gifted Undergraduate: Key
strategies
identification
promote a “gifted friendly”
atmosphere
gifted university class-mates can
be introduced to one another and
encouraged to form a study group.
“Compacting” the curriculum
use of designated adviser

55. Teaching the Gifted Undergraduate: Key
strategies
The programme coordinator/module tutor
can serve as a strategic counselor to the
students
Select modules (equating to 20%-25% of
their total course work) comprising special
units of study, seminars, colloquiums and
independent study
Seminar methods are characterized by
Socratic discourse
Requirement to engage with a research
project, a creative project or a thesis. Such
projects are accomplished through
independent study with a faculty member

56. Teaching the Gifted Undergraduate: Key
strategies
Notion of honors contract and
honors semester. Students electing
an honors contract select their own
curriculums with the guidance of
faculty members.
Mentorships and Research
Opportunities
Recognition for high achievement

57. The Role of Universities and Colleges in
Educating Gifted Undergraduates
• Accelerating vs Enrichment
• Early identification & merit-based
scholarships for entering students
• Academic advising
• Early identification
• Career planning

58. Key References:
 Baxter Magolda, M.B. 1992. Students’ epistemologies and
academic experiences: Implications for pedagogy. Review of
Higher Education 15, no. 3: 265–87.
 Biggs, J. (2004), Teaching for Quality Learning at University:
What the Student Does. 2nd edn. Maidenhead: Society for
Research into Higher Education & Open University Press
 Bransford, J., A. Brown, and R. Cocking, eds. 2000. How
people learn: Brain, mind, experience, and School Committee
on Developments in the Science of Learning. Commission on
Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education of the National
Research Council National Academy Press.
 Cigman, R. 2006. The Gifted Child: A Conceptual Enquiry.
Oxford Review of Education, 32, no. 2: 197-212

59. Key References:
 Claxton, G. 2007. Expanding Young People’s Capacity to
Learn. British Journal of Educational Studies, 53, no. 2: 115-134.
 Daly, A., Penketh, C., and Rush, L. 2009 ‘Academic
preparedness: Student and tutor perceptions of the
‘academic experience’’. Society for Research in Education
(SRHE) Conference proceedings.
 Fontana, D. 1995. Psychology for Teachers, 3rd Ed, Revised
and updated, London: The British Psychological Society
 Fredricksson, U., and B. Hoskins. 2007. The development of
learning how to learn in a European context. The Curriculum
Journal 18, no. 2: 127–34.

60. Key References:
 Lucas, L., and P.L. Tan. 2005. Developing reflective capacity:
The role of personal epistemologies within undergraduate
education. Research seminar discussion paper, Fourteenth
Improving Student Learning Symposium, September 4–6,
University of Bath.
 Moon, J. 2005. We seek it here . . . a new perspective on the
elusive activity of critical thinking: A theoretical and practical
approach. ESCalate discussion paper. Available online at:
http://escalate.ac.uk/index.cfm?
action1⁄4resources.search&q1⁄4criticalþthinking&rtype1⁄4itehe
lp&rtype1⁄4project&
rtype1⁄4publication&rtype1⁄4resource&rtype1⁄4review
 Moseley, D., Elliot, J., Gregson, M., and Higgins, S,. 2003.
Thinking skills frameworks for use in education and training.
British Educational Research Journal 31, no. 3: 367-390

61. Key References:
 Northedge, A. (2003), ‘Rethinking Teaching in the Context of
Diversity’, Teaching in Higher Education, 8.1, 17-32
 Perry, W.G. 1970. Forms of intellectual and ethical
development in the college years: A scheme. New York: Holt,
Rinehart & Winston.
 Poerksen, B. 2005. Learning how to learn. Kybernetes 34, no.
2/3: 471–84.
 Putnam, R.T., and H. Borko. 2000. What do new views of
knowledge and thinking have to say about research on
teacher learning? Educational Researcher 29, no. 1: 4–15.
Rawson, M. 2000. Learning to learn: More than a skill set.
Studies in Higher Education 25, no. 2: 225–38.

62. Key References:
 Robinson, M. Nancy. 1997. The Role of Universities and
Colleges in Educating Gifted Undergraduates. Peabody
Journal of Education. 72, no. 3/4, Charting a New Course in
Gifted Education: Parts 1 and 2 (1997), 217-236
 Rush, L., and Fisher, A. 2009. Expanding the capacity to learn
of student teachers in Initial Teacher Training. ESCalate,
Academic online paper (http://escalate.ac.uk/5802).
 Rush, L. 2009. Bridging the gap between theory and practice:
one tutor’s endeavors to embed and enact a distinctive
pedagogic approach to learning-to-learn (L2L). NEXUS
Journal 1: 197-212. Edge Hill University, Centre for Teaching
and Learning Research (CLTR)

63. Key References:
 Fisher, A and Rush, L. 2008. Conceptions of learning and
pedagogy: developing trainee teachers’ epistemological
understandings. The Curriculum Journal. 19, No. 3 pp 227-238.
Routledge.
 Rush, L. 2002. An Exploration into how Effective Upper key
Stage Two Teachers Manage to Intervene with More Able
Children in the Classroom Setting Ph.D.
 Schommer-Aitkins, M.A. 2002. An evolving framework for an
epistemological belief system. In Personal epistemology: The
psychology of beliefs about knowledge and knowing, ed. B.K.
Hofer and P.R. Pintrich. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum
Associates.
 Wingate, U. 2007. A Framework for Transition: Supporting
‘Learning to Learn in Higher Education, Higher Education
Quarterly, 0951-522461. No. 3: 391-405