Legitimate problems exist in determining whether these students are at greater risk for social or emotional problems than other students, and most interventions to reverse underachievement have met with limited success. Students who seem unmotivated may have attention deficits (Busch & Nuttall, 1995) or hidden learning disabilities. Rather, they are retained as a result of their classroom performance. Roeper Review, 4, 18-21. Oxford: Pergamon. (1985). Peer relationships impact adolescent behavior (Brown, 1982; Clasen & Brown, 1985; Reis, Hebert, Diaz, Maxfield, and Ratley (1995) found that high-achieving peers had a positive influence on gifted students who began to underachieve in high school. Whitmore, J. R. (1980). Therefore, in the absence of developing formal programs for underachievers, providing underachievers with support, attention, and positive feedback could help these students reverse their underachievement. At what age should an individual gain control over his or her own destiny and make decisions regarding his or her priorities and goals? Most of the interventions reported in the literature (i.e., Supplee, 1990; Whitmore, 1980) were designed to effect immediate results with a group of acutely underachieving gifted students. 5072 Accesses. Diagnostique, 21 (1), 43-59. Gifted "underachievers under-the-radar" are frequently overlooked, and sometimes even mistaken for high achievers. These are the exceptionally gifted students who coast through school, often receiving average to high average grades, but who fail to reach their potential. (1993). Academic underachievement among the gifted: Students perceptions of factors that reverse the pattern. ), The gifted and talented: Developmental perspectives (pp. Even so, several studies have found that underachievers do not exhibit lower self-concepts than their achieving counterparts (e.g. The sample consisted of 56 gifted underachievers and 122 gifted achievers from 28 high schools In a recent study, researchers used self-selected Type III enrichment projects as a systematic intervention for underachieving gifted students. ), Underachievement (pp. In addition, as many as 25 to 30 percent of high school dropouts may be gifted individuals. Defining underachievement based strictly upon scholastic success or failure may also be limiting. Clarifying the myriad definitions of underachievement that exist in our field will enable professionals and scholars to communicate and investigate this phenomenon more effectively. Intervention with underachieving gifted children: Rationale and strategies. However, such definitions may not adequately distinguish between gifted students who achieve and those who underachieve. McCall, Evahn, and Kratzer (1992) observed that most of the comparison group research within the area of gifted underachievement equates gifted underachievers to their mental ability cohorts. Crossover children: A sourcebook for helping students who are gifted and learning disabled. ; Christopher Columbus, an explorer, and discoverer of new lands.Primarily home-schooled. Baker, J. When a gifted student is performing only at grade level in those content areas, there may be a justifiable cause for concern. Baum, S. M., Owen, S. V., & Dixon, J. Research on the family characteristics of underachieving gifted students suggests that certain types of home environments may be related to the development of students underachievement patterns (Baker, Bridger, & Evans, 1998; Brown, Mounts, Lamborn, & Steinberg, 1993; Rimm & Lowe, 1988; Zilli, 1971). Clasen, D. R., & Brown, B. The problem inherent in defining and identifying underachieving gifted students are given special attention. Therefore, operational definitions of underachievement as a discrepancy will overidentify underachievement in students with higher ability levels and underidentify students with lower ability levels (Frick et al., 1991). Successful students received support and encouragement from each other and from supportive adults, including teachers, guidance counselors, coaches, and mentors. Operational definitions categorize a continuous variable (academic performance), thereby creating arbitrary divisions between achievement and underachievement at a certain cut-off point. Thorndike, R. L. (1963). Because of these errors of measurement, psychologists can never determine with 100% certainty a students true score on the original measure. This moderate correlation between the intelligence test scores and school grades means that IQ scores explain only 25% of the variance between school grades and IQ scores, leaving 75% of the variance in achievement test scores unaccounted for by IQ scores. Several authors (Heacox, 1991; Mandel & Marcus, 1988, 1995; Rimm, 1995; Schneider, 1998) have created profiles for different types of underachievers. The psychological characteristic ascribed to gifted underachievers vary and sometimes contradict each other. The multidimensionality of peer pressure in adolescence. Paper presented at the annual meeting of the National Association of Gifted Children, Louisville, KY. Schwekzgebel, R. (1965). Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 21, 169-186. The attitude achievement paradox among Black adolescents. No reason exists to believe that all gifted students should achieve well academically (Janos & Robinson, 1985) or that ability and achievement should be perfectly correlated (Thorndike, 1963). These factors were the relationship with the teacher, the use of self-regulation strategies, the opportunity to investigate topics related to their underachievement, the opportunity to work on an area of interest in a preferred learning style, and the time to interact with an appropriate peer group. Researchers proposing definitions in this category make no attempt to explicitly define or measure potential. Newbury Park: Sage. Gowan, J. C. (1957). Differences in scores will arise as a result of sampling errors, student mood and health on the testing days, and other extraneous variances. Unfortunately, little research has focused specifically on culturally diverse underachievers (Ford, 1996; Reis, Hebert, Diaz, Maxfield, & Ratley, 1995). One could even argue that Rimms definition includes almost all students. Diaz, E. I. Jeon, K. (1990, August). Laffoon, K. S., Jenkins-Friedman, R., & Tollefson, N. (1989). We need to individualize programs for underachieving gifted students at least as much as we individualize programs for achieving gifted students. Risk and resilience: Contextual influences on the development of African American adolescents. Green, K., Fine, M. J., & Tollefson, N. (1988). Roeper Review, 13, 181-184. Sociology of Education, 71, 68-93. ), Underachievement (pp. Broad, inclusive definitions of gifted underachievement allow more flexibility in the identification of gifted underachievers. Who should make the decision as to what is considered achievement and, by extension, what is worth achieving? These classroom strategies can provide attractive and interesting curricular replacement options and enrichment to advanced students. Neisser, U., Boodoo, G., Bouchard, T. J., Boykin, A. W., Brody, N., Ceci, S. J., Halpern, D. P., Loehlin, J. C., Perloff, R., Sternberg, R. J., & Urbina, S. (1996). Psychological disturbance in adolescence (2nd ed.). New York: Delacorte. Roeper Review, 12, 23-29. Renzulli, J. S., & Smith, L. H. (1978). WebStudent Achievement & Underachievement: A Conversation with Del Siegle from the Texas Association for the Gifted and Talented Professional Learning Online Units NRC/GT's Researched Strategies to Increase Student Motivation and Academic Achievement (5 comprehensive professional learning units based on the Achievement Orientation Model) Abstract. No one predictor will ever include all the determinants of a behavioral outcome. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Connecticut, Storrs. New York: Teachers College Press. Sixty-six percent of the students named peer pressure or attitude of the other kids, including friends, as the primary force against getting good grades (pp. Clark, B. Do we help or hurt a child when we ask him or her to assimilate into the majority culture? (1988). When a person scores at one extreme of the testing continuum on one testing occasion, he or she is more likely to score closer to the mean on the next testing occasion. Fink, M. B. WebGifted underachievers are underachievers who exhibit superior scores on measures of expected achievement (i.e., standardized achievement test scores or cognitive or intellectual ability assessments). Underachievement for somedropping out with dignity for others. New York: Teachers College Press. The most common component of the various definitions of underachievement in gifted students involves identifying a discrepancy between ability and achievement (Baum, Renzulli, & Hebert, 1995a; Butler-Por, 1987; Dowdall & Colangelo, Three general themes emerge from the many operational and conceptual definitions of gifted underachievement (Dowdall & Colangelo, 1982; Ford, 1996). Learning preferences and skill patterns among underachieving gifted adolescents. This article reviews and analyzes three decades of research on the underachievement of gifted students in an attempt to clarify the present state of research. ), Underachievement (pp. Interventions aimed at reversing gifted underachievement fall into two general categories: counseling and instructional interventions (Butler-Por, 1993; Dowdall & Colangelo). Ford advocated using a more holistic approach to defining and identifying gifted underachievers: Broad, inclusive definitions of underachievement support the notion that underachievement is a multidimensional construct that cannot be assessed with unidimensional instruments (Ford, p. 54). The 90% confidence interval for a score of 130 is 124-134. The causes and correlates of gifted underachievement have received considerable attention in recent research literature (Dowdall & Colangelo, 1982; Van Boxtel & Monks, 1992; Whitmore, 1986). One would expect a gifted students performance to be above grade level in some subject areas, especially those areas in which that student has been identified as gifted. Further research in this area must focus on developing multiple approaches to both preventing and reversing underachievement. Columbus, OH: Merrill. (1992). In L. K. Silverman (Ed.). WebUnderachievement is the unanticipated difference between accomplishment and ability. 514-528). Underachievers are students who exhibit a severe discrepancy between expected achievement (as measured by standardized achievement test scores or cognitive or intellectual ability assessments) and actual achievement (as measured by class grades and teacher evaluations). Likewise, negative peer attitudes can often account for underachievement (Clasen & Clasen, 1995; Weiner, 1992). The Davidson Young Scholars progr, RT @Indl_Learning: Some of the executive functioning skills are: See also Needs of Gifted Talented Children Lack of Motivation Most of the self-contained classroom studies lacked suitable control groups. 11-12). Gifted underachievers are especially prone to developing a poor self Practitioners who responded to a National Research Center on the Gifted and Talented needs assessment identified underachievement as a major research problem (Renzulli, Reid, & Gubbins, 1992). B. Conversely, there is a 10% chance that this students real IQ score is lower than 124 or higher than 134. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 14, 451-467. Patterns of underachievement among gifted students. It is erroneous to equate an A in third grade math with an A in advanced placement calculus. Springfield, IL: Charles C. Thomas. Classroom grades, though unreliable and teacher dependent, provide one of the most commonly used methods to assess and evaluate students. Both programs provided anecdotal and some qualitative evidence of at least partial success. Dowdall and Colangelo (1982) described three underlying themes in the definition of gifted underachievement: The results of this research suggest that flexible, student-centered enrichment approaches may help reverse underachievement in gifted students. First, psychometric definitions tend to ignore important behavioral causes and correlates of underachievement (Ford, 1996). Mansfield, CT: Creative Learning Press. Cultural relativism also becomes a factor when identifying underachievement in diverse groups. Motivation and self-regulation among gifted learners. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall. Fine and Pitts speculated that more family conflicts occur in underachievers homes, and recent research (Reis, Hebert, Diaz, Maxfield, & Ratley, 1995) has supported this view. Second, the psychometric or standardized tests that are used to screen for gifted underachievement may not be valid or reliable indices of the abilities of students from diverse cultural backgrounds. Author Lesley Sword provides strategies for parents to help their. As you can see, intelligence and high achievement are two of the big winners. Holland, 1998). (1988). B., Goldberg, M. L., & Passow, A. H. (1966). Giftedness (also called talented and gifted or TAG) is primarily determined through testing, which is often conducted by school districts. Wolfle, J. Externalizing behavior problems and academic underachievement in childhood and adolescence: Causal relationships and underlying mechanisms. These findings suggest that reversing the underachievement pattern may mean taking a long, hard look at the underachievers curriculum and classroom situation. Pendarvis, E. D., Howley, A. Although clinicians report success with counseling interventions, research on therapeutic approaches has documented limited success in reversing students underachievement patterns (Baymur & Patterson, 1965; Butler-Por, 1993; Jeon, 1990). Does the underachievement of the child create problems in the family unit? A teacher may believe that reading Huckleberry Finn is more worthwhile than mastering a new video game, but a child may not. Reasons why the gifted adolescent underachieves and some of the implications of guidance and counseling to this problem. This behavior illustrates a values conflict between adult and child (Whitmore, 1986). One fact seems certain: The identification procedure should flow directly and logically from the definition of gifted underachievement. Several recent researchers operational and conceptual definitions of gifted underachievement are summarized in Table 1, Table 2, Table 3, and Table 4 (please see all Table links at bottom of article). By Ingrid Wickelgren on November 2, 2012. For example, low self-concept is one of the most common characteristics ascribed to underachieving gifted students (Belcastro, 1985; Bricklin & Bricklin, 1967; Bruns, 1992; Clark, 1988; Diaz, 1998; Fine & Pitts, 1980; Fink, 1965; Ford, 1996; Kanoy, Johnson, & Kanoy, 1980; Schunk, 1998; Supplee, 1990; Van Boxtel & Monks, 1992; Whitmore, 1980). Gifted Child Quarterly, 41, 5-17. 44, No. In 95% of the families, one parent played the role of the parent that challenges and disciplines, and the other took the role of the protector. Both programs stressed the importance of addressing affective education, as well as the necessity of creating student-centered classroom environments. Psychosocial development in intellectually gifted children. (Research Monograph 95114). Self-regulation and motivation: A life-span perspective on underachievement. By contrast, families of underachieving students may tend to be more restrictive and punishment-oriented (Clark, 1983). Please note the date, author, and publisher information available if you wish to make further inquiries about any republished materials in our Resource Library.
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