ABSTRACT
The purpose of this chapter is to offer guidance and advice to teaching assistants in their work of supporting children who have difficulty in accessing the school curriculum. While the prime focus is on those children who have been assessed as being gifted and/or talented, many of the issues discussed and the recommendations made, are relevant to the majority of children. The education of exceptionally able children and young people is a contentious subject. The concept of gifted and talented education, together with the theories, philosophies and vocabularies that encompass it, can present an uncomfortable challenge to adherents of the over-arching theories and practice of inclusive education. The idea of identifying, assessing and making provision for society’s minority of ‘most able’ youngsters raises questions about elitism and ethical concerns about resources being allocated to a ‘group’ that many educationalists may consider to be already naturally advantaged. All children have a right of access to a school curriculum, which has been designed to meet their educational, social and emotional needs by people who understand how they learn. Although all children have an equal right of access, some find it more difficult to exercise this entitlement than others. These children are often given labels such as ‘special needs’, ‘bullies’, ‘challenging’, ‘disabled’ or ‘exceptional’. In each of these cases, as with ‘gifted and talented’, the label can act as a barrier to the successful inclusion of children into the life of a school and can help to deny access to the curriculum which it offers. Having said that, it is still legitimate to discuss children for whom a curriculum, which aims to meet the needs of the majority of children, is potentially inaccessible to a range of minority ‘groups’.
