Teacher Perceptions of the Primary Education Thinking Skills Program

ABSTRACT

The Primary Education Thinking Skills program (PETS) was implemented in three third grade classes and two kindergarten classes in a Title I school. The PETS program is a Talent Development program designed to teach students critical thinking skills and other gifted behaviors with the expressed goal of the program’s creators that the regular education teacher could then use the student behaviors elicited by the PETS curriculum to recommend them for the gifted screening process. Thus, our focus was to determine teacher attitudes regarding the ease of implementation, effectiveness of the program, and potential changes in their perceptions of high-ability students. These data were collected via semistructured interviews and analyzed qualitatively using content analysis. Results indicated that most teachers found the program easy to implement and perceived it as effective for a diverse group of learners.

KEYWORDS:

• critical thinking
• identification
• learner diversity
• talent development
• underrepresentation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Julia Hujar

Julia Hujar is a doctoral student at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte where she also received her MEd in Special Education—Academically and Intellectually Gifted. She formerly taught gifted middle school students in social studies and mathematics. Her research interests include the intersection of assessment and educational policy, identification, quantitative methodologies, and differentiation for gifted students. Email: [email protected]

Michael S. Matthews

Michael S. Matthews is a Professor at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. He is Co-Editor of Gifted Child Quarterly, and a leader in the NAGC, AERA, and state and local gifted organizations and schools. Dr. Matthews studies identification, science learning, underachievement, and parenting and homeschooling of gifted learners. His writing also focuses on English learners. He has completed five books, over 40 articles, and numerous chapters, and has been recognized with several awards including most recently the 2020 Distinguished Service Award from the North Carolina Association for the Gifted & Talented. Email: [email protected]