TITLE:
How Rich Is Your Enrichment Program?
AUTHORS:
Michael F. Shaughnessy, Charles Waggoner
KEYWORDS:
Gifted, Gifted Education, Enrichment, Acceleration, Evaluation of Educational Programs
JOURNAL NAME:
Creative Education,
Vol.6 No.7,
May
7,
2015
ABSTRACT: The term “enrichment” has been loosely applied to gifted children and gifted programs over the years. However, there is very little agreement as to this term, and there is minimal if any short term or long term evaluation over time regarding the benefits of this term and there is almost no long term research on the impact of various “enrichment” programs, nor can the average parent be assured of implementation with fidelity or integrity. In addition, “enrichment” varies from grade to grade, school to school and state to state, and the definition of enrichment varies from subject to subject and child to child. On-going objective evaluation is minimal at best. This paper will attempt to review the various programs that constitute “enrichment”. Some enrichment programs focus on higher order thinking skills, other critical thinking skills, other reasoning, other inferential and inductive and deductive reasoning. Some programs focus on “projects” while others examine community services. This paper explores this issue and examines some of these relevant, salient issues and discusses some of the issues regarding this term. Some “enrichment” processes and procedures will be addressed and concerns elaborated on.