Education and policies for gifted students are based on past research and learning traditions. But are these ideas sufficient for anticipating and understanding what might come next for developing learners and ourselves? This session draws on futures (or “foresight”) studies to explore evolving contexts for understanding and supporting gifts, giftedness, and creative talent development in our rapidly shifting and complex environments.

1. GIFTED FUTURES
Carmen Tschofen
Minnesota Council for the Gifted and Talented
University of St. Thomas — November 12, 2011

2. “GIFTED” IN CONTEXTS

3. “GIFTED” IN CONTEXTS
Individuals

4. “GIFTED” IN CONTEXTS
Individuals
Numbers

5. “GIFTED” IN CONTEXTS
Individuals
Numbers
Perception/awareness (Roper)

6. “GIFTED” IN CONTEXTS
Individuals
Numbers
Perception/awareness (Roper)
Performance in context

7. “GIFTED” IN CONTEXTS
Individuals
Numbers
Perception/awareness (Roper)
Performance in context
Futures “given” to our children (or “re-gifted?”)

8. “GIFTED” IN CONTEXTS
Individuals
Numbers
Perception/awareness (Roper)
Performance in context
Futures “given” to our children (or “re-gifted?”)
The problem with packages (both finite and the “gift
that keeps on giving”)

9. FRAMING OUR EXPERIENCES
Far from
Systems Thinking
Socially Relationship Building
Complicated Zone of Collaboration
Agreement
Build relationships,
create common
Complexity Good Enough Vision
Chunking Around Drivers
ground
Minimum Specifications
Multiple Actions
Adaptability & Organic
Close to
Simple Technically Complicated
Plan, control Experiment, coordinate expertise
Close to Certainty Far from
Michael Quinn Patton, 2009
Modified: C. Tschofen 10/10

10. FRAMING OUR EXPERIENCES
Connective and
Inquiry-based personal learning
Far from and personalized
learning
Systems Thinking
Socially Relationship Building
Complicated Zone of Collaboration
Agreement
Build relationships,
create common
Complexity Good Enough Vision
Chunking Around Drivers
ground
Minimum Specifications
Multiple Actions
Adaptability & Organic
Close to
Simple Technically Complicated
Plan, control Experiment, coordinate expertise
Close to Certainty Far from
Standardized Michael Quinn Patton, 2009
Modified: C. Tschofen 10/10
content and
instruction

11. POSSIBILITIES
Far from
Socially
Complicated
Agreement
Build relationships, Cone of
create common
ground Possibilities
Close to
Simple Technically Complicated
Plan, control Experiment, coordinate expertise
Close to Certainty Far from
Michael Quinn Patton, 2009
Modified: C. Tschofen 10/11

13. “FUTURES”?

14. “FUTURES”?
Futures as a recognized field of study and endeavor

15. “FUTURES”?
Futures as a recognized field of study and endeavor
The plural denotes possibilities, not prediction
Possible
Probable/Plausible
Preferable

16. “FUTURES”?
Futures as a recognized field of study and endeavor
The plural denotes possibilities, not prediction
Possible
Probable/Plausible
Preferable
Inter/transdisciplinary and imaginative

17. “FUTURES”?
Futures as a recognized field of study and endeavor
The plural denotes possibilities, not prediction
Possible
Probable/Plausible
Preferable
Inter/transdisciplinary and imaginative
“Be wrong in useful ways...” –Jamais Cascio

18. WHY THINK AHEAD?
(A DIFFERENT RATIONALE)

19. WHY THINK AHEAD?
(A DIFFERENT RATIONALE)
Anxiety

20. WHY THINK AHEAD?
(A DIFFERENT RATIONALE)
Anxiety
Depression

21. WHY THINK AHEAD?
(A DIFFERENT RATIONALE)
Anxiety
Depression
Unsustainable costs: education infrastructure

22. WHY THINK AHEAD?
(A DIFFERENT RATIONALE)
Anxiety
Depression
Unsustainable costs: education infrastructure
“If you aren’t concerned, you haven’t been paying
attention.”

23. DIFFICULT TRANSITIONS

24. SCENARIOS

25. SCENARIOS
Scenes or stories intended to help us understand and
manage uncertainty, emergence and complexity.

26. SCENARIOS
Scenes or stories intended to help us understand and
manage uncertainty, emergence and complexity.
Building blocks for today’s scenarios:
Scanning
Trends (loosely defined) and emerging issues:
identification and extrapolation
Imagination (“rigorous art”)

27. SCENARIOS
Scenes or stories intended to help us understand and
manage uncertainty, emergence and complexity.
Building blocks for today’s scenarios:
Scanning
Trends (loosely defined) and emerging issues:
identification and extrapolation
Imagination (“rigorous art”)
Encourage long-term thinking and personal agency

28. SCENARIO1
Trend: Privatization and profit motives
in mass learning technologies
“Online learning”
$32 billion in 2010
$50 billion by 2015
Teach.gov now run by Microsoft

29. SCENARIO1
Trend: Struggles for social well-being
Poverty
Health
Education
•

30. SCENARIO1
Trend: Learning Platforms
Knewton

31. THE NATIONAL
LEARNING GAME
A story

32. SCENARIO 2
Trend: Learning Analytics
“Data are collected from explicit student actions, such as completing
assignments and taking exams, and from tacit actions, including
online social interactions, extracurricular activities, posts on discussion
forums, and other activities that are not directly assessed as part of
the student’s educational progress. Analysis models that process and
display the data assist faculty members and school personnel in
interpretation.The goal of learning analytics is to enable teachers
and schools to tailor educational opportunities to each student’s level
of need and ability.”
–Horizon Report 2011
<http://wp.nmc.org/horizon2011/sections/learning-analytics/>

33. SCENARIO 2
Trend: Monitoring and Streams
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nZ-VjUKAsao

34. SCENARIO 2
Trend: Medical frontiers (It’s all in your head)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZDD7Ohs5tAk

35. THE GREAT TRADE-OFF
A story

36. SCENARIO 3
Trend: Networks as learning experience platforms
Directed
toward
interests
and
strengths

37. SCENARIO 3
Trend: Maker Culture
DIYbio, Makerfaire, and Etsy
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ig-DbfPoz3o

38. SCENARIO 3
Trend: Environmental Instability
“Nature deficit disorder”
Climate change
Resource scarcity

39. HAND-CRAFTED LEARNING
A story

40. FUTURES THINKING

41. FUTURES THINKING
Demands non-standardized skills

42. FUTURES THINKING
Demands non-standardized skills
Research

43. FUTURES THINKING
Demands non-standardized skills
Research
Imagination

44. FUTURES THINKING
Demands non-standardized skills
Research
Imagination
Creativity

45. FUTURES THINKING
Demands non-standardized skills
Research
Imagination
Creativity
Problem-solving/ Innovation

46. FUTURES THINKING
Demands non-standardized skills
Research
Imagination
Creativity
Problem-solving/ Innovation
Free

47. FUTURES THINKING
Demands non-standardized skills
Research
Imagination
Creativity
Problem-solving/ Innovation
Free
Available to all

48. “WHAT’S WRONG WITH THAT?”

49. QUESTIONS
What does “gifted” mean when some skill mastery or
expert knowledge is easily acquired/accessed?
What elements support a “new” vision of giftedness?
How does our inclination to wait for or expect an
identifiable “future” hinder our personal agency in the
present?

50. RESOURCES
2011 Horizon Report (web version) http://
wp.nmc.org/horizon2011/
Invisible Learning: Toward a new ecology of education
http://www.invisiblelearning.com/en/ (video summary:
http://bit.ly/tc3b1B)
OECD Schooling Scenarios http://bit.ly/ugw47M
Teaching about the Future: The basics of foresight
education (Hines and Bishop, 2012?)

51. GIFTED FUTURES
Carmen Tschofen
http://www.slideshare.net/tschofen