Do you have to be gifted to teach gifted education?

Percy Seiger: I am aware of no state in the United States, or any other country for that matter, where one needs to be gifted in order to teach gifted children in specialized education programs designed for them.If we're talking the United States, if it were a requirement, it would be considerably difficult to find teachers in each school that would be capable of doing so. Gifted individuals represent ~2% of the school population, but given self-selections that occur later in life, it's unlikely that very many teachers are themselves gifted*.Note(*): I'm not aware of any studies on the number of educators at the primary and secondary levels who are gifted. I make my statement based on two things. First, there's a decent body of research regarding fields/career paths gifted individuals preferentially select and prefer, and anything involving primary or secondary education doesn't ever get mentioned (which makes sense for a large variety of reasons). Second, there's a stron! g relationship between performance in whatever major a person selects, and their level of intelligence. Given that it's demonstrable that the curricula for education majors isn't very rigorous in comparison to most other majors, that the GPAs of people in education majors is lower than for others in majors of equal (and even in a lot of cases, greater) rigor, would suggest there's a lack of gifted individuals who major in education, and thus end up becoming educators at the primary or secondary levels....Show more

Norma Marsalis: No, it's not required, but it's recommended, or your students will eat you for breakfast.

Walter Scordino: No. Though it could be helpful, it is not a requirement in Washington state or any other.There is also no requirement that a teacher in Washington state receive any education or training specific to gifted (in Washington state it's known as "highly capable") programming prior to being placed in a classroom. This is not unusual. ! Surveys from NAGC (National Organization for Gifted Children)! show that lack of training and professional development in gifted issues is one of the most common concerns among education leaders across the US....Show more

Bo Perham: No. You just have to be trained to teach gifted students. Just like you don't have to be bilingual to teach ESL/ELL students.Oklahoma, but it's pretty much the same in every state.