Preliminarily explore gifted education in China

Introduction

The gifted children in Chinese traditional terms are called Tian-cai or supernormal students， because of Chinese people thought that the gifted Children are the children who born with super normal high abilities and high intelligence （Chan， 2008）.

In this essay， the stages of Chinese gifted education history will be introduction generally. Then the Supernormal Students Class （SSC） of USTC （University of Science and Technology of China）， also could be called TCSSC， will be used as an example to discuss the achievements of the Chinese gifted education practices and the identify test system innovations， because the TCSSC has been seem as the most successful and effective gifted education programs in China （Zhou， 1998）.

1. The three development stages

From 1978， during these 35 years， generally speaking， the development of Chinese gifted education could be seemed as three stages.

In the first 10 years， there were many schools and colleges have been started to be established. The peak point of these schools number appeared during 1985-1990， there were more than 13 universities and 60 middle schools and some primary schools established some classes or groups to be research programs of gifted education. However， from the early of the 1990s， most of these classes and groups have despaired one by one， until today there are only 3 gifted classes in universities has been retain and keep developing （Tang， 2010; Gao， 2000）.

2. The achievements of the TCSSC

TCSSC tend to be the first， the oldest and the most famous gifted class in China （Zhou， 1998）. It could be thought as the most outstanding achievements of mainland Chinese gifted education research project during these 35 years from 1978. As some research reports of TCSSC show that， in total， there are 1027 gifted students graduated from this class form 1978 to 2008. Among them， there are 91% students get master degrees after they graduated from this class. According to incomplete statistics， among 590 gifted students who were graduated from this class during 1983 to 1998， until 2008 there are about 380 students get PhD degree and 93 students to be professors work in Chinese or foreign universities or research institutes （Tang， 2010）.

3. The innovations of identify gifted students test system

The innovations of the methods of identify gifted and talented students. The Identification of supernormal students is a very difficult problem， because of every gifted students are different and special individual （George， 2003）. However， solving this problem effectively is also important for recruiting gifted students successfully. Because if the students are not gifted students， they are tend be not suitable for teaching methods of gifted classes and most of them lose their confidence of study. Possibly， this kind of unhappy experiences may effected their lives and studies negatively. Therefore， many Chinese studies focused on this area in China.

The research group of the TCSSC is also the leader of in this area in China （Gao， 2000）.They designed all of the three identify gifted students test system which are the only three system has been used to recruit gifted students of higher education level in China.

References：

[1]Chan， D. W. （2008） Lay conception of giftedness among Chinese people. In Balchin， T.， Hymer， B. & Matthews， D. J. （ed） The Routlrdge Internation Companion to Gifted Education， pp. 115-121. London and New York： Routledge.

[2]Gao， W. （2000）. Qianxi zhi nian： chaochang jiaoyu de weilai [The millennium： The future of gifted education]. Modern Special Education， 85， 1.

[3]George， D. （2003） Gifted Education： identification and provision. London： David Fulton Publishers.

[4]Tang， X. （2010） Zhongmei tiancai Jiaoyu de bijiao yu qishi [Comparison and Enlightenment of Gifted Education between China and America]. http：//cdmd.cnki.com.cn/Article/CDMD-10270-2010084440.htm， accessed 10 January 2013.

[5]Zhou， W. （1998）. Fazhan chaochang jiaoyu de zhengce yanjiu [Developing the political research of gifted education].Modern Special Education， 59， 10.

【作者簡介】徐璐，重慶城市職業學院。