The Renzulli approach, as described here (enrichment), has been big in our area. Thinking it was better than nothing, and
created a generally positive vibe, I went along with it to a degree.
This article changed my mind, and showed me the absurdity of how much we were shortchanging kids who needed more.
A brief extract follows, of the article as found posted on the NAGC website:
Home » Information & Publications » Gifted Education Strategies » What it Means to Teach Gifted Learners Well
What it Means to Teach Gifted Learners Well
]What it Means to Teach Gifted Learners Well, By Carol Ann Tomlinson, Ed.D, The University of Virginia.
6.Instruction for gifted learners is inappropriate when it is rooted in novel, "enriching" or piecemeal learning experiences. If a child were a very talented pianist, we would question the quality of her music teacher if the child regularly made toy pianos, read stories about peculiar happenings in the music world, and did word-search puzzles on the names of musicians. Rather, we would expect the student to work directly with the theory and performance of music in a variety of forms and at consistently escalating levels of complexity. We would expect the young pianist to be learning how a musician thinks and works, and to be developing a clear sense of her own movement toward expert-level performance in piano. Completing word-search puzzles, building musical instruments and reading about oddities in the lives of composers may be novel, may be "enriching,"(and certainly seems lacking in coherent scope and sequence, and therefore sounds piecemeal). But those things will not foster high-level talent development in music. The same hold true for math, history, science, and so on.
[i]This article reprinted from the May 1997 issue of Instructional Leader, with permission from the Texas Elementary Principals and Supervisors
This
article also appears on the Way Back Machine, internet archive; Saved 95 times between Sept 3, 2014 and Sept 4, 2019.
