Differentiating the curriculum for lower elementary talented and gifted students in the regular classroom

Gifted and talented students exist everywhere, in every community and in every classroom. The exact numbers are difficult to determine due to the many definitions of giftedness including a current trend ~o broaden those definitions to include multi-dimensional intelligences (Gardner, 1983). Such broad definitions mean that large numbers of students fall into the various categories. However, as Helmberger (1980) states, a teacher may have difficulty identifying the gifted and talented members of a class since they may not immediately stand out in the group