Spanish teachers’ perception of gifted students

Abstract

Nowadyas, it is estimated that between 95% and 99% of gifted students are unidentified. This paper, sensitive to this reality, constitutes an approach to perceptions that secondary school teachers manifested regarding these students. To do this, we designed a questionnaire which was completed by 637 teachers of Secondary Education of the whole Spanish territory, of which 176 have stated specific training regarding these students. These results show that a significant part of participants has limited knowledge about these students and continues to follow common myths regarding these students. It results alarming that even teachers with specific training on gifted students show those shortcomings and confusion. This complicates the correct detection and educational attention to these students, so it would be desirable to find out what is wrong with this teacher training, in order to strengthen it since its inception.