Abstract
Welcome to the first issue of Volume 25 of Journal of Advanced Academics. Our lead article for this issue is Dr. James Gallagher’s reply to “Are There More Gifted People Than Would Be Expected in a Normal Distribution? An Investigation of the Overabundance Hypothesis” which was published in our previous issue and written by Russell Warne, Lindsay Godwin, and Kyle Smith. In this paper, Dr. Gallagher counters Warne and colleagues’ argument against the overabundance hypothesis. We expect this interesting exchange to continue across upcoming issues of JoAA.
Our next paper is “High ability students’ voice on learning motivation” by Alex Garn and Jennifer Jolly. This qualitative study involved 15 gifted students attending a rigorous summer academic program. The data support multiple aspects of motivation theory, as students spoke to the joy they experienced at being able to involve themselves in learning more about topics that interested them outside of school. However, this joy was greatly diminished in the presence of parental pressure or other extrinsic motivators.
The third paper in this issue is “Multiple intelligences and ESL teaching and learning: An investigation in KG II classrooms in one private school in Beirut, Lebanon” by Norma Ghamrawi. This study compares the effect of implementing teaching ESL vocabulary to young children based on Gardner’s theory of multiple intelligences versus traditional teaching methods. The study uses both qualitative and quantitative methods and reports a complex mixture of effects.
Our final paper is “Assessing science reasoning and conceptual understanding in the primary grades using standardized and performance-based assessments” by Kyung-Hee Kim, Joyce VanTassel-Baska, Bruce A. Bracken, Annie Feng, and Tamra Stambaugh. This paper reports results from the Jacob K. Javits-funded Project Clarion and describes the creation and evaluation of a rigorous primary-school science curriculum.
As this issue goes to press, we are excited to report strong progress toward our forthcoming special issues on STEM and on Javits-funded research under the leadership of our exemplary associate editors, Jill Adelson and Elizabeth Shaunessy, who (with colleagues Scott Chamberlin, Eric Mann, and Alicia Cotabish) are serving as guest editors for these important thematic efforts. The sheer volume of special issue submissions has increased the demand on our reviewers, and we all thank those of you who have been called upon to contribute your expertise as reviewers in support of these efforts. Watch for these issues beginning later this volume year!
Sincerely,