Teachers’ Competency in Managing Gifted In-school Adolescents from the Perspective of School Principals

Background/purpose. The need to recognize and support in-school adolescents with giftedness who could drive Africa's economic progress is critical to the continent's future. This concern motivated the present study, which assessed teachers' competency to manage gifted adolescents in schools from the perspective of school principals.

Materials/methods. The study adopted a mixed-methods research approach. A total of 102 school principals and five 5 teachers were sampled for the study, comprising 63.7% females and 36.3% males, were sampled for the study. The Data collected was analyzed using frequency distributions, thematic analysis, and multiple regression.

Results. The findings revealed that school principals perceive their teachers as lacking the pedagogical abilities to manage gifted adolescents. The qualitative inquiry with the teachers themselves confirmed that they lack the pedagogical skills required, have insufficient knowledge of giftedness and inadequate cognitive abilities, and are unable to provide the support necessary for gifted adolescents. Furthermore, the results showed that giftedness knowledge contributes the most to the management of gifted adolescents (β = 0.508; t = 8.775; p < 0.05), followed by the support provided (β = 0.401; t = 6.218; p < 0.05), the cognitive abilities of the teachers (β = 0.339; t = 5.885; p < 0.05), and their pedagogical abilities, which made an inverse contribution (β = -0.122; t = -2.043; p < 0.05)

Conclusion. The study concludes that teachers urgently need professional development in pedagogy, focusing on adolescent giftedness characteristics, to ensure the full development of young individuals with special abilities

Keywords: Cognitive ability, gifted adolescents, giftedness knowledge, pedagogical ability, teachers’ competency

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