The latest reorganisation of the NHS.

children found the following complaints: school was too easy and boring; the children were expected to be perfect; peers teased them about being smart; they felt different, alienated; they worried a lot about world problems; and people didn't understand them.10 School services for gifted children at the elementary level in the United States and many other countries have often taken the form of supplementary instruction-in spare rooms after school and on Saturdays and in summer programmes.11 Full time classes with all instruction in a single classroom are also often used. At the secondary level gifted children may be placed ahead oftheir age and given special classes.12 Sometimes they are put into contact with leaders in a subject or given counsellors to help them with personal and social problems, psychological testing to help them understand their special talents and aptitudes, and tutors to work with them on advanced, special, or enriched learning material. The best instruction for gifted children is tailored to their needs and is diagnostic-prescriptive in orientation. 13 That means that their current skill or knowledge is assessed, and new learning tasks are then selected to be appropriately challenging. What happens to gifted children when they grow up? Terman and Oden, who followed up 1528 children from the age of 12 to mid-life, concluded that "the superior child, with few exceptions, becomes the able adult, superior in nearly every aspect to the generality. The superiority is greatest in intellectual ability, in scholastic accomplishments, and in vocational achievements."'4 Furthermore, their findings favoured rapidly promoted children. Several reviews of research and specific empirical studies have shown the value of accelerated teaching for gifted and talented children for both short term and long term accomplishments.15'7 Other research attests to the short and long term benefits of grouping gifted students together so that they can work with able and challenging peers.'8 While less effective than accelerated teaching and grouping, enrichment programmes also seem to benefit gifted and talented learners, although the benefits may be mainly short term.17 Parents are probably the most important influences in the development of talent or giftedness. Family sacrifices may be needed,'9 and parents have to make a long term commitment to help their gifted children develop their talents to the highest level.9 Parents provide all of the early teaching-in acquisition of language, mathematical operations, and thinking skills. Later, by monitoring children's progress in school and helping them get special teaching programmes in and out of school, they provide the resources for higher development.20 Finally, it is the parents who help gifted children formulate long term, high level goals and develop the motivation, learning styles, attitudes, and strategies to achieve them. JOHN F FELDHUSEN Robert B Kane distinguished professor of education