Master of Arts (Instructional Design & Technology)

Talent is a prized asset in a society like Singapore where every individual matters. Talent development is a hence delicate enterprise that must be carefully planned and systematically executed. Innate gifts may not be optimised and harnessed if there is no deliberate effort to develop them into superb mastery. This study is concerned with a systemic approach to talent development in a local premier girls’ school, Eureka School (pseudonym). To embrace the school’s philosophy of allowing individuals with diverse ability and interests to develop at her own pace, the school adopted Renzulli’s Schoolwide Excellence Model as an implementation model for a total talent development programme. Embracing the spirit of ‘a rising tide lifts all ships’, the model proposes developing gifted behaviours in students instead of focusing on identifying the gifted. One form of such behaviours is the ability to use and apply information and thinking skills to create original materials intended for a target audience. Such disposition is known as creative-productive giftedness. In Eureka School, Project Work (PW) is used as a vehicle to nurture creative productivity as part of the endeavour to develop talent. This study is to evaluate the effectiveness of PW in fulfilling this role. The approach taken is outcome-oriented evaluation where data collected was used to ascertain the extent to which the intended outcomes were achieved through PW. Through surveys carried out and analysis of students’ final reports, the potential of PW as claimed, seemed to be promising. It appears to have positive effect on students in promoting application of information and thinking skills as well as the spirit of inquiry. In answering the evaluation question of whether PW can promote creative productive giftedness the survey items scored above a mean score of 3.0 out of a scale of 4.0 for the four aspects measured.