23 - 24 MAY 2025

Registration

Registration (on Plaza level entry from Merivale Street). Delegates collect name badge and lanyard.

8:30 – Welcome by Anthony Stevens

Acknowledgement of Country

Introduction: Professor John Munro

Bio: Professor John Munro is Professor of Educational Psychology and Exceptional Learning at Australian Cahtolic University and Principal Research Fellow (Hon) at the University of Melbourne.

He has worked in the area of gifted education and talent development for the past four decades. He designed, co-ordinated and taught the Master of Education (Gifted Education) at the University of Melbourne from 1995-2016 and the Graduate Certificate in Gifted Education at the Australian Catholic University in 2024-25. He developed an explicit research agenda to investigate gifted learning in the classroom and twice-exceptional learning. The outcomes of this research have been published and reported at international conferences. The research agenda included the supervision of 12 PhD and 4 M Ed studies.

He has worked extensively with schools and education authorities both within Australia and internationally to improve provision for gifted and talented students. In Australia these include school leadership and middle leader and teacher courses through the Bastow Institute, Catholic Education Victoria, Department of Education (Victoria), the South Australian Education Department, and the Centre for Strategic Education, and Broken Bay Diocese, NSW. International consultancies include the Department of Education and Training (Victoria) for professional programs in Saudi Arabia, the National Academy for Gifted and Talented Youth, the Central Collegiate Academy, Birmingham and Kent Leadership & Innovation Centre in UK and a continuing consultancy with The Aga Khan Academies in Africa and Asia.

He was contracted by ACARA to write the initial version of the General Capabilities in Creative and Critical Thinking for the Australian Curriculum and was awarded the AAEGT Award for Eminence in Gifted Education in 2020 and the Australian Council for Educational Leaders Honorary Fellowship Award in 2005 for his contribution to exceptional learning and gifted education.

His approach to gifted learning and talent development and related research has been described in media presentations and podcasts, commissioned reports and papers, chapters in books, articles in refereed journals, commissioned articles in non-refereed journals and invited seminar papers, conference papers and invited keynotes. His most recent book is Leading Improvement for Gifted and Talented Students: High-impact strategies to improve high-level outcomes, published by ACER in 2024.

Session 1

Session 1: What does gifted learning, in its multiple forms, ‘look like’ in the classroom?

The starting point for provision is an understanding about gifted and talented learning looks like in the classroom.

This session will examine the contemporary research on how gifted students learn, the multiple types of gifted learning, including twice exceptional learners. Participants will be encouraged to identify what their school knows about gifted learning, which types of gifted learners are more likely to be accommodated by the school’s practices and whether assumptions made by the school about it could be broadened.

Morning Tea

Morning tea and networking

Session 2

Session 2: What practises are used to identify talented outcomes and the multiple types of gifted learning profiles?

Once the school has a clear idea of what gifted knowing and learning looks like, it is well placed to make decisions about how it will identify instances of gifted learning and thinking.

This session will examine the use of a range of assessment procedures to identify high level outcomes and various types of gifted learning profiles. It will include protocols for synthesising data from multiple sources and for collating an individual student’s gifted learning profile. Participants will be encouraged to evaluate the procedures their school currently uses and how these might be improved.

Lunch

Lunch and networking

Session 3

Session 3: How is educational provision differentiated in the classroom?

The educational provision a school puts in place to facilitate gifted learning and to optimise the learning outcomes of these students will also be determined by how the school believes they learn.

This session will examine a learning-based approach to differentiating the curriculum, the pedagogy and the classroom culture and context. Examples of a recommended approach to differentiating each aspect of provision will be provided. Participants will be encouraged to evaluate their school’s approach to differentiation and recommend how it might be broadened.