Needs-based assessment of twice-exceptional gifted students: The S&W-Heuristic

Balanced research and practice

Misdiagnoses and missed diagnoses of gifted students with co-occurring learning-, developmental and behavioural disorders are often mentioned in literature and practice. Consequently, 2E-students often fall between two stools when it comes to appropriate psycho-educational interventions. In this presentation, we will demonstrate how the Strengths and Weaknesses Heuristic (S&W-Heuristic) can be of added value in case of assessments of (supposed) gifted or 2E-students. This S&W-Heuristic was developed to assess students with (suspicion of) the co-occurrence of giftedness and autism in a needs-based way. Subsequently it was made applicable to students with (suspicion of) 2E in general. The systematicity of the S&W-Heuristic may help psychologists and remedial educationalists to reveal hitherto camouflaged strengths or weaknesses in underachieving smart students and to understand their contradictory psycho-educational needs. By shifting our mindset from a “classification-based” to a dynamic “dimensional-based” operational definition of 2E, camouflaged talent will be recognised and get more opportunity to flourish.