Conceptualising The Islamic Gifted Curriculum: Redefining Gifted Education From Islamic Perspective

The current models of gifted and talented education have always been based on the established curriculum designed on the parameters set by the standards in many western countries. While the concepts and ideas are relevant and proven, a Muslim gifted institution must take other considerations in the policy and implementation aspects to cater to the needs of gifted Muslim community. While main goal of gifted education is the student’s intelligent and talent development, the gifted Muslim student has additional areas of development that must be taken into consideration. Many mainstream gifted education models stress on the high academic performers or strong STEM-inclined individuals who displayed strong interest and academic achievement in science subjects. The Muslim gifted students have additional parameters such as religious inclination and interest combined with the Quran memorisation, hadith and Islamic references understanding. This study examines the existing literature on gifted and talented education models and adopts some core elements for the conceptualization of gifted curriculum for Muslim students, focusing on the fundamental elements of Islamic education philosophy. Applying qualitative method, the existing literature are reviewed systematically, and their educational philosophies analysed and compared. Based on the review and analysis, this paper proposes a conceptual framework on the integrated model of existing gifted philosophies from the western and Islamic perspective. The discussion has been framed specifically around the design and implementation of gifted and talented education in Malaysia. This paper will offer a guide to the development of integrated curriculum model – one which is based on the existing models both on the Western and Islamic ideas on gifted education. For gifted institutions adopting this guideline, it will serve as a working policy and implementation framework.