Mapping Taiwan’s gifted education ecology through the learning resource model: an integrative literature review

Abstract

Taiwan’s gifted education has expanded rapidly since the 1960s, yet persistent concerns remain regarding unequal access, regional disparities, and weak continuity across educational stages. This study applies the Learning Resource Model (LRM) as an integrative analytical framework to synthesize how educational and learner-side resources shape Taiwan’s gifted education ecology. Using a conceptually driven integrative literature review drawing from English- and Chinese-language sources across several databases (N = 91), evidence from historical policy documents, national survey findings, empirical studies, and local program evaluations was deductively mapped onto the LRM’s ten capitals: five educational capitals and five learning capitals. Across the reviewed literature, learner-side strengths, especially actional, telic, and attentional learning capital, are evident among identified gifted students, helping contextualize Taiwan’s strong academic performance and competition-oriented achievement. However, the synthesis also reveals asymmetric capitalization: learner-side strengths are most effectively cultivated among students who enter recognized gifted pathways, while economic, didactic, infrastructural, and social educational capital remain unevenly distributed across regions, giftedness categories, and educational transitions. The analysis further suggests that resource conversion in Taiwan must be interpreted socioculturally, as meanings attached to effort, adversity, merit, competition, and public recognition shape how educational capital is mobilized and converted into learning capital. Comparative perspectives show that the LRM is useful for examining how gifted education systems coordinate resources differently across centralized, tiered, science-focused, and locally generative models. Findings suggest that strengthening teacher capacity, broadening identification, supporting disadvantaged and underrecognized learners, expanding rural and digital networks, and building coordinated resource ecosystems are steps forward.