ABSTRACT In Brazil, there is little research about the thematic of high abilities causing larger discussions in the Education Field, particularly, in the Special Education Field. Consequently, some myth or erroneous ideas pass along the academic trajectory of high ability students. This happens due to the lack of knowledge, partly from some teachers, about ways of identifying and stimulating the talents of these students. This article presents results of a research proposed to investigate if the myth that involves students showing high abilities prevails in the conceptions of elementary school teachers from a public school of Santa Maria/RS. Ten teachers from afternoon shift, who teach from 1st to 4th grades, participated in this research. The defined instrument to the data collecting was the semi-structured interview that was applied individually in a reserved environment. A tape recorder was used to record the data upon previous authorization of the interviewed teachers. The content analysis was used as a way of "reading" the participants talking. As a result from the incidence of myth in the interviews with ten participants, it was noted that the teacher "A" can be observed in 60% of the mentioned myth while the others did not surpass 20%. This fact can be explained because that teacher did not participate in the research developed in the school in 2002 and 2003. The final considerations point out the importance of awareness from teachers that work in a regular classroom so that they can identify and direct students with giftedness characteristics to a specialized service.
myth; high abilities; special education
