Unwrapping the Gifted

Has it really been just two full days that I've been here?! It already feels like a week! (That's a good thing - it's just intense!) I'm typing at a table in a restaurant with some friends from other states because they peer pressured me into staying out later with them rather than going back to my room to write. I so love re-connecting with everyone here and meeting great new faces, too.

My day in a nutshell:

1) I learned some great tips about approaching legislators about gifted education issues from a former gifted specialist who is now a member of the Missouri legislature. Here's a sampling:
* Condense your information into about three simple and compelling talking points.
* If they can't read it in 90 seconds, it won't be read. (one sheet of paper with points bolded)
* Build relationships - find something you have in common to initially connect with them on.
* They need to like you and see you as influential.
* Connect with the decision makers and those who represent you.
* Focus on services for gifted children, not programs (because the purpose of programs is often misunderstood)
(Thank you, Sarah Lampe!)

2) Spent some time shopping in the Exhibit Hall...

3) Marveled at origami created with paper plates...

4) Learned about executive functioning processes in the brain...

5) Learned about American Mensa via lunch conversation...

6) Gathered ideas for a student of mine who is building a Rube Goldberg contraption. (One of the presentations focused on strategies for teaching thinking skills, simple machines, and engineering & physics principles to kids via the building of Rube Goldberg contraptions.)

7) Pondered what gifted kids really mean when they say something is "fun" ...

8) Attended a couple different receptions (face-to-face social and professional networking!)

9) Discussed the state of gifted education in Montana with a handful of other Montana GT specialists (there are only a handful of us anywhere...)

10) Talked with a doctoral student about her dissertation and shared ideas...

11) Had a photo op with four of my classmates from UConn -- the first time all five of us have been together at the same time since 2003.

12) And in the last session I attended this afternoon, I watched a really fired up presenter, Susan Rakow, give a feed-it-to-them-straight presentation about all those things in gifted education we all know deep down but rarely are gutsy enough to actually say (especially to people outside of gifted education). Her top 10 list of "things you can't say in gifted education" included "anti-intellectualism is the norm in the U.S." and "all children are NOT gifted." I found myself jotting down lots of gems she was saying, such as "giftedness is real and we need to stop apologizing for it" and "the glorification of stupidity." She talked about this "placation polka" we dance in order to soothe people's feelings or not step on any toes. And she said, "well sure, we retard them [gifted kids] for five years" in response to the common misperception that "the other kids will catch up."

Although my style is not quite so feed-it-to-them-straight, I think she's right that we have elephants in the room and don't confront or acknowledge important realities in our field. What do you see as the "things we can't say in gifted education"?

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 11:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

My first full day of the NAGC convention has concluded and I already have enough ideas to take home to keep me hopping for a while! (Yet there are still three days to go!) I'm hoping to squeeze in enough time to share some of what I'm learning with you during the week while I'm here.

The view from my hotel window is gorgeous :o)

And the city of St. Louis has done a great job of welcoming us here. The restaurant I ate at tonight was a fair number of blocks from the Convention Center and even there (all over, really!) we found one of the little "Welcome NAGC" signs:

And about every other street light has a little welcome sign on it too:

Today (Thursday) were the Board Institutes, which are in-depth sessions presented by NAGC Board members. This morning, I attended the session by Julia Link Roberts on product assessment and this afternoon I attended the session about NAGC's new Mile Marker Series (which I plan to write about in more depth in a future post).

This morning's session began with an important and thought-provoking question: "If during the first five or six years of school, a child earns good grades and high praise without having to make much effort, what are all the things he doesn't learn that most children learn during those years?"

(Take a moment to ponder that for a bit...)

In our ensuing conversation, we shared multiple possibilities, such as:
* the child might not be learning persistence
* the child might not be developing a work ethic
* the child might not be encountering struggles that foster resilience
* the child might not be learning healthy strategies for dealing with frustration (which I've talked about here a bit before)
* the child might not be learning how to maintain a sense of curiosity
* the child might not be developing an accurate sense of his/her true abilities/potential
* the child might not experience a sense of satisfaction when actually achieving
* the child might lose pride in his/her work
* the child might not be developing time management skills or study skills
* the child might not be learning how to break an academic sweat (and therefore doesn't grow or improve in the ways we do when we "break a sweat")
* (click here and scroll to page 17 for a great article by Tracy Inman on this topic)

Now, granted, kids can learn these life skills via multiple avenues -- it doesn't just have to be in school that they learn them. However, school is certainly a BIG part of kids' lives and can have a significant impact on their opportunities to learn (or not learn) these important life skills. We hurt kids in the short term and in the long term if we cheat them out of opportunities to learn these life skills. Providing appropriate academic challenge for each learner is one ideal way to help kids develop and nurture these skills.

What is your answer to the question? What do you think our gifted kids don't learn if/when we allow them to skate through school?

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 11:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Awhile back, I posted a link to a little survey that many of you completed for me. The purpose of today's post is to update you on the results (as previously promised due to the problem I had getting the survey system to link the results for all of you). I've taken screen shots of the results page in my Advanced Survey account and cropped them into individual JPEG images, which you can view below. Thank you to those who took the survey!

I am intrigued that the percentage of parents reading this blog is so high. Granted, since I limited the responses to that question to just one answer per person, the results don't reflect the number of people who fill more than one role, and that likely is many of you. Still, I'm glad to know that there are so many parents out there reading because it helps me know that I perhaps need to gear things to the parents a little more often!

Interestingly, the results to the above question have changed over time. Initially, when the survey was first posted, the responses to Question #2 were running about 75% "Yes" for subscribing to this blog via RSS or a similar feed -- probably because as subscribers they knew right away that a new post was up, whereas the non-subscribers gradually found it over time.

Even though I did allow multiple selections for the answers to Question #3, most people who responded only chose one or two answers each, hence the low percentages of interested folks for each topic. I'm fairly surprised that there isn't broader interest for more topics. (Of course, for me they're all interesting, but I'm also a bit of a geek for this stuff!)

I was disappointed to not hit all 50 states, although there are a couple states not represented that I do know I have readers in because I know people there offline who tell me they read this blog (Alaska, Idaho, and North Dakota, for example). And to the handful of you who claim to be living at Antarctica, I'd be really curious to know why you're there! (assuming you weren't just giving a silly response)

Wow, most of you are regular readers. I appreciate knowing I have a consistent audience and I hope I can (continue to?) do my best at offering you interesting, thought-provoking, fairly regular reading. And welcome to the many newbies!

If any of you didn't take the survey and would like to add your two cents to it, just follow these easy steps:

1. Go to Advanced Survey
2. Type my survey # into the little "Take a Survey" box on the right side of the page. Survey # is 69305.
3. Click "Go" and answer the five easy questions. (*Thank you!!!*)

Have a great week! I'm excited to be heading to St. Louis for the national convention and I hope to see some of you at NAGC this week! :o)

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 7:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Last week I presented at our annual state teacher's convention, twice on identifying gifted Native American students and twice on "Getting Started: A Gifted Program for Your School." With about 900 schools statewide, spread over 147,046 square miles and 56 counties, we have just over 40 FTE in Gifted Education positions in Montana. That's not even a whole person per county, let alone enough to cover all 900 schools.

So, needless to say, I'm often confronted with "square one" questions when I present in my state. And even though I should know by now what to expect, I still can't help but marvel at the "starting from scratch" situations people are in here.

Two gentlemen from a small town on an Indian Reservation in northeastern Montana came to one of my presentations and wanted to know where the closest place in Montana was to them that they could go to observe a gifted program in action, to get ideas and to see how it works. Although I was aware of a couple places closer to them that are also just getting started, the only "close" place I truly knew of that has (and has had for quite some time) a gifted program is a 262 mile drive for them - one way.

Easily half of the people attending my presentations last week were Special Education or Title I teachers from Class B or C (i.e. rather small, usually K-8) schools who had been "given gifted" for a class period by their administrators. Most of the other half were English teachers, Computers teachers, Librarians, etc., who had also been "given gifted" for a class period or two. All of them were at a bit of a loss as to where to even begin.

Yes, our state does have a very thorough Program Planning Guide available, in addition to other resources. Yes, Gifted Education is technically nothing new in Montana, with the founding of AGATE thirty years ago and a mandate in our state accreditation standards that schools identify and provide appropriate services for gifted students. Yes, we have come a very long way in the past three decades, thanks to a serious cadre of folks who came before those of us currently in the trenches. But geography, size, lack of funds, and misperceptions continue to plaque so many of our schools.

So in moments like this I find myself torn between the past and the present, between how far we've come and how far we've yet to go, between excitement for the schools that are getting the ball rolling and ache for the gifted students in those schools that continue to think an AP class at the high school level is all the "appropriate services" these students will ever need. Part of me wants to mentor each and every one of these amazing, motivated, uncertain, curious teachers as they develop services for their schools' gifted students - and part of me knows I can't just dive in and do it all when my own job(s) await(s) me at home (not to mention the garage I'm building out back in every possible spare moment of time). And then I think of how much more exciting and how much more daunting these same struggles must have been for those who were in my shoes in Montana thirty years ago... I am so grateful to them and I marvel at what they accomplished with essentially no road map. Thank you, Pioneers.

Before she left, one of the ladies who came to my first presentation last week said, "I have hope now that I can do this - and that it might actually be fun, too. Before, I was overwhelmed by all of the unknown and uncertainty. I was worried and nervous and intimidated. But now that I have some idea of how to begin and where to go to access resources, I think I might even be looking forward to this new, open-ended aspect of my job!"

Welcome aboard to all of you newbies out there! :o)

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 7:24 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

"I think subject acceleration helps a lot. It challenges us and gives us what we need. I'd rather be challenged to where I'm learning - even if it means I don't always get straight A's. I think moving me up in Math was a really smart decision on the school's part."

"It's a way to be myself and get ahead and actually do what I want to instead of staying behind and reviewing. I actually get stressed out if I'm NOT accelerated. This way I get to learn. I'm more stressed when it's too easy because it's the same review over and over."

The above quotations are from two of my middle school students whom we have subject accelerated in math. Despite the overwhelming evidence of acceleration's positive effects for kids who are ready for it, many schools still shy away from providing these kids with what they need educationally. Why? Some worry that the kids really can't handle it, some worry that it will create social problems for them ("look what became of Ted Kaczynski, after all!"), some worry that removing those students from the class will remove the "sparks" that get discussions going, some think the advanced kids have to be in the regular classroom to provide a model for struggling students, some think giving them extra work (in addition to the regular work) in the regular classroom will fill their need for challenge, some don't think any kids should ever be "singled out" (except, of course, the kids on the Varsity team), and some worry about life event issues, like all the other kids getting to drive sooner than the accelerated child. (Ah, yes, in the grand scheme of school priorities, getting to drive at the same time as everyone else at school is so much more important than learning at school...)

Subject acceleration is the process of providing students advanced content in a given subject. This is typically accomplished by moving the student ahead a grade in that subject (sending a 2nd grader to a 3rd grade class for math, for example) or by providing advanced groups within the grade level that significantly accelerate the pace and content.

Subject acceleration is one of many forms of acceleration. Others include:
1. Early Admission to Kindergarten (i.e. starting K at age 4 instead of age 5)
2. Early Admission to First Grade
3. Whole-Grade Acceleration (a.k.a. "Grade-Skipping")
4. Continuous Progress (being allowed to "move on" when material is mastered, even if the rest of the class isn't ready to move on)
5. Self-Paced Instruction (independent study, independent projects, self-taught subjects)
6. Combined Classes (for example, a 2/3 combo class)
7. Curriculum Compacting
9. Telescoping Curriculum (condensing content into a shorter time-frame ... i.e. learning two semesters of material in one semester, or learning three years of material in two years, etc.)
10. Mentoring (learning from an "expert")
11. Extracurricular Programs
12. Correspondence Courses
13. Early Graduation
14. Concurrent/Dual Enrollment (i.e. being dually enrolled in middle school and high school or in high school and college)
15. AP (Advanced Placement) or IB (International Baccalaureate) classes
16. Credit by Examination (i.e. taking a test to prove mastery... Colleges more typically offer this, where someone can "test out" of a class)
17. Acceleration in College
18. Early Entrance into Middle School, High School, or College

We have been providing subject acceleration in our schools here for a number of years, some of it through advanced-level groups within a grade level and some of it through above-grade placement in a subject. Most of our cases of above-grade placement have been in math.

So how does it work? Well, these details can give you an idea of one way subject acceleration can work. Feel free to share your own ideas and strategies in the comments section.

First, it's important to note that acceleration is not necessarily right for all gifted kids, or even for the same gifted kid in multiple subjects. It is a case-by-case determination. That said, though, acceleration (in its various forms) has been shown by oodles of research to offer a multitude of benefits for kids who are ready for it. The links at the bottom of this post will take you to further information on the topic.

I began the long road of bringing subject acceleration to my district about a decade ago, with one student who was an exceptional math student and whom I knew otherwise would only be getting grade-level content in math. I honestly don't remember how I did it, but I somehow convinced the principal and teachers involved that this student needed to go down the hall to a 6th grade math class when the 5th grade was doing math. They agreed to the arrangement, although made me promise that it could be "undone" if the student floundered or was teased. No worries - He thrived, and even outshone every 6th grader in the class. The initial surprise from some of the teachers caused me to shake my head in wonderment a time or two, but it wasn't long before the teachers involved became believers that not only were there some kids out there who could do this, but that we should be doing more of it. (!) Each year since, we have fine-tuned the process, and each year since, we have increased the number of kids being subject-accelerated. This year, for example, we have determined that 15 of our 5th graders were ready for 6th grade math. They LOVE it. More specifically, they love being challenged at a level they're ready for.

How do we decide which ones are ready? I seek recommendations from the 4th grade teachers (in particular from the teacher for our advanced 4th grade class) and I check every single 5th grader's score on the math portion of our state tests that they took in 4th grade and 3rd grade. Kids with the highest test scores and/or the highest teacher recommendations are selected for further screening (in most cases, they have both high scores and a teacher recommendation, although there is the occasional kid who only has one or the other). We give the kids a beginning-of-6th-grade assessment from our curriculum which targets the main skills the 6th grade teachers expect the incoming 6th graders to more or less have a good handle on. Any of the tested 5th graders who do well on the test (80% correct is a good target, although we always discuss each case and factor in work habits, desire for challenge, previous track record in math classes, etc.) is then placed into 6th grade math (which takes place at the same time as 5th grade math). So they leave their 5th grade classroom during math and walk down the hall to the 6th grade classroom for math.

We saved space for these kids in a 6th grade math class so that we could have a reasonable number of seats available for the number of 5th graders we were estimating would qualify. So some planning ahead in the schedule can be really helpful. But keep in mind, we started this here a decade ago with just one student. If what your school needs is a "test case" to "prove" to everyone that it can be done and the child CAN handle it well, then start with a test case. You can grow the process and the number of kids benefiting from it as you are able. (Yes, I agree, "but more kids need it now." In my case, I had to concede to myself that "starting somewhere" was better than "fighting the issue everywhere." And once we had "started somewhere," it didn't take long before I was no longer fighting the issue everywhere.)

Our middle school has grades 5-8, so yes, in 6th grade they walk down the hall for 7th grade math, in 7th grade they are scheduled into an 8th grade class (and by that point some of them are ready for the advanced 8th grade class), and as 8th graders they walk up the hill to our high school (it's essentially "next door") for either Algebra I or Geometry. And when they are full-time high school students, they continue to be placed according to their needs, which can mean an online AP Calculus course or other correspondence course or dual enrollment in a college course by the time they are seniors.

One of the most exciting outcomes of the process for me has been the enthusiasm by which (most) of the teachers view the process and the benefits for the students. They became so convinced of the need for subject acceleration for students who were ready for it that they developed their own procedures for subject accelerating kids in grades above 5th. If two weeks into the year, a 7th grader is blowing their socks off in their 7th grade math class, they assess the student and place her into an 8th grade class. When a new student comes and is assessed for placement, they put the child into whatever class he or she needs, basing their placement on what they're ready for as a learner, not on when they were born. I still coordinate the 5th to 6th grade acceleration process, but beyond that point, the process has evolved to take care of itself. Those who were once hesitant skeptics of subject acceleration are now enthusiastic supporters.

Mostly, today, I want to leave you with the words of the kids and teachers who have been a part of this process. The student quotations below come from a sampling of my 6th-11th graders, most of whom were subject accelerated from 5th to 6th grade math and a couple others were accelerated in a later grade level. I simply asked them for their thoughts on being accelerated - good, bad, or ugly. They took it from there:

"It was really helpful. It helped me improve my grades because I was no longer drifting off in an easy class."

"It's hard at first, but in the end it's worth it because you don't feel like you're held back. You can go above and beyond."

7th grader in advanced 8th grade class: "I like it because it gives me a challenge. It makes me work harder to get good grades."

"It's better to be challenged. I feel like I'm learning more. I'm doing better in school because I'm learning more and being challenged instead of being bored."

Teacher who has taught accelerated students: "Students express to me the relief of not being bored and under-challenged. They love to have their brains stimulated."

Teacher who has taught accelerated students: "The notion of keeping grades separate is a myth. I have 6th, 7th, and 8th graders in my '7th grade' math class. It's an intellectual class, not a social class. The 6th graders more than hold their own and the 8th graders tend to get it in gear when they see the 6th graders doing the work."

Teacher who has taught accelerated students: "It would be a shame to hold them back! Let them go on! They're usually even at the top of the class in the upper grade. They just want to learn and we need to let them."

Parent of a subject-accelerated student: "If they're ready for it, it allows them to take more in high school and not have to double up on classes in order to move on. My child is happier when she's learning and not repeating or reviewing information she previously mastered."

Homeroom 5th grade teacher who has had a few students subject-accelerated into 6th grade math: "Even if you try to accelerate in class, it's not the same. Try as you might, you just can't do for them what the subject grade acceleration can."

Institute for Research and Policy on Acceleration

A Nation Deceived: How Schools Hold Back America's Brightest Students (a summary of many decades worth of research on acceleration)

The Iowa Acceleration Scales (the most widely used method for determining acceleration placements)

Advice for parents whose kids might need acceleration

Synthesis of research on acceleration options by Dr. Karen Rogers (1999)

A statement on acceleration by Dr. David Elkind, president emeritus of the National Association for the Education of Young Children and author of The Hurried Child

More acceleration links from Hoagies' Gifted Education Page

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 7:51 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)

St. Louis, here we come!

This year's national conference (i.e. NAGC) will take place in St. Louis, Missouri, November 4-8, 2009. In addition to the 260+ regular conference breakout sessions (on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday), there will once again be Wednesday Academies, Thursday Action Labs, and Thursday Board Institutes, plus some great general sessions and mini-keynotes. One general session in particular that I'm curious to hear is a presentation by Josh Waitzkin, author of "The Art of Learning: An Inner Journey to Optimal Performance." Josh is an eight-time national chess champion and is also the person (then boy) whom "Searching for Bobby Fischer" was based on. I am intrigued to hear about his life story from his own voice and to ponder his theories on reaching "optimal performance."

I won't be able to be there on Wednesday, but if I was, I'd be curious to attend "Taking Middle School Gifted Students to Higher Ground" or "Tools and Strategies for Promoting Literacy and New Literacies for Young Gifted Students."

And I'm still debating what to sign up for on Thursday. "The Advocacy Journey: Finding Success for the Gifted Student" would certainly apply, as advocacy is a big piece of what I do as a Gifted Education Specialist (and also as President of our state organization, Montana AGATE). "Making Sense of Underachievement: A Counselor’s Perspective" catches my attention because it's an important topic and I know someone who attended the same session by the same presenter (Jean Sunde Peterson) at Edufest this summer and raved about it. Having great options to pick from is at least a good problem to have! ;o)

For all the parents out there, consider attending the convention's Parent Day on Saturday, November 7th. It looks to be a nearly 12-hour day chock full of opportunities to interact with other parents of gifted kids, learn about oodles of topics of interest to parents, and hear from keynoter Howard Gardner. You can even register for Parent Day for a special parent rate!

Want to get organized and plan your conference session selections before you hop on the plane? Use the awesome "itinerary planner" to build your own conference schedule. (FYI - If you are already an NAGC member but haven't logged into their system before, your username for logging into the Learning Center - where you can access the itinerary planner - is your email address and your password is your NAGC membership number. If you are not already an NAGC member, you can create a login account for free.) I love using the itinerary planner because I know that once my plane lands I will have very little time to read through the BOOK that is the conference schedule to figure out which sessions I want to attend. (Just as an interesting idea to toss out to y'all, I always bring the book/schedule back to show my students so they can see where I was and can read about some of the "classes" I took. They're usually rather impressed by all the topics and that 3,000 teachers get together each fall to learn about better ways to reach them as advanced learners.)

And bring some pocket change! The Exhibit Hall is so magnetic and will draw you in!

Friday night will be an evening of Network Events, each one sponsored by one of NAGC's fourteen Networks (essentially, they are special-interest sub-groups, like "Creativity" and "Research & Evaluation" and "Early Childhood"). Apparently the Creativity Network's Event, "Creativity Night," is a lot of fun. And I got quite a chuckle out of the Computers & Technology Network's title for their Event this year: "Speed Geeking," an interactive “speed date” of 5-minute presentations about educational uses of some of the best free technology resources.

I'm excited to be heading to St. Louis once again. The only other time I've been there was back in college when a friend and I went there for the National Collegiate Honors Council conference. It was October of 1993, the year of the floods, and I still recall how squishy the ground under the arch was, soaked with water even weeks after the Mississippi's unusually-wide summer flood line had receded. I may take advantage of the opportunity to go up the arch again. What an architectural marvel! The cars looked like ants from way up there... And St. Louis being the town where the Lewis & Clark expedition began lends the city some additional fascination for me. (Signs of Lewis & Clark are just about everywhere here in Montana!)

What do you appreciate most about attending the national convention? I love being able to interact with so many other people who do what I do. I love having access to so many great learning opportunities (i.e. all the sessions). I love the energy, the hundred new ideas I come back with (although my crazy "to do" list usually only allows implementation of about three!), the chance to see old friends, the continuous debate of ideas and exchange of theories. But I think most of all, I love coming home and seeing my students and letting them know that thousands and thousands of people are "on the job" of helping to improve understanding of gifted kids and methods for reaching them as learners. They feel less alone in being gifted when I let them know that I'm less alone in being a Gifted Specialist.

Okay, I'm off to officially register for the NAGC convention now... Consider doing the same! It's always interesting and worthwhile. You can register online or via snail mail. Oh, and if you register by Sept. 18th, your registration fee is $25 cheaper...

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 9:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I remember many years ago a discussion that broiled in a grade-level staff meeting regarding a 7th grade student at our middle school whom all the teachers were concerned about. As a consistently struggling student, she had been referred for possible Special Education services a few times over the years but never qualified for the services because her overall IQ wasn't quite low enough and she had no IQ-achievement discrepancy. Yet it was clear to her 7th grade teachers, as it had been clear to previous grade teachers, that she needed some sort of assistance. But the hands of the Special Education teachers were tied because the student didn't qualify for their services yet again. The 7th grade teachers were passionate that something needed to be done to give this student the assistance she obviously (to them) needed, and the special education teachers were frustrated that they were restricted by rules, regulations, laws, policies, etc. from being able to reach out to this student and offer her their expertise.

I don't remember what solution, if any, the teachers came up with to help her, but I do vividly recall the passion and intensity of the discussion. In part, I remember it because I recall thinking at the time that I was grateful gifted education (in Montana, at least) wasn't so restrictive. If the teachers and gifted specialist determine a kid needs gifted education services, we aren't limited by magic numbers from providing that student the services.

Yet there are places where "magic numbers" are required for a student to receive gifted education services, and I'm certain discussions similarly passionate to the one above have occurred regarding students who don't have the magic numbers to qualify for gifted education services and yet the teachers (and parents) all know the student needs the services.

When I first learned about RTI, or Response to Intervention, I thought, "Ah, so we weren't the only school with students who needed the expertise of special education services but didn't technically qualify for those services." RTI has been created as a way to make sure the kid gets the assistance/services he needs whether or not he technically qualifies for special education or as having a learning disability.

RTI is a tiered service delivery model, which means different levels of service (instruction, assistance) are provided and students receive their instruction and any assistance at whatever tier (or level) they need that information. So (pardon my simplistic diagrams created in Word, transferred to Fireworks, saved as JPEGs, & somehow uploaded for your viewing pleasure), the green tier (Tier 1) in the diagram below is the Core, i.e. the level at which instruction delivery will be appropriate for most students.

The yellow tier (Tier 2) represents the targeted or strategic interventions that some students will receive when assessments show they aren't quite learning the material after the Core lesson or layer of instruction. Tier 2 is where students receive some additional practice on a skill or additional instruction on a concept in order to help them grasp that skill or concept. The red tier (Tier 3) represents the intensive instruction that a handful of students may need when assessments show that Tier 1 instruction and Tier 2 instruction have not allowed the child desired results (i.e. learning or mastery).

[Interestingly, this tiered visual no longer appears on any of the RTI information sites - or if it does, it's modified. My graphics capabilities are limited, so I couldn't create anything much beyond this for you. I've place these images here simply for all the visual learners out there, not as a be-all end-all representation of an RTI model.]

RTI is instruction in tiers, not students in tiers, so the same given child could receive instruction in Tier 1 for learning the alphabet (for example), Tier 2 for learning the sounds of each letter, and Tier 3 for learning specific consonant blends (such as "cl" and "bl").

I ask you: Whose learning needs aren't represented in this model?

Yep, the gifted student. At face value, the essential RTI model assumes the Core (or Tier 1) will meet the needs of all students who aren't struggling with that skill or concept. Is the core, whole-class, grade-level instruction and curriculum appropriate for the gifted learners you know? Perhaps in some subjects for some advanced learners, but for all of them? Of course not. They have often already mastered the material (or can do so very quickly). Think about this:

> Just as there are some students who are a little bit behind in any given area/subject and who will need some extra assistance (i.e. Tier 2), there are about the same number of students who are a little bit ahead and will need some extra challenge and/or acceleration.

> Just as there are a few students who are significantly behind in any given area/subject and will need some significant assistance (i.e. Tier 3), there are about the same number of students who are significantly ahead and will need significant extra challenge and/or acceleration.

Spend enough time reading information about RTI and you will sooner or later come across a statement that says something to the effect of RTI being a way to make sure that every student, whether struggling or gifted or somewhere inbetween, gets what he or she needs as a learner.

Here, here!

But my concern is that nearly every piece of information about RTI talks about it in relation to the struggling learner. And that is how most schools seem to be interpreting its purpose. Yes, that was its original intended purpose, but you can also find information referring to RTI as a model for effective schoolwide reform, as "Every Ed" rather than "Special Ed," as having the ability to transform how we educate all students. I agree with those last three possibilities (and am excited by them), but they won't happen if the nearly-sole focus of RTI implementation is for only the struggling learner.

To me, it was simply instinctive to recognize that the tiers of instruction could be flipped to represent how we as schools can and should also provide tiered services for our advanced learners. And in the state of Montana we are in the beginning stages of trying to utilize RTI in both directions. Knowing this, I contacted my district's person-in-charge-of-RTI last year and offered to talk to our RTI committee about RTI for gifted and the response I got was, "Well, I don't think that's necessary. This is really more of a special education thing and doesn't have anything to do with gifted."

My fear is that any district adopting RTI with that line of thinking will (continue to?) ignore the tiered needs of its advanced/gifted learners while at the same time easily recognizing the tiered needs of their struggling learners.

So, not that I have the power to do this, but in order to help schools know that it can and does work both ways, I propose the RTI tiers - at least in implementation! - should look more like this:

[And really, if you turn it on its side, what does it remind you of?

MmmHmm - a bell curve.]

Here in Montana, we recently hired a GT Specialist at the state level (our Office of Public Instruction). [This means we finally actually have someone at the state level in a GT position!] And her job in part includes helping Montana districts implement RTI in the advanced/gifted direction, too. OPI asked me to be on the interview team and this meant missing a day of school this past spring to go to Helena and meet the candidates. When I explained to my students why I was going to be gone, I told them about RTI and drew the 3-tier model up on the board. Each time, no matter what the grade level of students I was talking to, their immediate response after hearing the explanation was, "But what about us? Where are we in all that?" It was so obvious to them, too, that there were missing tiers.

Is your district (or your child's school) implementing RTI (or their own version of it)? Here are some possible questions you could pose to find out if/how tiers of instruction will also apply to advanced/gifted learners:

* Those are great strategies for how we can reach the kids who struggle grasping a skill or concept. What strategies are we going to use to reach (i.e. stretch) the kids who already have a handle on the skill or concept?

* As we will already be assessing all students frequently [a key piece of RTI], how can we use that data to better reach/teach our advanced learners, too?

* We're putting into place a great continuum of services for our struggling learners. How about we examine also putting into place a continuum of services for our advanced learners?

* So these are our strategies for reaching our learners who are a bit behind. What are our strategies for reaching our learners who are a bit ahead?

As fuel for your questions, I recommend reading some RTI information sites and pulling quotes from RTI documents about "educating ALL students." For example, the following quotations come from the Montana RTI Trainers Training Manual (perhaps it is the same manual used in all states, I don't know...). (In each case, the emphasis is mine.)

"Response to Instruction (RTI) is the practice of providing high-quality instruction to all students based on individual need."

"…creates a continuum of instructional supports."

"Students who score at the higher level of Tier 1 should be receiving instruction that will continue to keep them challenged."

"Student learning is evaluated based on how quickly that student acquires instructed material (learning rate). The effect of this shift [in philosophy and process] is that it enables educators to focus on how much and what types of instruction students need, which increases accountability for student learning." (Which begs another question you could pose: * Shouldn't we as educators also be accountable for the learning of our advanced students?)

"Essentially, RTI is the practice of: (a) providing high-quality instruction/intervention matched to all students’ needs and (b) using assessment to determine learning rate and level of performance to (c) make important educational decisions to guide instruction."

If RTI is being promoted as a means to improve learning and instruction for **ALL** students, then let’s make sure that actually happens.

Want to learn more about RTI? Want to find out more about RTI's implications for gifted education? Try these links:

RTI Action Network

National Center on Response to Intervention

Colorado Department of Education RTI page (Colorado is including gifted in their RTI implementation)

Thinking Points - RTI and Gifted Education (also from Colorado Department of Education)

Council for Exceptional Children - RTI Information and Articles

National Association of State Directors of Special Education - Response to Intervention Project

Pieces of Learning - Progress Monitoring Forms for Gifted Learners (I have not used these and therefore don't have an opinion on them one way or the other, but found them while hunting for RTI + gifted info and figured someone out there might want to check them out.)

Gifted Child Today, Vol.32 No.3, Summer 2009 Special Issue: Response to Intervention I do subscribe to "Gifted Child Today," but it is delivered to my school address, so this new RTI/Gifted issue that I'm very much looking forward to seeing is somewhere in a pile of district summer mail that hasn't yet been delivered to my box (we haven't started school yet here - although do soon). So I have just written this entire post and now discover/realize that my timing is either really good (many of you out there will be interested in this topic due to GCT's latest issue) or really bad (because as soon as I finally am able to see the issue, I will probably discover information and resources I could've linked y'all to here in this post). Either way, I guess I can update if/as necessary.

What have been your experiences with RTI's implications for gifted students in your schools? How are your schools utilizing the RTI model/process to reach ALL students? Do you see RTI as a potential benefit for gifted education and gifted students, or as a concern, or both?

A final thought from Susan Winebrenner (2001): "Learning is forward progress from point of entry."

P.S. If you haven't yet taken my quick survey, please do so! Thanks :o)

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 9:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (11)

From now through the end of 2009, NAGC (the National Association for Gifted Children) will be offering free webinars on the 2nd and 4th Wednesdays of each month (plus a monthly "Parent Night.") It looks like they have a wide range of topics lined up (everything from perfectionism to advocacy to program evaluation and much more), along with some great presenters. I have never attended a webinar before, but I just signed up for my first one! Should be a good learning experience in more ways than one. Here are the titles and dates for the webinars announced thus far:

August 26, 7:00 p.m. EST - Classroom Indicators of Giftedness with Mary Slade, James Madison University, Harrisonburg, Virginia. (I met Mary at Edufest a couple years ago. She's a riot!)

September 9, 12:00 p.m. EST - Differentiation Overview with Jennifer Beasley, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Arkansas.

September 16, 7:00 p.m. EST - Parent Night - Back to School. Back to Gifted. with Robin Schader, NAGC Parent Resource Advisor.

September 23, 7:00 p.m. EST - Things Administrators Should Know about Gifted Education with Joyce VanTassel-Baska, College of William & Mary, Williamsburg, Virginia. (Joyce presented a keynote at Edufest this year, and I loved her down-to-earth sense of humor!) I'm hoping I can get at least one administrator from my district to sign up for this one. I think gifted education has good (and in some cases great) support here in my district, but there's always room for learning more :o)

October 14, 12:00 p.m. EST - Pre-Assessment: What are the Tools? (no presenter is listed yet for this one)

October 28, 7:00 p.m. EST - Examining the Myths and Truths of Gifted Education (no presenter is listed yet for this one, either)

Registration for each webinar opens two weeks before the event and closes when all the "seats" are filled. (They don't appear to be announcing just how many "seats" are available, but it is apparently limited so as to allow for "active participation.")

Want more info? Check out Webinars on Wednesdays.

Love Webinars? The SENG organization (Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted) also offers webinars on gifted topics. (There is a $40 fee for participation in SENG webinars, but that's a rather good deal for having a gifted education expert right there in your computer, live, for 90 minutes! Plus the fee includes unlimited access to a recording of the session.)

The next SENG webinar is tomorrow (Wednesday, August 19) at 7:30 p.m. EST - Social and Emotional Intelligence: The Path to a Gifted Child's Success and Well-Being with Steven Pfeiffer, Florida State University. (I won't be attending that one because I will be digging a giant hole in my backyard tomorrow - I'm building a garage and at this very moment a Caterpillar is sitting out there waiting to move a few hundred yards of dirt for me :o)

Another upcoming SENG webinar will take place Sunday, September 20, at 4:00 p.m. EST - Grandparents and Gifted Children with James T. Webb, Great Potential Press.

Happy Learning! :o)

P.S. If you haven't yet answered the five easy questions of my survey, please do so! Thanks :o)

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 10:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Well, the Edufest conference finished up swimmingly (and I did manage to get a smidge of "swimming" in via a float down the Boise River one day - squeezed in-between presenting and dinner). Here are a few highlights of what I learned the last three days of Edufest that might be of interest/use for any of you:

iTunes University - Did you know that universities are now recording professors' lectures and making them available for anyone to learn from? Want to learn about computer programming from an MIT professor? Want to listen in on a class at Oxford? You can do it via iTunes University!

Online Stopwatch - Want to give your students a visual reminder of how much time is left? Online Stopwatch counts up or down and the displayed numbers are large enough to be easily seen from a computer in the room (better yet, project it onto a big screen or wall if you are so equipped).

SchoolTube - Do your students want to post their video projects on YouTube but your district blocks the site or you're worried about the too-open-for-school-ness that is YouTube? Try SchoolTube, the school-friendly version of video posting.

Have a kid who wants to learn about programming and making/designing computer games? Scratch is a great place to get started. Created by the "Lifelong Kindergarten" group [isn't that a great name‽] at the MIT Media Lab, Scratch is a free download and once it's downloaded, the computer doesn't have to be online for the program to work.

Do your students email their homework to you? Inbox getting clogged up? Try Drop.io where you can create a free online drop box (up to 100MB) that your students can drop their digital homework into and you can retrieve it from. Keep even more organized by creating a separate box for each class period. (Also great for sharing large files with people other than your students, too, of course.)

Concerned that your students don't know the best ways to search on the internet? Google has little posters with search strategies that you can print out and hang in your classroom.

Looking for a pseudo-website to help teach your students that not everything on the web is valid and reliable? Show them this page about the (supposed) Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus and see if they bite.

Want to learn about more items like these? Poke around at this website created by the presenter for the technology strand where I learned these ideas (the presenter was Brian Housand). At Brian's Edufest page, click on any Day or click on "60 in 60" for additional ideas.

In addition to all of the above snazzy links that I'm excited to share with my students, I also spent a great deal of time learning about strategies for helping the teachers in my district implement differentiation in their instruction. This fall, as a matter of fact, I'll be running a year-long study group for any interested teachers from my district and the focus will be helping them learn various DI strategies and supporting them throughout the year as they begin the process of implementing them. (But more on that later! I should do a whole post about the study group and what I'm doing with them this fall when I have it up and running.)

And last but not least, I learned about survey creation software. Actually, Brian taught us about the Forms option at Google Docs, which creates surveys and then people can access your survey via the internet and you can collect the results/data in your Google account. It occurred to me that, hey, that would be a great way to gain some information/ideas from my blog readers! But the Forms option at Google Docs didn't have a feature I wanted (being able to post real-time results publicly so that all of you can see the results, too). So I hunted around on the internet, checked out 45 different online survey creation sites, and chose one (Advanced Survey) to use to create a little survey for y'all to fill out. (If you don't mind... :o) It's anonymous and I'm not tracking or gathering any traceable info via this survey. It's just that I've been curious... I know there are a lot of people out there who read, but I don't know much about my audience (except those who post comments). Are you mostly teachers? Mostly parents of gifted kids? Mostly people in the GT field? Do any administrators come here to read about Gifted Education issues? Who are you, quietly lurking out there???

Please take a moment and answer the five easy questions in my survey. I will post a link in the Comments section here so that you can come back and see the real-time results of the survey if you'd like.

Here's what you do:
1. Go to Advanced Survey
2. Type my survey # into the little "Take a Survey" box on the right side of the page. Survey # is 69305.
3. Click "Go" and answer the five easy questions. (*Thank you!!!*)
4. If you want to see the real-time results, check below in the comments section for the link to view them. (The Advanced Survey system should also let you view them right away after completing the survey.)

I didn't set an end-date on the survey, so anyone finding this post a year from now could still (in theory - if everything works as it should) be able to fill out the survey and/or see the results.

Have a great week, everyone!
Tamara :o)

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 2:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (6)

Greetings, all! This week finds me at one of my favorite places, Edufest in Boise, Idaho. It's a Gifted Education conference that takes place the last week of July each year. It's intense, in-depth, inspiring, interesting, jam-packed, fun, eye-opening, and energizing. (Edufest is patterned after Confratute, which takes place in Storrs, Connecticut, each summer, so those of you who live in the East could consider it an option if Idaho is a bit of a stretch for you.)

Essentially, the conference schedule is structured such that instead of attending each session for an hour(-ish) and then moving on to something else (and therefore never being able to delve much deeper into a topic in a conference setting), you instead attend strands, which last all week and are pretty much mini-classes on a given topic. Each day for three 1-1/2 hour time slots, you attend a presentation by the same presenter on the same topic, so you have the opportunity to learn in much greater depth. (Of course, this also contributes to the conference's intensity, but everyone seems to thrive on that!) If you scroll down at the Edufest link, you can click to access a list and description of this year's strands. For example, one of the strands I'm attending this year is about "leading and implementing differentiated instruction." Aimed at GT specialists, principals, curriculum directors, etc., we are learning in this strand various strategies for teaching the teachers in our districts about DI, plus strategies for helping our districts/systems implement it. My next strand is actually one I'm teaching (together with my co-author, Karen Isaacson) on "parent/teacher collaboration." We are discussing with the participants various strategies for building positive communication and relationships between the parents and teachers of gifted kids. For the other strand I'm attending, I am learning about "unleashing the power of technology for the gifted - making creative and critical thinking connections." I'm excited to share with my students all of the great new technology resources I've learned about! For example, my little musicians will love learning about Audacity, a free cross-platform sound editor.

In addition to the strands, there are also five keynotes and three "special topics" (i.e. one-time-only) sessions.

I was curious what everyone else was getting out of their experience here this week, so I went around to some tables at dinner and surveyed a variety of the attendees. (I told all of them the purpose for my question and that their responses would be anonymous). The question I posed was, "What is something that you have learned here at Edufest this week that you think everyone else 'out there' needs to know?" These responses come from conference attendees who are parents of gifted children, regular classroom teachers, gifted specialists, counselors, administrators, and experts in the field (presenters here) who are nationally (and some internationally) known for their work in Gifted Education. For some of those who answered my question, this is the first Gifted Education conference they have ever attended and for many of those first-timers, this is also their first exposure to learning about gifted students. Others whom I interviewed are 'old-timers' well-versed in knowledge, strategies, and research regarding gifted students. (And, of course, every portion of the spectrum in-between.)

"I have learned how to go back to my district and be an advocate while being low-key. We have a lot of kids who aren't identified because they aren't the 'perfect' gifted kid, and I've learned strategies to advocate for them without being pushy."

"We never learn enough. Gifted Education is a pursuit of the heart, a family. We get re-charged here. There's something inspirational every day and it gives you reason to keep fighting the fight."

(regarding the twice exceptional) "People still continue to want to 'fix' someone. It's hard to go through the paradigm shift of switching to focusing on strengths and what the kids CAN do. We're still married to the method. If we're going to change things [for 2e kids], we need to focus on the big ideas and not get bogged down in old methods. But adherence to old methods is strong."

"I learned about EtherPad!"
(work together in real time on the same document)

"I've learned this week that there are a frightening number of underidentified and unidentified gifted children, particularly children of color. That's unacceptable! I hope with more seminars like this we can change that."

"I've learned to be open-minded about differentiation because there are kids who really ARE in a different place."

What methods do you utilize for learning about giftedness, gifted students, and Gifted Education? Books? Websites? Conferences? Research journals? Webinars? Magazines? Asking your school's gifted specialist? -- Are you not even sure where to begin?

And I pose the same original question to you: What have you learned recently (about giftedness, gifted students, Gifted Education) that you think everyone else "out there" needs to know?

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 12:01 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)