Unwrapping the Gifted

In the September 2007 issue of "Parenting for High Potential," the National Association for Gifted Children published its newly created “Gifted Children’s Bill of Rights” written by NAGC President Del Siegle. Those of us who attended the NAGC convention in Minneapolis a couple weeks ago were also treated to a free poster of the list, printed by Prufrock Press. I shared the list with my 7th & 8th graders this week and I want to share it with all of you as well. Included beneath each item are some of my thoughts on it along with comments that my students had about each one.

1. You have a right to know about your giftedness.

Gifted children typically instinctively know that there’s something “different” about themselves, but they sometimes can’t quite put a finger on just what it is. Learning about anything that affects oneself is always a powerful and enlightening process. Knowing that you are gifted is no different. One of my boys commented yesterday what a help it was to him when he was identified for the program because he said he then finally had a lens through which to explore his quirks and talents. Giftedness often comes with a host of trials, challenges, blessings, and paradoxes, and being able to frame them with some insight and knowledge makes for a healthier human. These kids ARE different, and we do them a disservice if we deny them the opportunity to develop an understanding of just how and why they are different.

2. You have a right to learn something new every day.

“Yes!” was the resounding response from my students. Too often, gifted kids are placed into learning situations where the content and/or pace are nowhere near their readiness levels. They view the resulting environment as drudgery. Some will go through the motions. Others rebel (in various ways). As I’ve said here many times, school should be about LEARNING. When a child isn’t learning because the content is too complex or the pace is too fast, we make accommodations and do everything we can to assure that the child still has an opportunity to learn at his or her own readiness level. But if the content is not complex enough or if the pace is not fast enough, we conversely expect the child to put on the brakes and re-hash old material or learn new material at a pace that feels to them like crawling. This dichotomy needs to be abolished! A gifted child has just as much right to learn as any other child does. It may be (perceived as) inconvenient to reach them where they are, but it’s still unethical to not do so.

3. You have a right to be passionate about your talent area without apologies.

Gifted children are so passionate about their talents and interest areas! They eat, breathe, drink, dream, and live what they love. Yet those around them (parents, age-peers, teachers) don’t always understand how a child can want to spend a sunny day indoors reading about bacterial conjugation, or why it matters what the difference is between mauve and lavender. But to a gifted child who holds those passions, it is a big deal. Mom & Dad and Teacher don’t have to share an interest in the topic. They just need to be understanding of the fact that the child loves it so much. Telling them they’re “too into it” or “only keen on weird topics” or “too excited about that new book” only succeeds in shutting them down. Our world doesn’t need to be shutting these kids down. Because our world has a place for people who get excited about bacterial conjugation or the minute differences between colors. We need them. Let them be.

4. You have a right to have an identity beyond your talent area.

“He’s the Math geek.” “She’s the science genius.” “He’s the one who published a book at age 14.” “She’s the one who skipped two grades.” It’s an easy trap to fall into, really – pigeonholing gifted kids by their talents or accomplishments. But they are so much more than what they’re good at or what they’ve done well. Just like everyone else, they are human in all its glory: complex, emotional, diverse, and precious for just being. To distill them down to a single talent or accomplishment is to ignore the rest of who they are, is to disparage their humanness, is to overlook their weaknesses and other strengths, is to forget that they are still just a child who is still developing an identity. Help them come to know ALL of who they are by seeing them for who they are instead of seeing them for what they can do.

5. You have a right to feel good about your accomplishments.

What a delicate balance these children are attempting to achieve: being humble about their abilities and accomplishments while also being proud of what they can do and what they have done. If they swing too much to the humble side, they may lose sight of their talent or miss the opportunities that may come along to pursue it. If they swing too much to the pride side, they may exhibit such cockiness that they forget other people have talents, too, or that even they have weaknesses. If they consistently downplay their talents and accomplishments, they are denying themselves one of Life’s joys: basking in the glory of success. Yet if they bask in too much glory, they risk alienating those around them. The students in my class said that they feel like they have to qualify every success they have or every compliment they receive with a “well, but…” As in: “well, but I screwed up on the last page,” or “well, but it doesn’t fit together right,” or “well, but I didn’t understand how to answer the third question.” Humility is important. Very important. But let’s not deny these kids that great feeling they get inside when they accomplish something. After all, it is pursuit of that great feeling (a satisfied curiosity, for example) that gets them rolling in the first place. If we shut down their right to access that feeling, we shut down their desire to pursue what they are capable of achieving.

6. You have a right to make mistakes.

Ah, yes, those perfect little gifted children who score 100%’s on everything. At least, that’s what the kids perceive we think of them. And the comments teachers, parents, and age-peers make often only contribute to this perception. One of my girls gave a great example. She is a county Spelling Bee winner and she said that every time she spells a word incorrectly, she gets comments from people like “What do you mean you don’t know how to spell that word? Aren’t you the Spelling Bee champ?” The kids who have been accelerated in Math said that other kids seem to expect them to just magically know everything there is to know about Math. Yet these kids know they aren’t perfect. They know mistakes are a part of the learning process. They know that mucking around in a topic to truly learn it means accepting the mistakes that come along with the process. But the message they often pick up on from others is an expectation of perfection. For kids who often struggle with perfectionism to begin with, this can be a bad combination! We can help them have a healthier outlook by sending different messages. We can publicly own up to our own mistakes. We can accept that they will make mistakes, too. It is possible to maintain high expectations for learning goals while eliminating the expectation of perfection.

7. You have a right to seek guidance in the development of your talent.

Because these kids learn so well on their own, especially in the early years, they can grow accustomed to not needing someone else to help get them to where they’re going. Some even develop the belief that they should always be able to do it all on their own. Yet Olympic athletes don’t achieve their high level of performance without coaching. They seek out the best who can assist them in becoming the best. We can help our gifted children apply this same philosophy to themselves. Where do they want to go? Who can help them learn what they need to learn in order to get there? A mentoring relationship can be a life-transforming event, one that brings about the scaling of heights not otherwise reached. Anyone throughout history who has accomplished anything noteworthy had guidance at some point along the way. We need to help make it okay for these kids to raise a hand and ask for guidance.

8. You have a right to have multiple peer groups and a variety of friends.

Gifted children choose friends by common interests, not by common birth-years. This served me well in high school when I didn’t want to hang out with my age-peers, many of whom were, shall we say, involved in things I didn’t want to be involved in. So as a freshman, most of my friends were juniors and seniors. And as a senior, most of my friends were freshmen and sophomores. I was all of 20 when I met my friend Blanche (may she rest in peace), sixty years my senior. But it didn’t matter. She collected quotations just like I do. She researched topics on the side simply because they interested her. We connected by our common interests. My neighbor and dear friend Tracy is in her mid-eighties. Tracy was a Rosie the Riveter during WWII. Her job was to climb inside the ammunition canisters and weld the inside seams. She was also a pilot. She and her husband had a small plane and she used to take solo sunrise flights while her husband and kids slept in. Tracy has as many tools in her garage as I do in mine – and she knows how to use them, too. Even in this modern day, some people find it odd that I, a woman, can use so many tools. Imagine what it means to me, then, to have a friend like Tracy – someone who was like me in that way long before I was even around.

9. You have a right to choose which of your talent areas you wish to pursue.

The term “multipotentiality” is often applied to the gifted. They typically have many talents, many areas in which they excel. But that places them under no obligation to pursue each and every one of those talents to its fullest extent. I have talents I am not pursuing. At some point, I had to come to the realization that I would do myself in if I tried to pursue everything at once. Then I would only succeed in not doing any of them very well at all. So I made choices. Right now, these are the talents I am pursuing. Those others – maybe I’ll get to them at some point in the future, maybe I won’t. But either way, it’s my choice which ones I pursue and when. A child may have all the ability in the world to become a Nobel-Prize-winning research scientist, but if she chooses instead to pursue her talents in Law and vie for a seat on the Supreme Court, that is her prerogative! Mom & Dad may want Johnny to become a doctor because he always did well in his science classes, but Johnny may want instead to become a 3rd grade teacher and share his passion for science with hundreds of kids. Both options may be reasonable, but it is the individual’s choice which to pursue.

10. You have a right to not be gifted at everything.

“You mean you don’t know how to dance? Gee, I thought you were good at everything.” In a way, it almost snowballs for these kids. They excel at learning how to read, then they realize they excel at learning Math, learning science, running, playing an instrument, drawing, designing, filling leadership roles, and on and on. Pretty soon, they expect themselves to be able to do everything well (or at least someone around them expects that). What a heavy weight to carry! Cut them a break. Help them to understand that we all have our limitations. And that’s okay!

If you would like to print your own mini-poster version of this “Gifted Children’s Bill of Rights,” you can do so here.

Also, the full text of Del’s article in “Parenting for High Potential” that debuted this list can be viewed here.

Interestingly, while doing a little hunting around in the process of writing this post, I found a few other “bill of rights”-type lists pertaining to gifted learners. Bertie Kingore’s “The Gifted Reader’s Bill of Rights” applies these and other ideas to the talent area of reading. From a 1991 NCAGT newsletter, this is “The Bill of Rights for Gifted Children.” And I’m particularly intrigued by the “Gifted Kids’ Bill of Rights” written by Marissa Lingen. I love her #7: “I have the right to be my age. If I’m a smart 7-year-old, I’m a smart 7-year-old, not a short 30-year-old.”

I came across a few references, too, to an article written by Abraham Tannenbaum in 1988 that apparently concludes with a bill of rights for the gifted. I couldn’t seem to find a way to access the text of it, though. So if anyone out there can get their paws on a copy of it and post his bill of rights here in the comment section, I’d be curious to see what his version said, as well. Thanks :o)

Have a great week, everyone!

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 11:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Last week and this week have found me spending late nights sitting at tables in cold gymnasiums (note to self: wear long johns tomorrow night!), meeting with parents for Parent/Teacher Conferences. The parents come around to each teacher on their child's schedule to "conference." I put out the word to the parents of my elementary students that they could meet with me at the middle school (last week) or high school (this week) if they wanted to chat with me about their child(ren) whom I work with in our District's GT program. The middle & high school parents are already here for the same purpose.

Around this time of year, my colleagues rib me good-naturedly about what my Parent/Teacher Conferences must be like. They'll say to me, "So what do you say to all those parents? 'Yup, you're kid's getting straight A's again. Gee, what on earth are we going to do about him?!?'" What they don't realize is that the parents of my students often confide some serious issues to me or pose some heavy questions. They often don't feel comfortable bringing it to the child's regular classroom teacher. Or sometimes the issue/question involves the child's teacher. Or for other questions, they know that I have background knowledge about gifted kids that classroom teachers often don't have (because it was never taught to them, not because they can't develop that knowledge.) Here's a sampling for you of what Parent/Teacher Conferences are really like for a Gifted Education Specialist:

* A parent of an elementary student asks me how to deal with the following situation: Her daughter came home in tears one day, sobbing for an hour, because the teacher (from the child's perspective) has repeatedly held her up in front of the class (figuratively, of course) as an example to the other students... something along the lines of, "See, kids, THIS is how it's supposed to be done." The child feels terribly uncomfortable about this. She's deeply sensitive. She wants the other kids to like her and respect her, and it's hard to accomplish that when the teacher is using you as the public (i.e. not anonymous) model.

* A parent of a middle school boy says, "I'm worried my child will develop an ulcer. He worries so much about everything. He strives for perfection and agonizes when he doesn't achieve it." She wanted to know strategies for helping her child to reach a healthy balance with his perfectionism. She wants to know how to head off the ulcer before it actually appears. (Yay for being pro-active!)

* A parent of an upper elementary child says, "I need some advice before we conference with our child's teacher." She wanted to know how to broach the subject tactfully and yet still get her point across. The child is apparently being used as the classroom tutor, spending much of her day helping the other kids learn the material (i.e. doing the teacher's job) and therefore not being able to use her time to advance her own learning.

* One of my high school girls meets with me at the table, passing her report card across for me to see. "So why the C in Senior English?" Turns out it's finally challenging for her and she's not sure how to ask the teacher for help. She's never had to do that before.

* The parent of a middle school boy is flabbergasted. His grades in a couple classes vacillate between A+ and F... 100% or 0%. If he finds the assignment interesting and worthy of his time, he does it. If he feels he already knew the material, he doesn't "bother" doing the assignment because he doesn't see the point in wasting time on a repetitive assignment when he knew the material before the lesson. He prefers to put his time into assignments that require the learning of new material, rather than the mindless repetition of already-mastered material.

* One of my elementary girls approaches the table... She's been following her father around as he visits her older brother's teachers. And out of the mouths of babes she says, "I never knew before that my brother was such a good kid!"

* The parent of a middle schooler asks, "How do I help my child develop good work habits in school before he gets to high school?" He moved here recently and had previously rather skated through school without much effort.

* Two of my boys, one a middle schooler and the other in elementary school, approach my table with their parents. The older boy is already planning out his independent project that he'll do in my Advanced Studies class second semester and has questions about how to accomplish certain aspects of it. The younger one asks me a string of thought-provoking questions: "How come some kids don't seem to care about school? What can I do now to prepare myself to skip a level in Math when I'm in middle school? How did you know I needed to be in GT? How come Aaron uses his intelligence for bad instead of for good?"

* A mother of two elementary girls seeks advice about how to approach the school and encourage the incorporation of more leveled Math groups so the advanced students can move at a pace that better matches their learning abilities. She is also confused about what to do about her youngest, who is pretty much caught between two grade levels right now. She may need to be grade skipped at some point, and her mother is asking "how do we determine if and when the time is right to do that? What consideration do we have to give to the fact that she has an older sister in a numerically close grade level? Great in-classroom accommodations are being made for her this year, but what if that doesn't happen in a future year?"

Teaching gifted kids isn't a cake-walk of perfect kids with perfect grades and perfect behavior. It's a complex array of unique kids with quirky issues... who happen to usually do well in school. Assuming all is well because they have great grades may lead to overlooking some rather serious issues. I consider it an important aspect of my job to educate the parents of my students (and the students themselves) about these potential issues so that they're knowledgeable enough to speak up if/when they arise. Through this blog, I hope to do the same for many of you as well.

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 10:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (14)

Professional development – What thoughts and feelings do those words conjure up for you? Excitement? Boredom? A chance to improve your skills and learn new, interesting teaching strategies? A painful time of listening to someone talk about a topic you already have a handle on?

We’ve all been there at one point or another – sitting in a required professional development class listening to someone go over Bloom’s Taxonomy or some other concept/strategy that we’ve been using effortlessly for years because we’ve already learned about it and incorporated it into our methodology. We grumble our way through the session, irritated that we have to sit on our butts “re-learning” a topic we could have taught just as well ourselves, if not better. Partly we’re irritated because we have SO much else to do! Many teachers would categorize a situation like this as wasted time.

Clarification: My hypothetical example above does not pertain to ALL professional development!

I use the example, though, because it is a great way to help teachers relate to and understand what a gifted kid is experiencing when the material being taught in class is not at the right readiness-level for the child. We don’t like it when someone else puts us into that kind of a situation, yet we routinely do the same to the gifted students in our classes and we expect them to just take it – graciously, no less.

In part, we’ve been set up. Most college teacher preparation programs don’t teach future teachers how to adequately meet the needs of the gifted students who will end up in our classrooms. Consequently, we walk into teaching without a very important toolbox.

I brushed up against this topic last week, and today my goal is to give you the handiest of tools for your new toolbox: Curriculum Compacting. You could equate it to an adjustable hammer :o) And its best feature is that it’s free!

Curriculum compacting involves a few important steps, all with the aim of allowing students who have already mastered content the opportunity to move on and learn new content and/or to explore the topic in greater depth.

A tip before you begin trying this strategy: Start small. Try it out first with a class/topic/lesson/subject you feel comfortable attempting this on. Be within (or close to) your own comfort zone for your inaugural steps. This will help you to develop confidence in the strategy and in your ability to implement it, which will enable you to branch out from that point on.

So, what do you do? Well, first you must determine which of your students are possible candidates for curriculum compacting. You’ve had enough time in the school year thus far to develop some idea of which students complete their work faster (yet still relatively accurately) compared to others, which students you can’t seem to keep busy, which students seem to have a wealth of outside information, and which students consistently score well with little apparent effort. [Side note: Some gifted kids who would be great candidates for compacting won’t show up in these ways because they have already “checked out” in school. We’ll talk about reasons for that, ways to spot it, and strategies for dealing with it in a future post.]

Your next step is to pre-test these potential candidates. You have two basic options here: pre-test everyone or pre-test the handful of students you think actually have a shot at this. There are pro’s and con’s with each option, such as the fact that no one feels left out if you pre-test everyone, yet doing so also creates more work for you as the teacher (more pre-tests to grade). You can decide for yourself which route is the best for you to take here.

The pre-test can be the one from the book (or whatever alternative curricular materials you’re using), or it can be one that you create. It doesn’t have to be extensive. With spelling for example, it can be as simple as pre-testing the kids on the week’s words before they’ve been given the list. With other subjects, the pre-test should cover the main objectives that you want the students to learn in the unit.

By examining the pre-test results, you’ll be able to see which students have already mastered all of or large portions of the content. Continuing with our spelling example – If a child scores a 100% on his spelling pre-test before you’ve even given him the list to study, before he’s written the words ten times each, before he’s used each of them in a sentence, before he’s looked up all of their definitions, and before studying them at home with mom & dad – then why the heck does he have to still jump through all those hoops throughout the week? He shouldn’t have to. He’s just proven to you that he has mastered that content. Now you can compact his curriculum.

In the case of spelling, he could be given a harder set of words, ones he hasn’t mastered yet, and still do the same assignments with them. But for other subjects, the compacting process can be more thorough, differentiated, and in-depth. Let’s say a student shows through her pre-test that she has mastered six of the science unit’s eight objectives. Well, in this case, the student has mastered much of the content, but not quite all of it. For the portions she hasn’t yet mastered, she will be learning right along with the rest of the class. But for the portions she has mastered, she can now “buy time” (so to speak) to explore the topic in greater depth, do an independent project on a subject of interest to her, work with a mentor who can expand her horizons on the topic, move ahead in the curriculum, write that book she’s been itchin’ to produce, etc. A thousand possibilities present themselves, and just which one(s) the student pursues will depend in part on available resources, available space, available time, the child’s interests, your own flexibility level, etc.

The essence here, though, is that the child should be allowed to LEARN. If this child were forced to sit through all of the lessons on the content she has just proven she’s mastered, then what exactly is she learning? That school is for jumping through hoops whereas real learning takes place when she gets home and can read her encyclopedia and conduct experiments in her homemade basement laboratory? School should be for learning, too! But unless we use strategies like curriculum compacting, it will continue to be a place where gifted kids mark time, re-learning information they had the first time.

You don’t like to re-learn something you’ve already mastered, do you? Yet it’s ironic, isn’t it, that we place roadblocks in front of kids who want to learn something new. Let’s start tearing down those roadblocks!

Anyone wanting to learn more about curriculum compacting can visit this site and this one for additional details. I also highly recommend the book by Sally Reis, Deb Burns, and Joe Renzulli.

Give it a try! Let me know how it goes…

Posted by Tamara Fisher at 9:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)