I just read an article that challenges readers to Value All Gifts and Talents by creating new school options rather than the traditional academic model.
The underlying assumption in this article is that the typical high school’s college preparatory classes fulfill the needs of gifted students, while unnecessarily stressing students whose strength lies in arts, athletics, crafts, mechanics, teaching, etc.
I believe that this is a popular assumption, and that this is one reason that there is very little funding or support for Gifted & Talented Programs in many school districts throughout the USA.
Definition of Gifted
In our egalitarian society, you have to be brave to describe your child as “gifted” with its suggestion of elitism and status-chasing. Many people will tell you that all children are gifted, which is true, but not in the sense that the term is used in the field of education.
Here, gifted is a relative term that describes “individual exceptionality from the norm, about learning differences at a given point in time that require special educational adaptations.” (Mathews and Foster, Being Smart about Gifted Children)
Gifted just means that a student will have different education needs from that of most age-level peers, but those needs may vary drastically per individual.
Levels of Giftedness
Researchers are finding that there are many more gifted individuals in the general population than previously thought. However, the IQ of the gifted can range from Level One Moderately Gifted (117-129) to Level Five Profoundly Gifted (141+.) Note that these numbers reflect the new, lower IQ test results.
Early Indicators (prior to Kindergarten) of Intellectual Giftedness are found at all of these levels:
· Understands complex verbal instructions
· Shows interest and ability with shape sorters and 8-10 piece puzzles.
· Speaks in complex, correct sentences using comparatives and connective words
· Can sight read a number of words or familiar signs
· Completes 25+ piece jigsaw puzzles and complex mazes
· Recognizes and/or names a wide variety of colors and shades
· Knows the letters in or out of alphabetical order
· Makes letters by writing or using sticks, utensils, etc.
· Knows the numbers
· Shows keen memory for detail in spatial directions, past events, etc.
· Uses one-to-one correspondence in counting objects
It is interesting to note that in school districts that draw students from a high socioeconomic population, where most parents are highly educated professionals, most of the students are Level One Gifted but average learners. Also, a typical middle class elementary school will have 1-2 (out of 100) Level Three students at each grade level. Level 4 and Level 5 students are less likely to be found in schools, as they are more likely to turn to homeschooling or alternative schooling options.
Even more interesting is how the level of giftedness impacts academic abilities and needs. The Level One Moderately Gifted average learners already “show impatience with repetition and slow pace by age seven or eight.” Level Two students have the ability to do accelerated work often as soon as they start school. Level Three students can read youth or young adult books at around age 7. And Level Four students are capable of completing 8th Grade work by 4th grade.
(Source: Deborah Ruf, Losing Our Minds: Gifted Children Left Behind. 2005: Great Potential Press.)
Gifted Domains
Identifying the gifted is further complicated by the wide variety of abilities that falls under the “gifted” umbrella. Karen Rogers, one of the leading researchers in Gifted Education and the author of Re-Forming Gifted Education, sorts Giftedness and Talent into six domains: general intellectual; specific academic; creativity; psychosocial or leadership; visual and performing arts; and psychomotor. A gifted individual may display a mixture of traits from these domains.
While a Level Three Intellectually Gifted student who excels in class may be easy to identify as gifted; a disorganized, divergent “Creative Spirit” may be hard to spot as gifted.
Gifted Educational Needs
There are many options for providing an educational plan for the gifted, but – despite the prevalence of college preparatory school curriculums – “many experts in the field of gifted education have argued that the general school curriculum does not contain enough breadth or depth of content for bright, eager learners who crave knowledge.” (Rogers, p. 79)
Gifted Students want schools that:
· Provide advanced courses, honor classes, and other opportunities beyond the standard curriculum,
· Offer out-of-school options such as mentorships and community service projects, and
· Provide opportunities for teachers and counselors to learn about the special needs of gifted students.
Gifted students want to:
· Learn at their own speed
· Opt out of work they already know and understand
· Study things that interest them and go beyond the basics
· Work with abstract concepts that require more than simple thinking – such as creative, reflective, and analytical ideas
· Work with peers who share your interests and abilities
· Participate in options that connect your learning to the “real world.”
(Source: Surveys of gifted students reported in Galbraith and Delisle, The Gifted Kids’ Survival Guide: A Teen Handbook. 1996: Free Spirit Publishing.)
More Links:
Responding to the Needs of High School Level Gifted Learners
Dealing With the Needs of Underachieving Gifted Students In a Suburban School District: What Works!
Losing the Gifted
When the opportunity for relevant, meaningful learning doesn’t exist, gifted students may become bored and act out. Some become frustrated and angry, while others start clowning around. Many students who are forced to conform to the class standard may become withdrawn and/or apathetic. A student who started Kindergarten as a bright, eager, curious child can end up as a dull, uninterested adolescent. A pattern of underachievement can set in as early as the primary grades. By high school, many drop-outs are gifted students.
How to tell if your school district values the gifted and talented:
· There is funding for training teachers about Gifted Education.
· Gifted education options and resources are available from Kindergarten through 12th Grade.
· There is a Gifted Education Coordinator in your elementary school.
· A Gifted Coordinator/Guidance Counselor is available to follow a gifted student’s progress from 7th-12 Grade.
· There are opportunities for acceleration, at a minimum, in Math and English.
· Subjects that aren’t tested on the annual state standardized tests, such as Science and Social Studies, are given in-depth, meaningful coverage.
· Language arts programs include many opportunities for creative, as well as expository, writing.
· There is an Enrichment Program that provides opportunities for the development of higher level skills, such as divergent and evaluative thinking, problem-solving, and creativity.
· There are opportunities for self-directed or independent study.
· Availability of AP courses that follow the AP curriculum guidelines and offer the end-of-course exams for college credit.
· Library, Music, and Art instruction is given as much funding and time as physical education.
· Academic contests such as spelling bees, science fairs, or math counts receive as much funding and popular support as athletic or other programs.
So, do you think your school values the gifted and talented? What does your school do well? What else would you like to see your school doing?
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Great article!
Support and valuing of gifted and talented programs has been steadily declining for the past 25 years. Every few years in our school district, another “extracurricular” activity is dropped. Physical education is even declining. Kids often only get PE twice a week.
The reasoning our superintendent of schools gives is programs have to be dropped to improve standardized test scores. The dropped programs leave more funding and time for academic achievement.
In my observation, the more they devalue the arts, crafts, and other areas of learning, the lower the test scores become. I don’t believe I’m the only one who sees that, yet those who run our schools are missing the whole picture.
Because of this state of affairs, many families who can afford it send their kids to private schools. These schools mostly cater to the upper middle and upper class, and the programs offered are almost always college preparatory. This is where I see the most severe lack of valuing gifts that are other than strictly academic.
I benefited from a well-rounded education as a gifted student 30 years ago. Gifted and talented programs abounded throughout the entire district. I was gifted in math, science, English, and music, and classes were available at all my schools for gifted and talented students. I started college with 14 semester hours of credit from my high school AP courses. I completed college with a B.S. in chemistry and worked in industry and as an academic researcher before teaching.
Today, to study the arts seriously, students have to travel to a different city to attend a school for the arts that actually teaches at the students’ level.
Education in America today is a sad thing. That’s why I home-school my gifted son. He doesn’t test gifted by the academic tests given. But he can design, build and engineer robots that work with programs he writes on his computer. He’s 12. He was reading well in preschool and could count to 100 before kindergarten. There isn’t a test for engineering talent, so he’s not talented, according to the school district, yet he has all the signs and abilities of a gifted child. But he isn’t interested in performing on the academic tests, so again, he isn’t gifted. He considers the tests to be hoops a monkey could jump through and isn’t interested if that’s all they are interested in. So I also have a gifted child with an attitude, and that is challenging to say the least.
“I believe that this is a popular assumption, and that this is one reason that there is very little funding or support for Gifted & Talented Programs in many school districts throughout the USA.”
In “The War Against Excellence” Cheri Yecke wrote that slower students at the bottom 3% or so got 15 times as much money as the top 3%.
Sherri,
It is painful to see how NCLB is actually leaving many students behind. I’m also choosing to homeschool my son, and I’m finding that this is a great choice for him.
I’m also sending my daughter to a private school that encourages child-centered and project-based learning. This is a wonderful setting for my creative, gifted daughter. Not only is this the right academic setting for my daughter, it is also a truly diverse, open-minded supportive setting. My daughter found that any topic can be explored in class and that all kids are accepted – regardless of class, race, attire, etc.
By the way, many private schools (including this one) provide scholarships for students who otherwise could not afford the tuition.
It is a tremendous challenge to find the right school setting that matches a child’s needs. It would be lovely if most public schools (supported by out tax dollars) met the needs of most students. My advice for any parent is to learn about your child’s needs, place them where necessary, and advocate for your own child as well as the community’s children.
gifted and talented children are left behind; especially if they are living in an area with high immigrant popultations, low socio-economics, etc. My two sons are very bright, gifted and at least so far, INTERESTED in learning and going to school. Both read several grade levels higher than their “Grade”. Yet, their teachers cannot provide the programmed reading materials for them because the district office mandates and monitors the use of the programmed reading materials at each level…..So when my sons finish a 20 minute task in five minutes, they are just told to read their AR books. Teachers too busy with the lesser ability kids.
In this school district, GATE class opportunities are only available at certain schools. If parents want their child in the GATE program, the kids are either bussed across town or parents have to provide transportation. Yes, the GATE program was intentionally established at a forever underperforming school so that the GATE kids test scores would improve the schools overall test scores.
And at the jr high, GATE classes do not exist. GATE students are placed in classes with ELL, RSP and “regular” students.
Private schooling is not an option where we live. There is not real choice of private schools and the few that exist are not staffed by credentially teachers. And academically, they are not much different than the public schools. So, we send our sons to public school and provide, as much as possible, other learning opportunities for them.
I too see this difficulty in the public education, and even in some private schools.
My son is very gifted, he was reading at three and reading chapter books at four. He is also gifted in math, reasoning, and writing. He is still only five, so thankfully I have not had to enroll him in a school just yet. I homeschooled him through first grade this year, and plan to continue with more broad range topics this following year, before he becomes compulsory age.
I am very concerned about what to do with him once he attains compulsory age. If I homeschool I am concerned about telling the district what grade he is working in, etc… I do not want to limit him to learning say 3rd grade material in any given year, but I also do not want to say he does more, but then not finish it…
I would ultimately like to send him to a school. Obviously this will have to be a private school as by the time he enters “first grade” he will be in third more or less… I do not want him to be put in a class with only older kids, but would ideally like to see him learning in a mixed age class.
Well thanks for that post…
Mrs.MegLogan
well-
Our district has some really great programs once a child hits the 4th grade. Before that, it’s up to the individual school.
The school he goes to is good with a lot of teachers who really care about him, but aren’t really sure how to teach him. Some that are over zealous and keep trying to diagnose him with something.
It’s really stressful, we are currently thinking of having him put ahead a grade, he would skip the 2nd grade. The plan for next year is for him to go to the 3rd grade class for ela and math, then go back to the 2 grade for the rest of the day….. if the schedule works out. If it doesn’t? Who knows!
I think: if he is going to be with the 3rd graders for half the day anyway…. what is the point of keeping him in the second grade.
He started reading at age 2.5, and was reading 3rd and 4th grade books when he entered kindergarten. (Capt. Underpants was a big hit!)
He has been using a computer since he was 3 (we got him one for his 3rd birthday)
He goes to school and dumbs it up to fit in and to please his teachers. I think he has even gotten answers wrong so that he will seem more normal.
He does have a great reading enrichment program. The reading teacher is wonderful and pulls kids with the same abilities and puts them together in spite of there age or grade!
He also was going with the 3rd grade remedial math classes last year. Great math teacher.
One teacher tried to convince us he has aspergers syndrome and had me believing it. Thank god for his Doctor!
Sometimes I wonder how we could home school or send him to a private school. But there is no way we could afford to do it.
Full grade acceleration was never a viable option for my kids, but for some students it’s the best choice.
You know, you’re always trying to figure out the best option, but there’s never a perfect solution. Even when you figure out the best choice for the moment, things change.
What I can tell you is that, unless your school district offers full-time Gifted Education, there will be problems keeping your child challenged and engaged in a multi-abilities setting as he gets older. Primary grade teachers have a lot more flexibility than upper elementary teachers.
However, lots of kids thrive even in adverse school environments.
And, there’s no point stressing about the problems that don’t exist yet. It sounds like your school administrators and teachers are at least willing to work with you.
You may want to ask if your son can try out 3rd Grade full-time at the beginning of the year. If it doesn’t work out, he can always try Plan B.
However, I bet he’ll do well. At the beginning of the year, there is a lot of catch up and review. There are a lot of kids who don’t read or do any math over the summer. Your son will probably excel academically with little, or no effort.
Socially, the beginning of the year is the best time to integrate into the class.
Good luck taking it step by step!
My local district’s sole GATE offering is a single class each in 4th and 5th grade. There are more children who qualify than there are slots in the GATE class, and I’ve not been able to get a straight answer from the district about how exactly they select which students get to enroll. I’ve also not been able to get answers as to why the district does not add more GATE classes given the unmet demand for them nor why it does not offer GATE classes in other grades.