Teach a Gifted Kid Posts

Let them soar!

Number Four on the list of Top Ten Things is the topic of my next entry. It reads:

Asking regular education teachers to differentiate for the gifted sounds great, but if teachers do not know just how high those “high” kids can get, then the gifted never get needs met. In-service does not always show teachers just how much these children can really do.

Regular education teachers are very aware of the gifted child in their classroom and that’s about it. Every teacher struggles with meeting the wide range of social, emotional and academic needs of every child in their classroom. They can scale back the lesson for the lower learner and pile on more work to the high achiever but with the gifted learner, teachers can be clueless. For instance, what may look like a unproductive child on the outside may be a highly intelligent child on the inside. High achieving children may be just that – high achieving but are they gifted thinkers? I’ve learned that some behaviors in a gifted child is simply a coping mechanism or their way of handling boredom. Giving away the right to be in a gifted classroom to the best behaved child is just plain misguided. That little boy who can’t sit still but can make thoughtful connections and announces them impulsively is the same young man who drops out of school around his sophomore year.

How can a teacher better met the needs of their gifted learner without taking away from the others? When you assign a writing, allow the gifted learner to take it as far as they wish. I have approached more than one writing assignment this way. After buffeting several, “so how many pages does this need to be” type questions, students exploded. Some turned in one or two pages, others took the opportunity to write stories of great lengths! I encouraged students to come to me with a proposal for a project or topic for further study, then I made sure there was somewhere that they could present or publish their work.

Find out all you can about how different and unique gifted children are. Ask them what they would like to do. Play with their sophisticated sense of humor, appreciate their gifts then let them soar!

Gifted Education

gifted gifted learner high achiever regular education teaching

Teaching and accountability

Now that I’ve posted the top ten things administration should know about gifted teachers, I thought I would write about my personal experience with a few of them. I went to bed thinking about #1 and when I got up this morning my good friend, Nancy (an ESL teacher), had written a paragraph that nails the concept totally. She writes:

But when someone tells us that we have to make them succeed, it changes the whole feel in the classroom. As a teacher I am no longer responsible for my students but rather for their success. And not the student’s idea of success or even mine but someone else’s. And we are accountable not to the student or to ourselves for that student’s success but to that “someone else”.

My experience as a gifted teacher in the public school setting and then in the private school setting were vastly different. In the public school setting, I was not expected to get my students out to every type of competition but I did encourage them as much as possible. I would have even joined them on a Saturday to be their cheering section. Because of the personalities of my own two gifted children, I understood that some gifted students thrived on competition, others do not.

My position at the private school was another matter entirely. I was expected to attend training (on a Saturday), redesign my instructional time to prepare the students, and give up my weekends for competition. All students were expected to compete, even to the point of being lectured if they did not make it to the competition. I was expected to get my students to enter any and all writing competitions that passed over my desk (whether they were ready or not) and the writing skills of this particular crowd was very stilted, uncreative, and underdeveloped for most of the school year.

I understand that private schools need to get their name ‘out there’ to obtain more students, it is how the administration goes about setting expectations that ruins the experience for all concerned. This is where Nancy nails it! Once I am held accountable to that ‘someone else’, I’ve lost all buy in, I’ve lost the true purpose of being a teacher and encourager.

A truly good administrator knows which teachers on his/her staff is out there doing their job because they love it. They will somehow compensate those teachers who work above and beyond their usual eight hours. These administrators focus on how the student has benefited from participating in these competitions – not on how their participation has benefited the the organization!

I have high respect for my predecessors in my field. They were teaching during a time when accountability and testing was not reigning king over the profession. My children benefited from their passion and experience. They are my role models and I tried to emulate them as I taught. I was discouraged to discover that my last position did not value my passion but took my passion for granted.

Gifted Education Uncategorized

gifted teaching education passion administration

Top ten things administration should know about gifted

The following comments are from teachers and advocates of gifted education from the University of Iowa Gifted Listserv on or around Oct. 5, 2008. I thought they were well said and could be useful for those readers in the administrative capacity.

One Teacher’s Top ten list:

1. I am a teacher, not a coach! While competitions can meet some needs of some of the children, I am not contracted to teach at 6 in the morning until 5. If Mock Trial or Math Counts is to be made a part of the curriculum for gifted students, then time to work with children on these competitions needs to be provided during the scheduled daytime, not as an after or before school activity. If you want me to provide activities for students, then I need coaching pay on top of my regular salary.

2. If you want me to collaborate or co-teach, then I need time to meet with teachers. And they need to have the same time available to meet with me.

3. Gifted students need curriculum, coursework and classes commensurate with their abilities not their age.

4. Asking regular education teachers to differentiate for the gifted sounds great, but if teachers do not know just how high those “high” kids can get, then the gifted never get needs met. In-service does not always show teachers just how much these children can really do.

5. Gifted children NEED to know they are not the only gifted children in the world. In other words, they need to know that there are others out there that not only “get them,” but who are just like them.

6. If gifted students are not challenged early, then it can become increasingly more difficult to teach them the skills they need to work at challenging levels. Apathy and fear of failure replace the skills needed to work at challenging levels.

7. School should be where children learn; not show-off what they all ready know.

8. Gifted children are busy people too. Extra work, even if appropriate, keeps them from taking responsibility for their own lives.

9. The title “teacher of gifted” is often a misnomer. I actually not only teach, I administer tests, read and interpret test data, collaborate with and provide resources for core teachers, in other words, I specialize in all things gifted for the building/district. Perhaps my title should be “Gifted Specialist,” so more people in the district will know what my actual job entails.

10. Gifted students need a G/T person accessible in all grades; not just elementary school. In fact, teens often have more social-emotional needs than elementary aged students.

Gifted Education

gifted education school learning

Don’t you hate it when

Don’t you hate it when you have an excellent idea to write about but you are laying in bed around 2 am. In the morning when when you wake up the idea and the great way you thought to word it is totally gone. That’s what happened to me last night. I think it was about growing up in a small town in SE Colorado but since I didn’t capture the thoughts using a pen and notebook because turning on the light would wake up my husband I have now way of being sure. Maybe it will come back to me sometime……

Writing Entries

writing storytelling

Another Hurricane Experience

Here we are one hour NW of Houston and we encounter another hurricane experience! The storm began its assault around 1 am on Friday and by 3:30 am, we had lost power. I swear I didn’t get any sleep all night as the wind and rain beat on the house. We had eight guests upstairs (four adults, four teens). I’m sure they heard a different cacophony of the same thing. A couple of times I thought there was a tornado nearby as I could hear a low rumble for a certain period of time. As Ike passed over our house it was a weak Cat 2 storm. Don’t let the word “weak” fool you! I can tell you exactly when the barometric pressure was the lowest as my fingers, lower arms and toes all felt like someone was squeezing the bones. I was almost in tears both times the pressure dropped.

We had various small branches down in our front yard and lots of little loose stuff all over. One of our small pine trees now leans way to the south. That was the extent of our damage but others in the neighborhood weren’t so lucky. There were trees down in fields, over fences and a couple just barely missing the nearby house and our neighbor’s tin barn is in a pile.

We had two other families out here for two nights from Sugarland. It was a bit crazy during the day of the storm with four dogs and four teenagers. The dogs were the worse. We had opened the doors for ventilation which meant ‘free-for-all for the dogs who tracked in lots of leaves. The teenagers thought it was cool to run out shoeless in the rain and wind then needed towels to dry off. Luckily, the ants didn’t start to come to the surface until well after the storm so no injuries. The kids will probably have fond memories of the time which makes me smile about it all.

One of friends stayed for a breakfast of pancakes and bacon cooked on our propane stove in the house. It took far longer than expected and every bit of it was gobbled up by ten o’clock. We cleaned up and one family left as they found through a neighbor that they had power to their home. Our other friends stayed overnight. Their power did not return until three days later.

Dave and I were without power for seven days and 14 hours. I started and finished “The Life of Andrew Jackson” (400 pages) and “The Puritan Dilemma, Story of John Winthrop” (284 pages). We decided that it was much like camping on a sailboat only with a couple more amenities. Except for oven and microwave and running water, our kitchen was quite functional. Dave and the teens had filled our three bathtubs with water and I had purchased 48 bottles of water to prepare. By the time our power came back on, we used up 3/4 of the one tub downstairs and about 30 bottles of water.

For power, we hooked up a generator that we bought from our friends who moved to Nigeria recently. What a lifesaver! We kept all the contents in both refrigerators cold as well as hooking up a TV and a box fan. As time went on, we hooked up cable and the internet before we actually got power back. We didn’t have the gas issue like most of you saw on TV. By the time we needed more gas for the generator, most neighborhood stations were up and running.

It was a long seven days! There is just so much that you want to do with the temperature hovering between 80 and 90 degrees outside and inside. After about two days we had a nice routine going, fire up the generator to run for two hours, turn on the drink cooler, watch a little local news on a snowy channel, retrieve a few things from the frig or freezer to eat, cook, wash dishes after warming up water, rinse and repeat.

You can still see the indentations from the extension cords in the carpet but otherwise, things are back to normal. The going joke from Dave was that “the power would be on a nine.” He was wrong, though, it came on a six. Dave was out of work for the entire week which was about as close as I want to be to him retiring any time soon. I was about ready to apply for any job just to have something to look forward to.

Since we’ve lived in the south, we have lived through four hurricanes. Alicia (25 years ago), Katrina, Rita and Ike. Maybe there was more, I just don’t remember them. Alicia was our first experience. We had just moved to Houston and I was eight months pregnant. Can you believe that prior to that hurricane, I had considered naming my baby Alicia? Adam was born late September, he’s turning 25 this year.

I just peeked at my roses, they have a few beautiful blooms on their branches. We mowed the yard this morning leaving a few chopped up dead leaves. I power washed the porches and carport to clear the green leaves and short twigs. (Really, the leaves looked like they had been swirled in a food processor for two short bursts, then stuck to the sides of our white pickup, windows and doors the morning after the storm.)

Looks like we’re back to normal here. Thanks to the utility workers and garbage pickup!

Random 'Munchings"

hurricane cleaning Ike storm

Remember Tom Chapin?

Tom Chapin has written a satirical song that was used on NPR called “Not on the Test“.
You gotta love it!

Fun Stuff

Catching up with friends

Amber and I visited our New Orleans/Mandeville friends for four days a couple weeks ago and I’ve been meaning to write an entry about it.

First, we want to thank our friends, Rocky and Julie, for providing us with a great place to stay. We’ve known them since their youngest boy and my oldest, Adam were in school together in kindergarten and first grade at Lieder Elementary in Houston, moving to Louisiana as 2nd graders. (Both boys are out of college and happily employed and were educated in the gifted program in St. Tammany).

Amber (who is leaving tomorrow for a Masters program in International Relations in Paris, France) made arrangements to meet up with Justin, who completed college in three years and is employed as an auditor in the banking industry. He graduated a year after our boys from the same program. I’m always impressed with his knowledge of fine food and wine after working as a waiter in some of the best restaurants in the New Orleans area.

Our second lunch date found us at Coffee Rani’s in Mandeville talking about what it was like to grow up gifted. Kristen and her mom just returned from a SENG convention. Her mom manages a preschool and now looks out for giftedness with the little ones in her charge. Kristen completed her college early, started a masters in PA but found it to be not what she expected and is back in town while she calculates her next goal in life. The cafe was completely emptied of its lunch crowd by the time we disengaged.

Being labeled gifted, as most educators and parents know, can good and bad, based on the individual’s experience and life circumstances. Our mother/daughter lunch came to the conclusion that our girls were better off in the gifted program because they were challenged intellectually but their social/emotional issues weren’t really addressed. We also discussed how going to a large public college was like being thrown back into regular classes, even if you were enrolled in the Honors College. Amber made the comment that it seemed like the smaller college was more gifted-friendly. That was her experience anyway.

But the shocker for these girls was how the real world treated them now. They had realized that the grown-up, real world could care less if you are gifted or not. (Quite a wake up call for the young adults and one stated by my son in an earlier conversation.) After discussing the status of many of their classmates (one doing drugs and playing in a rock band, one working at a daycare in a fitness center, one working in Alaska in the oil fields, etc.), we came to the conclusion that what mattered the most was what one does with their giftedness. We noted that all these classmates are still driven to digest knowledge yet choosing jobs that seem to be unrelated to their giftedness. If you are ever around any of the individuals, you will notice that their intensity is still present.

I can look at all this from the viewpoint of a mom and an educator. Most well-meaning educators and specialized programs miss the mark when it comes to knowing just what the gifted child needs for their intellectual and social stimulation. Although St. Tammany has a well-developed full day gifted program, it fell short in the social/emotional area. We came to the conclusion that any gifted program must pay attention to the social and emotional needs of the student in order to best prepare them for future obstacles. Parents needed to be fully informed and supported in learning about the difficulties and joys of raising a gifted child. We also realized that children must be provided opportunities to develop tenacity or ‘stick-to-it-ness’ when faced with difficult situations. The bulldog mascot of their high school came to my mind as we talked.

We had lunch with another mother/daughter friend. This time, our discussion took a turn to the future and opportunities. This class mate had just returned from a trip to Morocco within her nursing program. We discussed how the US has so much compared to other parts of the world. I couldn’t help but thinking how we take our opportunities for granted rather than work for the greater good of our world as we talked.

Lunch with our daughter’s best friend’s family, Brennan, was also a joy. It was so cool to learn that he was selected to introduce Hillary Clinton at a recent speaking engagement at his college back east. This was the guy in high school who challenged the rules at every turn but did it with the expertise of a fine surgeon. He knew just how far to go to make the administration of the school look silly while staying out of serious trouble. He’s going on to law school soon. If I ever meet him in court, I want to be on his side!

Our last lunch was with Bobby. Bobby was the only one that we met during our stay that was not educated in the gifted program in St. Tammany, rather he was in the gifted program in New Orleans. He started at Tulane but because of Katrina, his degree plan was discontinued. He finished his Computer Science degree in Missouri and is back now seriously considering a career with the NOPD. Another guy I would want on my side.

I’m so proud of all my son and daughter’s classmates in all their adventures after their ‘gifted’ education because I know that each one is making a contribution to their world in their own way. I also realize that it’s not enough to be gifted in our world. It’s not enough to provide accelerated or enriched programs one day, two days or even five days a week for our children. We must also provide them with opportunities to struggle, to fail under controlled situations, to overcoming obstacles and to understand what it truly means to be just a little different.

Gifted Education Uncategorized

gifted young adults education future programs college

Compassion

Kelly over at The Apple has found several sites where students can use their smarts to help someone else. I wanted to pass along her findings. I had used FreeRice in my classroom and found it to be very useful for those early finishers. The students are eager to surpass each other in their donations so they always tried to do their best. Teachers and grownups like to see how smart they are too! Enjoy!

Fun Stuff

Houston Profoundly Gifted’s Fall Offerings

Below is a posting from my friend Stacia. This group does great things for the profoundly gifted population in the Houston area. Some of my readers may find this information helpful, so I’m posting their announcement here. You can also find more opportunities for the Houston area gifted on my Gifted Minds, Texas page.

*******
It is that time of year! We have lots of great things planned for this fall’s profoundly gifted co-op. We will continue to meet at the Vineyard Church in Clear Lake. We will continue all our Zome building fun! Instead of colloquia, the kids will be working on oral history projects. We want the co-op to offer a good mix of science as well as humanities. The older kids will be working together to create an oral
history of growing up gifted. They will learn how to interview; videography; ethics and law (copyright and liability), etc. The younger kids (likely 7 and under) will create an oral history project around man’s first walk on the moon. They will learn to interview and create an oral history and learn the how to document these interviews.

We will add sign language from 4:45-5:30. If you would like to participate in sign language, please be prompt. If you are late, it disrupts the class. If you are not interested in sign language, please arrive promptly at 5:30 for class.

We are going to ask the minimum age for participation be five years old.

The group settings are set to “no attachments” so if you are interested in participating in the co-op; please e-mail me and I will send you the appropriate forms.

The cost for the semester is $60 per child. This includes all supplies and necessary equipment. We do not offer sibling discounts at this time. We have worked very hard to keep the cost as low as possible for everyone to participate and this makes it difficult to offer a sibling discount.

Deadline for registration is September 1, so we have time to adequately plan. The tentative schedule is as follows:

September 10 4:45-5:30pm sign language
5:30-7:00pm Zome – Bubbles

September 24 4:45-5:30pm sign language
5:30-7:00pm oral history project- Intro, Apollo 8 anniversary audio documentary and other products, discuss open-ended questions, develop questions

October 8 4:45-5:30pm sign language
5:30-7:00pm Zome – Perimeter & Area, Fences problem

October 22 4:45-5:30pm sign language
5:30-7:00pm oral history project – legal issues, etiquette, develop questions

November 12 4:45-5:30pm sign language
5:30-7:00pm Zome – Picasso & Math

November 19 4:45-5:30pm sign language
5:30-7:00pm oral history project – conduct oral histories

December 10 4:45-5:30pm sign language
5:30-7:00pm Zome – Finding Tau

December 17 4:45-5:30pm sign language
5:30-7:00pm oral history project – conduct oral histories

As always, if you have friends who would benefit from the co-op please pass this on. Stacia Taylor, 832-476-3887
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Gifted Education Uncategorized

Houston profoundly gifted education homeschool

Gifted Learners

I cruise the TAGMAX mail list because I’m interested in the issues that are important to gifted parents as they navigate the social and emotional issues of the gifted child. These parents know what the want in an academic setting and are quite knowledgeable on curriculum and programs. In one of the exchanges the program at: Pennsylvania Leadership Charter School University Scholars Program caught my eye. More specifically, their understanding of the needs of the gifted student in the classroom. On their FAQ page, I found the following points:

* Gifted Learners can become mentally lazy, even though they do well in school.
* Gifted Learners can become “hooked” on the trappings of success.
* Gifted Learners may become perfectionists.
* Gifted Learners may fail to develop a sense of self-efficacy
* Gifted Learners may fail to develop tenacity in the face of obstacles.
* Gifted Learners may not develop study skills.
* Gifted Learners may fail to develop strong peer relationships.
* Gifted Learners may struggle with tasks that require cooperative work.

Any school that says it is there for the gifted learning needs address these issues in their program. I personally experienced all of these issues with my gifted learners as an educator. I struggled with the lazy learner by insisting that they ‘go deeper’ with their interpretations and detail, to adopt good study skills and work in cooperative groups as well as the host of other issues these points bring up.

Further, a teacher of the gifted MUST have the support and tools necessary to help these learners. Not an easy task – and many schools fail. Much of my last teaching assignment was taken up with educating the student on their emotional issues. This was obviously missing as indicated by their performance and behavior. It wasn’t until the last months of the school year did the students begin to respond by turning in quality work by the deadline. I spent an entire school year of dealing with non-academic issues so the student could learn to learn. And this is happening all over the world to our teachers and our most valuable minds!

If you have some hints or tips to share on how to manage these issues, please share them!

Gifted Education

gifted learners social emotional homeschooling

Digital Storytelling

This is the video I made at a recent workshop sponsored by the Office of International Outreach and Dept. of Educational Technology at Texas A & M. We used Microsoft Moviemaker or Apple’s VideoCue for the video portion, and Audacity for the audio. All these programs are readily available on your computer or for download.

I began the workshop with a factual piece about the local lighthouses but as the workshop progressed I understood the value of using the medium for storytelling. Ultimately I realized how valuable the process would be to the gifted learner. Yesterday, I found an article looking why humans tell stories in the Scientific American Mind, Aug/Sep 2008 issue titled, “The Secrets of Storytelling” which only solidified the importance of storytelling with the quote, “The imaginary world of stories may serve as a proving ground for vital social skills.” The author provided research that suggested that children who listened to stories developed empathy and ability to read other people’s emotions.

Back to my production. My writing underwent four total rewrites and edits before I was happy with it. It is usually quite difficult to get a student to put this much work into a written piece but the result is so worth it. (The National Writing Project has lessons that focus on the rewriting/editing process that appeal to children.)

Two side notes: I recently found that the New Canal Lighthouse actually fell in Dec. 2005 and had to be completely dismantled so my information is not quite accurate on that point. Also, I hope that I covered the complicated copyright issues correctly.

Thanks to Martha Green and her staff for researching and assembling the workshop!

Gifted Education Uncategorized Writing Entries

writing publishing gifted digital storytelling

Another way to do it

This school has the right idea! First Baptist Church of Lake City’s First Academy provides the structure and curriculum to students and parents just like any other school but is doing it in a different way. Providing choice. Savvy parents can use the school facilities or homeschool. Parents know what they want for their gifted children, most public school programs aren’t providing it. More and more, parents are looking into digital delivery of the content. Think of the advantages. Students learn at their own pace under the watchful eyes of a professional educator or the loving parent. The learning can happen at school or at home. Professional educators and administrators navigate the regulations and requirements for the parents. Schools need less in the way of actual classrooms. Are there other schools setting up a program with choice? I’d like to know about them.

Gifted Education

gifted private school education digital delivery techno

Summer is flying past…..fast

Dave and I just got back from our two week vacation visiting relatives, friends and acquaintances. This trip started out relaxing, and then just stayed that way. One of the neatest things we did was floating down the North Platte River near Laramie, Wyoming. My uncle is the best! He is a Fish Biologist for the Wyo Game and Fish. Dave teased him that he had one of the neatest offices in the world, especially when you consider that it includes all the lakes and rivers in the region. On our float, we saw numerous deer, ducks and geese. We floated under a mature bald eagle and a juvenile bald eagle who just stared at us. The most interesting thing we saw was something that looked like a cross between a muskrat and beaver. My uncle is showing the pictures that I took to a wildlife biologist for identification.

We thoroughly enjoyed visiting with my grandfather, who will turn 95 in a few days. Dave got him to chuckle with the comment, “I’d like to see the guy who buys a truck with 120,000 miles hauling dead animals.” (Inside joke, I guess you would have to be there.)

We also learned that his mother got to take control of a plane with some Air Force guys she knew when she was a young woman back in the 30’s. Everyone thought is was my grandma, until I asked “What was Mom’s name?” Apparently, her Air Force friends also flew from Alaska to come to her funeral and that made a big impression on my grandfather.

Dave had a fantastic time at his 30th class reunion. About 40 classmates showed up for some part of the festivities. Dave got a sunburn during the golf tournament, visited with his closest buddies and ate a really good steak cooked on a huge open fire at a chuck wagon dinner. We adopted my sister-in-law’s son, Keagan, for the weekend. What a great kid! Gifted, for sure!

The last few days of the trip involved some heavy-duty relaxing. Dave’s aunt and uncle have a place on Seminole Lake. First of all, forget everything you know about lakes. This one has NO TREES! Only bushes. This was quite a shock for me having camped as a kid in the Rockies in Colorado.

Dave’s mom and step dad also joined us at the lake. I had never been fishing on a boat. Growing up, we only fished from the shore. Dave’s mom caught the biggest Walleye! My fish-intuition told me that I’d be lucky if I fished. I was. I caught seven fish, outnumbering Dave by two. Dave’s uncle deftly skinned the fish and his aunt cooked them. Walleye is a pretty good eats!

If you haven’t gotten enough about the trip, stop by my Flickr account for pictures. I’d love to hear about your summer adventures!

Returning to Earth: I also just finished a three day workshop at Texas A & M. Every time I am out on that campus, I am impressed with the programs and people. I started to explore the idea of working on a doctorate within their gifted program if things don’t work out for a teaching position.

That’s when I figured out that my summer is flying past…..fast…..

Fun Stuff Random 'Munchings"

A Dream in 1939

After teaching a week of Camp Invention, catching up on errands and chores, and hosting our friends who are now on their way to Nigeria for a three year assignment, I have given myself the day to poke around the internet for interesting blogs and links. One such link comes from the InSuggest site which uses your Del.ici.ous username to assemble a list of sites that might be of interest. It was very simple to specify the tag you wanted to use to create a list. Using my ‘gifted’ tag, I found several sites I had seen before and a few new ones. The most useful ones had already been linked to this site on my Gifted Minds pages. One that I hadn’t seen before is the APA Center for Gifted Policy.

If you know much about Gifted Education, you are familiar with the issues surrounding NCLB and educating the gifted in today’s world. This site’s mission is to build awareness for gifted policies. I took the time to watch the Gifted Youth of 1939 World’s Fair video. located on the homepage. It is interesting to see how one man’s dream and ‘out of the box’ thinking provided opportunity and valuable learning experiences to about 30 students. The video is a good motivator for providing our educators resources to create this type of environment for our brightest students. Notable words I heard throughout the video were: “do, think ask” and “were willing to do the work.” Are we getting that message across to our children? The end of the video reveals the contribution that most of these students have given to our society. Enjoy!

Gifted Education

I had to try it out, of course

I love it when I visit a friend’s blog and find something neat to try out. My friend, Nancy (who just got back from the New Orleans Writing Marathon and is on my teacher blog list in the side bar as “Nancy”) keeps a great web log. She seems to stumble upon some cool little gadgets and Wordle is one. This is right up my alley! I’ve fiddled around with words and art on a page since my oldest was three months old. My closet is full of the school newsletters that I’ve done both with and without the help of technology. Oh yea, I remember when I had to type or copy, cut and paste clip art and articles to create attractive newsletters! (This is the new version of ‘I had to walk ten miles to school in a foot of snow’ story to tell my grandkids.) In any case, I used my del.icio.us bookmarks to create my own Wordle art.

Another thing I did that comes under the Fun category is setting up a MySpace page. Actually, I set up one way back during Spring Break and actually forgot about it until this evening as I was chatting with my niece in Arkansas. So here is the site address: http://www.myspace.com/teachagiftedkid.

Fun Stuff

Wordle Nancy MySpace

Building trust

I helped E find his ring! It may seem like a little thing to you but to E it wasn’t. The ring his grandmother gave him had flown off his finger onto the SW Colorado forest floor late in a “capture the flag” style game during our week long archeology field trip. Two classmates and I looked for about 20 minutes at dusk with no luck. I promised E that we would try again the next morning. It would be our last chance before returning to school. During this trip, it seemed that each student had their own ‘need’. For D, it was a slow reveal of his true self to others who think like him. For M, it was to be accepted by the crowd. For A, to show she was all grown up. For E, it was just to find that ring.

Most all the bags were packed and sitting by the bus parked in front of the lodge early the next morning when E reminded me about the promise I made the night before. He and I made our way up the path into the underbrush and looked for the marker we had chosen the night before and we began our search. Amazingly, I found the ring within about a minute of arriving. How we missed it, I will never know. E was relieved and happy. I could also feel his trust in me as his teacher had risen 100% that morning. He could tell that I truly cared about him.

This year, out of all the lessons coming out of the classroom, building trust with the class was the one for me. (Each year seems to have its lesson for the teacher.) Trust is wrapped up in the little things we do from day to day in our classroom. It’s fetching that special type of card stock paper for a project, remembering to bring in an ingredient for a recipe, smiling, chatting, following through with promises, and a zillion other things.

During a conversation the first week in May, a co-worker mentioned that sometimes it takes him nearly half the school year to build trust with his new class of students. It became clear that this was the issue in my class. This group of children was taking longer than most to develop that certainty that I was going to lead them, teach them and expose them to learning situations without embarrassing them, without stretching them too far beyond their needs or belittling them when something goes wrong. A big chore for any professional!

After some fits and starts, I can say it took well into February when the students began to trust me. Situations, attitudes, perceptions, stresses along with school culture and teacher experience all played a role in our slow development. The last part of the school year was the most productive for my students in many ways other than just in their class projects and assignments. We had quality discussions, inside jokes, playful fun. All these things the students will remember more than any lesson on grammar or ancient history that I taught.

Random 'Munchings" Writing Entries

“Managing stress” is a misnomer

It’s been a while since my last post. I’ve been spending most of my extra time in a car carpooling back and forth with my husband to work. It’s the time of the year in the field of education that one thinks about their plans for the fall. Should I continue teaching or not? For some, the decisions is pretty easy, for me it’s always a big decision. I elected to make education my field of choice and have all the credentials to be considered ‘highly qualified’. But with finding out I have been dealing with several mild but annoying health issues for the past 20+ years hasn’t helped make the decision any easier.

The other day I conferred with the new Principal at my school about the conundrum. I remember mentioning that I needed to ‘manage the stress’. My husband pulled up just as our meeting was over and we started our hour long journey back home.

I’m up at 2 am in the morning with a neck and back ache writing this entry waiting for the medicine to kick in. The reason: the five car collision that Dave and I was in right after the meeting with the Principal. It was on the feeder road just before entering the Interstate. We were completely stopped, the car directly behind us was completely stopped. I don’t know the status of the third car, but the fourth car hit the third, third to second, second to us. By the time the momentum got to us, we just got a good bump with no damage. The car behind us got a back dent in the fender area. The other three cars were totaled and had to be towed.

I just sat in the front seat of our car after the accident and marveled at the thought that anyone could manage stress.

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Keyword Searching

I just checked the stats on my website through Google Analytics which I do periodically. One of the keyword search phrases that someone used to find information regarding gifted was, “how to make my child gifted”. Wow! That is one for the books! Just to clear the air on this one – you don’t make your child gifted after they’re born! You can expose them to lots of learning very early which many people do, but research wavers on whether this makes one smarter than their age peers or just stresses out the child.

There’s not much you can do except contribute your X’s and Y’s early on and do your best to nurture your child as they grow and develop. Without going into much detail (and knowingly without exact references), I’ve read/heard somewhere that researchers believe that the gifted brain is just wired differently. It functions more efficiently and it absorbs information at a faster rate. And it will develop if given the opportunity to.

Have you ever spent any time reading about the lives of gifted individuals who lived in the past? You will find that some came from highly affluent homes, some came from very poor settings. Some endured hardships such as child abuse, others were mentored and cared for every step of the way. The book Cradles of Eminence gives excellent examples of individuals from all walks of life. http://www.gt-cybersource.org/Record.aspx?NavID=2_0&rid=12825

I’m far from the expert on this topic but I’m pretty sure you can’t ‘make your child gifted’. Before you wish you could make them gifted, be sure to do your research on the down-sides of being gifted such as perfectionism, out of balance development(asynchronous), being under-challenged, boredom, feeling alone, just to name a few.

…..and that’s all I gotta say ’bout that…..

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Gifted Education Random 'Munchings"

Closing the chapter

My husband and I are just about to close a chapter to a portion of our life. We’re moving out of our downtown Houston apartment and putting everything in our house in Magnolia. This might sound insignificant to you but to us it means the last of our ties to Hurricane Katrina.

We had ‘set up shop’ in the apartment just two weeks after Katrina hit so my husband could work in Houston while I stayed in Mandeville for eight months to finish my teaching contract and my Masters Degree. We traveled back and forth between Mandeville and New Orleans repairing our house and looking for a new one. Stressful times, now that I look back on it.

There are still many out there who were directly affected by Hurricane Katrina waiting to close their chapter. There is still much to do to undo what one large storm did to one large area in Mississippi and Louisiana.

Random 'Munchings"

You just never know

* The following was an email that I sent to the co-worker at my school in regards to the video she sent me. After I wrote the email, I decided it would be a great entry for my blog. Enjoy!

Hi Mary Grace,
I wanted to let you know of the effect that the video you sent http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r43yCiKlbCo had on the children. I showed about the first 2-3 minutes of class to the students and said that I was ‘advertising for the Nat. Geo Bee. As I watched them watch the video, their faces were all smiles and they were visibly impressed. I got 4-6 more students to sign up for the Bee before the day was done.

The best thing, though, was the social/emotional talk we had after. Our discussion included points like these:

The little girl was gifted spatially, she was highly interested in the activity, she kept coming back for more and her parents let her have more.

We’re not all gifted at everything and that’s ok. Gifted kids are sometimes “out of balance”, really smart about some stuff and not so smart about others.

Even though she was very good at what she was doing, she still needed to wiggle and dance and receive encourage from others (and she still wore diapers). She was developmentally still a 2 year old.

We also noticed that the video was on a site whose name looked Swedish or Dutch so we decided that there must be lots of kids that are gifted that live around the world.

And, lastly, they were so lucky to be at a school that lets them be gifted and kids.

So, thanks for sending the video on! You just never know where stuff like that will go!
Angie

Gifted Education