Nerd Shirts and Other Gifted Gear: Hoagies. SENG: Articles & Resources - Director's Corner, October 2005. Parent-Teacher Conferences Fall is in the air.
The students are established at school and the memo comes home regarding parent-teacher conferences. Of course we will attend to support our children in their education. What a disappointment when, during our brief conference, the teacher, with great enthusiasm, may tell us only, “Your child is doing fine!” Or, after checking in the grade book to determine which one is our child, proudly recites the letter grades the student is receiving. If we are about educating the whole child, parents and teachers must have positive communication regarding the child’s development, including both academic and emotional growth. After many school conferences, I devised the following questions I might ask the teacher to help me better understand my child: Does my child seem happy at school? SENG: Articles & Resources - Benny and Me. Benny and Me: A Father Sees Himself Through His Son It was a miserable day in the fall of 2001 when we got our first glimpse of what our lives would be like for the next 20-odd years.
We were a young family: a mom, a dad, one young daughter in elementary school, a newborn, and a young lad, Ben. Ben had always been a very alert boy, one who needed little sleep and had eyes that betrayed a deep longing for information. To say he was curious would be an understatement. As a boy, Ben was constantly getting into everything – taking things apart, exploring, sneaking, finding trouble even where trouble could not possibly be found. We learned, the hard way sometimes (and with much consternation on my part), that dealing with Ben was going to take a little extra. First Experiences With School As a student in pre-school, Ben refused to play with the other students or engage in whole-class learning, preferring to spend his time exploring and investigating his interest areas.
SENG: Articles & Resources - An Interview with James Webb, by Michael Shaughnessy. What Your Kids Want You to Know by Jane Hesslein As a teacher of the gifted, I am involved daily in the relationships between students and parents, working to keep each “team” apprised of what the other is thinking.
At the beginning of the year, I tell parents what I have learned from earlier classes about what it is like to be 10 and very bright. During the year, the students and I chat informally about many of their social and emotional issues. A few years ago, during one such class conversation, we were discussing topics that might occupy a young teen’s mind: identity; status; boyfriends; girlfriends; connections outside the family; independence; etc. One student said, “Wait a minute. “That’s right. “You’re a double agent!” He’s right, actually. SENG: Articles & Resources - Tips for parents of intense children.
Tips for Parents of Intense Children Living with emotionally intense children and partners can be turbulent, exciting, challenging, and joyful.
Emotionally intense individuals are often accused of “overreacting.” SENG: Articles & Resources - Director's Corner, March 2006. Emotional Sensitivity Gifted individuals are about as diverse a group as any you could hope to meet.
And, while few can agree on a black-and-white definition for giftedness, one characteristic of the population that has some global acceptance is emotional sensitivity. It is a feature of personality that often plays havoc with the ability to live easily in the world. That ‘world’ for our children has two main environments: the home and school. And, while I wouldn’t begin to pretend that emotional sensitivity is not without its trials and tribulations at home, it is in the school environment where children seem to have the most difficulty. When you think about it, perhaps that is to be expected. SENG: Articles & Resources - Developing a feeling vocabulary. By Sharon Lind.
SENG: Articles & Resources - Factors in the social adjustment and social acceptability of extremely gifted children. Factors in the Social Adjustment and Social Acceptability of Extremely Gifted Children Author Miraca U.
M. Gross Citation From Talent Development. 1994 2. Reproduced with permission from Great Potential Press. This presentation proposes that, as practitioners and researchers in gifted education, we differ significantly from our counterparts in other areas of special education, such as teachers of intellectually handicapped or hearing impaired students, in our failure to recognize and respond to the different levels or degrees of the condition we study. We recognize, for example, that the intellectually handicapped student has learning needs which are different from those of his or her age-mates of average intellectual ability, and the further such a child is from the average the more we acknowledge that he or she needs a special educational setting. SENG: Articles & Resources - A Case for Affective Education: Addressing the Social and Emotional Needs of Students in the Classroom.
Dr.
Stephanie Ferguson (formerly Nugent) is the Director of the Program for the Exceptionally Gifted at Mary Baldwin College in Staunton, Virginia. She earned a B.S. in secondary English education from Millersville University of Pennsylvania in 1989, a M.Ed. in curriculum and instruction-secondary gifted education from Southeastern Louisiana University in 1998, and completed her Ph.D. in curriculum, instruction and special education with an emphasis in gifted studies at The University of Southern Mississippi in 2002.
Her professional experience includes ten years of middle and secondary teaching in Louisiana in general and gifted education as well as academic counseling; education faculty positions at various universities and colleges; and numerous presentations and publications at the state, regional, national and international levels. Dr. Should Gifted Students Be Grade-Advanced Defining the Term Why Is It Important? Reasons For Neglect Closing Thoughts. SENG: Articles & Resources - Tips for Helping Gifted, Highly Sensitive Teens & Kids Cope with Trauma - Sharon M. Barnes, MSSW, LCSW.
Tips of Helping Gifted, Highly Sensitive Teens & Kids Cope with Trauma Some children and teens are more sensitive than others.
You know if you have one. She gets mad at you and may even cry when you squish a spider with your shoe or swat a fly with a flyswatter. He tries to keep up with his friends or siblings, but when they watch scary movies, he has nightmares. She picks her clothes by which ones are comfortable, not what looks good. What do you do when this child is traumatized by tragedy that is on the other side of the country or the world?
It’s important to know that highly sensitive people–adults and children–comprise about 10-20% of the population. A trauma response can occur to anyone who has been in a life-threatening event. SENG: Articles & Resources - Emotional intensity in gifted children. Emotional Intensity in Gifted Children Giftedness has an emotional as well as intellectual component.
Intellectual complexity goes hand in hand with emotional depth. SENG: Recommended Reading. SENG seeks to inform gifted individuals, their families, and the professionals who work with them, about the unique social and emotional needs of gifted persons. We support programs that foster in gifted individuals the mental health and social competence necessary for them to be free to choose ways to develop and express their abilities and talents fully. Gcabc. Some characteristics to look for, if you suspect your child is gifted, may be found in the various lists that have been compiled. One, developed by Dorothy Sisk (1977) shows the kind of specific detail worth recording. It includes, along with some examples drawn from older children by way of illustration, the following: Early use of advanced vocabulary. Talent and Diversity - Table of Contents.
GIFTED EDUCATION NEWS-PAGE Gifted Education Press. Survival kit for parents of exceptionally gifted children. When Gifted Kids Don’t Have All the Answers. When Gifted Kids Don’t Have All the Answers How to Meet Their Social and Emotional Needs Jim Delisle and Judy Galbraith, M.A. Gifted kids are so much more than test scores and grades. From Perfection to Personal Bests: 7 Ways to Nurture Your Gifted Child. You get the letter from school in the mail. A teacher has identified your child as potentially " gifted " and wants to send him or her for further testing and evaluation. Flash forward: the tests are completed, your child is a whiz, and enrichment classes will become a part of his regular school routine.
What wonderful news! It was in my family. Until all of a sudden, it wasn't anymore. Somehow, being praised for being "smart" at home seemed like old hat to her, but the more public label of being "gifted" at school created a level of pressure that quickly became overwhelming. Wow. SKYPE Andy Mahoney.