Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy gifted program picture in the yearbook

I guess that the reason I tend to disagree with the photo in the yearbook is b/c it is either celebrating something over which one has no control (innate differences in brain wiring) or it is an indication that the GT program isn't about such a difference at all. For instance, to be in a photo of the varsity baseball team indicates both that you have some innate talent and that you worked hard to develop it (i.e. talent). To be in GT, IMHO, should not be contingent on hard work to develop your intelligence much the way being in a class for kids with autism isn't likely contingent upon hard work to develop that difference in brain wiring. It is, or at least should be, a program set up solely for kids with different needs not just kids who are achieving or showing it through hard work.

I rankle because I've seen too many GT programs with too large of a focus on the "T" part of it. It isn't that I don't value hard work. I argue with my lazier child all the time about that very subject. It is just that GT programs will continue not to meet the learning needs of gifted kids as long as they are about pride over high achieving kids who very well may not be gifted.

So gifted children shouldn't be celebrated because they were born that way? I will always celebrate my son's natural abilities.

I've always thought of a yearbook as a way remember people in school from different contexts. From a student perspective, the GATE group are people they spent time together with throughout the school year outside of regular classes. If it runs true to course, good chance the kids on the yearbook staff were also in the GATE program and it was their idea.

Right-- but a photo in the yearbook suggests that this is a status thing, at least potentially. Like being on the VARSITY team. The difference is that all of the other things are optional and elective, and kids CHOOSE whether or not to participate in the first place. If this is that kind of picture, then fine. Good, even. But why on earth is it called "GT" then?

If gifted ed were truly about serving gifted students, very few bright-but-not-gifted students would be in those programs, because ordinary in-class differentiation and challenges would be great for that group of kids. But that is absolutely not the way that most of them operate; most schools seem to operate on an 'either-or' strategy with respect to differentiation approaches. So either they have in-class differentiation and tracking, or they offer self-contained GT. Very seldom both.

Ideally, of course, the one thing would serve bright-and-motivated and MG kids pretty well, while the other would serve kids who-- well, those who cannot be easily "mainstreamed" with other kids because of the huge gap between their cognitive needs and the norm.

Maybe living here has made me cynical, but I think there is a pretty big difference between the two things, and I tend to agree with Cricket about that subject.

While I don't think that there is anything wrong with noting the GT class, I also don't think that-- if you're going to do that, I mean-- there is anything wrong with identifying the kids who are in self-contained classrooms for other reasons, either. In a perfect world, I mean; one in which genuinely inclusive thinking means that all children are equally valued. We're still a long way from that reality, I think, which is why noting the "Life Skills" kids probably wouldn't be considered acceptable (and probably not legally okay, come to that, since it identifies kids by disability).

It does kind of seem strange in the first place. You would NEVER call out kids whose physical development was beyond (or behind) normative. Would you identify all of the high school sophomores who SHAVE? Why not? Okay, so why is this different, then? (In my mind, not so different-- except that in this case, you're "outing" hidden differences.)

If it's about elective/high achiever status, then there are organizations that operate as "clubs" there-- Honor Society, for example.

Yes, it's mostly GT kids, at least in a school that sets the bar very high. But membership is completely voluntary, and based on scholarship and service, both of which are about what the student does, not what they ARE.

I see the points that some are making here, but I still disagree.

Personally, I think our society has conditioned people to focus too much on achievement and not enough on innate talent. You have to recognize talent before you can develop it.

For some reason, we feel very uncomfortable around people who are very smart. One result is that our schools don't nurture cognitive talent (and often squelch it). We don't feel this way around people who are athletically highly gifted. We go to extremes to develop athletic giftedness. They use the term "talent scout" in sports, not "achievement scout." The point is to develop the talent and turn it into achievement.

And so what if gifted kids were born that way? Why does this mean you can't celebrate who you are? Schools have many types of clubs that celebrate how people were born: there are clubs for girls or African Americans or LGBT students. They were all born that way. In fact, the LGBT students are much more able to come out of the closet than they were even ten years ago. This has been an overall positive thing for them. Why should gifted kids have to keep hiding who they are?

Exactly, Val. Good looks is also something you are born with, yet society has no problem celebrating gorgeous people. But should you be so lucky as to be born highly intelligent, then to celebrate is to show off.

Here's a relevant article:

http://microscopesareprudent.wordpr...-we-underestimating-the-effects-of-envy/

What I find most illuminating is the intensity of feeling in some of the parental comments at the end of the article. And the fact that some parents protect their not-so-gifted children by downplaying the giftedness of the other/s. I'm not judging, just think it's noteworthy.

It isn't at all that I think that gifted kids should be made to hide or not celebrated. It is more that I think that this type of thing is, as someone mentioned above, a way to me of making the program appear to be an honor society or something that you strive to get into. I think that it enhances the problem I see with GT programs really not being about innate differences but more about status.

As to whether we should celebrate things with photos in the yearbook that are simply about the way our kids were born, yes and no. I'm torn here. For instance, my dd12 has lovely curly hair which she is finally seeming to accept and not spend all of her time straightening so it looks like other kids'. I'm glad that she's finally embracing the way her hair grows in. OTOH, I can't imagine the school putting a picture of all of the curly haired kids in the yearbook or all of the blond kids or .... You get my point.

Especially when it is something that others fight to get, for instance, it becomes muddy. Say, for example, if getting into the red haired class was a source of pride and kids were dying their hair red to get in, would we be saying that there should be a photo of the red haired kids in the school yearbook b/c our redheads should be proud of their hair? What if 75% of the "redheads" had dyed hair and we were all pretending that they didn't? That's kind of what I see GT being. A class of pseudo redheads where we all are expected to pretend that they are all natural in the interest of not asking the actual redheads to hide.

As far as LGT students, I see it somewhat differently in that it is a traditionally marginalized group so joining a club of others who are also born that way, to steal Lady Gaga's lyrics, and putting a picture of the group in the yearbook isn't so likely to engender competition to be a part of the group to which you do not legitimately belong. I don't know, maybe I am not expressing myself well here.

Some good points here, Cricket.