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    In the truth pile: Gifted students are not all alike. Teaching strategies that work for a PG kid may not work for a HG kid, or even another PG kid. Or even that same PG kid a year later. ("You've met one gifted kid, you've met one gifted kid.")


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    Myth:
    *That a child who is dramatically ahead in K, must be hothoused.
    *That a kid who reads encyclopedias, must be forced to do so.
    *That is doesn't hurt a kid to coast year after year in school.
    *There's something EVERY kid needs to learn in K (or 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.)
    *Gifted classes are too stressful for kids, even if they're GT.
    *Don't put your kid in the HGT class because those kids are weird. (OK, it's not a myth that many of them are unusual, but they would be anyway.)

    Truth:
    *Some kids don't want to skip, even when they're years ahead of their peers. (Like my son, who is 4 years ahead in math and 5 years ahead in LA. He likes to be around kids his own age.)
    *Most kids would rather be challenged than coast.
    *Even PG kids need and want to be taught. (My son's teacher gave him a math book in 4th grade and told him if he needed help, to ask. My son never asked, but he HATED math that year.)
    *Not all gifted kids are able to advocate for themselves, and therefore they seem like they don't care about schoolwork, when they actually do.


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    Originally Posted by syoblrig
    Myth:
    *That a child who is dramatically ahead in K, must be hothoused.
    *That a kid who reads encyclopedias, must be forced to do so.
    *That is doesn't hurt a kid to coast year after year in school.
    *There's something EVERY kid needs to learn in K (or 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.)
    *Gifted classes are too stressful for kids, even if they're GT.
    *Don't put your kid in the HGT class because those kids are weird. (OK, it's not a myth that many of them are unusual, but they would be anyway.)

    this! all of this! and man, did we ever find out the hard way.


    Every Sunday it brooded and lay on the floor. Inconveniently close to the drawing-room door.
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    Originally Posted by syoblrig
    Truth:
    *Some kids don't want to skip, even when they're years ahead of their peers. (Like my son, who is 4 years ahead in math and 5 years ahead in LA. He likes to be around kids his own age.)
    *Most kids would rather be challenged than coast.
    *Even PG kids need and want to be taught. (My son's teacher gave him a math book in 4th grade and told him if he needed help, to ask. My son never asked, but he HATED math that year.)
    *Not all gifted kids are able to advocate for themselves, and therefore they seem like they don't care about schoolwork, when they actually do.

    YES!!!

    Especially point 2-- if you see signs of avoidance of challenge in a gifted child, that ought to be a klaxon of warning for perfectionism. Time to examine the relative level of challenge in that child's life-- and to look at the history of how well (or poorly) that child's needs have been met.

    The third one, I've been around-and-around-and-around with my DD's school over. She needs a teacher. She also doesn't always know what she needs, she just knows that it's "wrong" when she doesn't have those needs met. That doesn't mean for one second that she is not HG+. No "NT" student can truly learn-- and retain-- a full year of mathematics in just 2 or 3 days. But she needs a teacher. Not YouTube, not Khan, not another 'workbook.'

    IMO, some truths are self-evident:

    Autodidactic =/= gifted.

    (Global) avid interest and cooperation =/= gifted.

    Gifted students may look that way, particularly when they are interested in a subject-- but they don't necessarily have those things as core traits. My DD is often quite a difficult student for teachers because of her rate of learning-- and her lack of cooperation with instruction over material she knows-- not to mention her disproportionate responses to constructive criticism due to her perfectionism. She's amazing all around, and I do not always mean that in a positive manner. She needs teachers who pay attention to her-- and who won't back down when she puffs up like a porcupine.

    Gifted children can do things that NT ones cannot. A child that spontaneously displays thinking, reasoning, or understanding which is not developmentally "possible" is gifted. Full stop. Do not write that off or rationalize it as a "fluke." It doesn't matter that s/he doesn't do it all the time, or that s/he won't do it on command (what? like a trained seal??). You cannot train a child to do things that his/her cognitive development won't support.

    I'd think that experienced people in education would recognize this and respond appropriately-- but you'd never know it from talking to (or advocating with) educators.




    Schrödinger's cat walks into a bar. And doesn't.
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    This thread is such an excellent source for parent advocacy!

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    Originally Posted by HowlerKarma
    Gifted children can do things that NT ones cannot. A child that spontaneously displays thinking, reasoning, or understanding which is not developmentally "possible" is gifted. Full stop. Do not write that off or rationalize it as a "fluke." It doesn't matter that s/he doesn't do it all the time, or that s/he won't do it on command (what? like a trained seal??). You cannot train a child to do things that his/her cognitive development won't support.

    Yes! Especially the bolded text.


    What is to give light must endure burning.
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    Thanks for the several responses, which are interesting and thought-provoking. Keep them coming.

    Some of you who participate in other Brand X online communities have noticed that I have asked the same questions in those. I will compile and digest and respond to your kind comments, jointly with responding to comments from elsewhere, in a while.


    "Students have no shortcomings, they have only peculiarities." Israel Gelfand
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    Myth:

    All gifted kids need is to be kept challenged and learning in order to fulfill their needs.

    Truth:

    The social / emotional needs of gifted children are often just as great if not a greater challenge than meeting their academic needs and these social / emotional needs are over looked in a majority of even gifted programs.


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    Old Dad-- I'd add that meeting them can be far more complicated, too. It's very much harder for parents to "afterschool" those needs than academic ones.


    Schrödinger's cat walks into a bar. And doesn't.
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    This kind of follows Old Dad and Howler Karma,
    Myth: Parenting/teaching a gifted child must be easier because they are so smart and advanced and don't have any problems.

    Reality: Parenting and teaching gifted children is really hard! None of the conventional wisdom/parenting books work the same for them. They can be exhausting, enfuriating, confusing, but parents often have little social support for this job because others don't understand and we sound to them like we are bragging when we are actually venting or seeking support. For the kids, it means that most adults as well as their peers don't understand them. Asynchrony, overexciteabilities, much less any twice exceptional conditions are a mine field that we as families negotiate on a daily basis. Except there is no map and everyone else walks by without even noticing the mines.

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