Previous thread some years ago on the forum on math word problems
http://giftedissues.davidsongifted.org/BB/ubbthreads.php/topics/104778/Math_Word_problems.html

Interesting article on the subject not specific to gifted
http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/literacynumeracy/inspire/research/WW_Word_Problems.pdf

One teacher's solution turned into a research paper.
http://scimath.unl.edu/MIM/files/research/SchwanebeckT.pdf