Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Recommended Resources Why gifted students need to be taught formal writi

I was multi-tasking at work and was listening to this presentation in the background. Looks like it's from a William & Mary conference (I believe they have a formal gifted ed program).

Why gifted students need to be taught formal writing

I found it interesting... even if you don't totally agree with the message. (I didn't think I would at first) It ends a little abruptly, but you get the general idea.

JB

I agree! Though unfortunately, it's easy to get a bachelor's degree without writing much, even at some highly competitive colleges. A friend of mine tutored law school students in remedial writing and was amazed how unprepared some were for legal writing.

Darn, I wish it didn't end so abruptly. Anyhow, interesting, thanks for posting it. While the video was talking about high school students, I'll interject about DS8. I ran into an issue w/ writing w/ DS8. For our quasi gifted program, there is the requirement for the child to be writing 2yrs+ ahead. Well, just like in anything, there are kids who are gifted writers and will be writing 3-5yrs ahead w/ no instruction, however, for those that aren't, I don't think it makes them any less gifted. So how can you have a 2nd or 3rd grader writing 2yrs+ w/ no instruction? The other issue is that many boys just don't like the physical act of writing so I think that requirement misses alot of kids who would otherwise qualify for the program.

I haven't watched the video yet but I just wanted to say that for me there is a very big difference between teaching writing and teaching handwriting. I got a bachelor's degree in foreign languages from a liberal arts school more than 10 years ago. I never turned in a handwritten paper and only turned in handwritten lab notes in one science class where the teacher was (literally!) 80. Handwritten work wasn't allowed. Good handwriting had nothing to do with college... at least not in my case.

We saw Dr. Webb speak several weeks ago. He very bluntly said the only purpose to teaching gifted children neat handwriting is for the SAT essay.

Now teaching writing, that's a whole different ball game!

When I said writing, I mean composition and such, not handwriting.