Understanding the Stereotypes Against Gifted Students: A look at the social and emotional struggles of stereotyped students

From Academic Leadership Live- The Online Journal


Volume 8 Issue 3 Summer 2010

Understanding the Stereotypes Against Gifted Students: A look at the social and emotional struggles of stereotyped students 

Posted On Wed, Sep 01 2010 15:10:53
Authors: Kimberly E. Ely 


An interesting article worth reading....

The "G" Word

We are revisiting earlier conversations on what it means to be academically gifted and why students come to SAGE. I believe if we can help the students to understand and clearly explain what SAGE is all about, they can begin to gain a more accurate understanding of "giftedness." Our discussion included:

*SAGE is not a club or honor society.

*Students come to SAGE to exercise their brain.

*Being in SAGE means you are "better at" math, reading and/or problem solving, not "better than" your classmates.

*Students come to SAGE to break bad habits, (like rushing or not reading directions carefully.)

*Students come to SAGE to learn to find answers to their own questions without having to depend on an adult.

*Students come to SAGE to learn to be more independent in their work.

*There are many gifted students that do not attend SAGE. They may be musically, artistically or athletically gifted and their gifted teacher is their music teacher, art teacher or coach.

The word "gifted" brings about strong feelings and responses from people. It can certainly be said that the many of those responses are neither positive nor supportive. I find that to be sad, as the majority of those same people have no problem touting achievements of talented young artists, musicians and athletes. Actually, the press in one major US city featured gifted athletes 30 times more often than gifted scholars. What message does that send to our students?

I'll step off my soap box and leave you with a quote from a 14 year gifted young woman:

“Have you watched adults squirm, and listened to their responses when you ask them if they’re gifted? What does this say about how they define giftedness, and what messages does this send to people, especially kids, about giftedness being OK?”

Educator advocate and author James Delisle says, "Even though most parents see giftedness as a positive attribute, they are often reluctant to talk openly about the term and its implications with their children. Fearing their gifted children will become “elitist” or “big-headed” if the term is discussed, parents downplay the term and advise their gifted children to do the same, “so that other kids don’t feel bad.”

By not discussing giftedness, or by telling your gifted child to avoid mention of it around others, you are sending a confusing, mixed message—be proud of your abilities, but don’t let anyone know that you have them."


Some thoughts to ponder...

Bringing Gifted Children Back to Earth, Without Popping Their Balloon!

Off and on, we have discussions about some of our learning goals in the SAGE program.  An important objective I need them to recognize is that part of my job is to help them break bad (learning/work) habits they may have acquired.  If students are able to complete the majority of their school work with ease and they rarely face work that challenges their abilities (even if this only occurs in their areas of strength) they will pick up bad habits. 

I cannot say that all gifted students develop the "bad habits" listed below, but most do to some degree.

• Many young, gifted students rarely read directions and don't discover they are doing an assignment incorrectly until they turn in their paper. 
• At this point they are often frustrated at the idea of redoing it (--especially if the assignment was below their instructional level.) 
• They will often begin to negotiate what they are or aren't going to do. (If they get by with it, then they've just begun one more habit I will need to break.)
• Some students will become "indignant" at the idea of doing the assignment over and may be perceived (accurately or not) as being disrespectful.          

• Many gifted students rush through their work.  They are all about first and most. "I got done first!" or "I got more done than anyone else!"  (Sometimes this is a case where the student is bringing their sense of athletic competition into the classroom.)
• They make careless mistakes and/or do a minimal quality of work. 
• Even if the child's work is better than everyone else in the class and even if it meets the standards of the assignment, it is not good enough if it was done in 2.2 minutes (or even 10 minutes.) 
• As a teacher, I would wonder, "What could that child accomplish if they applied themselves for 20 or 30 minutes?"  --I am referring to lessons that provide for higher order thinking skills and are somewhat open-ended (such as creative writing and project work.) 
• I have students every year who, I believe, have little or no concept of what their personal best effort is or looks like. 

I want to provide your child with some tasks that are not restricted by time.  I want them to have opportunities to focus on the quality of their work and to explore both their own potential, and the possibilities of the task.

I try very hard to make them understand that they are smart and their work is good, but when they are here, I want to see their "great."  It is difficult to get that across with out dinging their self-concept a bit.  Many of my students are used to hearing nothing but praise.   Please remind and reassure them that my constructive criticism/suggestions are intended to make them better students, not to put them down.  If you have questions or concerns about your child's perceptions, please let me know!

Engaging Toys & Games for Bright Learners

With the holidays coming up, I thought some of you might need some fresh gift ideas.  The Hoagies Gifted website has a page with a great list of books, magazines, toys and games that, over time, have been popular with bright children.  If you are interested, check out the link below.

Birthday & Holiday Gifts for Gifted Learners

So What Do You Think?

Kansas City Star, Sunday October 9, 2011 


We Are Failing at Creating Our Next Creative Mind
by Barbara Kerr, Special to The Star

SAGE Class Rules

This (rotational) week, as we are getting settled into our routine, we will be talking about expectations and class rules.  The rules we have posted in our classroom are below.

 Our SAGE Class Rules

1. There is no such thing as a dumb question or answer. 
2. This is a safe place to try new things.
3. It’s okay to say, “I don’t know.”
4. If you don’t understand, ask.
5. If you still don’t understand, ask again.
6. Be respectful of other peoples’ feelings and ideas.
7. It’s okay to disagree– try explaining your ideas.
8. It’s okay to be yourself, originality is in!
9. None of us are perfect.
10. This is a safe place to make mistakes- jump in a give it a try!

I am also incorporating an affective lesson on handling challenging work, frustrations and success.  I want the students to realize that when they are given work at their instructional level they will make mistakes and occationally feel frustration.  This is a good thing because it shows us we have an opportunity to learn something new.  We need to learn to get past our fear of failing and persevere to master the information or task. 

Having a "perfect"/-0 paper doesn't mean much if the work was easy. It is not the paper we need to hang on the refrigerator.  Praise your child for the paper that is -2, 3, 4 or even -5 as long as they stuck with it, made the corrections and learned the concept.  Then we are praising our children for their effort, not for a meaningless perfect paper.  Celebrate the moments when your child has to work to achieve success!

Welcome to Mrs. Koch's Primary SAGE Center Blog Site!

We have an exciting year of learning ahead and we invite you to join us on our journey. Each rotation day has its own blog that you will find in the links to the right. After each SAGE day, I will post an update there about our challenges, struggles and successes. The students will also have an opportunity to contribute their thoughts, ideas and opinions to our blog. We plan to include their writing, art work, research projects, photos, videos and technology projects on their rotation blog. I encourage you to sign up for email updates and/or an RSS feed from the individual rotation blog of interest.

Besides documenting our journey, our blog will also have a list of upcoming events, links to useful articles, tools and Web 2.0 applications. You can find these helpful links within the resource tabs along the top of this page. I will continue to add to them throughout the year. If you have an interest in or concerns about additional topics, please let me know and I will see if I can provide helpful resources.

As this is the first of our posts, we want to provide some basic information about "blogs" and "blogging." The link below will take you to a short Common Craft video, "Blogs in Plain English."

Feel free to share your thoughts with us throughout the year by commenting on our posts. We are excited about our year and we are glad you are along for the ride!