Opinion: Virginia's Gifted Not So Grand

As a teacher of gifted students, parent of two gifted children, and gifted learner myself, I can assure you that gifted programs are vital. Imagine that you have a first grade child who easily reads at a third grade level. His peers are still learning basic sight words and addition, while he wants to read easy chapter books and explore multiplication. I just described one of my children to you. Without a gifted program, he would be forced to learn things that he knew before he even entered school. There are other students who are profoundly gifted and have much greater academic needs. We are often quick to fund special education programs for slow learners and disabled students, yet we fail to recognize that gifted education programs meet a child's specific academic needs. In your story, Suzy will likely have opportunities to share her uniqueness with her peers, but if she is functioning way above her peers, then she should be provided opportunities to meet her where she is at academically. There is also the possibility that she does not fit in with her peers because she is a 'nerd' or 'brainiac.' If her educational meets are not met, then she is more likely to waste away and turn to alcohol or other drugs. If she is academically challenged, then she is much more likely to thrive and find academic success.

We 'herd' students to age-based classes all the time, much to their detriment. They are unique individuals and homogenized classes only reach the middle third, leaving the lowest and highest-ability learners behind or bored. We have no problem in recognizing the best physical talent at a school by placing them on a varsity team, and even singling them out as an MVP, but to do the same for academic talent is for some reason elitist or arrogant. It's time to remove this double standard and allow all students to receive academic opportunities commensurate with their abilities.

Jason,

I appreciate your taking the time to read and respond to this. I agree with your point that "age-based classes" can be detrimental as children mature, learn and grow at different rates, but I feel that if a child tests significantly above those standardized levels, then shouldn't he/she be put into a higher grade level instead of a segregated program?

I absolutely believe that children need to be academically challenged in school, but there seem to be too many negatives that stem from these programs that may not have been thoroughly researched or considered. As a parent, surely you would wonder how any program that your child is exposed to may impact them later on in life, be it in middle school or his/her adult life.

I agree that grade skipping should certainly be an option, but unfortunately many schools are resistant to this type of acceleration, instead preferring to keep students with same age peers. Research actually shows that gifted services should fall on a continuum, ranging from single subject enrichment, to acceleration within a subject, to grade skipping, to even more radical acceleration. Again, a one-size-fits-all type of education doesn't work for regular ed or gifted students.

I do appreciate your efforts through this article. Awareness of the problem is the first step in improving the situation. I just believe that the negatives that are associated with these programs are either perceived but invalid, due to miscommunication, or fixable.

[BTW - I found your article on my custom Google News section "gifted education."]

I agree that grade skipping should certainly be an option, but unfortunately many schools are resistant to this type of acceleration, instead preferring to keep students with same age peers. Research actually shows that gifted services should fall on a continuum, ranging from single subject enrichment, to acceleration within a subject, to grade skipping, to even more radical acceleration. Again, a one-size-fits-all type of education doesn't work for regular ed or gifted students.

I do appreciate your efforts through this article. Awareness of the problem is the first step in improving the situation. I just believe that the negatives that are associated with these programs are either perceived but invalid, due to miscommunication, or fixable.

[BTW - I found your article on my custom Google News section "gifted education."]

Kaylie, it sounds like you have been involved with/victim of something involving academic elitism. That's very unfortunate. I work with gifted children at an elementary school that is also a Title I school. As you probably know, giftedness is not a function of a hefty bank account or a family pedigree. Ignoring high academic ability and talent in my school setting would be a travesty and would short-change the futures of these children and their families as well as our communities. It would be a travesty to ignore these children in any school setting. All children should be nurtured to reach their potential.

If you are reading this comment and you are in a teaching degree program, you need to learn how to differentiate instruction for all children. Work to become that teacher who discovers all children's gifts and makes all children reach.

Helen

As a parent of a profoundly gifted child, I want to comment on this article. My son does not fit into *any* brick-and-mortar school setting. Therefore, he's always been homeschooled, at the urging of our own school districts (two states) at age 4, when he was in their preschool program, and at age 7, when they tested him.

You cannot just "grade skip" a child. My son is one, to five years "skipped" in his various courses at age 10. That does not work well in a B&M setting. You need to read up on the asynchronous development of the gifted. Many kids are above grade level in many areas, but their gross, and fine motor skills are age appropriate. This causes issues when they are expected say, in a high school composition class to write a hand-written essay in 45 minutes to practice for the SAT. They, like children who are at the other end of special education (my multiply-disabled daughter), and on IEP's, need accommodation. If you place a child too high, and many kids need *several* grade skips, there are other issues.

When my son was tested at age 7, our district wanted to put him in middle school science. He was more than ready academically. But had he enrolled, it would be like feeding him to the wolves. We didn't accept the offer and quite frankly, they told us to keep homeschooling, because for one, it was working tremendously, based on his academic achievement testing, and two, there was just nothing they could offer us. He was already three years ahead of the "math pull out" kids, which was what the elementary gifted program consisted of - one hour a week of harder math.

As Jason said, there are many ways to accommodate for an *academically* advanced child: acceleration (full or partial); compacting; telescoping; etc.

It is very disheartening to be a parent and have a child who is blessed academically (but not so much with motor skills) who cannot get the same recognition as an outstanding athlete. It's a really sad situation of our educational system today - to focus on sports but not on academics, and allowing each child to achieve their fullest potential.

By the way, not all parents brag about their gifted kids. I have one child on each end of the developmental spectrum. I will tell you this, most days my PG son wears me out MORE than his sister who has autism, cerebral palsy, major speech impairment and others. It is *not* a walk-in-the-park every day to have a child so ahead of your *own* skills. It is tough. The more people support us in our parenting, the better parents we can become.

Julie, I commend you. I am in the same boat with a PG child. I have also homeschooled with the support of the public school as they also preferred it and it has worked where they failed; so obviously shown on testing.

Most schools understand but are financially unable to provide for these kids. The best they can do is move them up or provide a general gifted program, one size fits all. The gross and fine motor skills are a detriment to these children. Our school district has a gifted program but it is tailored to the above average and mildly gifted because that is where they can maximize their funding. For children that require an advanced and accelerated program, neither grade skipping nor general gifted program will work. Because there are so few of these children in each district, private school or home school seems to be the only option. Very few private schools can accommodate these kids. And I have found that very few teachers understand them.

I don’t have an answer but I know what is out there today doesn’t work for these high end kids. It takes a lot of my time and energy to accommodate this child. There aren’t other kids in the regional area for him to have age level academic peers. This means we, as parents, don’t have local peers for support in trying to educate this child. There is no federal or state funding for these kids. It comes down to what the individual family can afford to provide.

It’s not easy but I wouldn’t change a thing. We have been lucky in that we have been able to afford a customized education for him. Are we elitists? No, just parents who would like to see their child happy and successful.

I don't know what creditials you have but this article brings up dozens of issues. It seems like you threw everything against the wall to see what would stick. I've taught gifted kids for 25 years and have 3 gifted sons of my own...I just have this to say. Do you know who learns the least new material in our schools everyday? The rightest kids learn the least. That's sad. I wish you'd done your homework before writing the article.

"Brightest" not "rightest". I have a sticky "B" on my computer.

As a public school educator for 10 years and the mother of two in the gifted program, I could not agree more with the comments regarding the complete lack of balance of what is revered in our schools today (and even on Planet Blacksburg--note what gets the most coverage every single day!) Why IS it that we can single out the athletes so readily and schools get such recognition for those students when kids who excel academically are forced to sit in classrooms where they are bored out of their minds? I have taught classrooms both homogeneously and heterogeneously grouped and I can tell you that grouping kids of differing abilities DOES NOT WORK for most subjects. How can you teach "A Tale of Two Cities" to a room full of students where some have a 180 IQ and others can barely write a sentence? The argument I often get, from a theoretical standpoint, is that the "high level kids can bring the others up and raise the bar." Please tell me why it is my child's responsibility to make sure the rest of the class can rise to the occasion? Of course it is satisfying to help someone, but at what cost? So that those with intellectual talents just flatline until their peers catch up with them? Are we really preparing our kids for the real world, no matter what their academic abilities, if we say, "We are all the same"? We are not all the same. The schools seem so centered on self-esteem and making sure that no one feels inferior academically that we are doing a great disservice to those kids screaming out for a challenge. If you are going to adopt programs that even out the student body like that, then let my completely uncoordinated non-athletic son play starting quarterback sometime and see how that works out.