When Smart Kids Grow Up

by Margret Aldrich, UTNE Reader: http://www.utne.com/The-Sweet-Pursuit/When-Smart-Kids-Grow-Up.aspx

 

Were you one of those students who made schoolwork look easy, earning a galaxy of gold stars and an alphabet of A’s between your first morning of kindergarten and your graduation day?

Did everyone gush over how smart you were? If so, you might know the curse of the gifted child.

An overload of affirmations can hamper the future success of bright kids, reports Heidi Grant Halvorson for Harvard Business Review.

Students who receive praise for intellect rather than effort, she says, develop a belief that their abilities are innate and unchangeable. As adults, they lose confidence in trying to develop new, difficult skills. They get stuck. Halvorson writes:

People with above-average aptitudes - the ones we recognize as being especially clever, creative, insightful, or otherwise accomplished - often judge their abilities not only more harshly, but fundamentally differently, than others do (particularly in Western cultures). Gifted children grow up to be more vulnerable, and less confident, even when they should be the most confident people in the room.

In a study conducted by Carol Dweck and Claudia Mueller of Columbia University, fifth graders were evaluated to determine how different kinds of praise affected their performances.

The students were given three sets of problems - the first relatively easy, the second nearly impossible, and the third simple.

Dweck and Mueller found that offering the praise “You did really well. You must be really smart!” to one group resulted in a 25 percent drop in performance on the third set of problems, after they had failed the second set.

Conversely, the group that received praise that focused on their effort (“You did really well. You must have worked really hard!”) improved their performance by 25 percent.

The “smart” group became stymied, doubting their abilities, while the “hard-working” group persisted, feeling that if they tried hard enough, they would succeed.

When gifted children who were praised for their brainpower grow up, they often feel shackled by self-doubt, avoiding challenges and sticking to easy goals. Halvorson posits, however, that it’s possible to get unstuck by realizing that capabilities are wonderfully elastic:

No matter the ability - whether it’s intelligence, creativity, self-control, charm, or athleticism - studies show them to be profoundly malleable. When it comes to mastering any skill, your experience, effort, and persistence matter a lot. So if you were a bright kid, it’s time to toss out your (mistaken) belief about how ability works, embrace the fact that you can always improve, and reclaim the confidence to tackle any challenge that you lost so long ago.

Source: Harvard Business Review
Image by ultrakickgirl, licensed under Creative Commons.

Guiding the Outliers in Education

evil genius (Photo credit: crza)

by Gregory V Diehl

Every society on earth functions under some form of hierarchical structure ... and the closer to the top you are the more power you have over your fellow man.

Whether the people in the positions of highest authority achieved their status through delusions of noble birth and supernatural intervention, violent conquest, or legitimate leadership ability is irrelevant.

For most people, the temptation of suddenly ruling over the lives of others is too much. How can you know your true character until you've been placed in such a position?

Of course, hierarchies of authority don't just exist as deities, political figures, police officers, and religious figureheads. We all defer to someone for many of the choices affecting our lives.

Most of the time, the authority we give up is voluntary, like when choosing to work as part of a company and taking orders from someone higher up. Every time we hire a specialist to solve a problem we cannot do on our own, we defer to their authority on the subject and trust their judgment.

Although, sometimes authority is taken from us without consent by bullies, criminals, and anyone who makes choices for us without asking permission.

Children, by nature of their initial physical and intellectual feebleness, are always under the authority of others in society. Anyone who produces an offspring or enters a line of work involving children will find themselves holding great power. Sadly, many are not ready to wield this power.

They become short-tempered and begin to act childish themselves when they can't effectively control a group.

Teachers are among the greatest offenders, as we've all seen adults, who should not even be given domain over a single child, attempting to chaotically enforce law and order over groups of many.

Attempting to teach in groups can be difficult.

It requires a totally different approach and dynamic than individual instruction. Large groups, like more than 30 students at a time, are a totally different experience than the personalized interaction that happens when working with only one or a few learners.

Due to time constraints and the respective mental differences among all the students participating, one has to streamline whatever is being explained into an extremely generic presentation that will, hopefully, reach some of the people paying attention.

However, anytime I instruct a larger group of individuals, I find that there are always a few who stick out from the group for one reason or another.

They think differently, or react with a different level of enthusiasm toward the material being presented. They might come into the class with an innately superior grasp of the material, or they just pick up what I am trying to say much faster.

If I were a simple-minded and traditional teacher, these outliers would serve as a diversion for the rest of the class.

They'd be problematic because I would have to devote time I didn't have toward implementing a different approach specifically for them - an approach that would be lost on the remaining majority of the class.

Traditional teachers ignore the specialness of these statistical anomalies, and treat them like one of the crowd. This is a massive disservice to these unique students, and, in the long run, it debilitates what they might contribute to civilization.

I've learned to take a more progressive approach to this intellectual imbalance.

I don't cast out the outliers, nor encourage them to become more like the group for simplicity's sake. I make leaders out of them. I capitalize on their superiority by showcasing them to the rest of the class as shining examples of what they should strive toward. I develop the day's lesson around these very students, based on what I think they can handle and in turn convey to the rest of the class.

Instead of keeping them on the outside, I make them the center of attention in the hopes that everyone else will begin to see them as the new standard and start to change themselves and their conceptions of "normal."

I'm seldom disappointed in the effectiveness of this method of determining the focus of education.

These outliers and anomalies are everywhere in society. As culture has progressed, these uncommon men and women have become more accepted and celebrated for the new standards they introduce into the old mold of the world.

Those born as anomalies are still frequently encouraged to abandon their unusual traits and become more like the statistical average. Commoners fear what they do not understand or cannot themselves accomplish, and so uncommoners are made to conform.

To reverse this trend, the figureheads given authority over the developing children of the world will have to instill a superior level of confidence in the outliers from the onset of their traits. This is the responsibility that authority brings: the power to shape the structure of the human world.

In the long run, I hope the mainstream mentalities of the world can work to become more like the outsiders and weirdos who look at things a little differently.

I know this can only happen when we've changed the fundamental structure of education to celebrate the individual instead of asking him to conform to general standards.

But for now, people in positions of authority can make the choice to devote the necessary time and effort toward the outliers that will help them capitalize on their uniqueness, and resist the social pull toward averageness.

Enabled Youth is a youth mentoring, development, and coaching service run by Gregory V. Diehl. It is dedicated to helping young people live up to their highest potentials.

Gregory is a professionally certified youth mentor, coach, and international educator with experience with children in seven countries. He helps children and teenagers unlock their highest potentials and achieve personal success against the many trials of the world.

Through his coaching practice, he also helps parents connect more deeply with their children and create harmony at home.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Gregory_V_Diehl
http://EzineArticles.com/?Guiding-the-Outliers-in-Education&id=7962299

Born Smart: Signs You May Have an Advanced Learner

by Rachel Elizabeth Wood

Millions of children in the U.S. are academically gifted. Advanced Learners can often get bored and fall behind their true potential in a traditional classroom. In order to avoid wasting your student's time, parents should consider online learning as an alternative.

Students can work at their own pace, a class at a time, and finish classes at the rate they determine. Enable your student to go above and beyond an average high school degree with online Advanced Placement classes. Here are some hints that your child might be gifted.

Does your student understand principles of higher learning levels?

Even exhibiting a larger vocabulary than their peers can be a sign of advanced learners. If your student quickly comprehends basic ideas and moves on to those of a grade above, they might be an advanced learner.

Is your student self-motivated?

If your student is always on the ball finishing their homework ahead of time, they may be advanced. This ability to work independently can help students move ahead of their peers.

Does your student ask why?

Naturally curious children often exhibit behaviors of advanced learners. If your student becomes fascinated by a subject or is constantly inquisitive, they may be gifted.

Is your student creative?

Creativity is a critical part in the development of a gifted student. The ability to think of original ideas illustrates a higher level of learning.

Does your student get bored in class?

Students who are ahead of their peers often lose interest in class because they already know and understand a subject.

All of these characteristics sound familiar? You may have an advanced learner on your hands. Asking yourself what should I do about it?

Parents with gifted students should choose an academic environment in which the student will have the ability to move ahead at their own pace. If advanced students are held back with children their same age, their education may be stilted.

Finding the right learning environment for your budding genius is critical to their academic success and happiness.

One option for students who are eager to get ahead is online learning. Online schools allow children to go at the pace they desire and even offer Advanced Placement courses. Your child will no longer be held back by confused peers.

To let your child reach their full potential consider enrolling in an online program. Your child will thank you for giving them an education that can finally keep up with them!

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Rachel_Elizabeth_Wood
http://EzineArticles.com/?Born-Smart:-Signs-You-May-Have-an-Advanced-Learner&id=7888768

Genes aren't Destiny but Teaching isn't Everything Either

Linda & Terry Jamison, identical twins (Wikipedia)

by Brian Byrne, University of New England

To follow the public debate on why some children prosper in school and others falter, you’d think it was all down to teachers.

The media - from the New York Times to the Sydney Morning Herald - as well as public figures and politicians are quick to blame any student failures on inadequate teaching.

One journalist wrote recently: “… anyone with an ounce of brains knows what must be done. It’s time to move from identifying failing schools to identifying failing teachers.”

The problem with confident statements like these is that many factors affect a child’s school progress - genetic endowment, classroom peers, to name just two.

So sorting out how much of the differences among students is due to teacher quality and how much to other factors has challenged researchers for a long time - and all the methods invented so far have their limitations.

But they can be useful, particularly in putting the debate about teacher performance into perspective.

A twin solution

One way we have chosen to tackle the challenge is by analysing the early literacy performances of around 700 pairs of twins in NSW and Colorado schools.

Twins can help us because members of some pairs are in the same class and others are in separate classes.

Although we know that members of twin pairs, especially monozygotic twins (also known as identical twins), score very similarly to each other, if teachers have the kind of impact some think they do, we should expect to see quite substantial differences between twins when they have separate teachers. And when they share a teacher, have much the same results.

Here are the pair correlations that we found for combined reading and spelling scores for the first three years of school:

Author

The average overall difference between same- and different-class twins was about .08, which translates into about 8% of the variability among the children being due to the classroom they are in.

This is well short of the 40% sometimes cited and in line with some of the higher quality evidence from other research.

We also know that classroom factors other than the teacher, sometimes called “classroom climate”, can affect the average class score, so the actual contribution of teacher quality is probably less than 8%.

Education researchers hold that teacher quality will show up most clearly when a child has a “bad” teacher several years in a row. In our project there was no support for that idea.

In a separate Scandinavian sample, we included many twin pairs in the same classroom and whose classes remained the same, with the same teacher, in the first and second grades. If teacher quality had the broad-brush effect many claim, we’d expect the twins to be even more similar to each other at the end of the second grade, compared to the first. But they were not.

The within-pairs correlations actually dropped a little - in other words, no sign of a cumulative teacher effect.

This study also shows us a higher correlation among monozygotic (identical) twins, compared to dizygotic (non-identical) ones. This shows us that genetics have a substantial effect on early literacy.

Genetics and literacy

But how much of a role do inherited traits play? Our studies and others like them have generated estimates of between 60% and 80% heritability.

Though we hasten to add that it is impossible to say in individual cases of reading difficulties whether genes or other factors are the cause, or are a combination of both.

We also need to emphasise that even in cases where difficulties are due to genetic factors there are very good reasons to be optimistic that well-focused intervention using proven techniques can alleviate them.

The kind of research we have reviewed, including our own, typically utilises large numbers of children, and large numbers of teachers and schools as well. As such, it can fail to detect individual acts of teaching and consequences of school policy that elevates a child beyond expectation or leaves another child foundering.

The research also does not mean that serious social disadvantage does not have its consequences. Indeed, research into the role of genes and the environment in academic and cognitive performance has shown that at low SES levels genetic influence is muted, as if the burdens of disadvantage prevent children from performing to their potential.

But the arena in which policy decisions are made, like the management of “bad” teachers, is the normal functioning of normal schools across large educational jurisdictions - this is where our data is useful.

Good and even

Our conclusion, then, is that teachers are doing a much more even job in fostering early literacy than many would have us believe. But is it a good job?

In the 2011 Progress in International Reading Literacy Study (PIRLS) of Grade 4 students, Australia ranked 27/50 in mean score, statistically indistinguishable for Bulgaria, New Zealand, Slovenia, Austria, Lithuania and Poland, above France, Norway, Belgium and Spain and the remaining participating countries, but below other English-speaking countries such as the US, Canada, Ireland and the UK.

In contrast, in less recent data on 15-year-olds from the 2009 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), Australia ranked sixth among 44 OECD countries, on a level indistinguishable from New Zealand, The Netherlands, and Japan, and above other countries such as Sweden, Norway, Germany, Ireland, Denmark, the UK, and the USA.

It is not clear how to reconcile these rather disparate results. It could be simply a matter of different tests, different sampling, different ages, different age cohorts. And it remains to be seen if Australia “catches up” in the move from age nine to 15.

But none of this alters the primary observation that within the country, teachers have less to do with differences among students’ reading achievement than often supposed.

Shifting the debate

Australia’s former top public servant Terry Moran recently said the key to improving education standards is not in spreading more money on schools “like Vegemite”, but instead the focus should be on recruiting and investing in bright school graduates to become teachers and future school leaders.

Although it should be clear by now that we do not agree with any implication that teachers are the primary source of differences among students, no-one could object to the aspiration of attracting the most able people into the teaching profession.

For that to happen, teaching needs to be a respected calling. But a culture of blame and antagonistic press coverage undermine the respect that teachers need.

Brian Byrne receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the U.S. National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.


This article was originally published at The Conversation. Read the original article.

Parenting an Inquisitive Child

Happy adjustment to school: Talking With Your Child (Woman Alive, 1974) (Photo credit: mod as hell)

by admin, Hire a Nanny: http://www.hireananny.org/blog/parenting-an-inquisitive-child/

A high level of inquisitiveness is one of the more common signs that your child is gifted, which is a blessing for most parents.

Still, the never-ending flow of questions from a curious child’s mouth can be a challenge at times.

Learning how to deal with the special needs of an inquisitive child without squelching her natural curiosity isn’t always easy, but it is possible with a bit of dedicated attention.

Encourage Her Natural Curiosity

It can be tempting to lay ground rules regarding how many questions your child can ask, and it’s easy to even become so frustrated with the constant requests for information that you shut down completely.

It’s important to keep in mind that if the special needs of your child aren’t met, she could begin to shut down altogether and fail to realize her full potential. Nurturing the thirst for knowledge will increase your workload as a parent, but it’s also one of the best ways to ensure that she stays engaged and eager to learn.

Rather than discouraging your child from asking so many questions, look for ways that you can nurture her inquisitive nature.

Talk About Privacy and Respecting Boundaries

Curious kids just want to know more about the world around them, and they’re not always burdened by the knowledge of social mores. As a result, it’s not uncommon to find yourself making apologies for hurtful or rude questions that your inquisitive child asks without realizing that she’s violating the social contract.

Making sure that you take time to discuss the importance of respecting others’ right to privacy and maintaining some boundaries can help cut down on these embarrassing situations.

Letting your child know that it’s okay to ask touchy questions when it’s just the two of you will satisfy her urge to discover new things without subjecting unwitting friends and loved ones to a barrage of delicate questions.

Find Toys and Games that Fuel Her Inquisitive Nature

The technological advances in the toy industry aren’t restricted to shoot-’em-up video games. There’s a wide selection of toys and games designed to foster learning and knowledge in kids that can help encourage a habit of independent learning.

When your child is able to find some of the answers to her questions or access new information on her own she’ll be able to take pride in her accomplishments while you escape at least a few of her questions about the world.

Make a Habit of Looking Up Answers Together

It’s embarrassing to admit that you don’t know the answer to a child’s question, especially if it happens on a regular basis. Rather than becoming frustrated as a result of your humiliation or offering an incorrect answer as a means of buying some silence, why not make a habit of finding the answers to her questions together?

You’ll be able to make sure that the information your child finds is accurate, she’ll begin to learn the basics of independent research and you’ll be able to learn a few things in the process.

Keep Answers Age-Appropriate

When a child wants to know everything that happens around her, she’ll naturally stumble on a subject or two that’s beyond her maturity level. Whether you’re concerned about the ability of her young mind being able to grasp more complex concepts or you simply want to shield her from certain realities about the world, there will be questions that you won’t quite know how to answer.

Rather than shutting your child down with a simple “let’s talk about it later,” think about the best ways to offer an age-appropriate answer. Remember, it’s okay to tell your child that you need to think about the right way to answer a question.

There’s no rule stating that you have to present the unvarnished truth immediately upon being asked a question, so take your time in formulating a response.

In some cases, your child’s quick mind and short attention span may mean that she’s forgotten all about her question by the time you find an answer that’s suitable for her developmental and maturity level and you won’t have to foist heavy knowledge onto small shoulders at a moment’s notice.

No one knows your child as well as you, so you may find that there are individual solutions unique to your child that will do the trick when sticky questions are asked.

In the end, it’s important to make every effort to support her curious nature, even when the stream of questions is beginning to wear on your nerves. Remember that she’s still learning about everything around her and that the answers to even simple questions aren’t always so obvious to little eyes.

18 Blogs You Can Use to Determine if Your Child is Gifted

Cover of Your Gifted Child

by admin, Find a Nanny: http://www.findananny.net/blog/18-blogs-you-can-use-to-determine-if-your-child-is-gifted/

Many parents think that their child is gifted, maybe because he walked before the other babies in the playgroup or was an early talker.

However, does this mean that your child is gifted or just really smart? What is the difference between a child who is gifted and one who is highly proficient? As a parent, what should you do to make sure your child is getting what he needs in school?

These questions and others will be answered in the following 18 blog entries. If you think your child might be gifted, you may benefit from reading these blogs.

Gifted vs. Highly Proficient

Sometimes children are labeled as gifted when they may just be ahead in their learning. Children who attended pre-school may be ahead academically when compared to a child who had no schooling prior to kindergarten. Does this mean one child is gifted and the other is not?

Determining the difference between a gifted child and a highly proficient one is a difficult task. The highly proficient child knows the answers to the questions, whereas a gifted child will ask questions that are beyond the scope of the lesson. Read through these six blog posts and see if your child is gifted or highly proficient.

• My View: 10 Myths About Gifted Students and Programs for Gifted: This is a smartly written article by an educator who has been involved in gifted programs for more than 20 years.
• Is My Child Gifted: You’ll find many questions here that can help you determine if your child is gifted or highly proficient.
• The Differences Between Bright and Gifted: This is a very thorough list of how to tell the difference between a bright child and gifted one.
• Gifted or Just Bright? How Does a Parent Know?: This post presents different questions to help the parent determine if their child is gifted.
• Bright vs. Gifted Children: This blogger looks at the characteristics of a gifted child and his social behaviors to determine giftedness.
• Bright Student vs. Gifted Learner: Several different charts with additional information regarding the difference between gifted and bright are available in this post.

Parental Role

As a parent, you may want to know what your role is in determining if your child is gifted. Decades ago parents sent their kids to school and that was pretty much it. It was the teacher’s job to teach your child. Often, children who are labeled as gifted now were considered unruly or disruptive back then.

So much more is understood about learning styles and various special needs that school is an entirely different ballgame now. Parents may have to step in to make sure that their child is getting the attention that he requires to learn and reach his full potential. If you feel your child is gifted and not being challenged enough in class, you have the right to have him tested for the gifted program.

• Parent Advocacy Model – Are My Child’s Needs Being Met?: Follow the flow chart on this blog to see if you are happy with the progress your child is making in class.
• Gifted Students Have ‘Special Needs,’ Too: The feeling that the brightest children are not being taught to their full ability and that changes should be made to the system are shared in this post.
• Gifted Education: Often, the needs of gifted students are not treated to the same level as a child who has another special need, such as ADHD. This blogger discusses this issue in depth.
• Parents’ Experience of Rearing Gifted Children: An interesting overview of what parents noticed about their gifted child while he was growing up is presented in this blog post.
• Parents of Gifted Kids Need This Information from Dr. Linda Silverman: Here you’ll find information about the struggles of parenting a gifted child, as well as several links to other helpful information.
• The Role of Parents in Identifying Gifted Children: This article is full of interesting information about what parents should watch for if they feel their child is gifted.

Testing for Giftedness

There are differing opinions about when a child should be tested for the gifted program. If you test a child in kindergarten, are you truly finding the gifted kids or just the ones that are ahead of the learning curve? How should a child be tested? These questions and others will be discussed in the following six blog articles.

• The Myth of Testing for Giftedness: This blogger feels that testing kids for giftedness is invalid.
• Schools Make Changes in Testing for Gifted Students: Rules are changing, and some parents could pay to have their kids tested for giftedness.
• Gifted Testing: A breakdown of how some kids are tested for giftedness is presented in this entry.
• Testing Your Gifted Child: The Pros and Cons: Points to consider before testing for giftedness are presented here.
• Testing for Giftedness: Read the story of this blogger’s journey through the gifted testing process.

10 Signs Your Child is a Gifted and Talented Student

Cover via Amazon

by LiveOutNanny.com: http://www.liveoutnanny.com/blog/10-signs-your-child-is-a-gifted-and-talented-student/

Parents generally think all of their children are pretty special, but some kids really are uniquely gifted when it comes to learning and grasping schoolwork.

If you were a gifted student yourself, you might recognize the signs, but here’s some tips for those of you who aren’t sure what to look for.

1. Strong Vocabulary – What kinds of words and sentence structure does your child use? Do they use more multi-syllable words than their peers? Are they often asking about the meanings of new words they hear and do they quickly put new words to use? Gifted children often have advanced vocabularies and quickly pickup word meanings through their contextual use.
2. Quick on Completing Schoolwork – If your child’s teacher tells you that your child is always one of the first ones completed with their assignments, this is a strong clue that your child is more advanced than the other students in their classroom.
3. Understand Monetary Concepts – Use of money is one of the first mathematical concepts that kids are exposed to in their home environment. If your child quickly picks up the concepts of the monetary values of coins and how they relate to one another, this may be a sign that you have a mathematically gifted child.
4. Listen and Learn – Does your child seem to be able to pick up concepts and the words to songs as soon as they hear them, even if it is only once? Gifted children don’t need the same amount of repetition to learn as other children.
5. Enjoys a Mental Challenge – Are puzzles fun for your child, but they quickly get bored with them if they are too easy? This could be a sign of a gifted child. Gifted children enjoy a challenge but easily become bored if there isn’t enough challenge.
6. Mature Sense of Humor – A gifted child will be more likely to understand more complex humor such as is found in newspaper comic strips or jokes that other children their age may not be able to understand.
7. Advanced Reading Skills – Most gifted children have advanced reading skills and enjoy reading. You will find them breezing through large books quickly and yet still comprehending what they’ve read and being able to explain it to you.
8. Enjoys Learning New Things – For gifted children, learning new things is exciting and fun. They have a great curiosity about how things function, how things are made and learning about just about any subject.
9. Observatory Skills – If you have a gifted child, they will notice things and remember things that most other kids would not. They may notice simple details like a person wearing a different watch than they normally do or be able to remember the exact icons on your computer that you clicked on to get to the program that they like to play.
10. Grasps Relationships – Gifted children will grasp and understand relational concepts quicker than their peers. They will be able to pick out and replicate more complicated patterns. They will find it easier to fill in the missing piece from a sequence.

Some children will be greatly gifted in just one or two areas, while others seem to be gifted in almost every direction. The important thing is to recognize your child’s strengths and encourage them and challenge them in those areas, so that they are always developing them.

How Do You Raise a Prodigy?

Joshua Waitzkin (born December 4, 1976, New York City) is a chess player, martial arts competitor, and author. As a child he was recognized as a prodigy, and won the U.S. Junior Chess championship in 1993 and 1994. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

by Andrew Solomon, The New York Times: http://www.nytimes.com

Drew Petersen didn’t speak until he was 3½, but his mother, Sue, never believed he was slow.

When he was 18 months old, in 1994, she was reading to him and skipped a word, whereupon Drew reached over and pointed to the missing word on the page.

Drew didn’t produce much sound at that stage, but he already cared about it deeply. “Church bells would elicit a big response,” Sue told me. “Birdsong would stop him in his tracks.”

Sue, who learned piano as a child, taught Drew the basics on an old upright, and he became fascinated by sheet music.

“He needed to decode it,” Sue said. “So I had to recall what little I remembered, which was the treble clef.”

As Drew told me, “It was like learning 13 letters of the alphabet and then trying to read books.”

He figured out the bass clef on his own, and when he began formal lessons at 5, his teacher said he could skip the first six months’ worth of material. Within the year, Drew was performing Beethoven sonatas at the recital hall at Carnegie Hall. “I thought it was delightful,” Sue said, “but I also thought we shouldn’t take it too seriously. He was just a little boy.”

On his way to kindergarten one day, Drew asked his mother, “Can I just stay home so I can learn something?” Sue was at a loss. “He was reading textbooks this big, and they’re in class holding up a blowup M,” she said. Drew, who is now 18, said: “At first, it felt lonely. Then you accept that, yes, you’re different from everyone else, but people will be your friends anyway.”

Drew’s parents moved him to a private school. They bought him a new piano, because he announced at 7 that their upright lacked dynamic contrast. “It cost more money than we’d ever paid for anything except a down payment on a house,” Sue said.

When Drew was 14, he discovered a home-school program created by Harvard; when I met him two years ago, he was 16, studying at the Manhattan School of Music and halfway to a Harvard bachelor’s degree.

Prodigies are able to function at an advanced adult level in some domain before age 12. “Prodigy” derives from the Latin “prodigium,” a monster that violates the natural order. These children have differences so evident as to resemble a birth defect, and it was in that context that I came to investigate them.

Having spent 10 years researching a book about children whose experiences differ radically from those of their parents and the world around them, I found that stigmatized differences - having Down syndrome, autism or deafness; being a dwarf or being transgender - are often clouds with silver linings.

Families grappling with these apparent problems may find profound meaning, even beauty, in them. Prodigiousness, conversely, looks from a distance like silver, but it comes with banks of clouds; genius can be as bewildering and hazardous as a disability.

Despite the past century’s breakthroughs in psychology and neuroscience, prodigiousness and genius are as little understood as autism. “Genius is an abnormality, and can signal other abnormalities,” says Veda Kaplinsky of Juilliard, perhaps the world’s pre-eminent teacher of young pianists.

“Many gifted kids have A.D.D. or O.C.D. or Asperger’s. When the parents are confronted with two sides of a kid, they’re so quick to acknowledge the positive, the talented, the exceptional; they are often in denial over everything else.”

We live in ambitious times. You need only to go through the New York preschool application process, as I recently did for my son, to witness the hysteria attached to early achievement, the widespread presumption that a child’s destiny hinges on getting a baby foot on a tall ladder.

Parental obsessiveness on this front reflects the hegemony of developmental psychiatry, with its insistence that first experience is formative. We now know that brain plasticity diminishes over time; it is easier to mold a child than to reform an adult. What are we to do with this information?

I would hate for my children to feel that their worth is contingent on sustaining competitive advantage, but I’d also hate for them to fall short of their potential. Tiger mothers who browbeat their children into submission overemphasize a narrow category of achievement over psychic health.

Attachment parenting, conversely, often sacrifices accomplishment to an ideal of unboundaried acceptance that can be equally pernicious. It’s tempting to propose some universal answer, but spending time with families of remarkably talented children showed me that what works for one child can be disastrous for another.

To read further, go to: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/04/magazine/how-do-you-raise-a-prodigy.html?adxnnl=1&pagewanted=all&_r=0

Homeschooling the Gifted Child

Laura Bush, listens to a student talk about Sea Turtles, Thursday, Feb. 16, 2006 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

by Jamie Gaddy

Having a gifted child can be quite a challenge. Yet, for many homeschool parents it is difficult for them to determine if their child is gifted.

Even for professional educators determining giftedness is not an easy task.

The diagnosis of giftedness itself can be a rather gray area.

Educators haven't got a clear cut definition, but there are a few simply questions that can be asked to help determine if your child is gifted.

How do I know if my child is gifted?

• Do they have an excellent memory?
• Do they have well developed reasoning skills beyond their typical age peers?
• Do they have a long attention span?
• Are they extremely curious?
• Do they have elaborate thinking skills with the ability to think abstractly, conceptualize, and synthesize information?
• Do they have excellent problem solving skills?
• Do they have an extremely vivid imagination?
• Do they have deep interests that they are passionate about?
• Do they learn fast with very little repetition or practice?
• Are they energetic?
• Is fairness and justice important to them?
• Are they extremely self motivated?
• Do they relate extremely well socially to adults, teachers, and even children?
• Did they begin reading early?
• Do they have an extensive vocabulary?

These questions are simply a starting point, but if your child exhibits many of these characteristics they might be gifted. Characteristics of giftedness vary from child to child, and your child might be different.

To know for sure, you can always have them tested. Giftedness will be based on their IQ score or SAI (school ability index) as it is now called. Typically if your child scores in the upper twenties to thirties they are considered gifted.

Giftedness also tends to run in families ... therefore, that would mean that it is possibly genetic. If you have relatives that are gifted then there is a great possibility that your child is gifted as well.

Gifted children also tend to have hypersensitivities. They often don't like loud noises, or are very particular about certain articles of clothing (like having their shoes tied a specific way!).

If you feel that your child is gifted ... the fun is just beginning! Truthfully, gifted children are typically highly motivated. Your job as a parent is simply to point them in the right direction. Highly motivated young people can learn at amazing rates. If you can find out their passions and then plan your homeschooling studies accordingly then you have just about climbed your mountain!

Once you've found your child's passions ... the goal is to continually feed that passion. For example, if your child is gifted in music then make sure they have lessons and instruments to constantly fire that passion.

As a homeschooling mom of six, I help challenge my children with curriculum that I make as well as online curriculum from http://www.time4learning.com. I enjoy writing and spending time with all of my very different children.

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What Should Be on the Tombstone of Gifted Education? Part 5: Writing the Tombstone

Strive to excel (Photo credit: pugaipadangal)

by Louis R LaMont

In Part 4, the focus was on extracurricular activities and their lack of use in gifted education today.

While all students would benefit from the extension of knowledge into social issues, gifted students are those that are most likely to attain positions of influence and their ability to solve social issues should be at the heart of their educational plans.

These experiences could take several forms from shadowing doctors or engineers, conducting research in any number of areas, reporting that research to the professional community, or aiding in the design of urban planning or alternative methods of planning.

Any experience that forces gifted children to incorporate learned knowledge and integrate this knowledge into their moral structure solves the issue of whether or not the knowledge learned is truly understood and can be utilized effectively.

As the facts in Part's 1-4 are examined, it is not hard to figure out why gifted education programs are not being funded or being closed completely. The education of gifted students actually requires more time and resources than the traditional student.

If those resources and money were spent on the traditional school, many more students could have their test scores raised and their political clout (test scores) would remain intact. Not only are resources an issue in teaching the gifted, the administrator's attitudes toward them also is changed by these very same test scores. It is assumed that the gifted will do well on their own so they are left to their own devices to prepare for state tests.

Identification of the gifted student also raises issues in housing these students, how districts will pay for their education, and what types of special curriculum will be used to train these students. Since most districts house gifted students in a single facility rather than providing each school an individual program, many students go unidentified as gifted. This limits the resources that are spent trying to educate these students.

Identification of the gifted also raises issues involving just how far a district curriculum or teaching resources will go to be sure the student is educated. Extended experiences are required to be sure that knowledge is processed and incorporated into the student's foundation of understanding.

So, what should go on the tombstone of gifted education? Gifted education is not dead yet but with the overreliance on state testing the allocation of resources into its preparation, gifted education has one foot in the grave and a headstone should be carved in anticipation of the end. In preparation, I suggest the headstone read as such:

Here Lies Gifted Education
Shot in the Back by State Testing
Mourned by Everyone, Missed by None

The Prairie Science Academy exists to seek out students who are highly motivated to begin a career in the sciences and provide a series of accelerated educational experiences. Our graduates finish the PSA program with a two-year head start on all public school graduates with the same goals. http://www.psadfw.com

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What Should Be on the Tombstone of Gifted Education? Part 4 - The Use of Extracurricular Activities

Knowledge Path (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

by Louis R LaMont

In Part 3, the use of assignments with the gifted and talented was discussed in terms of the level of assignment provided to them versus that of the standard curriculum.

Most of the assignments provided in the curriculum are geared toward a basic level of thinking and reasoning.

Skills such as absorbing knowledge, comprehending information, and the application of concepts dominate schools today.

Gifted students require a more sophisticated technique of structuring assignments that would allow them to create knowledge and analyze information to synthesize solutions to problems.

One remaining issue with the gifted and talented curriculum is one that is rarely discussed at all in discussion of any level of student at the public or college level. All students require the use of problems to solve with the knowledge they are taught.

In the standard curriculum, the use of knowledge stops with simple academic application. A student might solve a genetics problem by simply crossing two animals together on paper and predict the outcome. However, is the student exposed to the effects of this knowledge and skill on society?

Since the standard student is not brought to this level of thinking, their skills in using genetics knowledge will stop with the teacher's assignment sheet. The gifted student must be allowed to develop their skills in the solving of problems of society. This could take the form of research into a medical problem based on genetics.

Gifted students could shadow researchers and doctors that would allow them to apply the knowledge learned in class to real issues. Students would be given a simple problem to solve in the overall issue being researched. This is just one example of the type of outside use of learned knowledge that gifted students could explore.

Another method that could be used by gifted students to explore a broader range of issues is to allow them to write about their experiences. This type of writing goes beyond the simple regurgitation essay citing facts and figures about a topic.

The writing of professional experiences allows students to be able to experience what true professionals experience about their research work and, most importantly, tie together the knowledge learned from their shadowing experiences and incorporate it into their sense of purpose and into their moral structure. At the end of their experiences, the entire experience will cement itself and never be forgotten by the student.

Unfortunately, neither secondary nor college students have these types of experiences in school. At the secondary level, the district curriculum is undemanding and stops short of providing extended experiences that allow students at any level to integrate the taught knowledge into their lives in any meaningful way.

For the gifted student, this lack of extended experience further threatens their ability to maximize their potential in high school so they can gain the most from their college experiences. Students at the college level should have the same kinds of experiences, but often their educational experiences are not much more in-depth than those found in high school.

Coming in Part 5: Writing the Tombstone.

The Prairie Science Academy exists to seek out students who are highly motivated to begin a career in the sciences and provide a series of accelerated educational experiences. Our graduates finish the PSA program with a two-year head start on all public school graduates with the same goals. http://www.psadfw.com

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What Should Be on the Tombstone of Gifted Education? Part 3: Classroom Activities for Gifted Student

Teacher talking to student at LSI (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

by Louis R LaMont

In Part 2 of the series, the distribution of gifted programs in school districts was analyzed in terms of the allocation of this resource within a school district.

In the vast majority of school districts, gifted students are segregated in dedicated facilities in which they have to apply for entry.

While this method has advantages for both children and adults in the c=school setting, the major disadvantage is that students who are truly gifted or highly motivated are filtered out by a variety of statistical factors such as test scores, grades, and age.

Not only are statistical factors used but having a dedicated facility opens up the possibility of filtering based on human factors such as race, culture, and gender issues. The best option is to have gifted programs in each school so that many more students who are capable will have the access they need to gifted resources.

One of the worsening factors of modern gifted education is the level and quality of classroom activities available for these students. The modern classroom is not geared toward gifted students but rather to the middle student who is perched on the edge of passing the state test. The second priority in the classroom is the lowest student who contributes to the failing rate of state tests. It is assumed that gifted students will pass state exams so they are at the bottom of the school's priorities.

For those teachers that are allowed to design their own materials, this forces them into a teaching mode that focuses on the middle and low-level students and to virtually ignore gifted or highly motivated students. Since most school districts force teachers to use their materials, the district itself sets the stage for ignoring the needs of the gifted student.

In terms of the individual classroom assignment, gifted students require a higher quality set of goals and objectives to meet. Most assignments are geared toward a lower quality set of objectives which hinge of meeting goals based on lower-level thinking skills.

The majority of students are operating at the knowledge, comprehension, and application levels of Bloom's Taxonomy. This forces the assignment created by the teacher or district to be based on simple modes of vocabulary mastery and simple application to prescribed situations. Once this is done, the students and teachers move on to the next assignment.

The gifted child, who is in need of further learning at higher levels, is left with an experience that only marginally stimulates their higher potential.

The assignments that are provided to gifted children are not properly designed for their educational needs. They are designed for students who are working at much lower levels on a daily basis.

Gifted students require assignment and activities that stimulate their natural abilities to a much higher level of thinking. This is not to say that lower level assignments do not have value to the gifted student, but if the teacher stops at this point, then the gifted child to left with unfulfilled potential.

Coming up: Part 4 - The Use of Extracurricular Activities as a Method of Fulfilling Potential.

The Prairie Science Academy exists to seek out students who are highly motivated to begin a career in the sciences and provide a series of accelerated educational experiences. Our graduates finish the PSA program with a two-year head start on all public school graduates with the same goals. http://www.psadfw.com

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What Should Be on the Tombstone of Gifted Education? Part 2: Separate Gifted Program in All Schools

A Gifted Man (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

by Louis R LaMont

What Should be on the Tombstone of Gifted Education? A 5-part Series on Gifted & Talented Education

Part 2: Why There Needs to be a Separate "Gifted" Program in All Schools

From Part 1, we have seen background information provided that set the stage for why gifted education is about to be dead and buried in the educational system. The greatest factor working against gifted students was the infiltration of the programs by students who do not need to be there.

These mediocre and unmotivated students distract teachers and their resources away from the truly gifted kids. As a result, the learning experiences and the goals of the gifted child are decidedly reduced in effectiveness and efficiency. This leads to gifted students trying to advance their own education without the teacher's assistance.

Another factor working against modern gifted education is that the programs designed to educate gifted children are being closed in favor of transferring these funds into state testing preparation materials or other such programs.

During my own years in the classroom in preparation for state testing, the primary focus has always been on the lower level student and the so-called "bubble student" who is only a few points away from passing. Ninety percent of the test prep resources are geared for these children and all of the activities are designed to review or teach the at-risk kids.

The gifted child who is going to pass these tests regardless is purposefully left out of the test review process. For three to four weeks during the test review, the gifted child is left out of the educational process and expected to simply fend for themselves.

Since educational testing is the key to success in schools today, there is no real need to have a dedicated gifted program. It is this type of thinking that has eliminated gifted programs all over the country.

However, rather than abandon the gifted child, the gifted program should be expanded and made available to each and every school in every district. By doing this, the school could make arrangements to provide the gifted children the advanced instruction that they require while at the same time working with the middle and lower level students who require more of a dedicated test prep environment.

In terms of test prep, it is the gifted child that raises the "commended rates" of test scores. By establishing special test prep for gifted students, the school could increase every testing category and radically improve their political position in the state.

The distribution of gifted program facilities is generally done by making a single facility within the district a "gifted" school. In very large districts, a magnet school is designed to bring students from all over the district.

Having a central location has the advantage of isolating the instruction of the gifted group but it is extremely competitive and several gifted students are rejected. A more effective method of gifted student distribution is to have an in-house gifted program in each school that can potentially reach many more students. This would also have the advantage of allowing teachers to create more varied gifted programs and curriculum that would widen the activities within the district.

Coming in Part 3: Worsening Classroom Activities for the Gifted Student

The Prairie Science Academy exists to seek out students who are highly motivated to begin a career in the sciences and provide a series of accelerated educational experiences. Our graduates finish the PSA program with a two-year head start on all public school graduates with the same goals.

If you or your child is interested in an accelerated education, please fell free to visit our web site at http://www.psadfw.com and see the consulting and educational services we can provide to your child.
Louis La Mont, Executive Director & Lead Instructor

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What Should Be on the Tombstone of Gifted Education: Part 1 - Invasion of the "Gifted" Snatchers

Sculpture: "Teacher-Student" by Reinhard Schmidt in Rostock (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

by Louis R LaMont

Every one of us in the pre-retirement set remembers what it was like in school.

It was a tiny little microcosm of fragmented social groups. Some groups were popular while others banded together to rebel against the popular crowd.

Even inside these groups, further stratification was based on who was interested in school work and who wasn't.

Not that academic success mattered within the group, you were still accepted as a member and given the status you thought you deserved.

As we graduated, we drifted from high school groups into college or social groupings and tried our best maintain our status as long as we could.

Generally, most of us were successful in life in one way or another and we gave birth to the next generation that would run through the gauntlet until it was repopulated again.

Each generation that has lived through public education has seen fit to allow the cream to rise to the top and take their place as leaders of the perpetuation of the American social and political ideal. The gifted students were given unique and surplus resources to allow them to develop their talents so that they may graduate high school and take their place among their peers at the college honors table.

From this table of Phi Beta Kappans and research assistants, it was assumed that the gifted student would maintain their grades and the quality of work necessary to move them into graduate school where they would achieve their academic credential. This would catapult them into the elite of medicine, law, politics, sciences, etc. Here are our leaders! They achieved their goals from the blood, sweat, and tears of their high school teachers.

Let us fast-forward to the 21st century where the number of gifted students has shot up in number like they were on academic steroids. Today's gifted student is not that different than they were in the 20th century. However, their number and membership has been invaded by the greatest disease that the early 21st century has produced: Equality with a side dose of fairness!

If you walk into my employer's high school as it begins just after Labor Day, you will see a sea of students that have labels attached to them. Some of those labels will say "504", others will say "SPED", and quite a few will say "Gifted". Many of these gifted kids will have had the gifted label pasted on them from the early elementary days and will have carried this with them ever since.

However, once you begin working with these kids, the "g" and "I" begin to loosen from the gifted tag. They whine, cry, and complain about how hard your class is and start opening their Ipods while you are trying to teach them. Wait a minute! Are these the same kids that have been gifted the entire time?

What happened to their ability to step up on their own and take those extra assignments and research work to build up their futures? You begin to wonder if the really earned those grades or were they simply passed on to you from the previous teacher to get out of their hair.

Yes, in the name of equality and fairness, the gifted class of students has been invaded by the formerly mediocre students who were once content to sit in regular classes and do their nails and discuss the series of plays from Friday night's football game.

As I sit and work with gifted classes these days, I see the cream of the crop (they are always there) working away to achieve their future goals. But, now they must sit in the same classes with the popular set whose parents insisted that they be labeled as gifted and take the higher level classes.

Rather than the teacher of the gifted spending quality time educating them to achieve those awe-inspiring goals, the gifted teacher must now spend that resource on those students who do not need to be in the gifted class. Equality has suggested that there should be no class of students above another. Fairness suggests that it is not right to punish those poor mediocre students for doing their nails in class. They should be given the right to be gifted.

Coming up in Part 2: Why There Needs to be a Separate "Gifted" program in All Schools.

The Prairie Science Academy exists to seek out students who are highly motivated to begin a career in the sciences and provide a series of accelerated educational experiences. Our graduates finish the PSA program with a two-year head start on all public school graduates with the same goals.

If you or your child is interested in an accelerated education, please fell free to visit our web site at http://www.psadfw.com and see the consulting and educational services we can provide to your child.
Louis La Mont, Executive Director & Lead Instructor

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Help for Homeschooling the Gifted Child

AFINS logo. AFINS is a non-profit assciation for families with gifted or talented children based in Barcelona (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

by Armond K Joseph

Parenting a gifted child can be a scary and overwhelming thing! I homeschooled two gifted children, and I know how hard it can be.

If you have been blessed with this situation too, I want to encourage you with my experience.

When my first son was born and my midwife handed him to me, she gave me the best advice that I ever got, the only advice that I needed for being a parent. She told me to know my child and trust myself, and that everything would flow from there.

If you're the parent of a gifted child, you also have what it takes to parent and teach them, because you are the love-giver and not just a care-giver; you're the person that has actually been chosen and created for this job, in the same way that your child was chosen and created to be placed in your family.

As long as you make sure that you know your child, trust yourself, and do what is right at that moment for your child, these strategies are going to work not only for your gifted child, but also for every child in your family.

Although all children are gifted in some way or another, the term 'gifted' generally reflects children who learn more, learn faster, and learn at an earlier age. These children remember more, they understand abstract concepts and understand them earlier, they have passion in interests, and they can do multiple things at once and do them well. Of course, expert definitions of gifted vary widely.

One expert said that you need to have an I.Q. of 130 or more. I've tried to locate I.Q. tests and that's not easy to do, so it's not really helpful! Another expert said that the top 2.5% on standardized tests are gifted. Others say that gifted children perform two grade levels above their age group. Of course, there are some kids who are gifted but don't test well or are not compliant, so that evaluation is not without flaws.

As you think about the definition of 'gifted,' it's not always helpful to determine what it is through comparisons. Even if your child is highly gifted, there's always somebody else who's smarter. There are kids out there who are going to be smarter, if not across the board, then at least in one thing.

Maybe your child is really gifted at the piano, but you'll find somebody else who plays the cello or dances better.

Definitions are not going to change your child, or who they become. Whether you use the label or not, it becomes your job to decide whether that label is important for your child and their goals, and whether it will be helpful to you as you parent and homeschool them. Know your child, trust yourself.

Have a look at http://www.thehomescholar.com/blog/, the educational website where you can get enough details about homeschooling that may helps you to understand more about your children's education and learning. For furthermore detailed information on how to homeschool, you can visit here at http://www.thehomescholar.com/gold-care.php

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Storytelling to Stretch Young Minds

Image via Wikipediaby Steve Mynard on Teaching Expertise: http://www.teachingexpertise.com

Gifted and talented children are not always able to express themselves well and this can sometimes undermine their true ability. Steve Mynard shares techniques that will help children to become confident and expressive communicators.

Storytellers in ancient, preliterate cultures could remember word-for-word epic tales that might take several evenings to recount. They would store the entire tribal history in their minds and retell it at celebrations and ceremonies.

Writing stories down in books and reading them again liberates the mind from these feats of memory. But traditional storytelling still has a role to play and is a skill worth cultivating.

Why tell stories with children?

Introducing traditional oral storytelling to your class will benefit children by:

- providing opportunities to both tell and hear stories, encouraging the development of active speaking and listening skills
- fuelling their imagination and allowing children to develop their own mental images
- developing the memory
- influencing children's written work as well as their selection of reading material
- familiarising them with traditional tales, myths, legends and fables that speak in metaphor about deep-seated truths and conflicts. They provide a vehicle for the discussion of social mores and personal ethics
- creating fun and excitement - children love it!

Developing the skills of storytelling will particularly appeal to your gifted and talented children because of the opportunities it brings for developing expression, linguistic skills, the subtleties of timing and the flexibility of delivery. Storytelling also allows a dramatic element to enter the tale with facial expressions and a degree of acting out the story.

Getting started: teacher as storyteller

Although these notes are written for a teacher, or TA, they can just as well be used with an older G&T student who shows potential and interest in developing storytelling skills to use with younger children:

Before you can broaden your children's cultural horizons and imaginations with stories from around the world you will need to make a start as a storyteller yourself. This can be a daunting prospect.

Start with something simple. For Reception or KS1 you might choose a well-known tale such as the Three Little Pigs or Little Red Riding Hood. For Lower KS1 you might go with something a little longer and more complex like Rapunzel or a selection of Aesop's Fables. Upper KS2 children will want something they don't perceive as ‘babyish' (especially the more able).

Trickster tales are good for this age group and there are many in African and North American culture. Look for stories about Br'er Rabbit or Anansi the Spider. These tales are short, which is good for you, and have a twist, which the children will enjoy.

Read the story through several times to make sure you have it clearly in mind. For the kind of short, simple stories that I suggest you start off with you won't need to make notes. Try telling the story to yourself as you stand in front of a mirror or saying it out loud as you drive home from school. This will ensure that you are comfortable with the sound of your storytelling voice and will also help your brain to store the story.

Gather the children around you and tell them that you have been learning a new skill. Children always like to know that their teacher is still learning. Then simply tell the story. Don't feel you have to put on voices or use lots of facial expressions or arm movements this first time.

Tell the same story a couple of times in a week to build your confidence. Ask the children for feedback. Then choose another story. Aim to tell your class a new story each week and gradually expand your repertoire as your confidence grows. You can find stories to use in anthologies of tales from different parts of the world and the internet is a source of many traditional tales from different cultures.

Over the first term or two of telling stories to your class you will begin to find stories that you are drawn back to time and again. These favourites will form your core repertoire - stories that you know well and are confident with.

Don't feel that a story has to be told in exactly the same way every time you tell it. That is one of the great pleasures of storytelling. You can describe a forest in a different way the second or third time you tell a tale. As long as you don't change the key points of the story it's fine to experiment.

Moving on: children as storytellers

Once you have told a few stories yourself and the children are beginning to become enthusiastic about these sessions you can coach them in developing their own storytelling skills. Here are the techniques that I use. They are in a particular order which will allow skills to develop progressively, and I suggest you stick to this order.

Paired storytelling

I like to start children off with a storytelling activity that they feel comfortable with. Simply sitting with a partner and retelling a story together works well. I sit children on chairs in a circle and tell them a short unfamiliar tale. I choose a story they don't know because I want there to be a certain amount of challenge in this initial task.

Once I have told the story I ask the children to turn their chairs so they are facing a partner and to have a go at telling this story together. I stress that this is not one person telling the whole story and the other person passively listening.

They are telling the story together. One will start off and then the other takes over, or one might chip in some extra detail that the teller has forgotten. They might discuss a part of the story to refresh their memory: two heads are better than one. Use this technique with a couple of stories over a week before moving onto the next stage.

Circle stories

Once a child has told a short and simple story with a partner they may feel more comfortable about sharing a story in a group. For this activity the whole class, including yourself and any adult helpers, sit in a circle. You tell the story you have chosen in its entirety.

Everyone present then takes it in turns around the circle to tell a piece of the story. It is a good idea to have an object that you can pass around the circle as the story passes from person to person.

You start off the story again and after a few opening sentences you pass the object to the person next to you: left or right, it doesn't matter. They then tell a little bit of the story and pass the object on. Piece by piece the story takes shape around the circle.

This is a cooperative story so if someone gets stuck it is OK for another person to chip in a bit of the story to help them. The first couple of times you do this it is a good idea to include an opt-out. If a child really doesn't want to tell part of the story they can say ‘pass'. (Adults don't get to use the opt-out!)

The one-minute story

Once children seem relaxed about telling stories to each other you can introduce the one-minute story. Use a story that the children are familiar with. It might be one they have already used in the previous two activities. Tell them to work in pairs. One is going to tell the whole story while the other listens and then they will swap over. They only have a minute to tell the story and you are going to time them.

Get your stopwatch out and count them down to the start. Tell them when they have had 30 seconds, when they have 15 seconds left and then count down the last five seconds. This time pressure forces children to cut the story down to its bare essentials. There just isn't any room in the one-minute story for any frills. This activity is great fun and able children especially love the challenge.

'Bare bones'

With a one-minute story under their belts, the children are now ready to learn the key technique of storytelling. I call it the ‘bare bones'. Give pairs of children a piece of paper and a pencil and tell them they have to tell the whole of a story you have just told them in just 10 sentences. This is another way of getting them to concentrate on what matters most in the story.

I have a template I use. You might like to make yourself one. It is a sheet of A4 paper with the outline of 10 bones on and the children write their sentence on the bones. These ‘bare bones' are the notes the children will use when they move onto the next stage which is actually telling a story to an audience.

As a professional storyteller I will condense any new story I hear down to its bare bones and use the slip of paper as an aide-memoire when I am telling it for the first time. When I am working with children I will explain this technique to them and will ask them to count how many times I refer to my notes.

Children becoming storytellers

Your children are now ready to tell a story to the rest of the class. The most comfortable way for them to do this is as part of a small group. Give each group a printed copy of a story that you have never used before and ask them to write the ‘bare bones' together. Once they have done this each group then stands in front of their audience and tells the story.

Some children will simply read out their ‘bare bones'. Other, more confident children, will embellish their part of the story. Children who are good at this can be offered the opportunity to tell a story to the whole class on their own.

Storytelling for G&T children

Not all gifted and talented children are good communicators, but you will generally find that it is your more able children who take most readily to storytelling skills. Once they are confident in the basics of the art you need a couple of extra techniques up your sleeve to really stretch them. You can consider:

Performance: to younger children, in school or at a local pre-school, or consider putting on a ‘literature festival' with friends and relatives in the audience.

Production: with computer software, groups of children can record themselves telling a story and then add computer generated sound effects or even add background music. A compilation CD of your best storytellers should sell well.

Adaptation: challenge able children with the task of adapting traditional stories, for example setting them in a modern-day context.

Further information on storytelling

The Society for Storytelling is developing a new website with details of events and resources
There are various storytelling festivals held around the UK throughout the year. These include Edinburgh’s International Storytelling Festival (21-30 October) and the Settle Storytelling Festival in North Yorkshire (6-9 October).
Storytelling With Children (2009), written by Andrew Wright and published by OUP, is a very useful resource for teachers.

Steve Mynard is a teacher and professional storyteller.