Category: Education
-
Differentiation As a Tool to Unlock Potential (Part 1)
In their analysis of 38 studies published from 2000-2022, Nicholas et al. note that traditional notions of giftedness are changing, with a focus shifting from performance alone to recognizing its complex and context-dependent nature. This includes acknowledging socio-emotional factors and societal influences that may impact identification, which links to Grant’s…
-
Overreliance on IQ Testing Leads to Unsupported Students
Assessments of the gifted should provide objectivity and a data point which can be consistent across a range of abilities. However, in some cases the test used to evaluate the level of ability in students is both inaccurate and limiting.
-
Stay on the Move with Gifted Students
Human intellectual feats rise to their highest levels when accompanied by physical movement. We can model the importance of moving combined with thinking for our students. How?
-
No Challenge = Low Growth for Gifted Students
It would be silly to argue that knowledge is finite and, therefore, gifted students learn less because there is only so much to learn. Nonetheless, this is an assumption that we live with in the typical, modern classroom. Time is spent on the critical task of bringing students up to…
-
Vertical Differentiation: A Book Review
In her book, Emily L. Mofield has compiled a practical, realistic and highly readable set of 25 different approaches to that question in her Vertical Differentiation for Gifted, Advanced and High-Potential Students: 25 Strategies to Stretch Student Thinking. Almost any classroom teacher will find this useful…
-
Rigor Can Navigate, But Let Vigor Drive the Car
It is not about what we teach but, in the end, what the students learn. Two articles from Getting Smart, featured in Chris Unger’s A Revolution in Education newsfeed, suggest an underemphasis on “vigor” in learning diminishes student growth.
-
Independence Unleashed: Boosting Creativity and Problem-Solving Skills through Autonomous Learning
A greater emphasis on autonomous learning will lead to greater creativity and problem-solving skills. In some senses, this supports the enrichment approach driven by student choice. Nonetheless, we’ve also found the importance of setting clear goals in learning for students to build confidence and accountability.
-
Shifting Giftedness: The Impact of Family Moves on Gifted Identification
In “Gifted and On the Move: The Impact of Losing the Gifted Label for Military Connected Students,” Robyn Hilt introduces subjects who move in and out of gifted programs as part of that family’s mobility. She notes the benefits of the students’ use of their “difference” as a label. Students…
-
Goal-Setting: An Antidote to Underachievement
Ownership is the fuel for successful goals, and the New Year or a new marking period is an ideal time to discuss goal-setting with students. Gifted students, 15-50% of whom are underachieving (Morisano & Shore, 2010), can benefit from purposeful consideration of what they want to achieve and how they…
-
Smart, But How? Assessing Non-Academic Intelligence
Intelligence-ranking assessments are not designed to capture giftedness expressed as creativity or style, nor does potential manifest itself in most academic testing (Lohman et al., 2008; Mun et al., 2020; Siegle et al., 2016).