Parenting Your Highly Capable Child

Joy Giovanini Peninsula School District’s Highly Capable Coordinator

M.Ed. In Gifted Education

Warning: A teensy sip out of a fire hose…

A little background… Master’s in Gifted Education

College and Career Readiness Instructional Specialist with focus on Health Sciences and Engineering Technology pathways

STEM and project based learning

Taught every grade K-8 including self-contained HiCap, robotics, math, and language arts

“How many times do I have to tell you... you’re not supposed to read ahead.”

Ceilingless learning…

Everyone doing their best...

Why Highly Capable education matters?

… failure to help the gifted child reach his potential is a societal tragedy, the extent of which is difficult to measure but what is surely great. How can we measure the sonata unwritten, the curative drug undiscovered, the absence of political insight? They are the difference between what we are and what we could be as a society. Gallagher (1975)

High Achievers vs. Highly Capable from “The Gifted and Talented Child” by Janice Szabos, Maryland Council for Gifted & Talented

�  Knows the answers

�  Has good ideas

�  Copies and responds  accurately

�  Needs 6 to 8 repetitions  for  mastery

�  Grasps meaning

�  Completes assignments

�  Listens with interest

�  Asks the questions

�  Has original ideas

�  Creates new and original  products

�  Needs 1 to 2 repetitions  for  mastery

�  Draws inferences

�  Initiates projects

�  Shows strong feelings and opinions

How do I tell if my child is smart or gifted?

Often display similar traits so it comes down to depth and intensity…

How do I tell if my child is smart or gifted?

� Questioning Style

� Learning speed and application

� Concern with fairness

� Emotional outlook and rebound

� Level of interest

A Parent’s Guide to Gifted Children

Use quotes to open up discussions and give kids hooks for their thinking…

“The forest is magnificent… yet it contains no perfect trees.” Gye Fram

Parenting a gifted child is like living in a theme park full of thrill rides. Sometimes you smile. Sometimes you gasp. Sometimes you scream. Sometimes you laugh. Sometimes you gaze in wonder and astonishment. Sometimes you’re

frozen in your seat… And sometimes the ride is so nerve-racking…

you can’t do anything but cry.”

~ Carol Strip & Gretchen Hirsch

Unique (sometimes isolating) Parenting

The Incredibles Racing Scene

Highly Capable Strengths to challenges

Thinking independently Challenges authority

Wide array of interests Leaves projects unfinished

Enjoys complex work Resistant to repetitive work

Very curious Daydreams and off topic

Advanced comprehension Frustration and confusion with struggling students

Unusual intensity Stubbornness and emotional reactions

GREAT GRIPES THE EIGHT

OF GIFTED STUDENTS

Resource: Ian Byrd

1. No one explains what being gifted is all about.

2. The stuff we do in school is too easy.

3. People expect us to be perfect.

4. Kids tease us about being smart.

5. There are few friends who really understand us. 6. We feel different and wish people would accept us as we are. 7. We feel overwhelmed by the number of things we can do. 8. We worry about world problems and feel helpless to do anything.

Children’s Books with Highly Capable Characters

�  Wilfred Gordon McDonald Partridge (Fox)

�  Weslandia (Paul Fleischman)

�  Archibald Frisby (Chesworth)

�  Rosie Reveer Engineer (Beaty)

�  Boy Who Loved Words (Schotter)

�  The View from Saturday (Koinsburg)

�  Chasing Vermeer (Balliett)

�  The Mysterious Benedict Society (Stewart)

6 profiles of hicap

DaBrowski’s Overexcitablities

� Intellectual

� Imaginational

� Sensual (senses)

� Emotional

� Psychomotor

Intellectual Overexcitability �  Intensified activity of the mind

�  Proclivity for understanding

�  Problems solving with gusto and often tunnel vision concentration

� Moral weighing of issues

“Intelligence is the ability to solve problems but IO is the passion to solve them.” Frank (2006)

DaVinci

Imaginational Overexcitability

�  Rich interpersonal world

� Head in the clouds

�  Imaginary friends and alternative universes

Sensual Overexcitability

�  Physical engagement with world is heightened

�  Does not just see or hear- experiences and is often transported

�  Connects often to art, music, food

Emotional Overexcitability

�  Feelings are intensified with highs and lows

�  Often emotions shown through body reactions

�  Deep attachments to family, friends, animals, environment

Poet Mary Oliver

Still, what I want in my life is to be willing to be dazzled — to cast aside the weight of facts and maybe even to float a little above this difficult world. I want to believe I am looking into the white fire of a great mystery. I want to believe that the imperfections are nothing — that the light is everything — that it is more than the sum of each flawed blossom rising and fading. And I do.

Excerpt from The Pond

Psychomotor Overexcitability

�  Surplus of energy

�  Impulsive and compulsive actions

�  Competitive nature

�  Often presents as ADHD

Choreographer Gillian Lynne

What may I do with them at home to keep the spark?

Instead of… Consider…

Researching a science topic on the computer

Open ended time exploring the backyard or the woods

Ipad math facts or reading app Code.org or Scratch Jr by MIT

Reading and rereading the same books Print off a genre wheel to widen their reading interests or set up a book club with other friends

Tutoring and drilling skills Follow your child’s lead with their interests- one month Egypt, another learning Italian, another states of matter…

Workbooks and crafts Anti-coloring book, studying artists and exploring their favorite medium, and open ended journaling

How to Raise a Creative Child- Step one: Back off

“Evidence shows that creative contributions depend on the breadth, not just depth, of our knowledge and experience… Relative to typical scientists, Nobel Prize winners are 22 times more likely to perform as actors, dancers or magicians; 12 times more likely to write poetry, plays or novels; seven times more likely to dabble in arts and crafts; and twice as likely to play an instrument or compose music.”

New York Times Jan-30-16 OpED Adam Grant

Executive Skills for Kids

1. Directly teach deficit skills 2. Consider your child’s developmental level

3. Move from the external to internal

4. External means changes to environment, the task, and interactions 5. Use rather than fight child’s innate drive

for mastery and control

Executive Skills for Kids cont. 6. Modify tasks to match your child’s capacity to exert effort 7.  Use incentives to augment instruction

8.  Provide just enough support for success

9.  Keep support and supervision in place until child achieve mastery or success

10.  Fade out support gradually

Fixed vs. Growth Mindset

https://classteaching.wordpress.com/

“Children praised for intelligence value performance. Children praised for hard work value opportunities.”

How The Gifted Brain Learns

David Sousa

“Children praised for intelligence value performance. Children praised for hard work value opportunities.”

How The Gifted Brain Learns

David Sousa

An Allegory…

Resources for Parents of Highly Capable students

�  ** A Parent’s Guide to Gifted Children- Webb

�  Parenting Gifted Kids- Delisle

�  Smart But Scattered- Dawson

�  Living with Intensity- Daniels

�  ** When Gifted Kids Don’t Have All the Answers- Delisle

Feedback and a wee bit of resources to go…

STEM Toys (Like a Bonus Track)

STEM Toys

Myths about HiCap students

�  All students are “gifted”

�  Highly Capable students do not need any extra services

� Teachers and peers need Highly Capable students in the classroom to serve as models

� Students are only highly capable if they are “Straight A” high achievers