Duke Gifted Letter

Myriad Myths about Giftedness

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 21:55:33 -0500

Upon hearing the word "myth," one may think of Zeus on Mount Olympus or King Arthur at Camelot. However, not all myths come from history; modern myths exist as well. Some of the most prevalent modern myths in education surround giftedness and gifted and talented programs. Numerous lists of such myths have been published. In this article, we provide three such lists published by giftedness researchers.

Myths about Gifted Students, by Joyce VanTassel-Baska and Susannah Wood

This concise and easy to understand list offers a brief explanation of the research-based "reality" that contradicts each of the following myths about gifted children:

They are aloof, proud of their own abilities, and care little for others.
They are good at everything and should be reminded of that when they fail to perform at high levels.
They do not need special programs as they will be able to perform at high levels regardless.
They have even profiles in respect to intellectual ability, academic aptitude, and social emotional development.
They benefit from being the second teacher in the room, tutoring others in greater need than themselves.
They work well in randomly assigned groups to ensure that the work gets done correctly.
They all enjoy independent work and are motivated to complete projects.
They all have pushy parents who expect the school to do more than is possible or reasonable for their children.
They are good students, rarely causing behavioral problems of any kind in class.
They are rarely at risk for educational achievement or attainment beyond high school.

Each myth is phrased such that the first word "They" could be replaced with the phrase "Not all gifted kids" to turn the myth into reality (click the link to see the entire list of myths and realities). In addition to explaining what research has shown the lives of gifted children to be like, it also briefly explains how these myths may have developed. As with many myths, things such as "they benefit from being the second teacher in the room" may appear accurate and fair on its surface. However, upon reading the research based "reality" it is much more difficult to believe the myth. It isn't always possible to have such research findings at your fingertips, but VanTassel-Baska and Wood provide an easy to read list of relevant and important research findings that help uncover and explain the reality behind the lives of gifted children.

Gifted Children: Myths and Realities, by Ellen Winner (1996) Basic Books: New York.

Where VanTassel-Baska and Wood provide a brief explanation behind their list of myths, Winner's book begins with a chapter in which she lists each myth and its roots, clearly setting the stage for the rest of the book to explain the truth. Winner does so via a mixture of stories of actual gifted children and providing relevant research findings. Presenting these truths both briefly and then again in detail greatly helps make clear both what is believed to be generally true about gifted kids, as well as why the myths exist. Furthermore, Winner expands her scope of discussion beyond academic or intellectual giftedness to include other domains such as music and art as well, thus broadening the book's utility beyond solely academically gifted concerns.

In an attempt to better articulate the type of child she is writing about, Winner defined giftedness using three traits:

Gifted children are precocious.
Gifted children not only learn faster than average or even bright children but also learn in a qualitatively different way.
Gifted children are intrinsically motivated to make sense of the domain in which they show precocity.

With this conceptualization as her foundation, she proposed nine myths that plague beliefs about the nature of giftedness:

Academically gifted children have a general intellectual power that makes them gifted in all school subjects.
The gifted are those children with high ability in academic areas. Children with high ability in music and art are talented.
Giftedness in any domain depends on having a high IQ.
Giftedness is entirely inborn.
Giftedness is entirely a matter of hard work.
Gifted children are created by pushy parents driving their children to overachieve; when pushed too hard by over-ambitious parents, these children burn out.
Gifted children are better adjusted, more popular, and happier than average children.
All children are gifted, and thus there is no special group of children that needs enriched or accelerated education in our schools.
Gifted children, especially prodigies, go on to become eminent and creative adults.

Winner concludes her book with a plea to researchers to create unified theories that explain both typical and atypical development. However, it is important to note that a single theory should not be confused with a singular way of raising and teaching all children, regardless of whether they are gifted.

Gifted Child Quarterly Special Issue: Demythologizing Gifted Education. Fall 2009

Unlike the previous two lists that were mostly about gifted children, this special issue revisits and updates a list of myths originally developed in 1982 that revolve around gifted education.

The gifted constitutes a single, homogeneous group (Dr. Sally Reis and Dr. Joseph Renzulli)
The gifted constitutes 3% to 5% of the population (Dr. James Borland)
A family of identification myths: Your sample must be the same as the population. There is a "silver bullet" in identification. There must be "winners" and "losers" in identification and programming. (Dr. Carolyn Callahan)
We need to have the same scores for everyone (Dr. Frank Worrell)
Creativity is too difficult to measure (Dr. Donald Treffinger)
The cosmetic use of multiple criteria (Dr. Reva Friedman-Nimz)
Differentiation in the regular classroom is equivalent to gifted programs and is sufficient: Classroom teachers have the time, the skill, and the will to differentiate adequately. (Dr. Holly Hertberg Davis)
The Patch-On approach to services (Dr. Carol Tomlinson)
There is a single curriculum for the gifted (Dr. Sandra Kaplan)
Examining the ostrich: Gifted services do not cure a sick regular program (Dr. Ann Robinson)
Gifted education means having a program (Dr. Marcia Gentry)
Programs should stick out like a sore thumb (Dr. Joyce Van Tassel Baska)
You have to do it alone! (Dr. Dorothy Sisk)
Waiting for Santa Claus [Districts can wait for services and funding to be provided to them] (Dr. Cheryll Adams)
High ability students do not face problems and challenges (Dr. Sidney Moon)
Confusing "difficulty" and high stakes testing with rigor (Dr. Tonya Moon)
Gifted students do not have unique social and/or emotional needs (Dr. Jean Peterson)
It is fair to teach all children the same way (Dr. Carolyn Cooper)
Advanced Placement is an adequate secondary program (Dr. Shelagh Gallagher)

Coming largely from an education service perspective, each article in this special issue provides a clear articulation of each myth as well as a discussion and synthesis of the relevant research. Additionally, each article provides useful information for anyone working with school officials on how/whether services are provided for gifted students.

Conclusions

Perhaps the most significant feature of lists about the myths of giftedness is their diversity! There is some overlap, but each list also adds its own unique contribution. Moreover, some of the myths appear to be contradictory, such as Winner's myths about giftedness being entirely inborn versus it being entirely a matter of hard work (both are myths, but each is believed by many to be the truth).

There are many reasons for the development and persistence of these myths. Sandra Kaplan, in her article on the myth "There is a single curriculum for the gifted" wrote that, "myths are created and continue to exist because they explain phenomena that are not easily understood or appear to validate ambiguous ideas with ambiguous evidence." Another reason that these myths are perpetuated is that they can sometimes be true for some of the kids some of the time. The fact that a myth may be true for some gifted kids often makes it all the more difficult to debunk. For example, a person who meets one gifted child who performs at a high level without any special classes could incorrectly assume that this is the case for all gifted students. Advocates for gifted children cannot easily disprove a myth that has observable counter-examples. Because of this, it is important to keep foremost in mind the first myth discussed in the Gifted Child Quarterly special issue: "The gifted constitutes a single, homogeneous group."

Advanced Placement

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 21:50:52 -0500

Advanced Placement (AP) courses and tests offer college level material to students while they are still in high school. The 37 AP courses currently offered prepare students to take a standardized test of the knowledge and skills acquired in the course. Colleges and universities throughout the U.S. accept the test results as evidence of learning at a level that is largely comparable to what is taught in their classes.

Begun over 50 years ago, AP courses were originally intended to help bridge the gap between high school and college experiences and to help with college placement. However, AP courses are now often viewed as necessary for college enrollment and not just placement. A 2009 report by the Fordham Foundation stated that the two most significant reasons AP courses are have become so popular are the high standards and cost benefit. The high standards for learning go beyond basic high school content to include complex understanding of the discipline. Success in an AP program is connected with real world cost benefit, in that—depending on the college—a score of 3 or higher (out of a possible 5) can lead a student to opt out of an introductory college class or possibly even earning college credit while in high school. Thus, many view AP courses as a way of reducing the cost of a college education. For example, passing four AP exams could save a student a semester's worth of tuition at a college that grants course credit.

Similar to the SAT and ACT, AP exams are administered and scored the same way throughout the country. Thus, student performance on the tests can easily be compared, regardless of where they are from. Each AP exams costs $87 to administer and score. However, assistance is available to qualified students from the College Board (the authors of AP exams), the federal government, or the local school district. In 2009, more than a million students scored 3 or higher on an AP exam and six states had over 20% of their public school students earning a score of 3 or higher. The content of each exam varies by subject, but the format usually includes a combination of multiple choice and essays.

Who is taking AP?

The College Board reports that traditionally underrepresented minorities are participating in AP programs at increasing rates. In 2008, Hispanic or Latino students made up 15.4% of the public school population and 14.8% of students taking an AP exam. Black students were 14.4% of the public school population and 7.8% of those taking an AP exam and American Indian students were 1.1% of the public school population and .6% of those taking AP exams. White students composed 62.8% of the public school population and 61% of the AP examinee population while Asian students were 5.3% of the overall public school population and 10.2% of those taking an AP exam.

How do they do in subsequent college performance?

Several studies have looked at the college performance of students who have taken AP classes. Although results vary, in general, students who pass an AP exam earn about one-third to one half of a letter grade better than their classmates with similar backgrounds who did not take an AP course (i.e., going from a B to a B+ or an A-). Recent research has also shown, however, that students who perform poorly in AP courses typically do not show signs of having benefitted merely from being exposed to the material.

Giftedness and AP

Several studies have also looked at participation in AP courses on gifted students. In general, gifted students typically find AP classes preferable to non-AP classes in high school. Five common reasons for this preference are: increased challenge, help with getting into a good college, help with doing well in college, being able to skip introductory college courses, and sharing a learning environment with similar students.

In one study, researchers followed a sample of students who scored in the 99th percentile on a standardized test while in 7th grade. They found that in high school over 75% had taken at least one AP course or exam and that these students were more likely to report being intellectually engaged by their high school courses than students who did not take an AP course. Moreover, 70% of the students in their sample who had taken an AP course or exam had earned an advanced degree while 43% of non-AP participants had done so. Another study compared students who participated in a Talent Search and attended a summer program with those who had qualified for but did not attend a program. Their findings revealed that students who had participated in a summer program were more likely to take AP courses and took them earlier than those who did not participate in a summer program.

Notes of Caution

Although expanded access to AP courses is important, it is also important to differentiate those taking AP exams from those passing AP exams. For example, the College Board reports that while students from low-income backgrounds composed 17% of those taking exams, they were only 13.4% those passing exams. Additionally, although students from traditionally underrepresented minority groups are participating at higher rates, the passing rates often have not followed correspondingly. Nationwide, Black students made up 3.5% of students scoring 3 or higher on an AP exam in 2008 while Hispanic or Latino students consisted of 13.8% and American Indian students were .4% of those students.

Although the AP program is generally highly regarded, reviews by college faculty often identify areas in need of improvement. For example, the Fordham Foundation asked faculty to review a sample of AP courses and compare them to typical university offerings. Although the faculty generally reported positive ratings for each course reviewed (especially compared to state education standards), there were sometimes gaps in the coverage of the content. They also noted that there sometimes was also an unclear connection between the course material and the content of the exam.

It should also be noted that many elite schools that were early adopters of AP courses are moving away from concentrating on AP offerings and toward developing their own curricula for advanced learners. The reasoning often offered for this movement is a desire to avoid offering college in high school and because the standardized curricula can be seen as rigid. At the same time, some of the more selective colleges and universities have raised the requisite minimum score needed to earn college credit or the option of opting out of the course. Because each school varies, readers should consult the college or university admissions office websites to see the required criteria.

Summary

In general, most educators find the AP program to be a positive, effective, cost-efficient way of offering advanced curriculum to high school students. However, they also acknowledge it is not an exact "college in high school" experience. It should be noted that the College Board is in the midst of redesigning many of its courses. Thus, some of the concerns expressed about the AP program may be addressed; others may yet arise. Similarly, with some schools increasing the number of AP offerings, while others reduce theirs, the changes in who is enrolling and how they are performing in their subsequent college courses may also change over time.

—Matthew Makel, PhD

Matthew Makel is a Gifted Education Research Specialist at Duke TIP and the editor of DGL.

Administrators of Gifted Programs: Paying Attention to the "Man Behind the Curtain"

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 21:45:44 -0500

In the previous article about those who serve as administrators of gifted programs (AGP), the challenging nature of this role was explored, and the proposal set forth that the many demands that confront an administrator of a gifted program comprise a "Mission Impossible" scenario. Fortunately, there are professionals who are highly capable of merging the roles of leader, manager and advocate, and they are highly successful in their efforts on behalf of gifted students. Their effectiveness as they work behind the scenes, pulling levers and making magic in the midst of institutional smoke and fire calls to mind the legendary Wizard of Oz. Unlike the wizard's admonition to Dorothy to "Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!" in this article we pull back the curtain to examine the how interacting with the AGP can be accomplished in a manner that enhances the likelihood of success.

Advocacy

Advocacy is the term that describes a process of bringing about a change in attitude, in practice, in policy or regulations that improves a situation. Advocacy can occur at the micro or the macro level. "Microadvocacy" involves seeking an alteration of attitudes, beliefs and practices of those who work most closely with one child: the teacher, guidance counselor, gifted resource teacher or principal. Microadvocacy is about enhanced parental involvement with the people at their child's school to improve the relationships and the conditions of (and ultimately the learning outcomes for) their child. The issues, concerns or questions to be addressed are all problems related to the individual student. On the other hand, macroadvocacy involves the process of bringing change(s) that affect many students—the attitudes, practices, policies and resources at the district, state or national level. Advocacy at the macro level is often about politics. It is about those who hold positions of authority and control resources. Politics is the art and practice of making decisions to allocate scarce resources to virtually unlimited needs. Policy is the outcome of the political process. Policy decisions apply to many children across many situations, children who have similar characteristics and needs, and as such become the target population for the policy. Such decisions are made at the district, state and national level.

Microadvocacy

Being an advocate for your child suggests that you want to affect the attitudes, decisions and/or practices that currently exist in your child's school. You might have a concern that a teacher does not recognize that your child has far exceeded the learning goals designated for her grade level and needs a different set of materials or assignments to be appropriately challenged. You might be in a situation in which you have relocated, and your child was served as a gifted student in the previous school system but is not receiving services in the gifted program in her new school. In these circumstances, microadvocacy is called for because it is at the level of the individual. As a first step it is always appropriate—and is the best political strategy—to begin with your child's teacher. There are a number of advantages in doing so:

First and most significant, advocacy is about building relationships; beginning with the teacher demonstrates a level of trust and confidence in the teacher's expertise and skill that will increase the likelihood of receiving support or improving the climate.
Next, it doesn't serve to give the appearance of "going over her head" to a higher authority to accomplish what could have occurred in concert with the teacher. Respect the teacher as a professional and convey your perception of her potential to be a part of the solution.
The teacher knows your child better than anyone in an administrative role, and is in a position to make an immediate change in the classroom.
The teacher will be more focused on you and your child—the higher up the chain of command you go, the less personal the relationship will be.
The teacher has (or should have) sufficient knowledge of what programming options, if any, exist and how a student could access or qualify for those services.
Because more of the student's time is spent with the classroom teacher than with anyone else, this is the person who may be most important to engage in addressing the problems and seeking solutions to providing an appropriate instructional program for your child.

Things to remember when working with teachers:

While you have your attention focused on your one child, the teacher must equitably address the needs of all of her students, and as you work through possible solutions, it is important to accept that, as important as your child is, she must share the teacher's time and attention with other students. Be sensitive to the pressures teachers face in meeting the needs of children with disabilities, English language learners, and the myriad other issues that children bring with them to school. Your child IS important. However, so is every other child in the room.
You catch more flies with a spoonful of honey than with a barrelful of vinegar. Offer your compliments about the positive aspects of your child's relationship with the teacher, or the classroom climate. Even if it's only to compliment the bulletin board, find something to offer that shows your appreciation for the strengths before beginning to explore solutions to problems you perceive as shortcomings.
Be sure to include—perhaps even begin with—what you are willing and planning to do as a parent to support your child from your end. The message to the teacher here is that you are not putting the entire burden of maximizing success on the teacher; you're willing to do your share.
For students who are in the upper grades, it is reasonable to give strong consideration to including them in the conversation. Student-led conferencing offers a powerful means to have everyone at the table involved in developing and planning solutions to the problems of concern.
Prepare for the conference/meeting by developing some specific strategies you would like to see implemented or goals that you want to accomplish so that by the meeting's conclusion agreement could be reached on the actions to be taken. Examples of goals that might be discussed could include (1) alternative assignments; (2) compacted lessons; or (3) a referral for screening/evaluation for advanced learning opportunities. The thing to be avoided is, going into the meeting with the message, "My child is gifted, now what are you going to do about it?"
Do your homework prior to the meeting. Visit the school's website to find out what information is available that you can discuss in the conference, and try to determine in advance what is negotiable, and what is not. It serves no purpose to meet with the teacher for an hour requesting something that the district policy does not permit.
Regardless of what you know and who you know, keep the conversation about your child only. It is inappropriate to discuss information about any other child, regardless of how well acquainted you may be with that individual's situation or experience. Confidentiality prohibits—both ethically and legally—the discussion of any specific individual other than your own child(ren).
Treat the teacher as a professional. You wouldn't catch your doctor in her parking lot and expect to conduct an on the spot consultation with her. Call for an appointment, plan ahead in order to be on time, and use the time wisely. If the conference/meeting isn't concluded in an hour, look carefully at how the time was spent and what was talked about. In most cases, if the problem or issue can't be resolved in an hour's time, then it is evident that it is necessary to go to a higher level of authority in order to craft a solution.

Even with the best of intentions and the most effective strategies in place, there may be no satisfactory resolution to the problem that emerges from working with the teacher. If so, working with someone at a higher level, who may not know your child as well, but who knows and understands policy and expectations, has access to a wider range of resources, and can help leverage a resolution to the problem or issue at hand. This person may be a guidance counselor, principal, or even the district's gifted program coordinator. In this capacity, such an individual serves as the AGP who is in a position to assist you in solving the problem. Insofar as the problem is related solely to your child as an individual, this is still a microadvocacy process. In this regard, you can count on the AGP:

To be knowledgeable of the rules about how one qualifies for services as gifted if such provisions exist. States vary widely in their statutes governing programs for the gifted, and it cannot be assumed that it applies in exactly the same way in every setting. You can, however, count on the AGP to be able to describe to you what the procedures do allow, what services the program does provide, and provide an assurance that if your child is eligible, the services will be provided just as they are for other eligible students.
To have the knowledge of tests and measures to understand the implications of evaluation results for a student, including the differing implications regarding necessary services for a student who has an IQ of 130 and another with an IQ of 165.
To have access to and control of resources so that appropriate differentiated instruction can be provided to the student through any one of several options.

The outcome of microadvocacy might not be the optimal solution; it might be an adequate solution, instead. There is also the possibility that through the process, the parent comes to understand that there is nothing available to address her child's needs. There isn't anything that the child is being excluded from—there just is nothing in place to address the needs of the child as a gifted and talented student. It is at this point that macroadvocacy comes into play.

Macroadvocacy will be covered in the next issue of DGL

—Rick Courtright

Rick Courtright is gifted education research specialist with Duke TIP, having served as an educator for more than thirty-five years in roles of classroom teacher, gifted resource teacher, and district administrator of gifted programs. He has presented at state and national conferences on gifted education, has been a co-director of two summer institutes and three state conferences, and has led workshops and taught university courses for hundreds of teachers acquiring gifted education certification.

Proficiency and Gifted Students

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 21:42:41 -0500

The No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) has received significant fanfare and criticism over various effects it has had on education. One component that has received substantial attention is the focus on progress toward proficiency. Several reports have been published on the effect this move toward proficiency has had on gifted students. This article synthesizes the issues surrounding proficiency and gifted students.

What is proficiency?

Under NCLB states are required, "to ensure that all children have a fair, equal, and significant opportunity to obtain a high-quality education and reach, at a minimum, proficiency on challenging State academic achievement standards and state academic assessments." However, who is proficient depends on where they live. Individual states set their own educational standards and create their own assessments of those standards. Thus, a performance that is deemed proficient in Massachusetts may (and does) look drastically different than proficient performance in Mississippi or Michigan. These differences may be caused by differences in quality of education, because the bar of who is proficient is set at different levels for each state, or by a mixture of the two.

Changes in proficiency levels

The differences among states have led to some difficulty in interpreting trends. For example, according a report by the Center on Education Policy, 20 states showed gains on their state tests, but only 12 states showed gains on the National Assessment of Educational Progress. NAEP is a series of standardized tests given to thousands of students across the country and often is referred to as "the nation's report card," What's more, the two lists did not closely align. How can this happen? It can happen because states can 1. Change the content of their tests (i.e., ask easier questions), and 2. Shift the bar for what score is considered proficient. For example, a state that changes its proficiency bar from 30 correct out of 60 items to 25 correct out of 60 will appear to have more students scoring at the proficient level. We simply don't know which states are doing a better job of educating their students and which are taking advantage of the system so that they appear to be improving.

How does the focus on proficiency affect gifted students?

Several large-scale reports have been published about the whether the potential changes in test content and shifting the proficiency bar have influenced gifted students. In addition to NCLB's focus on proficiency, the legislation also specifically addresses gifted students. It states, that gifted students, "… need services or activities not ordinarily provided by the school in order to fully develop those capabilities." However, similar to how individual states "define" proficiency differently, they also define when a student "needs" services independently. Moreover, state tests can also play a role not just in gifted services, but in gifted identification as well. Here are two scenarios that illustrate this point.

Scenario 1: The Easier Test

Imagine 100 students take a test that is 100 questions long and 20 students get a perfect score. In this scenario, a student who scored a 99 percent by missing only one question would not only be below the 95th percentile (a common cutoff for gifted programs), but would be below the 80th percentile because 20 students scored higher. This is because percentile scores are calculated in comparison with how all the other students performed, not just based on the number of questions answered correctly.

Scenario 2: The Harder Test

Imagine 100 students take a test that is 100 questions long and the highest raw score was only 75 correct. The student who scores 75 is higher than 99% of the other students taking the test (often reported as the 99th percentile). In this scenario, depending on how the test scores are spread, it is possible that students scoring a 68 or 70 could still be performing at the 95th percentile even though they got more than 25% of the questions incorrect.

Because states use tests of differing difficulty on top of having different qualification requirements, it is important to know how to interpret what your child's test score means. Moreover, it is also important to keep in mind that, as illustrated by the two scenarios, a scale score, a percentile score, and the number of questions correctly answered are measures of different things.

Including several difficult questions on a test would help differentiate students at the top, but would take away some of the power differentiating the students in the middle. Under NCLB, proficiency is the important factor for states, so there is little motivation for states to include a lot of difficult questions (that most students are expected to get wrong).

According to a 2009 report by the Center for Education Policy, there is no strong evidence that NCLB is keeping students back who are scoring at the advanced level on state tests. But, as discussed in the previous paragraph, they also note that, "Tests may be less sensitive to improvements in advanced skills." Because of this, it is often difficult to get an accurate measure of how much the high performing students are learning.

On the other hand, reports such as High-Achieving Students in the Era of NCLB (Fordham Foundation) and Achievement Trap: How America is Failing Millions of High-Achieving Students from Lower-Income Families (Jack Kent Cooke Foundation) highlight the disservice the tenents of NCLB have meant for gifted and high-achieving students. Unlike the Center for Education Policy Report, these reports found NCLB to be detrimental to gifted students. The Fordham Foundation reported that under NCLB, high achieving students have made relatively smaller gains compared to low achieving students and that only 5% of teachers reported spending one-on-one time with advanced students (compared to 81% with low achieving students). To help high achieving students, The Education Commission of the States, among many others, has recommended education policy transition away from its focus on proficiency and toward the consistent growth of all students.

Looking for Appropriate Services for Gifted English Language Learners

Thu, 07 Jan 2010 21:35:50 -0500

What should an effective gifted program look like? This question may be difficult for any parent to answer, and it can be especially difficult for parents who have moved to the U.S. as adults. This is not only because there may be a language barrier, but also because our schools often are very different from schools in other countries. Gifted programming varies so widely in the U.S. that the closest we come to a description are explanations of service delivery models. These may involve:

Services provided in the regular classroom (differentiation by the classroom teacher, which often is ineffective for gifted learners, or co-teaching in which a gifted-trained teacher comes into the regular classroom to instruct a group of gifted learners);
A pull-out or special classroom model in which gifted learners move to a different classroom for a set amount of time each week; or
A special schools model, which may involve a school-within-a-school or a separate program such as a magnet school.

A relatively recent innovation that seems to be quite effective is whole-grade cluster grouping, in which students eligible to receive gifted services are grouped into one or two of the several classrooms at a given grade level; this type of grouping facilitates the use of co-teaching and differentiated instruction models. Any of these approaches can work well, but knowing the approach your child's school uses is not sufficient to tell whether a program will work well.

Teachers

Parents and community members commonly believe that teachers of children learning English may need to speak the child's home language to be most effective; however, this turns out not to be necessary. Because English language learners in a single school may speak dozens of different home languages, it's rarely practical or even possible to find teachers who speak each of these languages. The exception to this generalization is when a single school serves a large population from a given culture, in which case the school may be able to recruit one or more staff members who are bilingual. Regardless, specific training and teacher attitudes are probably the two most important aspects to consider when looking for an effective gifted program. A third key factor, only slightly less important, is the attitude of the school administration toward academically gifted learners.

All teachers in a school should have specific training relevant to working with students learning English, such as (for example) the SIOP Model approach to sheltered instruction. School-wide initiatives such as dual-immersion programming, in which all students receive content instruction in both languages, can be quite effective in raising achievement for ELL students and native English speakers alike (Lindholm-Leary & Block, 2010). Unfortunately, although teachers working in dedicated ELL positions usually receive appropriate training, the same training is rarely provided to teachers of the gifted. If your state is one (like North Carolina) that requires teachers of the gifted to obtain additional certification (see the NAGC Gifted by State summaries), some of the gifted education coursework should be relevant in helping them to meet the instructional needs of gifted English language learners, but specific training about English language learners in the form of in-service education or university coursework is preferable. District offices or school web pages occasionally provide this sort of information, but asking the teacher or principal directly about specific training they have had may provide answers that are more up to date.

Content area expertise is necessary but not sufficient to effectively teach a gifted child; attitude is also vital. Teacher attitudes develop over time, and what a teacher believes this year may change next year as she or he gains knowledge and experience. We know from several research studies that teachers' attitudes toward academically gifted learners become more favorable with additional formal training, and the same likely is true of teacher attitudes toward children learning English in school. Because few if any states pay teachers extra for obtaining training related to gifted or ELL children, teachers mostly are left to their own initiative. Appropriate training makes it more likely that teachers will have a positive attitude toward gifted ELL children, but even teachers with little formal training about these learners may still bring a productive attitude to the classroom. One attitude that should be avoided is the teacher or principal who believes that a child must master English before learning subject area content; current best practices suggest that ELL children should be allowed to learn both English and subject area content at the same time, and this is even more true for academically gifted ELL children.

Administrators

Administrators, like teachers, hold varying attitudes toward gifted learners, as well as toward balancing the school's needs (such as efficiency and perceived 'fairness' to all learners) against the needs of the individual student. The difference is that principals' desires carry much more weight than those of individual teachers, so a principal's attitude can set the entire school onto a more (or less) favorable path for meeting the needs of gifted English language learners. As the parent of a gifted child who also receives ELL services, you have some leverage with the school because your child's test scores likely bring up the average score for ELL students at the school; the laws require all groups (including ELL students, but not gifted ones) to make adequate yearly progress. If several parents were to pull out their high-ability ELL children and send them elsewhere, the school's performance likely would suffer.

Talking with other parents about the experiences their children have had with particular schools or teachers may be the best way for you to find out whether a given setting might be good for your child. It also can be important to build relationships over time with prospective teachers and other school staff, since at least one study (Huff, Houskamp, Watkins, Stanton, & Tavegia, 2005) found that parents were better able to identify appropriate services for their gifted children when they already had developed cooperative, advocacy-focused relationships with school staff.

—Michael S. Matthews

Michael S. Matthews is assistant professor of gifted education in the Department of Special Education and Child Development at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. Dr. Matthews' research focuses on gifted education policies and procedures, with specific attention to learners traditionally under-represented in gifted education settings.

Rewarding Kids for Good Grades

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:52:25 -0500

Ever offer your children money, gifts, or special privileges for every "A" they bring home on their report card? If you do, you're not alone. Across the nation parents are rewarding their children for good grades in a variety of ways—iPods, video games, concert tickets and even cars! But some believe such incentives take away the intrinsic value of learning.

Will kids continue to perform well when certain perks are removed from the equation? Dr. Virginia Shiller, a clinical psychologist and author of Rewards for Kids, recommends that parents reward their children for shortterm (for example, grades on a project or test) rather than long-term progress (for example, end of semester report cards). In doing so, parents turn the focus to those small things, like effective study skills, that will have lifelong benefits to the child.

Dr. Shiller also suggests using incentives other than cash and material items. For example, consider planning a special trip or allowing your child to have a friend sleep over.

—Matthew Makel, PhD,
Editor in Chief Duke Gifted Letter

From the Editor

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:49:45 -0500

Welcome to our Duke Gifted Letter Special Series. As a special benefit to our 4th/5th Grade Talent Search families, we are developing a series of special issues of Duke Gifted Letter, each with a theme relevant to a particular aspect of the lives of gifted children. The theme for this issue is social-emotional development. Often, so much effort is devoted to the academic development of gifted children that their social and emotional development does not receive the attention it deserves.

We hope the articles selected for this issue help us begin an informed conversation about these important topics. Please stay in touch, and let us know how we can meet your needs.

—Matthew Makel, PhD,
Editor in Chief Duke Gifted Letter

From the Editor

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:30:44 -0500

Decisions regarding school are no longer limited to what to pack as an afternoon snack. This special issue on school options isn't meant to be the final word on your child's educational choices. Rather, it is some first words to begin the conversation. Our goal in this issue is to present you with introductory information about questions you may want to ask or actions to take as you consider various schooling options for your child.

Also, be sure to read an article on advocating for gifted children "from the administrator's perspective." The article provides information from the other side of the desk on how the words and actions of parents advocating for their children are interpreted by school administrators. As always, please email us at dgl@tip.duke.edu with questions or suggestions.

—Matthew Makel, PhD,
Editor in Chief Duke Gifted Letter

Homeschooling

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:17:03 -0500

The National Center for Educational Statistics estimates that over 1.5 million children were homeschooled in 2007, nearly double the number from a decade earlier. This means that homeschoolers account for roughly one out of every fifty K-12 students in the United States. Beyond these broad numbers, it is often difficult to make general statements about children who are homeschooled. With no regulatory body, the homeschooling experience can vary widely. Nonetheless, common themes can be found in the reasons parents give for homeschooling. These reasons are typically related to concerns over the school environment, a desire to provide religious or moral education, or being dissatisfied with the academic rigor offered by the school.

Perhaps the most common questions that arise regarding homeschooling concern the academic and social development of children. Although there has been relatively little research conducted in either area, there are many examples of homeschooled students having normal (and in many cases even advanced) social and academic development. But, as with any type of education, advanced development is not guaranteed. It varies based on the specific needs and abilities of the student as well as the educational opportunities offered.

Parents thinking about homeschooling should consult state and local education laws and consider carefully whether they have the time, resources, and ability to provide an educational environment that meets their child's needs. For a more detailed list of things to consider about homeschooling, Search DGL online for "Homeschooling Gifted Children."

—Matthew Makel, PhD,
Editor in Chief Duke Gifted Letter

Home Page Image Vol 10 No 1

Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:09:25 -0500

When Praise Goes Awry

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 16:26:33 -0500

Praise is a powerful tool that parents and teachers can use to motivate their children. Furthermore, children appear to thrive on praise. Yet both the research on the effects of praise and advice about praise can be confusing. Praise can have widely different impacts on different children; it can:

motivate children,
lead them to brag,
embarrass them, or
cause them to believe that parents or teachers have too-high expectations for them.

Two sports stories from my clinical practice illustrate how children respond to praise.

Arianna's parents expressed concern about her poor sportsmanship while playing on her fifth-grade basketball team. Her father explained that they never missed a game and were supportive. They cheered her on enthusiastically, praised her great playing, and told her she was the best player on the team. When Arianna's team lost the occasional game, she lost her temper and pouted, or she blamed her teammates, the coach, or the other team for cheating-all unfairly and to the consternation of her parents. Furthermore, she got headaches and complained that basketball made her feel too pressured.

Tamara, an eighth grader, suffered from anxiety and perfectionism in relation to her schoolwork and her social relationships. She was not only critical of herself but expected perfect standards from her friends. Tamara's grades were excellent, but she experienced headaches and sadness. For perfectionists, I usually recommend activities that children are not so skilled at, so they can experience fun unrelated to perfection. Tamara chose cross-country running, an excellent activity for tension reduction, and her dad enthusiastically jogged with her on weekends. Tamara wasn't a fast runner, but she enjoyed it. She asked her dad for suggestions on how to improve her speed. He thoughtfully responded by saying, "If I were you, I'd find the fastest runner on the team and try to get as close to her as possible; then if you keep working at it, you'll gradually improve." Thereafter, Tamara cheerfully described her running experience to me as "terrific," saying she was improving all the time. She was working hard at her running but acknowledged that she was enjoying it and found it wonderfully unpressured.

You'll want to take note of two elements in these stories that affected the girls' responses. First, Arianna was involved in an activity (basketball) where she was assumed to have extraordinary talent, which led Arianna to feel like she had to defend her position of being the best. Although running was not a special talent area for Tamara, she felt she had little to lose. The second element involved the praise directed at the girls' success. Arianna's dad praised her performance excessively: he considered her a great player and the best on the team. Tamara's dad praised her hard work and helped her set goals for improvement only.

These two sports stories apply to school performance as well. They show how the wrong kind of praise can go awry and lead gifted children to feel undo pressure, underachieve, or be defensive about their high abilities. They also illustrate how parents and teachers can effectively praise gifted children in order to motivate them to achieve academically.

Gifted Children Attract High Praise

Consider all the praise gifted children receive from grandparents, parents, teachers, and even strangers: you're perfect, spectacular, a math whiz, brainy, the best, brilliant, genius, the smartest; and even "You're like Albert Einstein." These words may motivate young children to learn and make them feel smart, but they may also burden them with a persona they will feel pressured to live up to. Their defensiveness becomes evident when they are IQ tested in our clinic; they are afraid to take guesses or they change the subject when they don't know the answer and instead chatter on about what they do know.

Parents of gifted children claim they want to avoid pressuring their children and only want them to love learning and work to their potential. However, they assume erroneously that if some praise is good, more must be better, and most must be best of all. Highly competitive and superlative praise will facilitate effort only while children believe they can achieve such lofty goals, but it will cause pressure and discouragement as other children surpass their accomplishments or grade performance. Too much praise can cause children to either become dependent on parent praise or to think that their parents are only exaggerating.

Praise conveys parents' values and expectations to their children. High, reasonable expectations and praise that communicate messages to think well, be curious and enthusiastic, enjoy learning, work hard, and persevere will encourage those positive learning values. Praise that applauds kindness and consideration will encourage caring qualities. Once parents become aware that compliments convey expectations, they easily learn to be realistic and less pressuring.

How Parents Can Mediate Others' Super-Praise

Although it's difficult to stifle a grandparent's enthusiasm for little geniuses, parents can explain that Grandmom's exaggeration comes only because of her great love or Grandpa's exaggerated adoration is permitted only for grandparents. In that way, grandparents won't feel hurt, and parents can help put the extreme praise in perspective for their children—thus brilliant can be interpreted to mean pretty smart, and beautiful can be translated to mean the beauty within the child.

Praise and Underachievement

Extreme, early praise can often trap underachieving children into a defensive avoidance of challenging work, but it's only partially responsible. Gifted children quickly come to equate smart with easy; when schoolwork finally becomes difficult, or the competition from classmates feels problematic, gifted students may fear they're no longer gifted. As a result, they avoid their work as an excuse for not feeling smart enough. "I forgot," "I don't care," "the teacher doesn't like me," "it isn't cool to do work," "I don't like being gifted," or "school is boring" may be defensive statements used to protect themselves from the fear that even hard work might not lead to the straight A's they believe are expected of them. When praising gifted children, place particular emphasis on effort; for example, state "You're really working hard now." For underachievers in particular, a statement like "If you'd only do your work, you could get all A's" is likely to be interpreted as pressure for A's.

Strangely enough, as underachievers gradually emerge from their bad habits, too much enthusiasm often sends them back into their shell. One student, Joshua, reminded me that his mother expects him to get all A's based on the belief that if he would only do his work, he would get top marks. In truth, Joshua's mother would have been happy if he received a few B's instead of the C's, D's and F's he got because of all his missing assignments. Another student, Matt, finally got an A on his project, and his dad exclaimed in absolute excitement about how wonderful his grade was. Matt, too, shared with me that he wished his dad hadn't made such a big deal of the A, and that now, he'll probably be expected to get A's in everything. Cautious optimism and casual references to gradual improvement and hard work are more effective.

The Other Extremes

Do be aware of the other extremes: either negatively labeling a child continuously or giving messages of low expectations. The negative labeling often happens for only one of the children in the family. It becomes easy for one child to be the "chosen" one, while the other collects the sad or negative words or no praise words at all. One child easily can be labeled scholar and the other as the athlete, social one, or troublemaker. Parents can have whole, smart families who are reasonably social, participate in sports, and even get into trouble occasionally, if they're careful not to label their children and help all of them to develop their strengths.

As to providing too-low expectations, go back to the first story about Arianna, the fifth-grade basketball player. After I advised her dad not to praise her so extremely because I believed it caused her to feel great pressure, he reversed his strategy, but a bit too much. Instead, he reminded her that basketball was only a game and that he wanted her to have fun and not worry about winning. During her next game, he observed that she was clowning with her friends, not paying attention to the ball, and playing like she didn't care about winning at all. His communication had been too extreme. My subsequent recommendations were for her father to communicate somewhere in between those extremes like, "Yes, it is just a game, but I expect you to do your best to win, because that's what games are for." And, if she doesn't win, she can practice some more and do her best again. In life, she'll win some and lose some and while winning is more fun than losing, no one wins all the time. This more moderate strategy was effective. Arianna learned to compete, collaborate, and become a good sport—and these strategies are just as effective in the classroom as they are on the basketball court. Choose your praise words to reflect your realistic but positive expectations to motivate without over pressuring and remember, praising effort and perseverance is most effective.

—Sylvia B. Rimm, PhD

Sylvia B. Rimm is a child psychologist, director of the Family Achievement Clinic, and clinical professor at Case School of Medicine.

Web sites for Building Financial Knowledge

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:39:05 -0500

Issues surrounding financial spending and saving have been dominating the news for months, and it doesn't look like they'll be disappearing any time soon. Yet explaining these issues to your child can often be difficult.

Duke Gifted Letter went on the search for free, online resources that will help you talk to children about financial issues and let them try their hand at investing.

The Mint

Information: With different sections targeting kids, parents, and teachers, the Mint is a great introductory site on economic and financial topics. The Mint highlights new and important vocabulary words and provides a definition when you place your cursor over the word without requiring you to click. This site does everything from helping decode a paycheck and explain savings accounts and earning interest to giving and safeguarding your money.

The parent portion provides topics to talk to kids about such as negotiating allowances and how to lead by example. The age guide they provide for when to talk to your children about issues may not be perfectly accurate for gifted children, but their guidelines help provide an outline for a progression of complexity. The teacher section is short, but it offers a few basic lesson plans on explaining introductory topics like budgeting, credit, and the stock market (see the sidebar for Web sites with more detailed lesson plans.)

Interactivity: The Mint's Web site has a few quizzes to test your knowledge and understanding of the content explained on the site. Additionally, there are some activities that showcase how compound interest accumulates (for both savings and borrowing).

Overall: The site is completely text-based, but it is very informative about introducing basic-level knowledge on spending and saving. However, all the information with no guidance may seem overwhelming to someone not familiar with financial issues.

The Dallas Fed: Building Wealth from the Dallas Fed

Information: This Web site explains much of the same content as the Mint but has an audio component and provides specific examples while explaining the concepts. The flow is similar to a school lesson with pauses for the user to enter his or her responses.

Interactivity: The lessons frequently stop for the user to enter a response, such as "how do you define wealth?" or "long-term goals." However, because there are no "correct" answers, you can skip these questions if you want.

Overall: Users who prefer structure and audio to serve as an information guide will prefer the Dallas Fed's site. However, fast readers and people familiar with some of the content may find the pacing a little slow. The glossary of terms is a useful reference for basic definitions of terms.

Capstone: Investing Experience

Information: The premise of this site is simple. Each person gets a million dollars (hypothetical, of course) to invest. The site allows you to form a group or a contest for multiple participants, which may be good for families or classes.

One note of caution: this site is not designed specifically for children; some of the discussion boards for existing groups may contain adult language.

Joining is free, but the site asks you to check whether you want to subscribe to any of their offers. You can say no to all of them if you like. Now, you are set to begin trading. The site allows you to buy, sell short, and mark stocks to follow without purchasing. The site also provides links to news stories about your stocks. Users make trades with real-time stock prices and receive daily email updates about their portfolio.

This site may be initially overwhelming to students new to investing, but it acts as a realistic capstone to all the content explained in the above Web sites.

—Matthew Makel, PhD

Matthew Makel is a Gifted Education Research Specialist at Duke TIP and the editor of DGL.

Overexcitabilities and the Gifted Child

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:25:08 -0500

Does your child do any of the following?

Fidget a lot, or seem to have more energy than other children his or her age?
Have strong, unusual reactions to sounds or smells?
Create such a rich fantasy life that it is difficult for him or her to distinguish reality from fantasy?
Love nothing more than to think, solve problems, and ask questions?
Have intense emotional reactions, such that it seems like he or she is "overreacting"?

If so, your child may have one or more overexcitabilities.

What are overexcitabilities?

Overexcitabilities are extreme intensities or sensitivities that affect the ways in which an individual experiences the world. The Polish psychologist Kazimierz Dabrowski (1902-1980) identified overexcitabilities as part of a larger theory of development. Although most of us may have extra energy at times or have strong reactions to various stimuli on occasion, those with overexcitabilities experience these distinguishing behaviors regularly. Most researchers believe overexcitabilities are innate and will be present in some form throughout one's life. It is important to note that not all gifted children have overexcitabilities, but they do seem to be found to a greater degree in gifted and/or creative children than in average-ability children.

Although having overexcitabilities can be a positive experience, they can also cause problems with social interaction, daily functioning, and school experiences. How a person responds to a situation is determined by which overexcitability is most dominant, as overexcitabilities may be expressed in one or more of five dimensions: psychomotor, sensual, intellectual, imaginational, and emotional.

Psychomotor Overexcitability

A psychomotor overexcitability refers to a surplus of energy. Manifestations include extreme enthusiasm, rapid speech, love of intense activity, and impulsive actions. A person with a psychomotor overexcitability may act competitively, exhibit anxious behaviors, or act compulsively. A psychomotor overexcitability can be misdiagnosed as ADHD.

Sensual Overexcitability

A sensual overexcitability is seen in those with an enhanced level of sensory experience and is marked by the pursuit of pleasure through the senses, such as through taste and smell. Manifestations may include seeking enhancing stimuli, such as trying to become the focus of attention or overindulging oneself in food, or removing oneself from stimuli, by taking the tags out of one's clothes or wearing ear plugs.

Imaginational Overexcitability

An imaginational overexcitability is characterized by daydreaming, fantasizing, dramatization, and the use of imagery and metaphors. In order to escape boredom, those with an imaginational overexcitability may create an elaborate imaginary world.

Intellectual Overexcitability

An intellectual overexcitability is associated with striving for knowledge and truth through questioning, discovering, and analyzing, but it is not the same as intelligence, which is seen as an ability. Those with an intellectual overexcitability enjoy learning and problem solving, are curious, and can spend a great deal of time concentrating and being introspective, regardless of their ability level.

Emotional Overexcitability

An emotional overexcitability is marked by an intensified level of interpersonal relations to people, things, and places, and compassionate feelings for others. Its many manifestations include physical expressions of stress or emotion, extreme and often complex feelings, inhibition, empathy, and fears and anxieties.

Supporting the Gifted Child with Overexcitabilities

Several rating scales exist that allow one to assess the overexcitability levels of one's child or student. These scales (e.g., The Overexcitability Checklist) can be found online, but should be used with some caution as they are not necessarily valid or reliable. Self-report rating scales also exist, but are used primarily for research purposes (e.g., The Overexcitability Questionnaire-II).

Having overexcitabilities can be frustrating because of the intensity with which an individual experiences the world, but also because others may not respond favorably to a person with overexcitabilities. Often, others simply just do not understand. With proper nurture, though, a gifted child with overexcitabilities can have a wonderful and enriched life. The following are some guidelines for supporting the gifted child with overexcitabilities:

Allow time for your child to express his or her overexcitability in a safe environment. For example, make time for physical activity or daydreaming.
Educate your child and others involved in your child's life on overexcitabilities.
Encourage your child to focus on his or her strengths and to use his or her overexcitabilities to an advantage.
Teach your child skills to manage his or her overexcitabilities effectively. For example, teach your child emotion regulation techniques (e.g., deep breathing exercises for dealing with stress or anger) or how to effectively cope with offensive stimuli (e.g., politely declining a certain food or avoiding certain smells).
Emphasize your child's differences as a positive and not a negative. Help your child to understand that being different is okay. We are all unique beings and should be celebrated as such.

—Anne N. Rinn, PhD

Anne N. Rinn is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at the University of Houston-Downtown. She researches the social and emotional development of gifted adolescents.

English Language Learner Students and Gifted Identification

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:21:22 -0500

Among all the subgroups of students whose performance in school is commonly studied, English language learners (ELLs) are the least represented in gifted education programs. A variety of related reasons may account for this state of affairs, but the nature of gifted identification procedures is probably one of the more important causes. Awareness of this issue can help point us in the right direction to make progress in identifying children who would benefit from receiving appropriate gifted education services while they are learning English. Appropriate identification and inclusion benefit not only ELL students, but also help prepare non-ELL gifted learners to thrive in our increasingly diverse society.

Who are English language learners? Although students learning English are often stereotyped, there is a tremendous degree of diversity that often goes unrecognized within the ELL population. Much of this diversity, as well as the explanation for the need these students have for English instruction, can be traced to their status as recent immigrants to the United States. Among a group of over 400 gifted ELL students I studied recently, there were more than 40 languages and countries of origin represented, and this was within a single large school district. In other settings, however, such as the elementary school where I conducted my dissertation research in 2001, more than 90 percent of the large ELL population shared a single country of origin and many were even from the same state within that country. This tremendous variety in ELL students means that it is important for parents to develop a nuanced understanding of the school environment that their children attend, because effective services may look quite different in one setting than they do in another.

Gifted identification practices vary widely from one location to the next because policies and procedures are developed at the state and local levels, but some form of standardized testing is almost always used (see my DGL articles for more on the topic of assessment). Because tests are almost always in English, they may inadvertently be measuring English language ability rather than academic or intellectual ability. Although some test-makers claim that using their nonverbal tests may reduce or even eliminate such biases, researchers have found that these claims do not always hold up. Although portfolios of student work require more time to evaluate, they offer one promising alternative to standardized testing for identifying high ability among children who are learning English. As a parent, it is a good idea to familiarize yourself with the gifted identification criteria that apply in your children's setting so that you can pursue the portfolio option, if available, when appropriate. Many states, districts, and gifted education advocacy organizations now provide identification criteria and related information online.

A gifted education program is strongest and its students are most successful when identification procedures and program content are closely aligned. For students learning English, this suggests that gifted programming emphasizing language skills would be appropriate if students are identified based on their rapid acquisition of English; conversely, students identified using measures that emphasize spatial or mathematical abilities may be better served by gifted programming that emphasizes the development of those abilities. Students learning English may require some additional scaffolding, but all gifted learners benefit from understanding the structure, functions, and characteristics of English as well as those of other languages. Instructional content also should be relevant to student interests, and these interests will vary with the setting and student population; such relevance helps maximize the likelihood that successful students in the gifted program reflect the diversity of their community. Gifted ELL students bring to the classroom a valuable perspective that can educate other learners around them, particularly those who may not know more than one language themselves.

Finally, a school's underlying philosophy on gifted education may be just as important as the specific definitions or procedures it follows. Does your child's school focus on the strengths each child brings to the classroom and emphasize addressing students' individual learning needs? Or is the emphasis placed on perceived deficits and blind adherence to rules? Multilingualism should be viewed as a source of strength, regardless of where it is found. As an engaged and informed parent, whether of an ELL child or not, I encourage you to look around your child's school, and work for appropriate gifted education services for all gifted students.

—Michael S. Matthews, PhD

Gifted Program Administration: Mission Impossible?

Thu, 24 Sep 2009 13:04:42 -0500

As a district coordinator of gifted education for over two decades, I was continually surprised by the frequent exclamation, "I sure wouldn't want your job!" Although the reasons given for this utterance varied, the underlying sentiment reflected the perception of the difficulty of the many demands that confront an administrator of a gifted program.

The administrator of the gifted program (AGP) could hold any one of several professional roles in a school system: it may be the designated coordinator of gifted education at the central office; it may be the superintendent or a principal; perhaps a "lead teacher," or it may be the individual teacher who is the gifted resource specialist in a school.

Whatever the person's position, the AGP has at least three identifiable roles to fill: advocate, manager, and leader. The degree to which an AGP recognizes these very different skill sets and operates effectively within each of them will determine to a large extent her overall success. Because these roles can approach being mutually exclusive in their purpose and function, significant turmoil if not outright conflict may be the result in the absence of a multitude of skill sets. Awareness of the distinctions of each role can lead to better understanding and result in a reduction of conflicts.

Advocate: One distinct role of the AGP is that of advocate: a person who argues for a cause, a supporter or defender who pleads on another's behalf. Gifted education has grown through recent decades as a direct result of advocates who entered into the political arena to gain benefits for gifted students. AGP's usually enter the field of gifted education because they perceive the unique needs of this population and work diligently to address them. Parents sometimes lose sight of the fact that the person across the desk from them might be their best ally and support as an advocate for the gifted, and the encounter becomes an adversarial one because the existing procedures and regulations do not permit what the parents want. This can be incredibly exasperating for one who becomes an AGP to help gifted students but is unable to improve things for them in the short run.

Manager: AGPs are managers because they direct, exert control, and supervise the implementation of a school's gifted programs. In describing their managerial role, many AGPs identify the following requirements; they need to be:

As familiar as the best psychologist about tests and assessments, their scores and interpretation
As aware as the best guardian ad litem about eligibility, identification criteria, and placement decisions
As accomplished as the best teacher at developing curriculum and leading instruction
As capable as the best accountant in the developing a budget and distribution of resources
As discerning as the best human services director in interviewing and hiring teachers for the program
As skilled as the best journalist in writing procedural documents
As informed as the best politician about the prevailing attitudes among various stakeholders

These attributes are all necessary components to gifted program management, and important to providing stability to the services it provides. A good manager does things right. Consistent and equitable decisions must be made regarding eligibility and placement, services, and resource allocation.

Leader: The successful AGP is not only a proficient manager, but must demonstrate leadership, as well. A leader is one who guides, directs, or shows the way by going in advance. Warren Bennes characterized the difference as, "Managers are people who do things right. Leaders are people who do the right thing." Being a manager is about continuing to do the right things and maintain the status quo. Being a leader is about breaking through the quo after it has lost its status. This often means rocking the boat, looking for innovative ways to improve the current situation.

AGPs who are leaders have to constantly assess the current program structure with an eye toward what is needed to improve the program. AGPs must know the current research findings that can guide future program development, as well as emerging best practices in testing and assessment. They must guide the development of curriculum and evaluate the outcomes of learning experiences that prepare students for future careers and roles that do not yet even exist.

The chief difficulty of being an AGP lies in managing the dynamic tension between these two forces: that which compels change and that which seeks to maintain. The successful AGP is aware that every decision and every act supports either one or the other. Being aware enables the AGP to make a defensible choice - defensible in the sense that the reasons can be articulated in order to help all of the stakeholders understand the why behind the choice, so that even those who disagree will understand why that choice was made.

An advocate has to engage in the political process of crafting policy for gifted students. For the AGP however, the advocate's desire to provoke change—the change that is the goal of the leader's vision—must be balanced with the manager's responsibility to implement the current policies as structured. At least, that is, until that change can be brought about.

—Rick Courtright