Is there a Gap in Our Understanding? Gifted vs High-Achieving Students

Day 3 of the giftEDnz October Blog Challenge.

The Truth About Gifted Versus High-Achieving Students

Gifted students have it easy - right? They're well-organised, popular, are our natural leaders, a dream to learn and teach with, often the go-to person in the classroom and they always get the best marks. Right? No.  They don't.  These are our high-ability students and there IS a difference.  This is such a misconception and it puts our gifted students on the back foot right from the time they enter the classroom.  If they've been identified at some point and then don't meet teacher expectations there can be a break down in relationships, both with their teachers and their peers and the damage done to self-esteem and identity can be hard to rectify.

So what do we need to do as teachers?  I've thought about this a lot over the years.  Some of this thinking is based on research, reflection and my own learning but some thinking is also based on the gut instinct we develop as teachers. Here are my thoughts:

1. Don't assume 

I love this quote from Alan Alda - “Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in awhile, or the light won’t come in.” ~ Alan Alda, actor

The student that struggles with reading and writing could still be a gifted writer. They just need a different platform to share their ideas.  That student who's 'always in trouble' could also be a gifted student who is showing his or her frustration in a different way.  The autistic student could be the next top computer programmer. Sometimes our assumptions that a student CAN'T do something can cloud our ability to see what they CAN do.

For more on this, please read this powerful post...

Scrubbing Our Assumptions About Our Students

2. Don't read the report comments from the last teacher/school until well into the first term

This might be controversial but it's honest and not meant to offend.
By all means, respect the basic data/professional judgements and anything essential but we all know that personalities come into play in learning and teaching.  That student that "...has not reached his/her potential...' could just need a different teacher with a different perspective. We can't be precious about this. It's just a fact of life and it's normal.  If we see it as any other way then we might just miss that gifted student who just needs a fresh start or that new perspective.

3. Know our students as people first - students second

Who is this awesome person in our room - what makes them tick?  I used to get my students to write to me on the topic of "What I wish my teacher knew about me."  It was one of the most powerful learning activities I've ever done.  It gives you a real insight into who these amazing human beings are.

What I Wish My Teacher Knew About Me

4. Be open to possibilities - be open to the possibility that a student may be gifted.

This links in with not making assumptions.  We need to address our assumptions in terms of gifted students coming from so many different

5. Listen, observe and question

Teachers are great at talking - I am very much guilty as charged in this respect but many years ago I was reading about the power of listening in the classroom and it really changed how I interacted with my students.  It's still very much a work in progress because I can't help myself but it was amazing what I picked up by being quiet and just listening and observing.

Listening Is a Teacher's Most Powerful Tool

6. Surround yourself with as much knowledge as possible.

This is sometimes not as easy as it sounds.  Teachers are under so much pressure to raise achievement levels of students who are below the expected level, deal with a myriad of neurodiverse students and meet all the other administrative requirements of their profession. This is where our gifted students often fall between the cracks if we're not careful.  We can make sure this doesn't happen by learning from others asynchronously through our online professional learning networks (PLN) as well as in more formal learning situations.  There is a myriad of groups and pages where information can be found on learning and teaching with our gifted students.  Just a few are linked below...

Gifted and Talented Teachers (NZ)
giftEDnz - new website coming soon
NZCGE - New Zealand Centre for Gifted Education
NZAGC - New Zealand Association for Gifted Children
REACH - Specialists in Gifted Education
TKI - Gifted and Talented
Hogies' Gifted Education Page
SENG - Social and Emotional Needs of the Gifted

7. Question what you observe.

Always question what you are seeing and hearing.  This is not second-guessing or self-doubt.  It is part of being a reflective and reflexive practitioner. 
Two common models are the Gibbs Reflective Cycle Model (1988) and Kolb's Reflective Practice Model (1984)

Image Source: ELN

Image Source: Nicole Brown - excellent explanation on her page

If you suspect that a student may be gifted utilise your PLN, your colleagues, the student's whānau and other resources to help with identification. Be clear in your own mind that there is a difference between gifted and high-achieving students so that your gifted students aren't missed. It is a question of equity in education that the needs of our gifted students are met. 

You're Really Annoying Me!

Day 2 of the giftEDnz October Blog Challenge and it's all about how NOT to annoy gifted children.

Gifted Guru - Top Ten Ways to Annoy a Gifted Child

Today's prompt is one that could make you laugh...or cry...depending on the way you look at it and also what your background experience is.  The 10 ways to annoy a gifted child are listed below.  I thought about ways to reflect on these statements.  The author's (Lisa Van Gemert) perspective is funny with a touch of sarcasm.  But this is a serious issue and after nearly 20 years in the profession, I've decided my reflection will be a serious one - with hopefully a dash of humour and a whole lot of positivity around how we can make things better - for our gifted students and also ourselves.

First of all, I was going to reflect on how I have seen every one of these statements for myself over the years - and often despaired - but it's not in my nature to be overly negative. I'd much rather reflect on what I've learned - and am learning - and create solutions for these points.  Have I been guilty of some of these?  You bet I have - you don't know what you don't know, or so a very wise colleague said to me one day when I was beating myself up over something.  So here goes... 

1. Force them to remain at the “right” grade level.

This is a curious one.  Why do we do this?  Often we hear it discussed that it's because students 'wouldn't cope with different-age peers' but hang on...what about the mixed levels in smaller rural schools? Students have been coping exceptionally well in these learning environments.  In fact, when I was head of Year 7 in a large College a few years ago it was always quite easy to identify learners from these environments as they were often - not always - but quite often, more comfortable around people of all ages. It was what they were used to.  So what's stopping us?

2. Insist that they show their work.

This is another interesting one and one that has, in the past, been dictated by people other than those at the whiteboard face of teaching and learning.  The Numeracy Project was good for this.  I remember during one interview where students have to explain their thinking/strategies a student asked me why I needed them to do this.  My reply was the standard one about needing to know what strategies they could use so that I could find the right level for their next learning.  The next statement from the student really made me think - they were one of those amazing students that just 'got' the answer.  A truly gifted mathematician by every definition and description.  The response - "But is the answer right?" "Yes," I replied.  "Well then telling you how I got it isn't going to change it to being anything else then is it?"  The student had a point.  

I think with gifted students it's very different.  With a student who is struggling, explaining or showing their thinking can really help them understand what they're learning and how something works.  For gifted students, this just frustrates the heck out of them when they are more than ready to move on to the next challenge.

3. Force them to read along.

Fortunately, I've never done this (quickest way to kill a passion for reading) but I have seen it happen so many times! Back in about 2003, I developed a NZ version of Literature Circles.  One of the guidelines was around just this.  The group could only DISCUSS what their group was reading up to the part where the slowest reader in the group was up to - and being a slower reader was also a cause for celebration as they were often the ones who were also picking up the finer details as much as the gifted readers.  We really pushed and valued this in my class.  It was always something to be as proud of as being a gifted reader.  The more capable and gifted readers could read as much as they wanted.  It was all about flexibility.

You can read more about this version of Literature Circles by clicking through the presentation image.

Putting the 'Oomph' Back into Reading - Literature Circles, blogging and Twitter - the key to developing a passion for reading. from Justine Hughes / PhD Candidate/Teacher

4. No differentiation.

There's differentiation and then there's real differentiation.  It's not about giving more of the same to our gifted students or slightly harder work.  It's about truly knowing our students and differentiating to meet their specific needs.  This is becoming increasingly challenging as class numbers increase and the primary sector relies more on relief teachers to fill gaps.

Differentiation is not about putting our gifted students in the 'top group' or mixed ability groups all the time. To really meet their needs, our classrooms need to be organised to have clusters of gifted students in them so that they have the opportunity to learn and teach with like-minds.  This is crucial for their social and emotional development and careful grouping - and ranges of grouping are key.  Differentiation is all about differentiating the content, process and product.  The toolbox link below explains qualitative differentiation for our gifted students really well.

The Differentiation Toolbox- Brooke Trenwith

and from Carol Tomlinson...

We may have better opportunities for this with the new FLEs (or ILEs/MLEs depending on which acronym you use).  However, a caution with the new environments is that they may not suit all of our gifted students - particularly the twice-exceptional (2e) students, and there has yet to be a significant amount of research conducted into their effectiveness.  I'm excited about the possibilities though - but we need evidence and we also need professional learning and development (PLD) in order for these to work well as they necessitate a shift in pedagogy.

5. Make passive aggressive comments about their intelligence.

There's not much to say about this one.  We've all heard one of our colleagues say this and it is not acceptable.  Even as a joke.  Gifted students can often be very sensitive and this is just damaging to identity and self-worth. Never start a sentence with "But you're so smart..."

6. Only allow same-age friends.

This goes back to #1 but it is also more than that.  In order to be able to interact with like-minds it's crucial that students can interact with all ages.  Sometimes it's often by this interaction that we as teachers can start to identify a gifted student - or very importantly - one who has been flying under the radar and not indicated a great deal of giftedness in the classroom setting.  These are often our underachievers or students who may have behaviour issues.  Because gifted students often develop asynchronously, it's vital to let them find their 'tribe' - people who can meet their social, emotional and intellectual needs.

7. Don’t let them linger over things that interest them.

This is such a tricky one and the cause of this happening is so often beyond the control of the student's teacher.  The pressures from curriculum and assessment demands have, in the past, put enormous pressure on teachers to 'get through the work'.  It's honestly crazy.  The changes since I began teaching in 1999 have been enormous and the workload and expectations are sometimes out of kilter with what we know to be absolute best practice in teaching and learning.  I hope we can push back on this a little now that National Standards have gone but there's going to need to be professional learning for many who trained under the NS system so that the focus goes firmly back on our fantastic - and I still believe - world-leading National Curriculum.  

This curriculum allows for passions and interests to be followed. Genius Hour and Passion Projects fit so well into this. It has differentiation and personalisation at its heart.  It was designed to begin with the Key Competencies and build the curriculum for our learners from there. There's always 'wriggle room' in our planning and assessment.  Imagine the power of that!!

Davidson Gifted

Genius Hour Resources - crowdsourced resource collated by teachers

8. Give them more of the same level of work.

See # 4

9. Expect perfection.

Meet the Perfectionists

No one is perfect and most certainly I am not!  I have learned so much more from failing than I ever did from getting things right - something I've had to work on being the perfectionist that I am.  We need to take the negative pressure right off our able and gifted students.  They are individuals and a human being first and foremost.  If we don't remove that pressure or teach them how to combat serious perfectionist tendencies then we are contributing to the mental health statistics.

10. Make them repeat the same things over and over.

I will not dye my teacher's hair red.

I will not dye my teacher's hair red.

I will not dye...

Oh - not THAT kind of repetition!!

Repetition kills the joy of learning.  Yes, some students need repetition to help them master new learning but not all do.  We have to ask the question "What is the point in repeating something that a student already knows or has mastered?"

I think the key point in all of this - and helpful in not always annoying your students (let's be honest, we're human, we all annoy each other at some time!) is to keep them (individually and as people) at the heart of everything we do.  If we do that then we can't go wrong - and we'll only annoy them a little bit.

On Being A Champion and a Voice for our Gifted Students

Day 1 of the giftEDnz October Blog Challenge and it's all about the importance of being a champion or as Tracy Riley writes in her blog post for this challenge - of being an advocate.

Since I watched Rita Pierson's TEDTalk many years ago, I've been inspired by what she had to say and it's made me reflect deeply on the purpose of being a champion for our students and which students need that champion the most.  Of course, all of our students need a champion but there is a group which, at the moment, are in very real danger of being forgotten.  These are our gifted students.

I've been thinking about why this is the case and there are many reasons and issues.  A common belief is that "All children are gifted, they just unwrap their gifts at different times."  Unfortunately, this belief has taken hold and doesn't account for the unique social, emotional and learning needs of this group of students.  Yes, all children have or are gifts but not all children are gifted.  There is a wealth of research and information on this, some of which I've listed below, but still, the misinformation persists.  Why?

During recent discussions, I've come to understand that it seems to be a lack of knowledge through the professional learning and development gaps.  I graduated from university in 1998 and we were exposed to very little information on gifted and talented students.  In fact, the quote in the image above was frequently used.  I think it's like many things...if used enough it becomes a self-perpetuating belief that many grab hold of.  After all, we're teachers and we believe in every one of our students and we know that they have gifts.  That's of course as it should be, but by denying that truly gifted students exist by definition and identification we are perpetuating this myth and also taking a rather large risk with the specific social, emotional and learning needs of this group of students.  It then becomes an issue of equity.

We always champion our students and I've blogged about this in the past (here, here, and here) but have I really championed the gifted students I've learned and taught alongside?  Could I have done things differently?  Of course, there are always things we can do better.  I had a large group of gifted Year 5/6 students in my class in 2011 and I think, together, we really enabled them to shine, to share and value their learning from their one-day school and to make connections between the two learning environments.  There were so many lessons I learned from them and from fighting for them and their peers to be recognised in the school.  These are lessons I take with me today.

Prior to this, I was differentiating and personalising the learning for all of my students and they always planned the learning alongside me but knowing what I know now, I could have done it even better and made a real impact on how and what they were learning and how they were recognised and valued.  This understanding of gifted students and how to be a champion for them only came about through my own need to learn.  There was very little organised for us in terms of professional learning and development (PLD).  I think in the whole of my teaching career I have only attended one PLD session on gifted students.  One session - a one-off - does not ensure that changes in practice are made or are even sustainable. 

Having the knowledge and understanding about giftedness and gifted students helps us to be better champions for this group of students.

'Kids don't learn from people they don't like'.  This is an often-quoted statement from the late Rita Pierson. I wonder what happens to our gifted students who know they are different, who feel that they don't fit in if we as teachers don't acknowledge that giftedness even exists?  What does that do to a student's self-esteem and identity? To their understanding of who they are?  What impact does that have on their love of learning and of school in general?  These are all questions that need further thought and research - and most importantly, input in the form of student voice.

For me, being a champion for our gifted students means that we open up the debate and have honest reflective discussions around our own beliefs and understandings - this can be quite confronting but our students need and deserve this.  We need to share as much evidence as we can about what the experiences are for this group of students.  We can say that we're differentiating the learning and personalising it but unless we understand the specific needs of this group of students, I'm betting that we have a way to go - but isn't that the great thing about learning?  

A champion is someone who will always have their students' backs and fight for what is their right in the education system.  They help give students a voice.  That is currently leading to some fantastic debates on social media.  The more we can have these conversations, the better chance we have as champions for gifted students. 

Rita Pierson by Sylvia Duckworth

Resources

Aren't All Children GIfted? - David G Myers

Giftedness is not an unwrapped present - Carol Bainbridge

The Problem of Giftedness - Jim Taylor

10 Social and Emotional Needs of the Gifted - Ian Byrd 

Social and Emotional Issues of Young Gifted Children - Carola Sampson

Identification - NAGC

Gifted and Talented Students: Meeting their needs in New Zealand Schools - Ministry of Education

Championing Our Gifted Students

Although this blog post is part of the celebration that is Gifted Awareness Week in Aotearoa New Zealand and our Gifted Blog Tour that is held each year I think every week is Gifted Awareness Week.

As teachers, we are always determined to celebrate our amazing students.  As the late Rita Pierson said, we ARE their champions and they need us now more than ever.   We get excited by their successes and achievements and this is so easy to do when they're in our area of focus during the week but how do we make sure that we do this when they're not - when, for example - they're part of a one-day gifted and talented school?  For these students, it can be even more important to provide that crucial link between the two learning environments - to celebrate their achievements and shout them from the rooftops.  Why?  Because relationships and connections are everything in learning and teaching.  Because it celebrates and normalises who they are - it makes it okay to be gifted and keeps us connected to them.  And it absolutely is okay to be gifted.  So many of our gifted students have to fight to be accepted when we should be celebrating that giftedness and as my colleague, Andrea Delaune writes in her blog post for Gifted Awareness Week - having a party for it!  This has really struck a chord with me.

So then, how do we change this thinking to make sure that the connections are strong and that our gifted students are truly valued? How do we create and change a culture to make it a collaborative one where learning is shared and celebrated between the two learning environments?  Where students don't become targets because they go to a different school one day a week? 

Like many things, it comes from the top down. The teacher sets the tone - be champions for our students.  It's not that hard and it's a whole lot of fun.

Back in 2011 I had quite a large group of gifted students attending a one-day school and wanted to find ways to connect, share, value and celebrate their learning so I talked to their teachers at their other school and also to the students themselves and we set up their blogs - all of my students had them in our home classroom and they also had them at their one-day school so they could share the learning from both environments.  The value of the feedback that was shared by the students, teachers and parents/whanau was powerful and had a huge impact on learning and confidence.

We also devised a plan where they could run workshops to share their learning across the school when they returned. This was voluntary initially but they were all very keen so we ran with it and it was very successful.  It didn't take a lot of time and it created exceptionally strong relationships in the classroom.  The learning from both directions was valued and celebrated, as were the students.

There are now so many different ways to connect and collaborate.  I've posted recently about one - using Hapara  and I've created a test Workspace in Hapara to try this out - you can take a look at it here and let me know what you think - is it something you think could be valuable for creating a better understanding and deeper, collaborative connections?  This one helps to connect the home school, the one-day school, students and their parents/whanau and caregivers.

Hapara - Workspace - Gifted and Talented Collaborations

Seesaw - student-driven digital portfolios and blogs are other ways that the learning can be continued along with workshops discussed above.  Talk to your students - they will have so many ideas for ways to share their learning with you. 

We've got to create better connections and be champions for these students in particular.  I will leave you with the fabulous Rita Pierson. I've shared this so many times, including with many students whose response was simply - "She gets us."

                                         Rita Pierson - Every Kid Needs A Champion

Creating Greater Communication for our Gifted and Talented Students and their Teachers

Many of our gifted and talented students attend a one-day school and as teachers, we often don't really know what they learn there apart from following a blog, if the one-day school or student has one, or reading emails to keep us up-to-date with students' learning and progress.  If we don't make time to talk to our students about their days then we may not fully understand or appreciate what learning looks like for them at the schools or what their experiences are.  What are the alternatives? How can we make this a more valuable and connected experience for all involved?

As part of my research for my PhD in gifted and talented education, I've been thinking about ways to help create a deeper connection between the two learning environments.  When I was in the classroom I used Google Classroom and Hapara as a way of promoting learner agency (this is a great post from CORE Education), and making sure that my students had strong voices in their day-to-day learning and teaching, (I always see students as teachers as well as learners and vice versa for teachers).  A few years earlier I had a large number of students who attended a one-day school in Invercargill and they always had opportunities to run workshops when they returned so that they could share their experiences and skills with the rest of the class and school.  This, combined with using a tool like the Hapara Workspace could have many positive implications for our gifted and talented students and would really value their learning experiences outside of their home school.

Hapara

Google Classroom

To test my thinking about this, I recently completed the Hapara Champion Educator Programme.  This is the first of three that you can complete increasing your skill level and expertise in using Hapara.  It is run over a few weeks and is completely asynchronous - great if you're a fan of any time, anywhere learning and need it to be flexible to fit around other commitments. The organisers recommend around 5 hours per week.

Through exploring the new features of Hapara which have changed quite a bit since I was using it in 2015, I can see that this has so many possibilities for being able to connect home schools with the one-day schools and to link parents and caregivers into the learning as well. 

For the third and final task, we had to create a Workspace as an example of what we'd learned and this was a chance to put into practice what I'd been thinking about.  My reflection on the 'Why' of the Workspace for Gifted and Talented Learners can be found here.

Gifted and Talented Collaborations Workspace

The next phase of learning about Hapara is the Champion Scholar programme.  I will be using this to see where the possibilities created in the first programme can lead.  At this stage, I may also look for schools who would like to try this idea out as part of my research.  I will keep you up to date with progress on here but if you're interested in any part of this, please don't hesitate to contact me or add a comment. I look forward to reading your thoughts.

The Vulnerabilities of Being A Teacher

Last Friday's chat on #whatisschool was all about our vulnerabilities as teachers.  The minute I read the questions, I thought they would be a great challenge for me as a reflective teacher (this links to a long-ish post with links to many other posts on reflective practice over the years).  As the chat progressed I was humbled by the depth of sharing and the honesty of individuals whom I value and respect as colleagues around the globe.  That's the power of being involved in weekly Twitter chats such as these - they push your learning and you are able to reflect more deeply because of where the conversations head.  You don't always get these opportunities during one-off professional learning sessions.  I've blogged about this before here and here and my Masters thesis was on the power of online Communities of Practice and their potential to change teacher professional learning and practice.

Back to this week's chat though - and this was one that really made me reflect on my practice and my vulnerabilities as a teacher.  Even the first question was quite tough - we're often not good at identifying our strengths.  If I could choose one strength, then it would have to be empathy - I hope that I will always have empathy for the students and the families I come in contact with.  Personally, I don't believe you can reach your students unless you have this.   I also know that I'm not afraid to fail, to make mistakes and let my students see me doing this.  This is so important if we want to encourage our students to develop a growth mindset and be a learner alongside our students.  I've often been challenged on how much I collaborate in my planning with students but I have no problem with this.  After all, it is THEIR learning.  That was part of the discussion for Question 2.

Question 3 was a tough one - as a teacher, what are my vulnerabilities?  It was tough, not because I don't have any - I have plenty - it was because there are many to work on.  I'm a perfectionist, and I can be very critical of myself and others.  I have high expectations for myself and others but sometimes I need to engage brain before mouth, particularly with adults. This is always something I continue to work on.  I know that I care too much and have trouble switching off which can lead to this frustration.

Question 5 prompted a really interesting discussion around what happens when a colleague notices our vulnerabilities - what would we want them to do.  One of the most powerful experiences of my teaching career happened when I was involved in a very well set-up Critical Friends programme where the feedback was always honest and constructive and delivered through a coaching platform.  I would always want to be told when I'm missing the point, or not communicating effectively or not delivering as I should.  We expect to be able to do this with our students in order for them to become the best they can be.  Shouldn't we also expect this for ourselves as learners too?  Sometimes it's not always easy to hear - and I've been in this situation where it has been some of the most difficult feedback to receive because I'm certainly not perfect, but I hope it's helped me to be a better teacher / leader - and person - and that I've been able to reflect honestly on the feedback for my own benefit and for the benefit of those around me.

Sometimes our vulnerabilities need to be faced.  Sometimes they can be a strength and sometimes they are something that needs to be faced honestly and worked on.  That's what learning and teaching - and growth - is all about.

The following TedTalk by Brené Brown  is all about the Power of Vulnerability.  It's worth watching:

The Power of Sketchnoting

A couple of weeks ago I participated in the weekly #whatisschool Twitter chat which that week was hosted by @sylviaduckworth.  Many of you reading this will know her as the guru of #Sketchnoting - something I've long been a fan of using...with my students.  It has so much potential for helping students organise their thinking and share their learning so, of course, I was going to be a fan.  I had been toying with the idea of using it to help me organise my, at times, wandering mind for my studies but had really dismissed the idea due to a lack of artistic ability but when I saw the topic of the chat, I thought I'd lurk and see what other's had to say...

Isn't it funny how, as teachers, we are our students' biggest cheerleaders when it comes to wanting them to have a growth mindset and give things a go...to not expect to be perfect at something...but when it comes to our own growth mindset that sage advice often goes out the window??!!  What do they say about 'Physician heal thyself'.  A lot can be learned from this.

How many times do we say this...but do we practise it ourselves?

As usual, the conversation on the weekly chat lead to deep reflection about my own beliefs about learning - it's funny how a 140 character Tweet can do that sometimes.  I've always been very vocal about things such as pedagogy before tools in the case of my passion for all things digital and ideas / content before surface features in writing, as just two examples, but here I was, reluctant to give something a 'go' which I knew would be powerful for my own learning just because I might be lacking in the artistic department.  What message would that be sending to my students if they knew about that..?

So...I'm going to be exploring sketchnoting throughout my PhD studies in gifted education as a way to explore my thinking and record my learning. It's something different and I'd be very keen to find out if any other PhD students have explored this.  Watch this space - or the page on this blog I'm going to dedicate to my PhD learning journey.  I'm going to practise what I preach and develop a growth mindset around this - after all - as everyone in the chat kept saying, and I tell my students...it's about the ideas not the art...

Image by Sylvia Duckworth