All Kids Are Gifted in Some Way, Right?
Over the next two weeks, I’ll help you explore the merits, blessings, and challenges involved in homeschooling your gifted kids.
I begin this series, and think back to my classroom teaching years. As a third grade classroom teacher, then a gifted education specialist, and now the parent of gifted children, I’ve heard a variety of comments, myths, and even prejudices related to gifted education. The most common is this question:
Aren’t all kids gifted?
Unfortunately, the term gifted brings up all kinds of emotional reactions when parents and teachers hear it. When this question is asked, I think the person asking means more along the lines of, all kids are special {or talented} in some way than all kids are gifted in the academic/learning application of the word.
Because, yes, all kids are special. All kids do have things they’re really good at. All kids deserve to have their specific learning needs met within whatever learning environment they spend their time.
But all kids are not gifted.
Gifted kids learn differently than kids their age. They learn things more quickly, and with less repetition. They have intuitive abilities to master complex patterns – of words or numbers – at very young ages. They can grasp nuances easily. They pick up things they are interested at incredibly rapid, almost insatiable rates, and they can converse with specialists about these topics as peers.
Just like we do not say all kids have learning disabilities simply because all kids are better at some things than others, we cannot say all kids are gifted learners.
Because giftedness is a learning difference, meeting the needs of your gifted kids can be quite challenging, especially if you have more than one child! There is no one-size-fits-all approach to teaching a gifted child because each has such different needs.
Over the next few days, I’ll share with you more detail about the needs, abilities, and differences between gifted kids, why homeschooling gifted kids makes sense, identifying your kids’ learning styles, and what asynchronous development is. I’ll also share some of the common misconceptions about homeschooling and how to develop or find curriculum suited to your kids’ specific learning needs.
In the meantime, check out some of these great books on teaching and understanding your gifted child:
- Homeschooling Gifted and Advanced Learners by Cindy West
- Creative Homeschooling: A Resource for Smart Families by Lisa Rivero
- Parenting Gifted Kids by James R. Delisle, PhD
- Smart Parenting for Smart Kids by Eileen Kennedy-Moore and Mark S. Lowenthal
I’m looking forward to sharing this topic with you over the next two weeks. If you haven’t already, please take a moment to subscribe so you don’t miss a post:
