Oh, no, my kid might be gifted! Where do I start?

This is perhaps the most common reason people call me.  Maybe they always assumed that their kids would be gifted, but had also assumed that there would be clear and easy guidance and help available from the school system.  Or maybe giftedness just wasn’t on their radar, but a pediatrician or teacher or relative or someone else said something.  Either way, they started web-searching, and quickly found themselves confused and overwhelmed — there is so much information, so much jargon, all the information is contradictory, and so much of it is, well, highly opinionated.

[Okay, so I’m probably no exception to the “highly opinionated” thing, but I try not to go off the, “Your kid is a super-special superior being,” or the, “If you don’t do this One Right Thing and you don’t do it Right Now, you’re not taking proper care of your child,” deep ends.  If I do, please don’t hesitate to call me on it.]

But let me give you a few simple things to do.

First, breathe.  Your kid is wonderful and terrific and you are feeling the same awesome responsibility as the custodian of a young life as all good parents do.  But, as I tell my own kids, unless something is bleeding or on fire, chances are good that this isn’t an emergency.  I do get some emergency-type calls (school is in the process of throwing a kid out, kid is emotionally falling apart on a regular basis, etc.), and if that’s the kind of situation you’re in, absolutely send me a note or give me a call and I’ll talk you through.

But otherwise, relax.  Your kid is the same kid they were yesterday and is the same kid they’re going to be tomorrow.  A day or a week or a month here or there isn’t going to make the difference between a fulfilling life of scholarship, career, and love, and a kid who crashes and burns and ends up on Skid Row.  It’s okay to take the time to get your bearings.  And few decisions are truly permanent — you can usually change course later.

Okay.  There are a lot of books written about gifted kids and how to parent them.  I frankly don’t think that parents (who are probably pretty smart themselves!) need to read every book out there — there’s not going to be that much new information once you’ve read one.  My current go-to book — it’s comprehensive, realistic, calm, not worshipful or overblown or dismissive — is Webb, J.T., Gore, J.L., Amend, E.R., & DeVries, A.R. (2007).  A parent’s guide to gifted children.  Scottsdale, AZ: Great Potential Press.

If you’re looking for some specific suggestions for curricula, toys, books, contests, local groups, you name it, go to Hoagies.  Carolyn K curates probably the largest single pile of links to All Things Gifted.  You name it, it’s probably already there.  If it’s not, tell Carolyn, and she’ll add it.  It’s not the easiest site to browse through, just because there’s so much of it — use the search tool liberally.  Hoagies also has a wealth of articles with every possible opinion on every possible topic, but chances are good that’s what got you overwhelmed in the first place (grin).

One very strong theme in the research literature on giftedness is the idea of social isolation, both for kids and for parents.  Yeah, you.  Giftedness is treated with a lot of ambivalence in the USA and similar cultures — you’re supposed to have brilliant kids, but whatever you do, Don’t Talk About Them.  The single best thing parents can do for themselves is to break the isolation.  If you go to Hoagies (of course), there is a list of mailing lists and ways to get in contact with other parents: http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/on-line_support.htm.  What I usually recommend is to subscribe to GT-Families and TAGFAM, two general-interest mailing lists.  Volume can be high at times — try using your mail program to sort messages into a folder, and if you get behind by a week or more, don’t feel bad about deleting.  There are also related lists for parents of kids who are twice-exceptional, homeschooling, radically accelerated, etc.  The lists are *very* helpful for parents to get advice and feedback from each other, and even just to have a place to talk about what they’re going through without being assumed to be bragging.

The GT universe is also moving into social media — many of the major players have Facebook pages (you can find mine here), blogs, Twitter accounts, etc.  Hoagies again is a great one to follow, and allow yourself to bop around and enjoy the variety of viewpoints.  I don’t have favorites yet in this realm — it’s changing too fast.

Another great organization is Supporting the Emotional Needs of the Gifted:  Besides having some very good articles on the social-emotional experience of giftedness, they train facilitators to run local parent support groups.  Very helpful for breaking the isolation and processing one’s own experiences of growing up gifted.  Hint: the kid didn’t just fall out of the sky that way…

There is a National Association of Gifted Children, and every state has an association.  Associations vary widely in terms of what they actually provide — my experience has been that they are more focused around political advocacy than around direct service to parents or kids.  You can find a list of the state associations on that same Hoagies page.

Many parents who call me are looking to find out about what their school districts are obligated to do.  You can find a complete listing of state laws affecting gifted kids at Genius Denied.  The title might lead you to think that it’s a pretty depressing listing, and you’d be right.  Sigh.

Along with that, by the way, if you think your child might be twice-exceptional, or if you live in a state where gifted education is handled through the special education process, the place to go is Wrightslaw.

There are many state and regional talent searches; find the ones serving your location on the Hoagies Talent Search page. All offer low-cost methods for kids to take out-of-level achievement tests (because they’d hit the ceilings of grade-level achievement tests, of course!), qualifying them to take courses designed for gifted kids.  Courses can be expensive but financial aid is available.  The courses are generally terrific, and the chance to be with other gifted kids is one that many kids treasure.  If nothing else, having a qualifying score on these is a cheap-and-easy way to get something objective in hand that you can share with your child’s district when they say, “Oh, we have lots of kids just like that.”

To learn about what the research actually says about the various different forms of academic acceleration, you can download the A Nation Deceived and A Nation Empowered reports for free.  They’re from three of the leading researchers in gifted education, and, as the title might suggest, most of what educators think they know just isn’t so.  They typically get zero training in gifted issues while in teacher school, and what they do get typically just perpetuates the myths.  And don’t worry about that “social-emotional” thing, or the one story they can tell you about the kid who accelerated and was miserable — the most important social-emotional need for gifted kids is appropriate academic challenge and real peers.

The best single book to share with teachers is: Winebrenner, S., & Brulles, D. (2012). Teaching gifted kids in today’s classroom: Strategies and techniques every teacher can use (3rd ed.). Minneapolis, MN: Free Spirit Publishing.  She talks about how to actually implement techniques like curriculum compacting (test out of what you already know), tiered or differentiated lesson plans (have different kids do different things on the same topic), and independent projects, without spending lots of money or putting forth enormous effort.  There’s even a companion CD with customizable forms for the teachers to use.

Because we need to break the social isolation of the kids, too, I also strongly recommend sharing with administrators if they’ll let you:  Winebrenner, S., & Brulles, D. (2008).  The cluster grouping handbook: A schoolwide model: How to challenge gifted students and improve achievement for all. Minneapolis, MN: Free Spirit Publishing.  In cluster grouping, instead of spreading the gifted kids out among all classes in a grade (which seems “fair” to the teachers, but makes it very hard for the gifted kids to find each other), they get put in groups of about 5-6 kids within a few classrooms.  This costs nothing to implement, and not only does the book tell a principal how and why, it even includes sample letters to help manage the political stuff around it.

If you are considering a whole-grade acceleration (grade skip), check out the Iowa Acceleration Scales, 3rd edition.  It’s a research-based measure designed to help parents and administrators talk in a holistic fashion about a kid when making placement decisions.  If you’re talking with administrators about district-wide acceleration policy (hey, a girl can dream, eh?) the Institute for Research and Policy on Acceleration has guidelines.  Both of these are from the same folks as Nation Deceived.

If a kid has IQ and achievement scores both above 145, there are some great opportunities available through the Davidson Institute for Talent Development.  Consultation, financial support, classes for kids and parents, all sorts of nice stuff.  Even if the child is not eligible (I always have to remind people who come to me for testing that by the math of the normal curve, 96% of kids above 130 are *not* above 145), DITD has some public-access bulletin boards with useful information and discussions as well, and a database of articles on specific topics.

That should get you started.  If you need more help, ask me, ask on the mailing lists, ask on the bboards, ask wherever, and you’ll get lots of help.  Typically, folks introduce their questions with, “I don’t know if anyone has ever had this happen, but…” and everyone says, “Oh, no, we’ve all had that happen, here’s the different ways we dealt with it.”  Sure, you’ll probably end up with way too many ideas, and you’ll hear all sorts of, er, very strong opinions.  Remember that I’m here giving you permission to relax, take a breath, work with the school, don’t give up, accept that you don’t have to find a perfect solution right away, and that there’s no one right way to do anything.

This post is part of the Hoagies’ Gifted Blog Hop on Gifted 101.