Gifted children: The debate rages on!

[Tabouli]

Catlady:
> TABOULI, I disagree with you so much that I can't write! I wish I 
lived in some universe where schools taught high-IQ children that 
they were superduper just because of being book-smart! I had the 
vague impression (stereotype) that Australians had an even stronger 
egalitarian (except for sports) idea than USAmericans, and would 
therefore be even more eager to punish anyone who got better than 
average grades...<

Now haaaaang on a minute here.  I wasn't saying this at all.  I know all too well that Australians are apt to see "gifted children" as some sort of un-Australian blight on society, how dare they make other people feel inferior, the swine, they should shut up and be like everyone else, cut down the tall poppy and trample it into the dirt.  I was totally stigmatised and reviled in primary school for being too smart.  At high school I went to a much more academic school and was put in the gifted class (the PLC PEGS program, Shaun, any thoughts?), and the other six classes stereotyped us totally, were convinced they'd thrash us in sporting competitions because we were geeky intellectuals, etc.etc.etc.  As an example, I remember talking to a friend of mine after an Intelligence lecture about gifted children and hearing the disgust in her voice when she declared that gifted education was a total waste of funds, if they're so clever, they can bloody well figure out ways to stimulate themselves, so we can allocate funds to people who really *need* it (i.e. people who are below average).  Moreover, when I tried to argue with her, she said "That's just because you think you're gifted."

I wasn't talking about the parents and teachers with the above attitude, or denying their existence.  I was talking about the people on the other side of the war, fighting against these people, telling gifted children about the glories of their high IQ.  Hence the skewed self-esteem profile, feeling both socially persecuted/inferior and defiantly superior to spite the first group, turning to their superior IQ as a source of comfort and vindication. The anti-gifted warriors only fuel the need to believe that the thing they are being stigmatised for makes them superior to their tormentors.

Shaun:
> What you've seen - what you've watched - is anecdotal, basically by definition.
And I'm sure you are aware that anecdotal evidence has serious limitations.
>
>What the detailed research shows is that when gifted children are given accss
to *appropriate* and *well designed* programs, when they are adults, they are far
more likely to be succesful in their chosen fields - and what is more significant,
by far - they are far more likely to be contented with their lives, to be happy, to
avoid significant psychological problems.<

Sure, sure, obviously anecdotal evidence regarding a sample of maybe 20 people I've observed over the years isn't the sort of thing around which research papers and policies are built.  All the same, it was interesting for me to read your reply to my post and see how many of my informal observations seemed to tally with yours, notably in the effort issue.

Me:
>> It's not what you got, it's how you use it, and IQ tests only measure what you got<<
Shaun:
>Yes - but what you got, is still important. Especially when what you got, creates special needs.<

As for appropriate and well-designed programs, I have no doubt that if you have an exceptional level of  "resources" available to you, programs which teach you how to capitalise on them effectively have a very good chance of helping you become highly successful in your chosen field.  That's pretty obvious.  I support the development of programs which help the children manage their abundance of intellectual resources, instead of being crushed under them.  However, the people I have observed, and as I suspect you'd agree *most* gifted children, have *not* had the chance to attend a well-designed program, but have been exposed to varying degrees of well-intended stop-gap attempts to "do something for them" from parents and educators.  I just identified a pattern, a typical psychological profile, after having a lot of contact with people who were identified as "gifted" as children (not the least of which is my father), a profile which was more detailed than the basic findings I'd read but seemed to hold.  I did at one stage consider exploring giftedness formally in my postgrad degree, but decided to do cross-cultural psychology instead.

I suspect the competitive nature of the education system doesn't help much.  How well do non-competitive systems like Steiner schools deal with giftedness?  Better?  I in fact recently spoke to a friend of mine (whose 7yo daughter is at a Steiner school) about giftedness and she is very anti "gifted" education, says that from what she's read her daughter is probably "gifted" but the last thing she wants to do is isolate her from other children on the basis of this, and she is very glad that her daughter is in an environment where her individual potential is being addressed without fanfare or stigmatising labels.

Interesting.

Tabouli.


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