Gifted Androgyny

Gifted girls and gifted boys are generally more androgynous than other children (Kerr, 1997; Kerr & Cohn, 2001), a condition that results in both benefits and problems. Interests of gifted girls are usually much broader than the typical girl. They may enjoy girl Scouts, craft projects, and dance, but they may also like rock climbing, fishing, and distance running - the more traditional male interests. Interests of gifted boys likewise are generally more androgynous and have a broader range (Herbert, 2002). Gifted boys may like the traditional football, but they may also enjoy dance and gardening. It is gratyfying to see these children develop their potential in so many areas. However, their androgyny may cause them, and others, to be somewhat concerned about gender identity. Adults with broad and androgynous interests may also experience problmes deriving from their multipotentiality. Their changing passions may make it difficult to establish a long-term career commitment to any one field. Others may judge them to be superficial and flighty.

-Webb, Amend, Webb, Goerss, Beljan, Olenchak, "Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults"

The discussion here focuses on two issues: multipotentiality and androgyny. For now, we'll set aside the multipotentiality and examine only the androgyny issues.

I've mentioned before that I'm not a social scientist. One of the most interesting courses I took in college, however, was a sociology course on gender roles. My background is technical, and due to the fact that I was one of the few women in many of my courses, I was beginning to experience stereotypes about women in those fields. I felt this course would give me a way to explain my experiences.

Surprisingly, the most important information that came out of that course didn't address the issue of women in technical fields. Instead, I learned something very jarring: men have more stringent stereotypes than women, and the consequences for men and boys who try to buck the stereotypes have serious consequences.

That isn't meant to negate the experience of women, but it is important to realize that these stereotypes are harmful to both genders. When dealing with gifted boys and girls in a normal classroom setting, the issue of androgyny become very obvious. Gifted boys may not be as interested in sports and may not be confrontational, thus diminishing their masculinity. Girls who are interested in math or less passive and interested in their appearance than their peers may not seem as feminine. Breaking from these stereotypes causes issues with peers, who will reject the gifted children for their differences.

Hoagies Gifted has several references on the influence of gender stereotypes and how they affect the gifted. In particular, there is a link to Jane Piirto's article on personality types of teachers and gifted children. She makes the point that gifted children very often, especially in the early school years, spend time with teachers who do not understand or appreciate their gifts. Teachers, early on, communicate that they don't value boys who like ideas and non-conformity. They may not take well to a girl who challenges or questions her teacher. In a school setting, teachers appreciate hard working children who follow rules. Gifted children have personality types which vary from the normal child, and these types seem to be somewhat linked to gender. This may be very perplexing to teachers who may expect behavior along gender lines.

Gifted children will undoubtedly receive negative feedback from both peers and teachers. Therefore, it is important for the parents of gifted children to nurture their interests and understand that they may be more varied than the typical age-mate of the same gender. Finally, they may have more friends of the opposite gender who share their interests. The varied nature of their interests and friends from both genders is very normal for a gifted child and should not be discouraged or criticized.

Educational yardsticks

I read an article today on the growth of online school options. I have been pondering the following quote:

Huerta worries that the report's authors have confused efficiency with quality.

The response, a couple lines later was, Mr. Reed suggests a better way to account for learning: Keep track of course material completed, not number of hours of instruction.

This is a big issue with the gifted in a structured learning environment. The gifted typically spend half their time in school waiting for the other kids to catch up. This means they spend half a day sitting in a desk while attempts are made on the part of the teacher to "keep them busy".

I'd argue that while some online schools don't have the best quality (I had an unfortunate experience with one), it is fairly straight-forward to assess what has learned by giving a student a nationally normed test or some sort of annual growth assessment.

However, for the gifted, efficiency is a big issue. Many spend years relearning topics which they already know for the sake of being kept in an age-graded classroom. Not only is this inefficient, but there is no quality present, either. For the gifted child, efficiency in topics of less interest are better spent allowing them to delve deeply into their passions where it is highly unlikely the quality of public school instruction could ever parallel the gifted student's desire for immersion. As it stands now, most gifted students' education in the public school system is neither a quality education nor is it efficiently obtained.

I would also argue that quality instruction occurs when students grasp the subject matter quickly and can then (perhaps) apply that knowledge. It could also occur when the subject matter is paced for the student's needs. Finally, it provides a depth of knowledge. I can't imagine that public schools would fare much better should a yardstick for quality be developed along these lines. Perhaps individual schools might fare well, but not public schools as a whole.

Therefore, if you can't look at quality as a factor, efficiency probably should become a yardstick for how education is assessed. If the students are doing what it takes to earn a diploma and aren't necessarily passionate about it, there is no point in wasting their time and energy in forcing mastery, gifted or not. They should be allowed to get on with their lives and not forced to sit in a seat simply because they aren't yet 18.

Issues with Auditory-Sequential Thinkers

Gifted children and adults who have an auditory-sequential thinking style are also likely to have particular behavior patterns that may be misinterpreted and labeled as a disorder. For example, auditory-sequential gifted children generally take matters very seriously; they may not understand why the other fifth- or sixth-grade children are frivolously thinking about things that seem so unimportant. With their intensity, they take their seriousness to an extreme. Auditory-sequential children and adults can be so serious and rule-bound that they experience little joy or spontaneity in their lives, and others may see them as rigid and overly worried, or depressed, even though they, themselvse, feel quite comfortable with their lifestyle.

-Webb, Amend, Webb, Goerss, Beljan, Olenchak, "Misdiagnosis and Daul Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults"

With all the difficulties my son has had, I assumed that life would be much better for him if he were an auditory-sequential thinker. I didn't realize that being a gifted auditory-sequential learner created its own set of problems. Until I read Misdiagnosis, I had no idea what a gifted auditory sequential learner would look like. I assumed they were the ones who were always getting their homework done and were highly organized. I was partially correct.

As it turns out, I have a close relative who is both highly gifted and auditory-sequential. I find her personality to be a bit abrasive as she was always so serious and had, what I considered, a bizarre adherence to social conventions and rules. If my grammar wasn't entirely correct, which is often isn't, she never failed to point it out to me. She was always serious about everything and had high expectations for everyone.

Because of her very adult behavior, she was often misconstrued as being more emotionally mature than she was. Expectations were heaped upon her beyond what she could really handle. She, as a teenager, was diagnosed as having various disorders, including depression.

Looking back, I can imagine it was difficult for her to deal with people who, it seemed to her, were being difficult and careless. It is unfortunate that no one took the time to help her deal with her extreme expectations. Everyone thought she could handle it. After all, she was so smart and mature! Unfortunately for her, her giftedness worked against her. In seeking refuge from people's expectations (and her own) that she always be perfect, even when dealing with terribly emotional events, she ended up dropping out of school and using drugs. It's sad to know that she had so much potential but was never able to fulfill it.

Peer Relations

We take the position that it is important to consider who is actually a peer for a gifted child. It usually isn't a child who is the same age. More often, it is someone with whom the child shares interests and who is about as skilled as the child in a particular activity. Even though most of us recognize that children of a given age vary quite widely in level of skills and interests, we still group children in school strictly by age, a practice that was probably lost its usefulness for both academic and social reasons. This is dramatically confirmed in the finding that most gifted children in the regular classroom spend one-fourth to one-half of their time waiting for others to catch up to their level of competence (Webb et al., 1982).

Peer relations for gifted children was noted as a problem as early as the 1920s by the psychologist Leta Hollingworth, who declared that one of the major challenges for gifted children and adults was "learning to suffer fools gladly" (Klein, 2002). That is a harsh statement, and Hollingworth may have said it somewhat tongue-in-cheek. But waiting for others to catch up is a real issue for many gifted children. Numerous studies have demonstrated that feelings of alienation and rejection experienced by young gifted children often influence social and emotional development and lead to difficulties, which are then diagnosed as mental disorders (Cillessen, 1992; Hymel, 1990; Parke, 1997; Strop, 2001).

- Webb, Amend, Webb, Goerss, Beljan, and Olenchak, "Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnoses of Gifted Children and Adults"

When my son first started kindergarten, the teachers began telling me that my son was constantly vying for their attention. He didn't want to play with the other children, he wanted to spend all day talking to the teachers. This was very frustrating for them as they (rightly) wanted to make sure each child was receiving adequate attention. This problem was only resolved when my son began reading. The reason it resolved was not that he suddenly learned communication skills from reading books. The opposite actually occurred: he began ignoring everyone in favor of reading books. The books were more stimulating than his age peers and never told him to be quiet or go away. He found that many imaginary characters shared his views or suffered from similar alienation.

My son's inability to get along with his age mates, along with other manifestations of his giftedness, eventually led to teachers wrongly assuming that he must have some autistic spectrum disorder.

Unfortunately, this behavior and the reaction to the behavior are not uncommon in the gifted. As noted in Misdiagnosis, younger gifted children often imagine complex play. They want others to participate, but often their age-mates don't comprehend the rules (or the rules may end up looking a lot like "Calvin-ball"). This causes the other children to lose patience with the gifted child and vice versa, ultimately resulting in alienation of the gifted child. The gifted child is often blamed: "If he/she just wouldn't be so bossy!"

As gifted children get older, their interests may become more complex or mature. Often the topics are not of interest to children of the same age. The gifted child will attempt to make friends with adults, who either have similar interests or at least are willing to listen to the child. Many adults don't want to be viewed as a peer for the child and shoo the child away, telling them they need to spend time with children their own age.

Often these children give up and immerse themselves in books. Worse, some of them become depressed and view themselves as being fundamentally flawed because no one seems to like them.

Depending on their temperment and learning style, they will viewed as either extremely immature (usually visual-spatial learners) or too serious (usually auditory-sequential learners) to make friends. It seems doubtful these children are capable of making friends at all. Yet, when gifted children are accelerated to levels where they have the ability to interact with intellectual peers, they usually do very well. These children often benefit from adult mentors who share their interests.

Children who have difficulty with peer relations shouldn't automatically be assumed to have Asperger's or, even worse, an anti-social behavior disorder. Sometimes, it is actually a mismatch between child and environment. The child needs to be in a place where they can find common ground between themselves and those around them.

Gifted Kids' Bill of Rights

I recently came across the Gifted Kids' Bill of Rights. It was written by Del Siegle, who is currently president of the National Association of Gifted Children.

1. You have a right to know about your giftedness.

2. You have a right to learn something new every day.

3. You have a right to be passionate about your talent area without apologies.

4. You have a right to have an identity beyond your talent area.

5. You have a right to feel good about your accomplishments.

6. You have a right to make mistakes.

7. You have a right to seek guidance in the development of your talent.

8. You have a right to have multiple peer groups and a variety of friends.

9. You have a right to choose which of your talent areas you wish to pursue.

10. You have a right to not be gifted at everything.

Tamara Fisher has written an article elaborating on each of these points.

I think the main themes are that gifted does not equal perfect and that gifted kids should not be forced to dumb themselves down for the benefit of other people or institutions. People often take the term "gifted" to mean that these children are somehow less deserving of proper educational environment. They do everything so well. Why should they be upset or need special accomodations? It would be wonderful is all schools took seriously the need to provide a challenging educational environment for everyone.

Tracking, ability grouping, and differentiation

When I was in school, some students used to be placed in advanced classes. Some schools use the term "tracking" while others use "ability grouping". This has largely been discontinued due to notions that these types of programs are elitist and racist. However, removing this system was not the answer. In fact, many gifted children find themselves miserable with the lack of challenge in their classes.

Part of the problem with this type of grouping was the implementation. Ability grouping, which is grouping students by ability and achievement but with flexibility in moving a child either up or down in level, has been found to be acceptable by the courts. A strict tracking system where students are chosen strictly by IQ scores and has no flexibility to "cross boundaries" is not acceptable in the courts.

Part of the reason that ability tracking has many opponents is that they claim that teachers don't provide a proper environment for slower-learners due to reduced expectations. It is true that teachers have different expectations and provide different environments, but research by Gamoran et. al. found that providing exactly the same type of learning environment reduced progress on the part of slow learners.

One thing opponents fail to mention is that ability grouping actually increases the self-esteem of slower learners. When they do not have to compare themselves to the faster learners in the class, they don't feel as inadequate about the learning that they have accomplished. Likewise, when fast learners aren't comparing their learning to the slower learners but other fast learners, they have a more realistic sense of their abilities and accomplishments.

There are several studies that discuss these results: School Choice and the Distributional Effects of Ability Tracking: Does Separation Increase Inequality?, To Group or Not to Group Academically Talented or Gifted Students?, and One size fits all? Age based tracking versus ability grouping in elementary school mathematics.

Sadly, the research on this has been ignored in favor of eliminating ability grouping. Instead, the new solution to the problem of differential learning rates has been to attempt differentiation. Most of the research done on this shows that this provides no benefit to the students. The problem is that faster learners may also prefer to learn material with more depth and complexity. They don't gain from learning material that is often more than a year below their level of competence because it doesn't provide depth or complexity. For example, giving a student the option of writing a paragraph or an entire paper doesn't help the student learn more. The fast learner would probably rather spend a significant amount of time learning about the underlying concepts and relationships inherent in a particular concept, whereas the slower learner may struggle just to learn the basic concepts. The materials required to teach these two learning styles is significantly different, which is why in-class differentiation has been found rather ineffectual.

I find my frustration with this issue goes back to my question about standards: what is the point of teaching children something they already know? The point of standards is to make sure they learn certain concepts, not to force them to remain in same-age classrooms where they feel starved for stimulation.

Failure to Accelerate: It can be avoided, sometimes

When one spends several years advocating acceleration for their gifted child, they are likely to run into a multitude of excuses. Battling these excuses can become very tiresome and, in many cases, causes the parent to give up on the public schools. When administrators refuse to be flexible in accomodating these exceptional kids, the parents often feel that homeschooling is the only viable option.

However, it's good to be prepared for the opposition one might encounter. If one knows the likely excuses administrators will make, then perhaps a way around them can be devised before a meeting takes place. If administrators have alternative solutions, some may be willing to accomodate acceleration for a gifted child.

First, if your child is in K-8, you probably want to fill out the Iowa Acceleration Scale. This will provide some objective criteria to the decision to skip a grade. Unfortunately, when you buy the information, you must buy a packet of multiple evaluation sheets. The idea is that you could perhaps benefit other students and give them to the school so that they may make the opportunity available for other students.

There are still objections that need to be overcome, even with a objective instrument such as this. Some objections fall into the criteria of the shortcomings of the school; they are perhaps worried they cannot provide appropriate curriculum beyond a certain level if, for instance, you want to accelerate in just one subject area. Good ways of handling this may be "crossing that bridge when you get there" and pointing out that there may be available curriculum through other means such as online classes through talent searches. A child should not be held back based on worries about future accomodations. When children are gifted, you may have to get creative. It's as simple as that.

Another objection is that children need to be in the same place as other children after transitions. This is actually a subset of the argument that children of the same age always need to be together. This is probably true for about half the kids in a given class. The only response to this is to provide documentation of studies and reports that gifted children fit in better with intellectual peers than chronological peers.

A third objection is one that I discussed previously: it seems paradoxical to accelerate a student who seems unmotivated or unable to handle the work they already have. Few teachers and administrators can conceive of the fact that gifted children are quite literally bored to tears when they are insufficiently stimulated.

The best way I've found to handle these arguments is to have someone else do it for me. An advocate, such as a psychologist or teacher, can be immensely helpful. They need to be someone who has both knowledge of giftedness and the credibility (usually in the form of a degree or specialization) to impress the people you're working with.

However, even with all this preparation, I've run into administrators who simply lacked the flexibility to work with alternative arrangements. When one deals with this situation, there may be nothing you can do except to pull your child out of the school. In this situation, perhaps you can be lucky enough to find a more flexible school or you can use the most flexible option of all: homeschooling.

Homeschooling the Gifted

No other educational option accommodates the wide range of abilities of gifted children as well as homeschooling. Gifted homeschoolers can move ahead without skipping a grade. They can learn math at high school level while enjoying sixth-grade books. Or they can take their time through high school and study topics of interest in depth rather than going to college early. A few profoundly gifted children homeschool because they are ready for college-level work before they reach middle school. In all cases, these children fit perfectly in no single grade, and homeschooling doesn't force them to try.
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Many people assume that gifted children are advanced evenly in all areas, so there should be no problem with simply letting them skip a grade, but this is not the case. They might be years ahead of other children in one or two subjects, but at grade level or even below grade level in others. Some are advanced in almost every subject academically yet their sensitivities prevent them from socializing with older children. They have a hard time fitting into any one group comfortably.

-Lisa Rivero, "The Homeschooling Option"

Rivero makes some very good points about homeschooling the gifted as well as homeschooling in general. I would add, however, that this is even more critical for the gifted/LD child.

In my experience, there are things done in homeschooling that simply cannot be done in a more structured setting. The primary example is changing curriculum. Most public schools cater to the auditory-sequential learner both in lecture and even in the format of the textbooks. Some teachers, probably those who themselves are visual-spatial, may be able to fill in the gaps for those learners who are at a disadvantage in this environment. Most likely, these types of teachers are going to be a minority.

My son is visual-spatial and has either a very strong preference to learn this way or an actual learning disability that prevents him from learning using auditory-sequential methods. The gist of this is that he learns at slightly above grade-level in a classroom. There used to be a significant difference between his IQ scores and aptitude testing. However, when the material is presented in a different manner, he suddenly started getting ahead. In fact, the gap between what he's learning and what the average child in our school district has learned increases every year. In one area this past year, his rate of growth was five times that of the average child in our district.

The change happened, however, when we were homeschooling and switched to a different curriculum. Suddenly things clicked. Unfortunately, that is not a modification that can be made in normal classroom. When a child doesn't understand something, the assumption is that he or she isn't trying or has difficulty learning. Both can be true, but the teacher doesn't have the option of trying different curriculum. Unless the teacher understands the way the child learns and has a good grasp on how to present it, any attempt to modify the presentation may not benefit the child, either.

The standing assumption seems to be that if they aren't learning in the current environment, they aren't capable of learning any better in a different environment. I imagine this stifles the intellectual growth of hordes of students, not just the gifted.

This is not the fault of the teachers. I've seen teachers very frustrated because they know what a child needs but cannot provide it based on the requirements that are dictated by school boards or other entities. The ever present standards and requirements are like the little devil on the shoulder saying, "You can't go out of your way for this child. You'll get in trouble." I feel very sorry for most teachers in this position.

On the other hand, John Taylor Gatto was in the same position. His philosophy, however, seemed to be that the child's individual needs were more important than the mandates of the school boards. Because of his approach to teaching, he won some very notable awards. It's unfortunate there aren't more teachers like him. However, schools are not likely to attract risk-takers. The risk-takers are the ones more likely to pull their children out of school.

The Manual on Child-Rearing

Few parents realize that nurturing their children's gifts- including advocating in their children's schools - is an ongoing, time-consuming process. It's also crucial. Research shows that parents play a more important role in the development of a child's gifts than schools. A supportive, advocating parent can make the difference between a meaningful education and wasted years.

- Jan and Bob Davidson with Laura Vanderkam, "Genius Denied: How to Stop Wasting Our Brightest Young Minds"

If there was a manual written for child-rearing, the first thing is should say is that raising children is time-consuming. I really had no idea how time-consuming it would end up being when I had my first child. Advocating for my son eventually became so time-consuming, emotionally draining, overwhelming, and, most unfortunately, utterly fruitless that I relented and began homeschooling.

I realized that I would spend less time in a week teaching my child than I would dealing with teachers and the emotional repercussions of the well-intentioned but harmful diagnosis being thrown at him. I was getting calls nearly daily about one problem or another. I got the usual lines about how giftedness had nothing to do with this, "all our children are gifted", etc.

My initial experience homeschooling was not as productive as it could have been. Like most new homeschoolers, it took me a couple years to realize that boxed curriculum and "one-size fits all" learning did not work for me or my son. The books in the boxed curriculum were read and absorbed at an amazingly high rate. A month later, the books were done and the rest of the materials were left untouched. At that point, I realized that if I wanted my son to learn something, I should hand him a book and ask questions later.

The biggest lesson I've taken from homeschooling is that, for every topic, there is a faster, more enjoyable way of learning than is generally done in the schools. The problem, however, is that method may be different for each child. Unfortunately, most teachers do not have the time to find the way that works for each individual child. They are also required to have the child produce some sort of work that "proves" they learned something.

I'm beginning to think that schools go about this whole process incorrectly. I wonder what would happen if the classroom became an environment where children were provided materials they needed to learn and then were able to demonstrate their learned knowledge in ways where they were more comfortable. I think much of our current system is about checking off a list of things a child should do while not actually caring if this helps develop the skills or the desire necessary for life-long learning.

Gifted Minorities

Minority students who do not hold positive racial identities may be especially vulnerable to negative peer pressures; they may also equate achievement with "acting white" or "selling out" (Fordham, 1988), which contributes to low effort and, thus, low achievement. Specifically, Lindstrom and Van Sant (1986) reported that many gifted minority students must choose between need for achievement and need for affiliation. These students often succumb to negative social pressures so that need for affiliation outweighs need for achievement.

- Donna Y. Ford and Antoinette Thomas, Underachievement Among Gifted Minority Students: Problems and Promises

Everyone has heard of the blog "Stuff White People Like". I'd heard of it but never visited it myself, until tonight. In searching for information on gifted children, I came across a post about Gifted Children. It's an amazing coincidence because while I've read that minorities are under-represented among the gifted, I read my first account of what it's like to be a gifted minority yesterday.

I was stunned that someone who was profoundly gifted would be ridiculed as "acting white" because of her desires to go to college and eventually earn a PhD. She wasn't celebrated by her community; she was pressured to conform to socially acceptable view of how a black woman should act. What is worse is that this view was being pushed on her by those who ought to have been her strongest allies.

I found it to be quite depressing. It's hard enough to be white and deal with the misconceptions of giftedness that seem to be so succinctly summarized in the referenced post. I imagine it's far worse to be an ethnic minority and gifted (or, on the other hand, to be Asian and assumed to be brilliant because of your ethnicity). This post explicitly states that the assumption of giftedness is just a label to get special things for your kids. The unwritten assumption is that there are few gifted white children, but there are no gifted minorities.

Asking to have your child's intellectual needs met is for "white people". I have read a lot about girls, in particular, who pretend not to be gifted because they want to fit in. I can imagine that the prevailing attitude could be worse among minorities, especially after reading the comments.

I find it sad that the minority communities, who should be the most vocal in showing off their best and brightest to counter the unkind stereotypes pervasive in our society, are potentially more trapped by the anti-intellectualism that is overwhelmingly present in our nation. It makes me wonder how much the problem of low recognition of gifted minorities (and later, underachievement) isn't strictly due to outside ignorance that giftedness crosses racial boundaries. Perhaps some of it may be due the confluence of this ignorance with pressures of families and friends to not "act white".