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How to Help Your Child Overcome Shyness In this Ask the Experts article, a counselor gives tips and guidlines for helping parents help their shy youngsters come out of their shell. Topics include identifying strengths and weaknesses, improving communication skills, role playing, and coping with stressful situations. Shyness can be conquered! Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
The Truth About College Admissions A college alumni officer and admissions interviewer reveals what colleges really look for in evaluating candidates for admission. The most important admissions tool -- the essay! Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
Myelin Deposits Affect Brain Activity A neuropsychologist explains how different rates of brain development affect thinking, especially higher-level thinking known as "metacognition." Guidelines for parents and teachers are offered for observing children. Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
Play: A Waste of Time or Basic Right? This article explores the debate on what kind of play is best for children's development -- structured or unstructured. Research is cited that indicates unstructured play is essential for healthly development, and that it may be a constitutional right! Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
Less Is More with Kids and Money Basic money management tips are presented in this article to help your children relate to money in positive ways. Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
Adult Classes Offer Special Enrichment Adult classes offer an unlikely environment for gifted children. But in this parent's Idea Place, the virtues and benefits of adult classes are made very clear! Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
Brainstorm for Writing Ideas This parent's Idea Place entry offers abundant advice on how to help your youngster brainstorm ideas for writing projects. Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
Gifted Children Break Traditions In this Teacher's Bulletin Board item, a science specialist argues that gifted children naturally seek to go beyond accepted limits and that this is a function of their development and one means to identify gifted children. Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
Things of Beauty Are a Joy Forever In this Teacher's Bulletin Board item, two early childhood educators talk about the aesthetics of a classroom in relationship to learning. The same principles may be applied by parents in creating a beautiful, learning-conducive environment for their child's room at home. Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
_______Ask Dr. James Alvino Thinking about Eminence What is the difference between eminence, reknown, and fame? Which does our society value most? What implications does this have for gifted programs? These questions are addressed in this insightful editorial. Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
_______Ask Arthur Lipper III™ The Return on Investment from Special Education for Gifted Children. A controversial article that may spark some small effect in changing the attitudes of those who influence the allocation and investment of special education funds. Thinking of people in investment terms is a dirty job, but someone has to do it as there is not, and cannot in the future, be enough for oil. Jump to Full NewsWeb Story
During the period when many of the Library articles appearing in Gifted-Children.Com were first published, Gifted Children Monthly was advised by respected members of the community who generously gave of their time, knowledge, experience, and insights. While they are alumni advisors of Gifted-Children.Com, we are proud to acknowledge their commitment and contribution to the development and encouragement of gifted and talented children.
Steve Allen, commedian, author composer
Alexinia Baldwin, professor and chairman, department of curriculum and instruction, University of Connecticut at Storrs
"I often doodle during breaks at school. I have drawn pictures ever since I can remember. I like the imagination I can put into my drawings because there is no limit to the possibilities." -- Eighth Grade Student Indiana University Summer Arts Institute
How can you determine whether your child's love for doodling truly represents artistic talent and, if so, what measures you should take to support his or her interest in the arts?
Over the years we have sought answers to these questions by working closely with students, their parents and teachers, administrators, and others who are interested in developing special abilities in the visual arts. As a result we have formulated some ideas about identification, teacher characteristics, curriculum content, educational settings, administrative arrangements, and educational resources that best serve the needs of children gifted in the visual arts.
How Do You Identify Them?
Although there are many programs and schools throughout the country for artistically talented students, there is little or no consensus about how to identify such students. Academically or intellectually gifted students are identified by test scores or by their levels of classroom performance; however, there are no standardized criteria, tests, or guidelines for identifying artistically talented students. This raises questions that have yet to be resolved and has resulted in the creat Jump to Full Gifted-Children Story
It is the night before a paper mache model of Mars is due. At one home with a gifted child, Mars has been completed, embellished and ready to go for days. In another, Mars is being hastily put together and dried in the oven to ready it for painting the next morning.
Conversation over breakfast here at this second household is heavily sprinkled with the need to plan ahead and intimations that this will be the last, last-minute bail out.
Familiar scenes? According to Dr. Diane Farris, who provided these examples from her experience teaching gifted children at the University of Florida's Laboratory School in Gainesville, the way kids interact with others and the world reflects their psychological "type."
Sixteen Possible Types
Contemporary theory of psychological type is based on the work of psychologist Carl Jung, Freud's most famous disciple who explained human personality in terms of extroversion, introversion and modes of perception and judgment.
Extroversion (E) is commonly defined as a preference for the outer world of people and things; Introversion (I) as a preference for the inner world of concepts and ideas.
Perception (P) refers to how we go about "finding out" what we know about a situation or a problem; there are two opposite ways of finding out: Sensing (S) and Intuition (N, because I stands for introversion).