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EAGER -- Encouraging Achievement Gifted Education Resources

This online curriculum resource offers direction in boosting achievement and encouraging engagement among gifted students. Using Bloom's Taxonomy, it offers specific teaching suggestions for getting gifted learners involved in subject matter and using high-level thinking. It is broken out into theory, practice and evaluation and can be applied to any subject matter in any class.

Printed Materials: Books

20 Ideas for Teaching Gifted Kids in the Middle School & High School

Attention, teachers of secondary gifted kids: Receive some of the best ideas and lessons developed by master teachers, in this book by Joel McIntosh. Both this and its sequel, 10 More Ideas for Teaching Gifted Kids in the Middle School & High School, feature ideas for starting mentorship programs, teaching history using scientific surveys, producing documentaries, and more.

A Menu of Options for Grouping Gifted Students

This book is part of The Practical Strategies Series in Gifted Education and Karen B. Rogers, a leader in the field of gifted education, provides teachers with practical advice for choosing a grouping option that best fits their students and information on how to assess their grouping choices.

Aiming for Excellence: Gifted Program Standards: Annotations to the NAGC Pre-K Grade 12 Gifted Programming Standards

A review of standards developed by the National Association of Gifted Children. Each chapter describes guiding principles (and supporting material) that correspond to standards for the minimum requirements for satisfactory programs.

Big Tools for Young Thinkers

In this book by Susan Keller-Mathers and Kristin Puccio, children in the primary grades can learn and apply a wide variety of powerful thinking tools for generating options for focusing their thinking. Creative problem solving tools include brainstorming, braindrawing, forced relationships, and the evaluation matrix.

Building Thinking Skills Book 1: Critical Thinking Skills for Reading, Writing, Math, and Science

This workbook contains activities in verbal and figural similarities, and differences, sequences, classifications, and analogies. Skills addressed include reading comprehension; describing shapes, things, and words; following directions; antonyms and synonyms; several types of analogy; deductive reasoning; parts of a whole; mapping and directionality; logical connectives; spelling and vocabulary; overlapping classes; pattern folding; tracking, rotation, and reflection; mental manipulation of two-dimensional objects.

Computers as Tutors: Solving the Crisis in Education

In Computers As Tutors: Solving The Crisis In Education, Frederick Bennett lays out the difficulties present in contemporary American education and reveals why the millions of newly added computers in schools have been largely ineffectual. Bennett describes how computers, if used differently, will enable every student without exception to succeed in school. The key is individualized instruction. A private tutor in the form of a computer will allow each pupil to learn at his or her own comfort rate.

Content-Based Curriculum for High Ability Learners

Recognized gifted curriculum leader Joyce VanTassel-Baska covers acceleration, incorporating higher order process skills into content, concept development, and developing creative student products. Each chapter shows how the integrated curriculum model relates to curricular standards advanced by national organizations.

Curriculum Compacting: An Easy Start to Differentiating for High Potential Students

Another in the Prufrock Press' Practical Strategies Series in Gifted Education, this book by Sally M. Reis and Joseph S. Renzulli, focuses on differentiation strategy that incorporates content, process, products, classroom management and the teacher's personal commitment to accomodating individual and small-group differences.

Designing Services and Programs for High-Ability Learners

Each chapter of this guide by Jeanne Purcell, features the research of leaders in the field of giftedness. From identification to advocacy find stategic plans and resources for designing a program.

Developing Mentorship Programs for Gifted Students (Practical Strategies Series in Gifted Education)

This is one of the books in Prufrock Press' popular Practical Strategies Series in Gifted Education and offers practical strategies for starting and developing a mentoring program. From structuring a program, selecting a mentor, and monitoring progress, to ensuring success, editors Karnes and Stephens, provide an excellent introduction to the topic.

Developing Programs for Gifted Students: A Total School Approach

Eddie Braggett discusses how teachers can overcome opposition to the provision of programs for gifted students in schools and the foundations for appropriate gifted programs.

Differentiating Instruction in the Regular Classroom

In this guide, Diane Heacox presents a menu of strategies for any teacher faced with a spectrum of student needs and styles. Some are quick and easy--differentiating discussions, creating tiered assignments. Others are more comprehensive--matrix plans for designing curriculum units, "one-sentence lesson plans" that encompass content, process skills, and evidence of learning.

Diverse Populations of Gifted Children: Meeting Their Needs in the Regular Classroom and Beyond

Starr Cline and Diane Schwartz focus on how teachers can help their students reach their full potential. The authors discuss reasons for the failure to integrate gifted education into the fabric of the school and the relationships between multiple intelligences philosophy and the curriculum.

Educating Children for Life: The Modern Learning Community

An exquisite and compelling statement of what education could and should be. Begins with an insightful discussion of "the dilemma of modern education" in order to provide the reader with a clear understanding of "where she is coming from." She then presents a philosophy of self-actualization and interdependence which represents a "philosophy of both learning and life."

Educating Gifted Students in Middle School: A Practical Guide

Susan Rakow, Ph.D., focuses on helping teachers, administrators, and parents to understand gifted middle school students, implement effective program models, define the role of the gifted teacher, and more. This book provides specific guidelines for program and curricular planning.

Engaging Readers & Writers with Inquiry: Promoting Deep Understandings in Language Arts and the Content Areas with Guiding Questions

Implement inquiry in the classroom with this book from Jeffrey Wilhelm. Engaging Readers & Writiers with Inquiry leads educators in using research-based techniques to meet mandated content-area standards while engaging students in productive, meaningful learning experiences.

Excellence in Educating Gifted and Talented Learners

This book gives tips on identification, education, and understanding of gifted children. Major topics and issues in the education of gifted and talented learners are discussed in detail and is helpful for any parent, student or educator.

From the Land of Enchantment: Creative Teaching with Fairy Tales

In this book, you'll find a wealth of ideas, curriculum resources, and teaching techniques that promote multiple intelligences, critical thinking, creative problem solving, and problem-and product-based learning. Flack shows you how to use fairy tales with a variety of effective teaching strategies and engaging activities, such as making books, writing and editing newspapers, and creating a classroom museum. Versatile and easy to implement, these strategies can be used in a variety of settings.

Gifted Students in Secondary Schools Differentiating the Curriculum

The authors of this book (Gross, MacLeod, Pretorius) offer direct and practical assistance in differentiating the secondary school syllabus to extend and challenge students talented in specific areas, developing your own curriculum units for gifted students, understanding the characteristics and needs of gifted and talented students. These curriculum ideas can be easily adapted to your own needs.

Grouping and Acceleration Practices in Gifted Education

The most influential works on acceleration and grouping practices for the gifted are gathered in this volume, which covers concerns about the effectiveness of such techniques, presents research on the optimal conditions and methods for the utilization of grouping and/or acceleration, and describes effective programmatic initiatives. (Source: Amazon.com)

Implementing Multiage Education: A Practical Guide

This book is a great resource for anyone interested in teaching or understanding the philosophy of multiage instruction. The first section deals with the underlying research and history regarding graded and non-graded classrooms. The authors offer clear and convincing arguments for multiage instruction. The middle is how to change from a graded to a multiage classroom or school. The last section has teaching strategies and advice for managing the organized chaos of a multiage classroom, or any classroom where a teacher wishes to differentiate curriculum.

Improse: Activites That Promote Creativity, "Gooder Grammer" and Better Punctuation

Make grammer fun by using this book from Brad Newton.30 creative, improvisational activities are included to help kids learn grammer, puncuation, critical thinking and problm solving. Children in grades 2-10 will enjoy Newton's approach for developing foundational language skills.

Instructional Units for Gifted and Talented Learners

The creative lessons covered in this book by master teachers, Mary Dyer, Oscar Figueroa, Mary Morris and Becky Newsom, cover all of the core academic areas for grades K-6. Lessons include standards-based ojectives, interdisplinary connections that can be explored and discussed amd assessments strategies for each unit of instruction.

Intelligent Life in the Classroom: Smart Kids & Their Teachers

Karen Isaacson and Tamara Fisher share comical stories of children and teenagers in order for the reader to understand and appreciate the intellectual and emotional lives of gifted students. They cover key concepts such as: Curiosity is a powerful motivator for learning; Excellent teachers noth follow and lead their students; Learning happens when learners are inspired, not when they are admonished; and, Good teachers help students develop disciplined minds without overcoming students with discipline.

Language Arts for Gifted Students

This collection of articles from Gifted Child Today (compiled by Susan K. Johnsen and James Kendrick) were selected specifically for the teacher who is searching for ways to serve students who are gifted in English/language arts.

Lessons From the Middle: High-End Learning for Middle School Students

In addition to the 12 model lessons provided, this book from Sandra Kaplan and Michael Cannon, includes a step-by-step guide to developing lessons that emphasize depth and complexity. All of the materials focus on ways to align the middle school curriculum wtih established national standards and offer strategies to evaluate learner achievement.

Literature Links: Activities for Gifted Readers

Educators can enhance their reading programs with fun titles while meeting the needs of advanced K-6 readers. Author Teresa Smith Masiello is a Gifted and Talented Specialist for the Virginia public school system. Activities include learning centers, graphic organizers. literature binders and more!

Manual of Natural Education

This book accompanies Natural Education and is a guide to the teaching strategies, methods, and materials required for the Natural Education approach. By 1916, Stoner had organized Parent-Teacher Natural Education Study Circles to promote her methodology.

Math Education for Gifted Students

This Gifted Child Today Reader by editors Susan Johnsen and James Kendrick, offers information about how to differentiate for mathematically gifted students, as well as tried-and-true instructional strategies to employ, including tiered lessons, distance learning, and activities combining architecture and math.

More Units of Instruction for Gifted Learners

In this book developed from veteran gifted educators Simons, Hood, Peters, Sheets, Gilcrest and Wiedle, introduces five new units of instruction. Students in grades 2-7 will enjoy experimenting with static electricity; exploring the properties of rocks, gems and minerals; creating and presenting advertising campaigns; and investigating and taking action on real-world issues.

Multiple Assessments for Multiple Intelligences

James Bellanca, Carolyn Chapman and Elizabeth Swartz designed this book to assist teachers in modifying assessment practices by leading the reader through the process that guides him/her through multiple intelligences and assessment practices. The authors do this by showing educators how to devise specific performance standards for each intelligence and easily apply them directly in the classroom. Also included are sample lessons that target the intelligence.

Organizing Thinking: Book One: Graphic Organizers

A handbook of lessons which integrate teaching thinking skills into instruction--language arts, writing, science, math, social studies, personal problem solving, and enrichment. The central feature of all lessons is the use of graphic organizers to illustrate how information is related. Each lesson includes a lesson plan, background information, and answers. Reading level: grade 4; ability level: grades 2-5; 82 activities, graphic organizers and answers included. Reproducible for single-classroom or single-home use. Students who use graphic organizers learn to see information as systems or relationships which improves their retention of facts, helps them simplify complex tasks, and enhances their problem solving abilities.

Program Evaluation in Gifted Education

This book is an experts guide to gifted education, and is part of the essential readings in gifted education series. The topics of this book include gifted education and the major issues, trends, and various teaching methods influencing the field.

Simply Grammar

Simply Grammar features an oral approach to teaching the basics of English grammar through the intermediate and middle school levels. This approach is particularly attractive to families homeschooling gifted children, since gifted children often have an aversion to written drill and practice activities. The grammar program can be conducted with children of a variety of age levels at once; students may accelerate in the program as fast as they are able to master the material.

Standards-Based Activities and Assessments for the Differentiated Classroom

This book by Carolyn Coil, shows how to put differentiation into practice with practical, timesaving methods. Coil provides 49 ready-to-use differentiated topic lessons and units that include hundreds of activities. From map skills and space exploration, to early settlers, this wonderful resource provides you with the hands-on lessons and units that can be used right away or modified to meet special requirements.

Strategies for Differentiating Instruction: Best Practices for the Classroom

This book from Julia Roberts and Tracy Inman offers practical strategies that allow all students to learn at appropriately challenging levels and make continuous progress by focusing on their various levels of knowledge and their willingness to learn.

Strategies That Work : Teaching Comprehension to Enhance Understanding

This book covers educational strategies for teaching/homeschooling, focusing on instruction that is responsive to kids' interests and learning needs. It also has an appendixes that includes lists of educational aids, such as books, magazines, and journals, curriculum guides and professional journals.

Successful Strategies for Twice-Exceptional Students

In this book, Kevin D. Besnoy, Ph.D takes an in-depth look at the various learning disabilities and difficulties some gifted students face, provides practical tips for accommodating and planning instruction for these students, and gives an overview of federal law related to this population.

Super Smart Math - 180 Warm-Ups and Challenging Activities

Super Smart Math challenges students to think critcally while providing activities and problems that become increasingly difficult as the students progress through each section. Organized by mathematical topics for grades 5-8.

Teaching Gifted Kids in the Regular Classroom: Strategies and Techniques Every Teacher Can Use to Meet the Academic Needs of the Gifted and Talented

This book has been the definitive guide to meeting the learning needs of gifted students in the mixed-abilities classroom—without losing control, causing resentment, or spending hours preparing extra materials.

Teaching Gifted Students with Disabilities (A Gifted Child Today Reader)

This Gifted Child Today reader by Susan Johnson and James Kendrick is filled with practical classroom ideas, discussions of identification and classroom management. Both authors are professors at Baylor University in the fields Educational Psychology and Communications.

Teaching Kids With Learning Difficulties in the Regular Classroom: Strategies and Techniques Every Teacher Can Use to Challenge and Motivate Struggling Students

A recognized expert on gifted education and teaching in mixed-ability classrooms, Susan Winebrenner, presents practical, easy-to-use teaching methods, strategies and tips. Her tips help teachers differentiate the curriculum in all subject areas to meet the needs of all learners-including those labeled "slow," "remedial," or "LD," students of poverty, English language learners, and others who struggle to learn.

Teaching Values: An Idea Book for Teachers (And Parents)

In this workbook, Gary A. Davis provides activities and excercises for teaching students ages 9-15. Objectives and discussion questions for more than 50 lessons are included. Pages are reproducible and include checklists, quizzes and word searches. Davis assists educators in discussing universal values using creative lesson plans, questions, and role-play.

Teaching Young Gifted Children in the Regular Classroom: Identifying, Nurturing, and Challenging Ages 4-9

Teaching Young Gifted Children in the Regular Classroom discusses proven, practical ways to recognize and nurture young gifted children and create a learning environment that supports all students.

The Competent Classroom: Aligning High School Curriculum, Standards, and Assessment

Helps readers consider the main concepts surrounding creative teaching and ways of helping students take ownership of their learning. Provides insight into what it takes for teachers to learn about, work with, and benefit from standards.

The Parallel Curriculum: A Design to Develop High Potential and Challenge High-Ability Learners

This handbook is a great resource for educators and parents. Authors Tomlinson, Kaplan, Renzulli, Purcell, Leppien, Burns, have given a new outlook on developing curriculum and instruction for gifted students by presenting heavyweight curriculum by well known leaders in gifted education.

The Survival Guide for Teachers of Gifted Kids: How to Plan, Manage, and Evaluate Gifted Programs for Gifted Youth K-12

Written by Jim Delisle and Barbara Lewis, The Survival Guide for Teachers of Gifted Kids, uses the experience of gifted educators to give teachers insight on working with gifted students. The book discusses: identifying and evaluating gifted students, various plans and programs that can be used to teach the gifted, and techniques to develop network support in schools that often suffer from under funding.

Unicorns Are Real: A Right-Brained Approach to Learning

This best-seller by Barbara Meister Vitale, provides sixty-five practical, easy-to-follow lessons to develop the much ignored right-brain tendencies of children. Her methods have been successfully demonstrated at workshops, in-service training sessions, and at several major educational conventions nationwide.

Units of Instruction for Gifted Learners

This informative collection of teaching units, by Diana Brigham, Jessica Fell, Constance Simons, Kathy Strunk and Anthony Yodice, combines skills from the disciplines of language arts, math, science and social studies. A focus on active (rather than passive) learning is evident; teachers who adhere to a constructivist interdisciplinary approach are sure to find this useful. This gifted-specific book is designed for students in grades 2-8.

When Gifted Students Underachieve: What You Can Do About It

This guide by Sylvia Rimm, Ph.D, is part of the The Practical Strategies Series in Gifted Education and offers advice and guidance for understanding the pressures students face in school and at home, adjusting curriculum to engage these students, improving the self-concept of students, and working with parents to reverse the pattern of underperformance .

Working With Gifted English Language Learners

Part of the The Practical Strategies Series in Gifted Education, this book by Michael S. Matthews, Ph.D introduces educators to the complexities and challenges of providing appropriate educational experiences for gifted English Language Learners.

Writing Success Through Poetry

Grades 4-8 will gain insight from this book offering practical questions to facilitate Socratic-style discussions and explorations of literary concepts found within poems. Author, Susan Lipson, provides 25 original poems as prompts for students to use as inspiration for their own poetry and prose.

Printed Materials: Online Documents

Computer-Based Instruction Brings Advanced-Placement Physics to Gifted Students

This article by Raymond Ravaglia, J. Acacio-de-Barros, and Patrick Suppes (of Stanford University) describes two college-level introductory courses in physics, with calculus prerequisites, that are entirely computer-based.

The Mystery of the Passive Students

This website hosted by the Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute, expresses the concerns of a teacher for her gifted and talented students; they seem to become passive thinkers. Read more to discover her solutions.

Printed Materials: Periodicals/Reports & Studies

FACES Periodical

Geared toward nine to fourteen year olds, FACES encourages young readers to build their critical thinking skills as they learn to look at other cultures - and their own - in new perspectives. Photographs, maps, time lines, activities, and contests all add interest as children roam the earth in their reading, one theme at a time.

Paths of Learning

In Paths of Learning, educators, parents, and others write about the things that truly matter in teaching and learning: caring communities, a sense of place, values of peace, human rights, and sustainability, and a deep respect for learners' own passions, hopes, and quest for connection and meaning.

Wonderful Ideas for Teaching Mathematics

"A newsletter that features ideas for teaching, learning, and enjoying math, with an onsite collection of elementary and middle school activities, games, and problems. Classroom activities focus on creative problem solving, hands-on thinking, math manipulatives, and cooperative learning, and are tied into the NCTM Standards. Activities: Painted Faces, The Factor Game, and Operation Fill-ins. Also subscription information, an entry blank and information for a "Create a Function Machine" contest, Writer's Guidelines for submitting articles, and Kids' Corner math problems."

Schools & Programs: College Affiliated

Millersville University (Millersville, PA) - Masters in Gifted Education

MU now offers a Master of Education Degree in Gifted Education. The curriculum is appropriate for both teachers who provide instruction in special programs for the gifted and those who teach in a regular classroom where gifted children are mainstreamed. Courses for this program are held off-campus.

Schools & Programs: Independent

School in the Park (San Diego, CA)

School in the Park is a multi-visit museum program for students attending the Rosa Parks Elementary School that blends formal and informal learning by utilizing the rich resources of museums and educational institutions. This structured program focuses on high student expectations, aligned with state education standards, as students spend their time learning and gaining new experiences within rich museum settings.

Websites & New Media: Commercial

Gifted Education Press

Gifted Education Press is one of the leading publishers of books and periodicals on identifying and teaching the gifted. The company produces numerous rigorous books in the sciences, mathematics and humanities, as well as a quarterly publication, Gifted Education Press Quarterly.

Lesson Planz

This website is a free, online, searchable directory of lesson plans. Educator for all grades and subjects will find valuable lesson plan resources on this site.

Owl and Mouse Educational Software

This website by Owl and Mouse helps children learn with games, software (mostly free) and educational activities. Owl and Mouse gives the parents and teachers tools to provide individualized and intriguing learning for their children. You can download anything from maps to learn geography to medieval castles to learn about history and feudalism.

Responsive Classroom

The Responsive Classroom® is an approach to teaching and learning that fosters safe, challenging, and joyful classrooms and schools, K-8. Developed by classroom teachers, it consists of practical strategies for bringing together social and academic learning throughout the school day. Since 1981, thousands of classroom teachers and hundreds of schools and school districts have used the Responsive Classroom® approach to help create learning environments where children thrive academically, socially, and emotionally. Educators using these strategies report increases in student investment, responsibility, and learning, and decreases in problem behaviors.

Stenhouse Publishing

Stenhouse Publishing offers a wide variety of curriculum books. According to the website they offer: Professional Materials by Teachers for Teachers.

Teacher Created Materials

Teacher Created Materials provides nearly 200 literature units based on exemplary children's literature and young adult fiction. Each unit contains detailed lesson plans, literature response activities, discussion questions, assessment tests and rubrics, and all necessary student materials. All Teacher Created Material units were designed and written by practicing teachers and tried out and refined in actual classrooms. The guides are relatively inexpensive ($7.95 per unit) and they cover a wide range of award-winning children's literature and young adult fiction.

The Curriculum Project

This company provides elementary, middle school and high school educators with training, materials, and software. Areas of focus include: differentiation for multiple learning styles and ability ranges; cognitive and metacognitive strategies; engaged, student-centered lessons; technology and training related to differentiated curriculum development and rubric and product guide writing.

The Lesson Machine

An online monthly subscription service offering comprehensive language arts curriculum from a multicultural perspective. Sign up for the free monthly newsletter with cost-saving tips and information about the latest free samples and member updates. Everything you need for language arts is here!

The Mental Edge - Learning ShortCuts, Inc.

This online curriculum website contains more than 1,900 subject reviews for grades 3-12 that are coordinated with all major textbooks. They are comprehensive reviews that match up with day-to-day classroom activities and cover all subjects. There are also reviews for ACT/SAT preparation, the GED and other Proficiency exams. The reviews are free to use, but the website is supported by advertising.

Websites & New Media: For Educators

Differentiated Instruction: A focus on the gifted

This video highlights practices that research has demonstrated to be effective when working in classroom environments. It acknowledges the diversity that exists in every classroom and presents a foundation that begs for differentiated instruction.

Rand McNalley Education and Classroom

The Classroom section of Rand MAcNally's website is packed full with Teacher Resources that include class activiy ideas from "Make your own compass", to "Physical-Political Wall Map" making, to teaching "Ocean Current."

Teachers.net - GATE/AP Chat Board

No need to register to participate in this discussion group's postings. Gifted Centers, Advanced Studies in Gifted and Talented Education and Acceleration: Is it the right thing to do? are just some of the discussed topics.

The Starting Point--Teaching entry level geoscience

This site is designed for faculty and graduate students teaching undergraduate entry-level geoscience, environmental science, or related courses. Each section describes a teaching method, its usefulness, how it can be implemented, and a set of examples spanning the Earth system that can be used in your class.

Websites & New Media: For Fun

KidProv

In 1991, Bob Barraza and Shawn Patrello pursued their passion for improv and kids as they formed a duo named Kidprov® in order to teach the art of improvisation comedy in day-care centers across the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex. Finding little response, they put their idea on the back burner. Meanwhile, Brad Newton, a teacher of elementary-aged gifted students chanced upon Bob and Shawn as they performed with a Dallas-area improv troupe. Little did they realize that this serendipitous encounter was the conceptive moment of what exists today.

Websites & New Media: Informational

A longitudinal assessment of gifted students' learning using the Integrated Curriculum Model (ICM)

This article from Roeper Review discusses how "this study examines the effects over time of implementing the William and Mary language arts and science curriculum for gifted learners designed around the Integrated Curriculum Model (ICM) in one suburban school district. It also analyzes stakeholders' perceptions of the effectiveness of the curriculum."

A Montessori success story

This article provides one parent's account of her child's accomplishments due in part to the Montesorri elementary program.

Accommodating fast learners in the Winchester [Massachusetts] Schools

This article discusses the changes being made in Winchester, Massachusetts schools to accommodate the highly gifted population from kindergarten through twelfth grade. Reforms include changes in curriculum and the use of the term "fast learners" instead of "Gifted."

ADD in School

ADD in School.com presents hundreds of classroom interventions to help elementary school, and high school students with "ADD" or "ADHD," Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. "ADHD" in all six of its types, impacts about two students in every school classroom, in every school, in every state, across America.

Applying multiple intelligences theory

This article by Mary Ann Christison discusses the theory of multiple intelligences (MI). "As Gardner (1993:15) states: It is of the utmost importance that we recognize and nurture all of the varied human intelligences, and all of the combinations of intelligences. We are all so different largely because we all have different combinations of intelligences. If we recognize this, I think we will have at least a better chance of dealing appropriately with the many problems we face in the world."

Autonomous Learner Model (ALM)

Developed by George Betts, Ed.D. and Jolene Kercher, this program helps gifted and talented students work towards the goal of independent learning by addressing their cognitive, emotional and social needs. It incorporates five dimensions: Orientation, Individual Development, Enrichment, Seminars and In-Depth Study.

Citrus Organization for the Gifted (COG)

Citrus Organization for the Gifted (COG) is a new and dynamic parent-teacher organization designed with the particular needs of the gifted student and his/her family in mind. The primary purpose of the Citrus Organization for the Gifted is to serve the needs of the gifted child.

Education Place

This website is produced by Houghton Mifflin School Division, which publishes a variety of educational materials, including textbooks, resource materials, and technology for K-8 teachers and students. Launched in January 1996, Education Place is the longest running website of any educational publisher. With more than 18,000 pages of engaging content to explore, visitors to award-winning Education Place can delve further into the subjects they most enjoy to find helpful teaching resources, textbook support, educational games, and more.

Education World

This website targeted at the K-12 education community features a collection of teaching materials, curricula and free downloads. The database has many good links to internet resources on almost every school subject. There are daily updates of current resources of educational interest and sources on building lesson plans, curriculum development. The site is affiliated with Education World magazine.

Ethics in the Science Classroom

This extensive guide offers a considerable amount of suggestions and guidelines for incorporating ethics and values into secondary science instruction. Included are links to a number of case studies in which science and ethics intertwine, as well as information on additional resources.

Gifted Canada

This website aims to provide a forum for Canadian researchers, educators, organizations and families to share information concerning gifted education, research and resources across Canada.

Gifted in the regular classroom?

You have a classroom of 20-30 students and you have varying levels of ability in your classroom. Guess who will probably learn the least in this typical classroom? Most likely it will be the 'gifted' student(s). This article by Sue Watson discusses this issue further.

GT-Models

Posted by the Council for Exceptional Children, this article provides a listing of sample practices for gifted programs.

How Did It Ever Come to This?

This webpage displays the notes for a talk at the National Association of Scholars and provides the author's responses to the process of inflation in education, the death of the “new math” and rise of the “know-nothings”.

Inquiry-Based Learning

"Inquiry" is defined as "a seeking for truth, information, or knowledge -- seeking information by questioning." Individuals carry on the process of inquiry from the time they are born until they die. This is true even though they might not reflect upon the process. Infants begin to make sense of the world by inquiring. From birth, babies observe faces that come near, they grasp objects, they put things in their mouths, and they turn toward voices. The process of inquiring begins with gathering information and data through applying the human senses -- seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, and smelling." Check out this website for a more in-depth look into Inquiry-Based Learning.

Learning Maps: Virtual Field Trips

This page on Renzulli.com shows how educators can using virtual field trips to excite and motivate students. The organizers have catalogued outstanding virtual field trips in a wide variety of content areas. In the Renzulli Learning System, these virtual field trips will enable your students to learn about exciting places that they will “virtually” visit and things and objects that they can explore.

LessonPlans.com

This website provides information for teachers on lesson planning. The Education Resource Group is dedicated to helping professional educators, student teachers, parents, mentors and tutors educate students by providing access to education resources.

Mathematical Talent: Interview with Issac Greenspan

This interview between Center for Talent Development director Paula Olszewski-Kubilius, Ph.D and her former student, Issac Greenspan discusses his education from elementary school to high school. Issac reviewed his experience in various programs that would accommodate his accelerated academic pace. In addition to these programs, he also describes his social growth and the importance of parent advocacy and teacher mentoring.

'Mathematics for All' Must Include High-Ability and Highly Motivated Students

This article written by Glenda Lappan and hosted on the National Council for Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) website, advocates the need for gifted children to be challenged in their course work, specifically in mathematics. She stresses the importance of using outside resources for children to read and study on their own. Lappan states that mathematics clubs can provide extra opportunities.

Mentorship at Its Best

In this article, Nancy Lashaway-Bokina describes effective mentoring and motivational techniques. She covers methods of guiding lower-income students and highlights one teacher's unique motivational ideas.

Modifying Regular Classroom Curriculum for Gifted and Talented Students

This article link takes users to the Prufrock Press Web site. Laura McGrail states that meeting the needs of gifted students in the classroom "equals and often exceeds" challenges of disabled students. The article is a how to format, listing easy to implement strategies and modifications for curriculum, assignments, lesson plans and scheduling. The article concludes with three separate case studies of how modifying the curriculum was beneficial for students.

Motivating Students

This website by the University of Oregon's Teaching Effectiveness program answers many common questions about student motivation. Some answers are tailored to teachers, others are appropriate for homeschoolers.

Motivating students

This article link is an excerpt from Tools for Teaching by Barbara Gross Davis from the University of California, Berkeley. The article outlines some general strategies, then offers more detailed and specific suggestions, including how to structure courses and incorporating instructional behaviors among others. These tips are contructed to be relevant to the GT population.

National Library of Virtual Manipulatives for Interactive Mathematics

This website offers just what the name implies -- interactive math. Learning and understanding mathematics, at every level, requires student engagement. Mathematics is not, as has been said, a spectator sport. Too much of current instruction fails to actively involve students. One way to address the problem is through the use of manipulatives, physical objects that help students visualize relationships and applications. We can now use computers to create virtual learning environments to address the same goals.

New Horizons for Learning

The role of this advocacy organization is to give added visibility to effective teaching and learning practices and to help mainstream certain ideas. This organization offers many science resources, including specialized information for gifted learners. It is often used for new educational organizations.

Online courses help boost AP results

"More students are taking--and passing--Advanced Placement (AP) exams in every part of the country, as college-level work in high school becomes increasingly common, the College Board reported Jan. 25. Many state education officials attribute the gains in participation at least in part to online courses that expand the reach of advanced-level instruction. "

Pifactory Teacher Resources

This website has curriculum and other fun resources for teachers of Mathematics which may be downloaded from the site for FREE.

Planning for Differentiation

This article by Dr. Tracy Riley of Massey University in New Zealand, outlines a theory for planning gifted and talented learning experiences.

Professional Development at The Learning Page

This online curriculum resource offers professionals the opportunity to improve their skills. Through a variety of professional development programs and resources, educators can learn how to effectively use Library of Congress resources in the classroom. Programs include teleconferencing workshops, online and downloadable materials, live workshops and a fellowship program.

Project 2061: Algebra for all - Not with today's textbooks

This article link reviews the content, pedagogical approaches, and problems with current algebra textbooks. The study includes a chart with overall information about the comparisons, reviews of individual textbooks, instructional criteria, and the criteria used to evaluate each individual text. This link will be helpful to parents in selecting an appropriate algebra textbook for a homeschooling program, although parents of gifted students should keep in mind that the evaluations were based on an age-in-grade, rather than an early, presentation of algebra.

Promising Curriculum and Instructional Practices for High-Ability Learners Manual

This online educational manual submitted by the Nebraska Department of Education is designed for Nebraska educators of the gifted and of general interest to any parent or educator of the gifted. The manual covers a variety of techniques used to alter the curriculum to provide a more appropriate education for gifted students. In addition it discusses social-emotional development, and other relevant issues to parents and educators, such as funding and staff development.

Providing curriculum alternatives to motivate gifted students

This article link presents strategies to help highly able students get more out of school. Teachers may find that the strategies enable them to challenge and motivate both gifted students and students who have talents and abilities in specific areas. How to get the best performance from every student is a challenging task, especially in classrooms where there are many different levels of ability. Often, students who are gifted are not challenged to perform to their full capacity because they seem to be doing just fine. Unfortunately, these students may never achieve their potential because they have not had complex tasks and have never learned to really work.

SciGuides

SciGuides "provide instructional examples on how to use the URL resources within the SciGuides with your students, whether you have a one-computer classroom or access to a lab down the hall. At the theme level, each SciGuide contains specific lesson plans, vignettes, audio files, and student work samples. All of these resources illustrate how you might use them in the classroom; for example, you might use them to demonstrate a visual simulation of a difficult concept, collaborate with other students in virtual experiments, or complete or create a WebQuest."

Self-Serve Workshops

This online professional development curriculum was created and is used by the Library of Congress. These lessons are available online for use in local professional development activities. Topics covered include Classroom Applications; Search Skills; Technology; and Working with Primary Sources.

Some ideas for motivating students

This article by Robert Harris covers many common tips for motivating children. The author goes a step further by examining motivation as it relates to baseball. The result is a novel look at motivating students.

Teaching especially bright students

This article provides tips for teaching the gifted student to play an instrument, and looks at some of the problems that the child may face due to his or her giftedness.

Teaching Strategies for Twice-Exceptional Students

There are a series of detailed tips for teachers on how to deal with the challenge that many gifted students face with learning or with social disorders. There is also a list of methods on how to facilitate the gifted abilities of students - not focusing solely on their disabilities.

U.S. News Classroom

This online curriculum by U.S. News & World Report integrates current events into the classroom. "On these pages are dozens of techniques you can use to bring your classroom alive -- essential ideas for social studies, economics, English, journalism, composition, science and business classes; ways to challenge students as they work individually or in groups. You'll find fresh teaching methods to strengthen basic skills and to promote critical thinking. All levels of activities are included -- from basic skill-building exercises to thought-provoking creative challenges. And all are designed to help you use U.S. News most effectively in your classroom."

We believe in the magic of schooling!

The authors summarize the purpose of the Unicorn project, a joint project in Queensland, Australia, in relation to gifted education and its goals to improve access, participation and educational outcomes for underacheiving gifted and talented students through enrichment opportunities.

Web English Teacher

This is one of the most detailed, comprehensive websites for English/Language Arts teaching resources. With detailed lesson plans, videos, biographies, useful classroom activities and more, this site intends to serve as a guide for beginning teachers and provide new ideas for those more established. Educators can use online technology to share ideas and benefit from each others' work.

What is your learning style?

Knowledge of learning styles can help both educators and learners improve their effectiveness. In this feature, the author recommends sites to help you discover your learning style, and suggest resources describing optimal teaching and learning strategies for each.

Websites & New Media: Learning Tools

Curriki: The Global Education & Learning Community

Curriki hopes to improve education around the world by empowering teachers, students and parents with user-created, open source curricula, and it's all free! This website is an ever-growing collection of free lessons, assessments, resources and textbooks.

Intrinsic Motivation

Hosted on the Enhance Learning with Technology website, this detailed article by teacher Priscilla Theroux, outlines 21 strategies for enhancing motivation in students. Theroux has extensive experience dealing with underachieving students and has been greatly influenced by the insight of Joanne Rand Whitmore and Sylvia Rimm.

Socratic Seminars

Socratic Seminar participants seek deeper understanding of complex ideas through rigorously thoughtful dialogue, rather than by memorizing bits of information or meeting arbitrary demands for 'coverage. As listeners and readers, students will analyze experiences, ideas, information, and issues presented by others using a variety of established criteria. This information is provided by the Greece Central School District in New York.