This organization provides parents of profoundly gifted children support, insight, and a number of useful resources. Parents can also access information on the characteristics of gifted children. TPPG provides both an online and in-person support network.
Through some 500 excerpts quoted in the text, Mishow Piechowski illustrates how the intensities and sensitivities of bright young chilren make them more alive, more creative, and more in love with the world than others.
Four experts (Webb, Gore, Amend, DeVries) in the field of gifted and talented provide practical guidance in the areas of: Characteristics of gifted children; Peer relations; Sibling issues; Motivation & underachievement; Discipline issues; Intensity & stress; Depression & unhappiness; Educational planning; Parenting concerns; Finding professional help; and much, much more!
Click here to read a review of this book.
Written by Joyce VanTassel-Baska, Ed.D., this book provides a concise and thorough introduction to methods for identifying gifted students in the school setting. Including overviews of assessment tools and alternative methods of assessment, as well as pertinent discussions concerning the need to identify gifted and talented students, this book combines research and experience from top scholars in the field of gifted education in a convenient guide for teachers, administrators, and gifted education program directors. Click here to read a review of this book.
This is a comprehensive resource guide from Jacquelyn Saunders for parents of young gifted children. It contains information on identification, early enrichment activities, school placement issues, and parenting strategies.
Norbert Weiner's out of print partial autobiography of his childhood, youth and education. Includes long discussions and reflections on what it is like to be a child prodigy; radical acceleration; parenting styles; family relationships; publicity; and the social development of child prodigies.
In this book, author H. J. Eysenck considers the role of intelligence, social status, gender, and many other factors that have been linked with genius and creativity. His theory traces creativity from DNA through personality to special cognitive processes to genius. Eysenck puts forth the argument is that it may be the fact that they believe that they are geniuses that make them so.
Author Kate Distin aims to help children and their families learn more about what is typical or normal for gifted and talented children and to shatter some of the myths about these children and their parents.
Dr. Ellen Winner's book focuses on both intellectual and artistic giftedness. This book has a developmental psychology perspective, but also addresses educational issues. Of particular note to those who work with the profoundly gifted, Winner makes a case that public funding for gifted programs should be focused on the most profoundly gifted students first, with higher classroom standards the means for meeting the needs of the moderately gifted.
This in-depth handbook examines the categories of exceptionality most often described in educational, behavioral, and health practices. Here, editors Vicki L. Schwean and Donald H. Saklofske compile valuable information from leading authorities in the medical, psychological and educational fields.
This practical resource by Susan K. Johnsen, Ph.D. offers up-to-date information for building an effictive, defensible identification process. It acts as a hands-on, research-based guide for identifying gifted and talented children.
Written by Susan K. Johnsen, Ph.D., this publication will provide directors and coordinators of programs for gifted and talented students with a specific step-by-step plan for developing an identification procedure in a school or school district. While the sections of this publication are laid out sequentially according to the steps, identification is an ongoing process. The goal of identification is to ensure that every gifted and talented student who needs a program that is different from the general education curriculum receives one that is matched to his or her specific characteristics.
Completely revised and updated, this edition tackles important and timely issues dealing with the social and emotional needs of today's gifted children. Dr. Tracy Cross uses research data, cultural analysis, and personal insight to address the lived experiences of gifted students, how they cope with mixed messages in a constantly changing society, and how they manage their way through school and home. The book also contains a section outlining suggestions and ideas for guiding and supporting the development of gifted children.
Author Lucy Jo Palladino defines the Edison Trait (named after Thomas Edison) as divergent vs. convergent thinking. Edison Trait kids - one in five children - have the qualities that make innovative leaders, inventors, explorers, yet they often have a hard time in school where their personality traits may be seen as weak or negative. Palladino recasts these children in a positive light and gives specifics on understanding and becoming an ally for your Edison Trait child.
This book by authors Sally Yahnke Walker and Susan Perry offers up-to-date, authoritative information about giftedness, gifted educucation, problems, personality traits, and more. You'll learn what 'giftedness' means, how kids are identified as gifted, and what's good—and bad—about the label. You'll find out how to keep from raising a 'nerd,' how to prevent perfectionism, and how to advocate for your child at school.
This book offers insights into the intellectual and emotional development of exceptional children. Contributors explore the nature of giftedness and how to recognize it in youngsters; the complexities of the creative process; standardized tests and their effectiveness in asserting potential; and developmental theories and how they relate to the identification of gifted children. Several chapters also examine young prodigies and the diversity of personalities and talents that exist among the gifted.
This entry level book is written by Judy Galbraith for parents of children ages 2-8. It includes characteristics of gifted, descriptions of terms used in gifted education, perfectionism, parenting the gifted child, working with the schools and the rights of parents.
An estimated 500,000 potentially gifted children are born each year. Since most schools don't begin to test for giftedness until about age 8, it is left to parents to recognize and nurture their children's special talents and abilities in the early critical years. Written by Joan Franklin Smutny, Kathleen Veenker and Stephen Veenker, this intelligent, insightful, and useful book is a complete guide to identifying gifted children and helping them develop to the fullest.
This article thoroughly discusses the issue of ADD and how it relates to giftedness. It goes into detail about key characteristics of gifted children, how "gifted" is defined, and offers advice for parents.
This About.com site is filled with articles, a blog and other useful information for anyone interested in learning more about gifted students. Topics include how to identify gifted young people, their educational needs and parenting help.
This site includes topics related to gifted children including testing, disabilities, education, and what it means to be gifted. Aalso has links to physics demonstrations, elementary science experiments, book links, and the Schonell Reading test (a simple test to determine your child’s reading age).
BrainConnection.com is dedicated to providing accessible, high-quality information about how the brain works and how people learn. Many discoveries are being made in areas that relate to the human brain, including language, memory, behavior, and aging, as well as illness and injury. We believe that access to this information can provide practical tools for teaching and learning as well as valuable insights into almost every aspect of our daily lives.
This website has a variety of resources for educators, parents, students, and couselors that may be helpful in learning the various characteristics of gifted individuals.
This checklist hosted by the Austega.com webite provides a characteristics checklist for teachers and parents looking for signs of giftedness in young children. Characteristic traits are listed by broad category of giftedness and include general intellectual ability, specific academic aptitude, creative thinking and production, leadership, psychomotor ability and visual and performing arts.
Gifted children or students may exhibit many, but not all, of these characteristics in any one list. Those who consistently exhibit the behaviors have a strong possibility that they are "gifted".
This link is a list of general characteristics of giftedness. Individuals that are gifted may not show all of the characteristics. Additionally, in recent years, more studies have been completed on giftedness.
Gifted People and their Problems, by Francis Heylighen identifies the social issues gifted people stuggle with, thus, being misunderstood and underestimated by peers, by society, and usually even by themselves. She explains the cognition, perception, emotion, motivation, values, activity and social relations gifted people experience.
This article by Anne Leverette-Sanderlin discusses giftedness and gives advice on the topic. It explains some of the signs of a gifted child, when to test a child too see if they are gifted, and more.
Helen Dowland is a Gifted Education Consultant who specializes in analyzing problems and developing practical solutions. On her website, she offers advice and a great variety of downloadable documents for personal use by parents and teachers.
This is a great site that gives parents of young children a great source of information about the developemental milestones while contrasting normal children with gifted children.
This article, by Pamela Darr Wright, M.A., discusses the frustrations parents of special ed kids feel when their children are blamed for certain problems that arise in school.
The Gifted Identity Formation Model, presented here, helps bridge the theoretical with the practical, includes identity and its formation as crucial variables in the counseling process and uses identity as the baseline for intervention. The model aids with assessment and helps deliver counseling related interventions that explore and strengthen the identity and identity formation of gifted people, in turn enhancing the health and development of the self.
The purpose of this site is to bring to light some of the unique and phenomenal talents of those who are nothing short of extraordinary and unfortunately, many times overlooked in regards to their talents. This site also provides information on mental and emotional issues unique to gifted individuals and provides an overview of gifted characteristics in general.
This information is provided on the website of The Qualifications and Curriculum Authority, located in the United Kingdom, which maintains and develops new curriculum for teachers and administrators for differentiating the classroom experience for gifted children.