| Our Current Mission Statement:
The mission of the Alabama Association for Gifted Children (AAGC) is to advocate for the diverse population of gifted children in the state of Alabama and to equip parents and educators to meet the unique educational needs of these children. Goals of AAGC:
To promote advocacy efforts that benefit gifted and talented children by disseminating legislative information to the members and community.
To foster professional development in meeting the needs of gifted and talented children among educators by providing opportunities for learning.
To share and disseminate news and information among members, parents, and educators.
Don't Forget to Submit a Proposal for AAGC Conference 2007!! Click here to download a Proposal form for the conference. We are looking to all of our members to share your experiences in Gifted Education and open a vast network for sharing opinions and ideas. Please join us in celebrating what we do best-with others! The deadline has been extended to~ April 30th for Proposal submissions. Email works great for Proposal Submissions!!! E-mail me with proposals and/or questions. | From the desk of
Dr. Bertie Kingore...
High Achiever,
Gifted Learner,
Creative Thinker
In this era of standards-driven education, legislators and educators continue to misinterpret high achievement as giftedness and creativity as fluffy extra. High-achieving students are noticed for their on-time, neat, well-developed, and correct learning products. Adults comment on these students' consistent high grades and note how well they acclimate to class procedures and discussions. Some adults assume these students are gifted because their school-appropriate behaviors and products surface above the typical responses of grade-level students. Educators working with gifted learners and creative thinkers experience frustration trying to help other educators and legislators understand that while high achievers are valuable participants whose high-level modeling is desired in the classroom, they still learn differently from gifted learners and creative thinkers. When in environments where learners are respected, valued, and encouraged, gifted students' demonstrate complex, in-depth thinking with more abstract inferences and diverse perceptions than is typical of high achievers. Creative thinkers, when working in respectful learning environments, question the known, inject new possibilities, and make mental leaps that surpass the correct-answer-driven responses that are more typical of high achievers. Articulating the instructional implications of these learning differences is vital when we strive to differentiate instruction. | Szabos (1989) published a comparison of the bright child and the gifted learner that challenged me to re-examine the nature and needs of advanced students working at different levels of readiness Her comparison helps to delineate differences between bright and gifted, and it provides a useful format for discussions. However, some of the items listed in the comparison are questionable. For example, the gifted learner is credited with having wild, silly ideas. In reality, it is creative learners who exhibit the ideas often called wild or silly; not all gifted learners demonstrate that aspect of the creative process. As a second example of concern, Szabos lists bright children as enjoying straightforward, sequential presentations. This behavior seems more associated with learning preferences than with ability. Arguably, some gifted learners also enjoy straightforward, sequential presentations, but their questions and responses to such a presentation may dramatically differ from the questions and responses of bright children. As a final example, Szabos' comparison states that gifted learners prefer adults while bright children enjoy peers. This statement has negative connotations leading to the stereotype that gifted learners are so out of sync with society and have such poor social skills that they can only communicate with adults. In reality, gifted learners seek idea-mates rather than age-mates. They enjoy the company of peers when the peer group understands the shared ideas. In practice, gifted students often seek interactions with adults because they assume the adult is more likely to have the background to discuss the content elevated by the student's interests. |
