Gifted Students

What do normally people think about gifted kids?

Usually, people think that gifted students are those who have high capacity and, because of that, they have many facilities which allow them to get very good marks and go beyond the rest of their classmates. The truth is that this is not always like this, in many occasions, these children are not recognized, they are viewed as students who are not interested in the subject and even there are a percentage of gifted children who have had academic failure. 

What are their real characteristics these kids have?

It is true that these children have high intellectual capacities, and this makes them gifted students but sometimes they are difficult to recognize because they are children that due to their defining characteristic, this means, due to their high capacity, they are often bored in class and they do not want to go to school because what they already know are studying. They are children very restless and curious, who ask about everything to their parents and also to their teachers. They are children who, when they have a special interest in a subject, they love to study it and learn about it, but if they do not have this interest, it is difficult to get them to focus and concentrate on this topic.

 When should teacher identify them?

When a teacher observes a child who already knows how to do something that was explained a few sessions ago and the rest of the class does not understand it yet, when a child says he does not want to go to school because he is bored because he already knows what they are studying there, when a child does not stop asking the teacher questions and even contradicts him or her... In all these situations we can be dealing with children with high capacities, sometimes they are seen as pedantic children, or lazy children because they do not want to go to school and they can even seem as rude by their way of asking and answering, but we must be careful because we may be confusing ourselves and what we have is a child with high capacities.

What type of gifted kids exist?

 They can have two types of personalities, they can be divergent or convergent. The ones that are divergent are more difficult to deal with. When they reach adolescence, they are always questioning authority and questioning any information they receive. On the other hand, the convergents have a easier adolescence, the don't stand out, they don't question everything. They normally try to please teachers with their good behaviour or simply they just behave as any other kid and it's very difficult to identify them.

                                                                                     What should teachers do?

 The first thing teachers should do is identifying those kids. After that they should create tasks that are more challenging for them. This kids have a special need, they can't be taught in the same way as the rest of their classmates. If teachers don't provide them any challenge, these kids get bored and demotivated. Nowadays, society luckily seems to have started working with kids that have difficulties and there are adjusted materials and special classes.  Nevertheless, these kids have also necessities that are completely ignored. For instance, we saw the statistics in the Comunitat Valenciana and there are very little cases reported of gifted people, when they know with certainty that there is a huge number.

Are there any associations?

Yes there are many, for instance in Valencia we have AVAST (Asociación Valenciana de apoyo al superdotado y talentoso).

Our opinion/ comments on the video La campana de gaus

The video is very interesting, since it shows the situation of gifted children in Spain. Their situation appears as something very dramatic, a great percentage of them have suffered academic failure, and they are not always detected. In addition, as we have seen in the case of Enna, schools do not always try to make things easier for them and solve their problems. The result from this, therefore,  is that gifted children cannot be developed as what they are. For us, a change at schools should change and schools and teachers should try their best so that gifted children can be developed and they can feel that they are in a good and comfortable atmosphere in their classrooms.