Transcript Meeting the Needs of the High

Overview of
IUSD’s GATE Programs
Beth Andrews
TOSA, GATE/APAAS
I like a teacher who gives you something to take home to think
about besides homework. Lily Tomlin as “Edith Ann”
What does gifted Mean?
What does a gifted program look like?
Gifted: innate exceptional
ability of a person.
Talented: exceptional
performance of a person.
Gifted & Talented: innate
exceptional ability and
performance of a person.
IUSD’s GATE
Program
To be identified GATE (grades 4-8)
CST Score of 460 ELA and 460 Math or
Score 95%or above on OLSAT or
Qualify on approved IQ test given by a licensed psychologist
GATE Program- (grades 4-8)
GATE Cluster at each grade level (4-8)
APAAS Alternative Program for Academically Accelerated Students (4-6)
Honors or GATE-cluster (middle school)
What Matters Most
Is that each student grows as
a responsible thinker,
wise consumer of ideas,
and innovative
contributor.
So that he/she may improve
conditions for those who
share the journey through
life.
Teachers play an important
role in ensuring that each
student becomes all he or
she can become.
How do we meet the needs of all
of our students?
We Respond to
To Ensure Each Student
• Student readiness • Is appropriately
• Student interests
challenged, and
• Student learning • Can overcome
style
learning obstacles
• Will learn to learn
Differentiation of Instruction
is a teacher’s response to learner’s needs
Guided by general principals of differentiation, such as
respectful
tasks
Content
flexible
grouping
Process
On-going assessment
and adjustment
Product
According to student’s
Readiness
Interests
Learning Profiles
Differentiated instruction centers around three key curricular elements –
content, process, and product.
Based on C. Tomlinson, 2000
Differentiation
In differentiated classrooms, teachers use the
core content to provide specific ways for each
individual to learn as deeply as possible and as
quickly as possible, knowing that each student’s
road map for learning is unique and may not be
identical to anyone else's.
Teachers work to ensure that each student is held
to high standards, and must think and work
harder than they meant to; achieve more than
they thought they could; and come to believe that
learning involves effort, risk, and personal
triumph. (adapted from Carol Ann Tomlinson)
Content
What the student needs to learn.
Instructional concepts should be broad based, and
all students are given access to the same core
content. The content’s complexity is adapted to
students’ readiness, abilities, and interests.
Content is varied through the presentation of
subject matter ( i.e., textbooks, lecture,
demonstrations, taped texts) to best meet
students’ needs.
Process
Activities in which the student makes sense of
content. Examples of differentiating process
include scaffolding, flexible grouping, interest
centers, varying pace of instruction, varying
duration of time for a student to master
content, and encouraging an advanced
learner to pursue a topic in greater depth.
Product
Culminating projects that ask students to
apply and extend what they have learned.
Products provide students with different
ways to demonstrate their knowledge
using various levels of difficulty, through
group or individual work, and various
means of scoring.
Characteristics of Gifted Students
•
•
•
•
•
Behaviors
Learning characteristics
Emotional needs
Social needs
Concerns
When the Curriculum is not
Challenging...
• Frustration and anxiety
• Perfectionism
• Lowered academic self-concept
• Underachievement or Non-production
Asynchronous or uneven
development
• creates difficulties in relating to both
themselves and others.
• may be more likely to view themselves
based on their relative weaknesses.
• show more perfectionist behaviors.
• the lack of educational fit can also
create adjustment or emotional
difficulties.
DEFINE UNDERACHIEVEMENT
Is Underachievement A Perception?
• Students must value academics.
• Students must be self-regulators.
• Students must believe they have the skills.
Underachievement is an adult term used to
describe a set of troublesome child behaviors that
don't match some preconceived notions of how
high a gifted child is supposed to perform. (Delisle)
Lessons on Seeking a Balance
1) Seeking a balance between who kids are and what
they can do. They possess much more than just
their brain.
As Dumbledore said to Harry in Harry Potter Chamber of
Secrets, “It’s our choices, Harry, that show who we are,
far more than our abilities.”
2) Need to achieve some sense that life has winning
and losing in it; both shape us to be who we are.
We do them a favor when we incorporate things that are
too hard and with natural loss so that it becomes a part
of the woodwork of life for them to help them with that
balance.
Lessons on Seeking a Balance
3) Seeking the balance between quality and
compulsion. Quality is good, but there’s a fine line
between coming out nicely and the need to be the
best.
Being the best will hinder their ability of being their best.
“A champion is someone who wins like they’re used to it,
and loses like they like it.” (From an Olympic coach).
Learning to continue to compete means understanding
that you are going to lose sometimes.
Excellence is not something that you can achieve and
hang on to forever; it‘s a quest that involves ups and
downs.
Seeking a Balance continued
4) Seeking the balance of how they are alike, and
how they are different, from other people.
In showing them that they have unique needs, we
need to also show them that everyone has special
needs.
This helps them to understand both their uniqueness
as individuals, (particular talents they have, particular
hurts that they have), but to realize that all human
beings are on a quest where we are all trying to have
our dreams realized.
In the end, all learners need our energy,
our heart, and our mind. They have that in
common because they are young humans.
How they need us however, differs.
Unless we understand and respond to those
differences, we fail many learners. Carol Tomlinson
*