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Insight: Nov 13

Marc Fennell hears about how to identify a gifted child, and what the best approach is in the classroom & beyond.

This week’s Insight, guest hosted by Marc Fennell, hears from gifted children, their parents and teachers about how you identify a gifted child, and what the best approach is in the classroom and beyond, so they can reach their potential.

Tennille Smith noticed there was something different about the way her son, Angus, was able to learn when he was just 18 months old.

During a routine check-up, the child health nurse asked her if he was saying 10 or 20 words.

“I said to the child health nurse, oh, it’s definitely more than 50,” Tennille tells guest Insight host, Marc Fennell.

Tennille counted that Angus had 110 words, so she eventually decided to have his IQ tested and he was identified as gifted.

“When I finally got the report and I read just how well he had done, that’s when it really hit and I got really anxious,” Tennille recalls.

“I didn’t know what this meant for his future, or what schooling was going to be like.”

Balancing the needs of students is always a challenge for teachers, particularly for students with learning difficulties – but parents of gifted students are also concerned.

“Teachers are not getting training in gifted education, they do not know how to identify these students,” gifted education researcher, Jae Yup Jung tells Insight.

“They might engage in antisocial behaviour, they might drop out of school and this is a huge waste of the potential of these students.”

When Cherry Huang approached her daughter’s school with a suspicion that Bertha was gifted, it seemed like the school didn’t believe it was natural ability.

“I asked the school to give her extra work, or extension work, but being an Asian parent… I think they probably thought that she was given 200 maths questions every night.”

Cherry thought that the only way Bertha would succeed in life, was if she was challenged, and given the chance to fail by skipping grades at school – but there was reluctance from the school to accelerate her.

Professor of teacher education, Robyn Ewing, says teachers are doing the best they can with the resources they have and should be trusted by parents to give gifted children the help they need.

“We realise there are times when teachers aren’t getting it right but it’s certainly not because they don’t have the enthusiasm and the passion and the desire,” Robyn says.

“As teachers we continue to be blamed for all of the things that society doesn’t get right.”

Tuesday November 13 at 8:30pm on SBS.

2 Responses

  1. Can relate…I have two geniuses…one dyslectic …could not get acknowledge ’til high school…I was over zealous parent they told me…This was a very good program ..but it usually is what ever the topic…..Dateline which followed was also informative…in the same vein…

  2. Dyslexia is such a challenge. Frequently misdiagnosed. I was told my son was “normal” and my parenting to blame based on the testing by the clinical psychologist employed by his school. I fought to and got him tested independently. The day I told him that he didn’t have to attempt to read again was the first day of the rest of his life (he was 11). I am so impressed by him as he is now working through the last year of his justice degree.

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