69825-Giftedness

[Giovanni Schwartz]

Oh pick me! I love to talk about how smart I am.

I had a long soliloquy typed out, but I decided it was too full-of-myself. What it boils down to is this:

I think that I’m lazy and ADD now because I was not challenged enough in school. Activities were never really interesting enough for me to bother learning them in class. If they were intuitive, I’d still do well later, because I would (or could, or wanted to) teach them to myself. Meanwhile, as I progressed to more advanced classes (see: electricity and Magnetism, Calculus 2 and 3) I stopped seeing ANY practical uses for the problems at all. I figure if the teacher can't give me a story problem about it, then it's not important to know.

And so if Advanced programs were actually useful, I would be better at school.

*If anyone wants to see my monologue (Warning, 8.5 on the 1-10 brag scale), you can... message me? email me? Both?

[Genuine Article]

We had TAG (Talented and Gifted) in my state, but we didn't do anything differently than any of the other kids and I'm not even sure how we were selected. All I know is that on my state testing the bubble was filled in that said I had participated in TAG, which I objected to, but my teacher wouldn't, or possibly couldn't, untag me. I really resented being tagged.

[bobtheenchantedone]

I was ridiculously far ahead in reading comprehension (reading at a high school level in elementary school) and had a relatively high ability in grammar and writing because of that, but not much was done about it. Just a special program in middle school and advance English classes in high school, both of which just added a creative element - I acted in a play in middle school (a play I wrote) and did things like dress up and draw pictures and stuff in high school.

Marduk should be responding in this thread.

[Whistler]

I was in Gifted And Talented Education (GATE). We went on some awesome field trips to NASA space camp! I think I got to write a little newspaper with the two other gifted kids in my class. Lots of goofing off in the library.

[krebscout]

I participated in TAG, too, and Odyssey of the Mind and Math Counts, and I was in whatever advanced stuff was available (with the exception of the combined AP English/AP History course that my father forbade me from taking, as he hated the teacher so much they had some sort of war via letters-to-the-editor of the local paper...but I ended up taking another English class with a teacher that became my favorite teacher of all time, and I still exchange emails with him once or twice a year). I really don't know how it affected me and I don't have anything against which to compare my experience, but I have a feeling that being known as one of the Smart Kids gave me the confidence (or the ego to keep up appearances) to excel. I don't think I would have breezed through school nearly as easily as I did if I hadn't received external validation that I was smart.

[mic0]

Okay, I'm happy that all of you had those cool experiences, but this also just reminds me of how I was never in any gifted/talented programs! BOO. And (I am only somewhat bitter about this now) one time I had an ~A grade in my freshman history class and asked the teacher to sign-off for me to go to the higher level class the next year and SHE WOULDN'T! I was so mad. And I am still mad! Because my whole life could have been different! (Or, at least I would not have been in the horrible US history class where someone borrowed my FAVORITE pen and never returned it. Okay... as you can see, this was all very traumatic and being in gifted and talented programs would have clearly improved my life.)

Edit: Okay, I'm trying not to be bitter about that time in my life where I didn't get to be in the AP history class, but anyway I remembered that I wrote a really funny story about the time someone borrowed my pen. Here it is!! I guess I'm not too worried about my identity. Anyway, it is pretty funny, especially if you imagine me as I was: 15 years old, quiet, trying to be nice, accidentally lending my pen to someone.

tl;dr - I was never in any gifted programs but have instead always utilized my "great" "wit" to deal with my "mundane" lifestyle. (It is way too late, I need to stop posting!)

[Defy V]

Mico, I've always thought you were really smart based on your answers. Just so you know.

So, C4 and I went to the same elementary school. (It's what happens when you're sisters, you know, C4 and D5.) There was nothing gifted or talented or accelerated reader when we were there. And we were, you know, really really smart little kids. (Same as everyone on this forum, it sounds like [I'm still geeking out that NerdGirl got a 168 on the IQ test]. Apparently gifted people are often socially awkward, which probably explains why we all flock to anonymous internet forums.) So what was our school to do with the girl who was silently reading novels in kindergarten or making up color math (yellow minus orange is negative red) and showing it off for show and tell in first grade?

The answer at our school was to skip a grade. We both skipped 2nd grade because that's basically a review of 1st grade, right? So we didn't learn anything new or go on special field trips, but we got to learn things a little bit faster for one year. And be the runts of 3rd grade (and subsequent grades). And not get to date til the end of junior year of high school. And feel like a pariah for being crazy smart, a lot smarter than the next smartest kid, and be a year and a half younger than him/her.

Overall, it probably still was the best decision given the options my parents had, but you kids with Gifted and Talented programs were lucky.

[Whistler]

It was fun being in GATE, but it didn't exactly eliminate harassment/teasing.

Personally, I wonder how classrooms would change if they were less focused on age/grade and more on "what does this person already know? What should they learn next?"

[Giovanni Schwartz]

Yeah... Mostly I got jealousy that I got to leave the classroom one day a week. and then the next benefit came from skipping GE's in college because of AP.

[Whistler]

My honors English teacher didn't really think I should take AP English, but we didn't have a strict gatekeeping and I took it anyway (it was fine). We might have had a gifted program at my high school, but I didn't really know about it (I switched districts).

Were AP courses part of the gifted program at your high school?

[Giovanni Schwartz]

They basically WERE the gifted program. In addition to a couple other advanced classes. But mostly AP was it.

As an interesting side note, I never got above a C on any paper I wrote for an advanced class, but when I decided to slack off my last semester and quit AP English, as well as ENG102 that I took, I got above 95% on all of them. And 100% on most. Whether I edited them or not. Or wrote them at 3:00 in the morning or not. I also got a 5 on the AP English test that I took my junior year.

[Marduk]

So apparently Bob says I should comment here.

Um, let's see: our elementary school program was called A.L.L. (Accelerated Learning Lab) and you took a test for it in 4th grade. Depending on how you did, they gave your parents the option to place you in the program. The test was scored out of 5, one being the highest: 5 meant at or below average student level, 4 was above average but insufficient for the program, 3 was borderline and they left it up to the parents, 2 meant you were accepted into the program, and 1 meant they "strongly encouraged" participation. I got a 1, but it was only at some schools in the district, so I would've had to go to a different school, and my parents couldn't take me there every day. So they didn't enroll me. As it happened, we moved that summer after enrollment, and the school that I then went to actually DID have the program, but it was too late to enroll me. So I was just in a regular class. However, the A.L.L. class was treated like just another class when it came to competing in school events. All of the students dreaded things like "knowledge bowls" competing against them. But then we went to one, and I single-handedly beat the whole A.L.L. class. After that I was celebrated by my class as some sort of a ringer, so my intelligence there made me MORE popular. Then we had school vs school knowledge bowls, and I was the only non-A.L.L. kid allowed to participate. I also answered more questions correctly than the rest of my team combined. I never lost a school spelling bee all through elementary school, either. (Through a bunch of random flukes, I never won one outside the school, however.)

Then I got into junior high and my mom decided it would be "healthier" for me to be more like a "regular" kid. So I wasn't allowed to take any honors classes. I was so bored I didn't ever do any homework and failed about half of my classes. So my mom transferred me to the junior high where she worked, so she could "watch over me." BUT she allowed me to take honors classes, which became what my schedule was filled with. I got straight A's the rest of junior high. I also decided to take up Spanish, and went into Spanish I my 9th grade year. I hadn't had any Spanish before that, so that's where they put you. I started to read books in Spanish and decided that I was learning it too fast, so I asked her to transfer me into the Spanish IV class (where all the immersion kids were.) I did that for the second half of the school year, and aced the AP test that year (got a 5.)

After that I got into high school and got into a lot of fights with the 11th grade honors English teacher. It was her first year, and she didn't really know anything. I was incensed that they'd allow someone so green to teach the class. So they transferred me out into a regular class. The teacher failed me on every paper I wrote, primarily because I used big words she didn't understand. So I failed a class for the first time in my high school career.

The AP classes all went wonderfully (except for the fact that I still got C's and D's because I hated doing homework.) Still, without doing any homework, I was able to dominate discussions and wreck the curve on every test. Unfortunately, my mom wouldn't pay for any AP test in a class where I got lower than a C, so I only ended up taking about half of the AP tests for the classes I was in. Every test I took I got a 4 or a 5, and ended up with around 40 credits before I stepped foot in a college classroom.

Other anecdotes: in that 11th grade class, I took a paper along with a rubrick to every other English teacher in the school and asked them to grade the paper. Every single one of them gave me an A instead of an F. But the teacher refused to change the grade. In elementary school, they have the period where they teach you about the techniques of indoctrination used in Nazi Germany. So the teacher draws two lines and asks which is longer. After that she indicates the line which is clearly shorter, and and says it is longer. Then she asks the class if they want to switch their answer. The way it is SUPPOSED to go is that most students agree with the teacher, demonstrating obedience to authority. The way it DID go was that I refused to agree with her, and most of the class switched their answers to agree with ME instead. Also, as far as finishing tests first, my self-appointed goal was to sit where I'd be in position to receive the first test handed out, and finish the exam before the last test was handed out. I did this probably about half the time (damn those essay tests!)

[Digit]

Sounds like you might do well on the Jeopardy! test.

[Katya]

Apparently everyone on this forum is above average. (Just like Lake Wobegone.)

[Genuine Article]

Apparently everyone on this forum is above average. (Just like Lake Wobegone.)

Yes, but are they also strong and good-looking?

[UnluckyStuntman]

Apparently everyone on this forum is above average. (Just like Lake Wobegone.)

Yes, but are they also strong and good-looking?

*flexes biceps* Yep.

[Portia]

I skipped a grade. I think all parents of private schoolers believe their children to be gifted. (Ha.)

[C is for]

I can't help but be amused at the response to this question. I asked it to make fun of Yog. I don't really care about gifted programs.

But I guess this is how you can tell an inside joke question is successful -- the people in the know are amused, and everyone else jumps at the chance to answer too.

[Yog in Neverland]

I can't help but be amused at the response to this question. I asked it to make fun of Yog. I don't really care about gifted programs.

But I guess this is how you can tell an inside joke question is successful -- the people in the know are amused, and everyone else jumps at the chance to answer too.

I got a great text from MSJ about it when it posted and this thread started, actually. I will never ever live this down. *sob*