#ohiogtchat is Sunday April 3rd at 9pm ET. 

As boredom is measured through our own internal scale, it can be difficult for others to acknowledge something that can be different for them. This measurement is dependent on each person's ability level, freedom to change circumstances, and understanding of any underlying conditions. In this #ohiogtchat we will explore Gifted Children and Boredom, how to identify what's going, and ways to advocate for change.
 
Q1) How do you interpret what a child means when he or she says "I'm bored."? Is this a straightforward plea, or is there an underlying issue that needs discovered?
 
Q2) What are the dangers of an ill-adapted educational setting for a gifted child?
 
Q3) As an educator, what can we do to reduce or eliminate boredom in our students?
 
Q4) What is some advice on advocating with the school to eliminate boredom in your child's educational setting?
 
Q5) Outside of the classroom, outside of school, can boredom be beneficial?

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Our next chat is April 17: Overexcitabilities: We will be looking at the 5 different OE traits and how they can effect gifted children. We will also discuss how we can help our gifted children navigate the world through OE. We are still looking for a featured guest for this chat who has experience working with gifted children with overexcitabilities. If you are interested please tweet @HeatherCachat or @jeff_shoemaker.

This is part 1 of a 4 part series of book reviews from E.L. Strauss from Thinxygen Publishers. I would highly recommend checking out their website along with their other books.


Global Explorer: The Southern Hemisphere

What to go on a journey? Want to dive to the Great Barrier Reef? Want to see Ayer’s Rock? Want to see ancient salt pans that look like glass when they are wet?

Then open this book! This book will challenge you, stretch you, and help you develop your logical thinking and problem solving skills.

Overview
This book covers the three most diverse continents you find in the southern hemisphere: Australia, Africa, and South America.

Australia
In the Australia section of the book the author discusses many aspects of the country along with their flag, how large the continent is, and some historical facts. The author also discusses the animal population on the land and in the ocean, and the environmental concerns of the Great Barrier Reef created by humans and by sea creatures. The author writes about the aborigine people of Australia. She not only gives us facts, but gives us some of their Dreamtime myths, and invites us to interpret what we see from their myths, and to take a different look at the Uluru inselberg that the aborigine people see as sacred.

Africa
In the Africa portion of the book the author focuses on Namibia and the Namib Desert. Here the author discusses the size and scope of the Desert. She also explores the unique geologic formations of the Desert, plant life and, unique animals that live there such as the Oryx. What I lied about this section is the author gives a small section on how to survive in the desert on little water.

The other area that is focused on is the Skeleton Coast, Sossusvlei and Deadvlei, the salt and clay pans of Namibia. I believe these areas are not covered as much in most science or geography books enough.

South America

In this section the author focuses on two major areas: Bolivia and Patagonia. In the introduction to this section the author does touch on other countries and languages spoken in South America.

Bolivia
Salar de Uyuni a salt desert formed when parts of Lake Minchin, a prehistoric lake dried up. This ancient salt desert has different uses for modern people. It was pointed out the book that NASA uses this area to calibrate their satellites, and there is an abundance of lithium that is used in cell phone batteries. Again the author invites us to interact with the reading and create our own salt crystals.

Patagonia
In this section the author talks about the history of the area, and some of the myths that took hold here for centuries. One of those myths were giants living in the area. From journals from Magellan, the people he encountered were much taller than the average person for the times. It is thought these people were roughly 6 feet tall. These people the Tehuelches were tall, but the myths spoken back in Europe were these people were giants over 15 feet tall. The author shows how people who live in different climates can be different sizes. She also grow through the math, and invites the reader to also check out the math for themselves with data she provides.

What I love about this book

I love many aspects of this book. What struck me first was the first few pages where the author writes a series of questions that the reader will hopefully answer through the reading. This gets the reader engaged and prepped.

There are great color pictures with short explanations on them. Some pictures are warm and inviting, and some are vibrant and bright. The pictures are chosen to help bring more depth of knowledge to the reader about what they just read.

There are exercises that the reader is encouraged to participate in such as finishing a food web in the Barrier Reef section, and using their imagination to chart out similarities and differences in the Dreamtime section in the Australia chapter.

There are also sections of the book that the author encourages the reader to interact with the material they just read through Desert Survival 101, making salt crystals, and how to collect water in the desert.

Each chapter ends with a short quiz to help reinforce the material that was shared in the chapter.

In short, this is a great book for middle school gifted children. It uses vocabulary words from geography, geology, earth science, and biology. It also uses a more advanced vocabulary in general. It is a great book for children who love to read about far off places, peoples, and environments. I would recommend this book to students in traditional schools, and those who are homeschooled.

You can find Thinxyogen on Facebook and G+

As an educator of gifted children, my central foci within the gifted world had been the academic. The teaching and education of my gifted students. But as I put more years behind me, I found that I was looking more at my family, and how giftedness was expressed in it. How did I feel about giftedness? This surely forms my pedagogical views with my students. What pushed my viewpoints?
 
As I reflected inwards, and looked at generations past and present, I can say as a whole I have a very creative family tree. There are members who sang opera, became professors, created beautiful art, worked within nuclear engineering, and answered the call to help others. We are not eminent, but we have immense potential. Giftedness courses through our family tree. It pops up more apparent, more academically, in some than in others. And that my friends, is okay. It is who we are. It is part of us.
 
Gifted individuals need to know and understand that giftedness is part of their identity. This is the basis of our #ohiogtchat tonight. I invited Sharon Duncan and Dr. Grace Malonai to discuss gifted identity formation with us tonight. These ladies are the founders of the Gifted Identity Project, http://www.giftedidentity.com/, and they are both wonderful, warm-hearted people wanting to bring insight and guidance to parents as they learn about their own gifted children as well as recognize their own giftedness.

How we talk about giftedness forms our children's views on their self-image of their own giftedness. Sharon Duncan and Dr. Joanna Haase, Ph.D., MFT gave a presentation on how we should talk about giftedness, and why it is important to step out and discuss giftedness: Addressing the Elephant in the Room, How to talk about giftedness, http://www.giftedidentity.com/addressing-the-elephant-in-the-room-how-to-talk-about-giftedness.

Andrew S. Mahoney, M.S., L.P.C., L.M.F.T. discusses four parts to a healthy gifted identity: validation, affirmation, affiliation and affinity. http://www.counselingthegifted.com/articles/insearchofID.html#sub2.
 
Validation of one's giftedness comes from the "acknowledgment that one's giftedness exists as corroborated by others or by oneself" by people close to the gifted person, such as parents or teachers. A parent reading a book about giftedness with their child will create a solid, positive self-image for that child. It validates his or her giftedness in the eyes of a person important to the child.
 
Affirmation of one's giftedness comes through interacting with others, learning and experiencing through the use of his or her gifted abilities. "It is the ongoing, interactive process between self as gifted and the world. The process reinforces in the self that 'I am gifted.'" This can include a challenging learning environment that pushes the child's abilities, and where he or she learns how taking risks can lead to positive results.
 
Affiliation with one's giftedness is finding others with similar interests or intensities, their "tribe," where he or she is acknowledged by peers/siblings/colleagues and accepted. "Included in this process is recognition of the need for belonging and feeling that "who I am" has a place and meaning." Many parents and teachers may see gifted children deny their giftedness in order to be accepted or belong to groups where their uniqueness is not acceptable.
 
"The mind is not a vessel to be filled, but a fire to be kindled ~ Plutarch
Affinity for one's giftedness is kindling the "fire of the self." Fulfilling what is considered a calling to the gifted person, or a passion. By doing this he or she supports the self, giving him or her purpose, a mission. "Unmet affinity creates anguish, making life more tenuous. 'If I can't fulfill my calling, then I will never have a sense of fulfillment and relief from my angst.'" (bold lettering my own)
 
Giftedness lasts a lifetime. So how do we support through the lifespan? The Journey Lasts Lifetime After Lifetime, http://www.giftedidentity.com/the-journey-lasts-lifetime-after-lifetime/

Recognizing that multipotentiality in gifted individuals with push them to try new things, go into new professions, switch from job to job, all in order to challenge their self.
 
And if we recognize that giftedness spans throughout an individual's life, then we must consider how we take care of our gifted elders. Joy Navan, Ph.D. writes on her blog http://ongiftedelders.com about the needs and ways to care for our gifted elders.

We form our culture, and to maintain that giftedness only occurs within the classroom is to deny gifted individuals the need to create a healthy identity. Discussing giftedness and accepting the unique needs of this vulnerable population will create awareness. And that is perfectly good!

See our Storify story at https://storify.com/mrjshoemaker/ohiogtchat-march-20
 
Warm regards,
Heather.

Tonight's #ohiogtchat was on a topic that has gained momentum in popular press over the last couple years. Impostor Syndrome was recognized on college campuses in the 1970's by psychologists Pauline Rose Clance & Suzanne Imes. Women who were clearly intelligent and capable enough to be in college experienced fear that maybe they didn't know as much as they thought, and what if others found out? Having experienced these feelings of doubt herself, Dr. Clance created a test, available on her site, that you can take to see whether you are also experiencing Impostor Syndrome.

Our featured guest tonight was Jade Ann Rivera (@jadeannrivera), an innovative educator who has worked extensively with neurodiverse children. A gifted woman herself, Jade brings a quiet confidence to the individualized environments she creates for her students. Jade's article The Twice Exceptional Child and Impostor Syndrome is well worth the read.

The American Psychological Association article Feel Like a Fraud? quotes Dr. Suzanne Imes as saying, "The impostor phenomenon seems to be more common among people who are embarking on a new endeavor." Among gifted children, with an imaginational overexcitability, the new endeavor of finally being challenged in the classroom could bring on feelings of "Do I belong here?"

Many gifted children experience feeling outside the norm, whether it is being able to read before anyone else, or figuring answers faster than others, or feeling the intensity of emotions that other kids don't seem to experience. Because of this, Douglas Eby, M.A./Psychology states, "Many talented and creative people experience impostor or fraud feelings and beliefs about themselves, despite their accomplishments."

From an educator's perspective, we will often see a high degree of perfectionism expressed.

So how do you respond to Impostor Syndrome and perfectionism in gifted children?

Watching our feedback is primary. Giving students specific positive feedback worded in a way that shows the work they did was meaningful.

Mentors or role models who share their own experiences with impostor syndrome and perfectionism.

Discuss stereotypes and people who have broken the norm. Seeing how someone else was able to do it gives students confidence and shows them that they are not frauds.

Lastly, I want to share an article written by Janet Driscoll Miller, the president and CEO of Marketingmojo, a marketing firm. Why I Choose to "Lean In" and I Hope You Will Too discusses how many women experience impostor syndrome despite their achievements. How many women will undermine themselves. From Sheryl Sandberg's book Lean In, "Author Ken Auletta summarized this phenomenon in The New Yorker when he observed that for women, “self-doubt becomes a form of self-defense.”  In order to protect ourselves from being disliked, we question our abilities and downplay our achievements, especially in the presence of others. We put ourselves down before others can."

Finding ways to counteract this type of behavior in our gifted students will help promote a healthy self image and positive emotional growth.

I hope you have found this article helpful. Please join us for the next #ohiogtchat March 20 when we discuss identity formation in gifted children.

See a complete transcript of this chat at: https://storify.com/mrjshoemaker/mar-6-imposter-syndrome.

Warm regards,
Heather