Misconceptions and Myths About High Ability Kids | Dr. Steven Pfeiffer Full Webinar

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[00:00:06]Good afternoon everyone. My name is Justice and it is my sincere pleasure to welcome you to our MHS webinar, Misconceptions and Myths About High Ability Kids. We are thrilled to have you all here today. Ahead of our presentation, we would like to begin by telling you a bit about MHS. MHS is a global leader in scientifically grounded solutions that help organizations understand, develop, and unlock human potential. For more than 40 years, MHS has supported professionals across clinical education, gifted, talent development, and public safety spaces with trusted insights that drive better decisions, fair outcomes, and lasting impact. Our gifted and talented education solutions support fair identification through scientifically validated assessments that uncover student potential across all backgrounds, helping schools recognize high ability learners early and fairly.

[00:00:59]This webinar will start with a presentation by Dr. Steven Feifer.

[00:01:03]Afterwards, we will ask you to spend 2 to three minutes on an attendance survey which may entitle you to continuing education credits, also known as CE credits, or a certificate of completion.

[00:01:13]Then we will open the floor for a live Q&A. Our main goal is to make sure you have an enjoyable and educational experience. Do not hesitate to ask any questions during the webinar as our MHS staff is here to help.

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[00:01:34]From there, you will find the ask a question button at the bottom of the window. Questions relating to the webinar content will be read aloud and answered after the presentation. I'd also like to share an important note with you regarding obtaining your CE credit or certificate of completion after the webinar today.

[00:01:52]As a part of the CE credit requirement, all participants are encouraged to complete a feedback survey. We are using this survey to record your attendance at today's webinar.

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[00:02:52]Now without further ado, it is my great pleasure to introduce you to Dr. Steven Feifer. Dr. Steven Fefeifer is a popular speaker, scholar, and recognized authority on giftedness. He is a licensed psychologist whose work centers the social emotional needs and character development of high ability children.

[00:03:09]Dr. Feifer received his doctorate at the University of North Carolina following his internship in clinical psychology.

[00:03:15]He completed post-doal training at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and is currently professor emeritus at Florida State University.

[00:03:24]Prior to his tenure at Florida State University, he was director of Duke's gifted program. Dr. Dr. Feifer also served as clinical psychologist in the Navy and as a psychologist at Oxner Clinical and Medical Center in New Orleans. He has also served as director of Devo's Institute of Clinical Training and Research. He is the lead author of the gifted rating scales first and second edition and author of the book Essentials of Gifted Assessment. His most recent book Parenting from the Heart: Raising Resilient and Successful Smart Kids is now available. Now over to Dr. Feifer. Hello everyone and good afternoon. I am really quite delighted and honored to be here this afternoon to present this webinar for MHS on the topic of misconceptions and myths about highability children.

[00:04:15]This is um a really exciting topic I find for those of you either in the academic or clinical world who work with high ability children because we find that many practitioners and parents, educators, administrators still uh hold a number of misconceptions and myths about gifted children. So this is an opportunity for MHS in inviting me to present to share a few ideas about this really interesting topic. Let me say that um you will have access to a short essay, a paper that was recently published in the journal of gifted education and creativity on this very topic that um I was invited to pen an article on and then it appeared a little more than a year ago. So, the article goes into a little more detail than today's webinar on many of the topics that I'll be talking about as well as some topics that I might allude to, but we don't have the time or opportunity to get into in more detail. So, hopefully the webinar wets your appetite for this topic and the article that MHS is sharing provides you more more detail about it.

[00:05:44]Okay, here's how I've structured the webinar and hopefully this makes sense and hopefully you appreciate the way I've organized it. We only have about 4550 minutes for the presentation.

[00:05:59]So, I'm going to move kind of fast and I apologize if I go a little too fast on some topics that you might have particular interest in. But as I said, the handout article provides more detail on these topics.

[00:06:15]I'm going to be talking a little bit about my background and personal and professional history because it does impact um how I've come to view and work with and some of my writings and thinking on the gifted and talented student. So I'm going to start off here with this slide which shows the Oxner Clinic and Hospital in New Orleans. So early in my career I was recruited as a clinical psychologist in the child development center in the department of pediatrics at Ashner Clinic. It's a large tertiary tertiary care medical center and we would see literally hundreds of youngsters from birth through age 18 that came in for any number of neurodedevelopmental problems. So I was part of a multidisciplinary team uh that worked with pediatricians, developmental pediatricians and child neurologists and OTP speech and language experts and special educators in coming up with a educational plan for the youngsters that we saw at Oxner Hospital. and uh they came from really about 40 different states and maybe 30 different countries.

[00:07:41]So we saw children from really across the globe in my work uh at Ashner. This really predates my formal involvement working in the gifted and talented field. But it gives you a sense that my foundational experiences as a clinical psychologist was working in a department of pediatrics in a large tertiary care hospital.

[00:08:06]From Oxner Hospital, I had the great fortune of being recruited for the position of executive director of Duke University's gifted program, Duke TIP. I had uh completed my doctoral training nearby at University of North Carolina Capitol Hill and had done some practicum work at Duke Medical Center. So I was a known entity at Duke, but it was really a a great uh feather in my cap that uh a UNC alum was recruited for a position at Duke University.

[00:08:46]Great experience. Duke TIP was one of the leading centers providing research, consultation, educational services, parent education work for literally tens of thousands of high ability kids from the United States and globally. So it was it was a great experience and introduced me to the world of the gifted and talented.

[00:09:14]is a picture here of you can see on in the upper picture is um talking with two Duke tip we call them tipsters um they were 11 to 17 years old and would spend 2 to 3 weeks each summer taking um an advanced academic class and the bottom picture is just a picture of the beautiful uh bucolic Duke University from Duke I Um, I was recruited by Florida State University um to be a professor and I'll talk a little more about that in a second. This slide, however, um, talks a little about a incredibly uh, fortunate opportunity I had. I was invited by the governor to develop and co-direct a Florida Governor's School for Science and Space Technology.

[00:10:12]um the governor and legislature and putting forth a number of million dollars in in money to support this said, "Hey, we have Kennedy Space Center and NASA here in Florida, so let's focus the Florida Governor's School on Science and Space Technology." And I'll talk a little more about that in a few minutes, but it was a great opportunity to be part of developing um an academic a high-end academic program for high school students that we recruited from across Florida. It was based at Kennedy Space Center where kids came during the summer and spent three weeks working in research labs with NASA scientists at Florida State University. In addition to um my role as co-director of the Florida Governor's School, I was a professor and served as a clinical director of the clinical program at Florida State University.

[00:11:19]And as a typical academic professor in a research one university, I had to develop a research lab where masters and doctoral students conducted research. We published our work. We went to conferences and focused on high ability kits. This was really the time where I was able to develop a deeper understanding for some of the challenges that high ability kids and we'll talk about this a little later face. In the research lab, one of the things that um I focused on was how do we define success and how can we understand what increases the likelihood that these high ability kids are going to be successful. So I'll be talking a little more about that this afternoon. How do we operationalize what is success? What should the goals of gifted education programs be? In the research lab at Florida State, I ended up essentially focusing on social emotional skills, what we called social intelligence, looked at character, strengths, how do gifted kids flourish? A lot of my work over the next 20 years focused on what my doctoral students and I investigated during our time at the research lab.

[00:12:49]Also at this time, um, I worked on developing the revision and update of MHS's gifted rating scale, the GRS2. And I'll talk a little more about that as well. When I retired from Florida State University in 2019, I was very passionate about the work that we had accomplished at Duke and Florida State. So I transitioned into a role as a consultant and speaker and I've been busy in in those roles as consultant and speaker for the last six years. Um it's been my great joy. I've taken a number of my former students, a number of my postocs who've come to study with me both in the United States and postocs really from South America and Asia and Europe. um where we've consulted with gifted organizations. We've worked with school districts in how to best identify high ability kids, how to work with those kids who are not doing as well as their potential would suggest. In addition, I've had as a clinician an active clinical practice where I've seen um 10 to 12 gifted youngsters and their parents and families each week over the last seven, eight years. So, it's been a good rich experience building upon the academic experience I had at at Duke in Florida State University. And I apologize this is I always tend to include pictures of family members. So this is my daughter and grandson um in the country of North Carolina.

[00:14:32]Okay. So I said I was going to first talk a little about what we know about the gifted before I get into some of the myths and misconceptions the essence or core of today's talk. So what do we know about the gifted?

[00:14:47]Well, one of the things we do know is typically high ability kids, however we operationally define them, and we'll be talking about that in a couple minutes.

[00:14:57]However we define them, they're at least as well adjusted as any group of kids.

[00:15:04]Not better adjusted, but not less um well adjusted either.

[00:15:13]research indicates that they're no more socially vulnerable than any other group. So that's good news. Also, they're as well adjusted as any group and they're not a particularly vulnerable group.

[00:15:30]Third thing we know about the gifted youngster is there's a tendency towards developmental unevenness. sort of the peaks and valleys in their social, emotional, intellectual and academic domains. What we call asynchronies or asynchronous development by the very nature of their intellectual um development being advanced quite often, not always, but quite often other areas of their social, emotional, personal, physical development have not yet caught up with the intellectual. So we see asynchronies in many gifted youngsters. And I should point out um that I'm I have to be careful speaking in generalities and stereotypes because there's always exceptions to all these points. But in general, what we find is a considerable amount of asynchronous development among high ability youngsters.

[00:16:34]What we also know is that many, not all but many gifted children and adolescents wish desire to be like everyone else. So there's this temptation among some gifted youngsters, children and adolescents. In the research literature and in my clinical practice, I often see this. there's this temptation to mask or cover their abilities so they can fit in more with the peer group. This doesn't happen with all gifted youngsters, but it happens with some. So, it's important to point out that there is data, evidence, and my own experience that this does occur with some gifted children.

[00:17:18]What we also know is, and this is true in the United States as as well as internationally, the school environment, school classrooms and curriculum are often not well calibrated to meet their higher abilities.

[00:17:35]And this can create problems. Those of you who work with gifted and talented youngsters probably have experiences, firsthand experiences with the student that you're doing an evaluation or counseling or consulting with that the school environment, the classroom is just poorly calibrated. The curriculum um for their extraordinarily high abilities.

[00:18:00]What we also know about the social world of the gifted is that they're an incredibly diverse group. One of the myths, jumping ahead a little, but one of the myths in the gifted field is that all gifted kids are the same. This that's absolutely not correct. Um, in the research that our lab, a number of my doctoral students did as well as my own work and in my own experience anecdotally, we know that these kids vary tremendously in their interests, in their level of creativity, in their passion or motivation, their grit, in their level of self-confidence, temperament, social maturity. tremendous variance across many domains for gifted youngsters.

[00:18:50]What we also know about high ability children is that often times they have difficulties reconciling their desire to do well, their passion to achieve with affiliation conflicts, with wanting to fit in and not rock the boat, not uh grab all the attention. And this becomes a real challenge and I've talked to many many counselors and therapists and psychiatrists who work with high ability youngsters and see they see this in their clinical practice. It's not true for all gifted youngsters, but it is true for some because of their accelerated cognitive and academic status. Quite often they're bored in the classroom. And what we find is that many, not all, but many gifted youngsters have inappropriate ways of dealing with school boredom. And it's this gets them in trouble.

[00:19:51]This um alienates them further from their peer group. And sometimes this becomes a red flag for teachers in the classroom who start developing negative attitudes towards high ability or gifted students.

[00:20:08]So, school boredom is, as you might expect for for bright kids, a problem that occurs quite frequently.

[00:20:17]Okay. We also know, and there's been some research over the last 12 to 15 years that confirms this, that there's a purported higher than average incidence of introversion, over excitabilities.

[00:20:36]Drossk's work, the Polish psychiatrist talks about um heightened sensitivity and many many people who work with gifted youngsters see this not true for all but for many overexitability is a a picture a clinical picture for them.

[00:20:54]Negative perfectionism is another issue in the social world of the gifted.

[00:21:00]research has sort of um differentiated perfectionism and negative perfectionism from uh more normal perfectionism and quite often um gifted youngsters show signs of negative perfectionism.

[00:21:19]Power struggles is not uncommon among some gifted children both in the fa in the family and in the classroom.

[00:21:30]And there's been reports of existential depression among young adolescent gifted youngsters. So this is something also for those of us as educators and clinicians who work with high ability kids that we want to be tuned into. Is there evidence for depression, power struggles, negative perfectionism? These are things that can get in the way of their achieving their full potential.

[00:21:58]Continuing on in terms of what we know about the social world of the gifted, quite often they have difficulties meeting compatible peers. And as I'll talk about in about five minutes, um, as gifted become more and more bright, they have greater and greater difficulty meeting compatible peers. This was something that was very common and a common issue I heard at Duke University. when the Duke students, the the 16, the 15, the 14 year olds came to campus, they said, "Oh my god, for the first time, um, interacting with other kids who were just like me. They were just they go through schoolwork as quick as I do.

[00:22:46]They share the same interests that I do.

[00:22:48]I no longer feel like I'm really standing out." Um, so the issue of meeting compatible peers can be a real problem for gifted kids, particularly those who are at the highest levels.

[00:23:03]Too often youngsters are misdiagnosed or there's a misdiagnosis. So the two misdiagnosis or misdiagnosis and this fits in with a lecture I gave in fact for MHS a couple months ago on the gifted and the twice exceptional. The twice exceptional essentially are high ability kids who also have coexisting developmental neurodedevelopmental problems. many go undiagnosed.

[00:23:42]Another phenomena among some gifted youngsters are power power struggles with authority figures. So don't be surprised if you're doing an evaluation on a for a gifted youngster if they report power struggle struggles with authority figures. This is not true for each and every gifted youngster but for some it is a prominent issue in their social world.

[00:24:11]Also what we find is that teachers and parents and family members and siblings have unrealistically high expectations for them and this can be a burden for gifted youngsters as well.

[00:24:28]And finally, as I I mentioned in in this slide here, quite often what we find is their social judgment lags behind their intellectual abilities. So we want to be aware of that. They can act kind of goofy and silly and immature even though their intellectual prowess is way off the charts.

[00:24:50]Okay. So this now this slide transitions into the essence of today's webinar talking about a few myths and misconceptions about the gifted about high ability youngsters.

[00:25:08]One myth and this is a myth that I was exposed to during my doctoral training and many many of my students and postocs were exposed to this idea also is once gifted always gifted and we'll talk a little about that but that is a myth it's a misconception it's not necessarily true for all bright kids and I'll share some very interesting provocative and recent research was published just this past year with a huge sample of youngsters following high ability youngsters that discon um this myth that once gifted always gifted.

[00:25:55]The second related myth in the gifted world is that giftedness is really the same as high IQ and high IQ defines giftedness.

[00:26:06]There are many people who still believe this view, operate as if this view is true. But my own experience leads me to say no, that's not necessarily the truth. It's it's too narrow and limited a way to conceptualize what we mean by high ability kids, by giftedness.

[00:26:30]And that feeds into the third myth that a single test score can identify gifted students.

[00:26:38]And for years I've been struggling with this practice that gifted screening and identification is based on a short form IQ test that identifies whether a child is gifted or not. And I have argued over and over, if you're familiar with my publications, that it's bad practice to use one measure, one test, one scale to identify any condition in humans, including giftedness. So we shouldn't rely on a single test to identify what we mean by a gifted youngster.

[00:27:18]We need to be able to clearly conceptualize what do we mean by gifted so that when you seek parent permission authorization to test their daughter or son for gifted program you're able to succinctly say this is what my understanding of giftedness is and this is why I'm administering these tests and why I'm collecting samples of your daughter or son's schoolwork and why I'm doing this and that. So we need to be real clear on how we understand, how we conceptualize giftedness and then select a variety of measures, tests, scales to confirm or disisconfirm the hypothesis, are they gifted?

[00:28:01]A fourth misconception, and I write a lot about this, is that gifted is something that's real.

[00:28:09]It's no different than when we talk about a youngster who has specific learning disability or bipolar disorder or um diabetes or whatever it might be that it's every bit as real as that. But it's not. It's not.

[00:28:28]It is a useful social construct for sure. I would argue that it's a very important and useful social construct, but it's not something real like um depression or anxiety.

[00:28:45]I mentioned this large research study that was published just a few months ago. It's it's really an elegant an impressive study um in the journal of intelligence and cognitive abilities and a group of researchers analyzed the trajectories of over 11,000 kids they followed. These kids were tested at age 4, 7, 12, 16, and 21. And the data included a battery of cognitive and academic measures as well as social emotional measures, measures of family SCEs, family school engagement, important social and cultural constructs that contribute to success of a youngster.

[00:29:39]And the results were not surprising to those of us who've worked in the field, but to many others quite shocking that there were substantial shifts or fluctuations in the IQ scores of the kids that that were f followed, these 11,000 youngsters. We conducted in my research lab at at Duke 20 years ago a similar study following 110 youngsters and we found also that there were substantial shifts in the kids cognitive ability scores over a six-year period. So it was really uh affirming to see that Blanch at all found the same thing with 11,000 individuals.

[00:30:29]Their study also showed that a majority of those their sample did not maintain their relative status rank among the distribution of of of youngsters in their sample. What does this mean? It means that many of the kids who might have been classified as gifted at age 6, 7, 12 would no longer be classified as as gifted at age 16 or 21. And the reverse, many of the kids who were in the low average or average or high average range at age four or seven shifted to the high average and gifted range.

[00:31:07]So this is a a hugely significant study in confirming that um a trajectory of cognitive ability is not as stable as we once thought.

[00:31:22]Another myth in the gifted field is that gifted and talented youngsters and this goes beyond academically gifted in theater and dance in music in the performing arts and sports uh in almost all areas that we consider within the gifted and talented domain that they really need special mentoring, instructing, coaching to reach the highest levels of their god-given gifts.

[00:31:55]The myth in the field was they really don't need special help because they're so bright. But that is a misconception in the gifted field. They do need mentors and teachers with training and experience working with high ability kids. They need their parents to be given support so that they know how to work with their their gifted daughter or son. Another myth is that they're not aware that they're different. Absolutely not the case. And I've worked with literally hundreds, tens of hundreds of gifted youngsters. And they are aware that they're different. Not surprising really, those of us who are psychologists that they are aware of their skill level and competencies and how they match up to other kids. So they know they're different both in good ways and not so good social ways.

[00:32:47]For many years when I was in graduate school, uh we were taught that gifted kids enjoy being role models and examples for other kids. And in fact, they're they love being tutor helping slow learning kids.

[00:33:02]It's not necessarily true. What we found is that in fact many of them don't enjoy being pointed out as models and don't want to be tutors for kids in the classroom who are not doing well. So, it's important to remember this.

[00:33:18]And a myth is that they need to be pushed by parents if they're going to reach the highest levels of their god-given abilities. And I see this with a lot of youngsters I work with in Europe and Asia. Uh kids were getting tutored every afternoon, every evening, uh being really uh cooker pressure pushed to reach their highest potential and quite often this backfires and the kids um resist this level of of pushing. So we need to be careful in that regard as well.

[00:33:56]So, rounding out a few more myths about the gifted and talented, a popular myth is that their social and emotional maturity is at the same level as their intellectual ability.

[00:34:11]And there's no reason to believe that this is the case. But this has been a myth that's been around for the longest time. But it's not it's not necessarily true. And research that we've conducted at at Duke University and Florida State and published by other researchers confirms that their social emotional maturity may fall quite quite short of their level of intellectual and academic ability.

[00:34:39]There's been a belief in the field that they're easy to parent, that they're easy to educate, and this is not necessarily the case.

[00:34:48]Some gifted kids are they're very coachable. They love to get um coached and parented and and taught, but others resist.

[00:35:00]So, it's not necessarily true for all gifted youngsters.

[00:35:06]And the myth that they're no different from other kids. Well, they are in many ways. In many ways, they are different.

[00:35:15]This um this slide poignantly shows our view of the gifted and talented that there are at least four and some argue five different levels of giftedness when we look at the distribution of high ability kids. And again, we've done research with academic intellectual giftedness, but we've also looked at athletic giftedness and giftedness in music and theater.

[00:35:47]And what we what we find is consistently and reliably, we can discriminate at least four and sometimes five different levels of ability within the the gifted domain.

[00:35:59]And as you might expect, kids at different levels are different. So the kids at the level five are going to present socially, emotionally, academically very different than the kids at level two. Most of what was written about the gifted field going back to the early 20th century really looked at from this diagram here, level one and level two. the 117 to 135 IQ kids, but they vary much more. And this distribution isn't just on IQ. It can be on um those areas that differentiate gifted musicians and gifted artists and kids who are gifted in drama. So there are at least four and maybe five discernable levels of giftedness that we need to respect.

[00:37:00]This points out that when you view giftedness as I like to do from a talent development model, what we see is that there are five levels that one passes through to reach the highest levels of gimminant. When we talk about the the most imminent scientists, professors, researchers, um cardiovascular surgeons, teachers, politicians, whatever the domain or field is, what we find is people start out as novice or beginners and through education and experience, they move up to a level of competence. This is still not as I consider giftedness, but it's important. Certainly in my own field of clinical psychology to practice independently, you need to demonstrate at least minimal competence as a clinician. Doesn't mean that every clinician is gifted, but it does mean that for protection for society, they're at least minimally competent to practice independently.

[00:38:08]What one hopes they move on to is the next level, which I argue is the first level of giftedness, the level of being an expert or excellent in your field. You're no longer just competent, but you're demonstrating skills and competencies and a level of creativity and inventiveness where you're excellent.

[00:38:29]might be in surgery, it might be in theater, it might be in leading an orchestra, it might be in uh flying a jet.

[00:38:43]So there are differences between the fully competent pilot and the expert or excellent pilot. And in my writing, in our research, we tend to look at this as the first level of giftedness, the excellent or expert. But what we found is in studying kids that some move on to even a more elite status, higher than excellent. This is wonderful. This is a different kind of animal. Kids, whatever the field, that have moved from being excellent in what they're doing to a highly elite status.

[00:39:21]And finally, we've had the good fortune when we work with a large number of kids to see that there are a few who make it to the most imminent levels in that field. These are the highly gifted youngsters. And as I was talking about earlier, there are differences across these three to four levels of giftedness. The kids are different in personality, in social emotional behavior, in looking for peer group that they're comfortable with based on where they are on the talent development model.

[00:39:59]And finally, I'd like to conclude by talking about something that I think is an omission in the gifted field. And it's something that I've been writing a lot about and sort of led me to write my most recent book, a parenting book. Um and that is that in the gifted field my experience has been that there's been an overemphasis makes sense why but an overemphasis on the intellectual and academic development of high ability kids.

[00:40:36]Clearly an overemphasis on on that, but an almost total disregard for the soft skills that we used to talk about when we talked about working with the whole child, a disregard for the humanistic focus on students, including gifted and talented students.

[00:41:00]I um put together a pilot program on engineering for high school gifted high school students.

[00:41:10]Brought some top professors of engineering in uh to meet with me at Duke University. And what I found, these were brilliant uh professors of engineering, but they really resisted my encouragement to build into this pilot curriculum a focus on the humanistic soft skills that I think and I argue are important for every field, every domain. They just said there's not enough time to cover it. It's not quite as important, they would argue, as covering the academic and intellectual skills that one needs to develop in engineering. And there was a tension because I kept saying, but in everything that engineers do, they can think of their implications for other humans.

[00:41:59]So, this is something that I've been pushing in my writing that I've been encouraging when I consult with school districts. Let's not forget the what I call the heart strengths, the important things that go into civic thought, spiritual values, character development.

[00:42:18]How do gifted kids lead a flourishing life? It's not enough just to score really high on SAT or GRE or MCAT.

[00:42:30]What are the things that lead to development of levels of empathy and concern for others?

[00:42:37]What is it that goes into developing integrity and honesty among gifted youngsters?

[00:42:44]What about a respect for the environment in our planet? How can we encourage gifted youngsters to be thinking beyond just themselves and their academic and intellectual goals?

[00:42:57]These are things that I've been writing about and talking about that I think has been a a gross omission in many, not all, but many gifted and talented programs that I've observed here in the United States and as I've traveled around around the globe. So I hope that as you work with gifted and talented kids, you can consider how can we respect their heart strengths as well as their head strengths in furthering and optimizing their development.

[00:43:29]I want to thank you very much for your patience and listening to today's webinar. Here are some helpful resources if you want to dig a little deeper, drill down in terms of some of the topics that I talked about this afternoon. The handout um that MHS is providing to you is also, I think, rich with information if any of this material sparked your interest. And I wish you much success, much joy in working with high ability kids. They're a great population to work with and I think if you've worked with them, you know that they bring a lot of joy and satisfaction professionally uh to those of us who've dedicated our lives to education and child development.

[00:44:19]Have a great afternoon. It's been my pleasure talking with you today.

[00:44:24]>> Now on to our Q&A. Hi Dr. Feifer. So we have a few questions here. Um, the first question is, of the myths and misconceptions you shared today, is there one that you find yourself speaking about most often?

[00:44:41]>> That's a great question. Um, I really can't think of one that I would rank order as the top uh misconception or myth in the field.

[00:44:55]Um there's probably three or four that compete for that top position. But what I hear a lot particularly now as I give talks in Europe and in Asia is this notion that you only have to give one IQ test one time in the life of a child and uh that their status as a gifted youngster never ch changes. So you don't need to re-evaluate, re-examine or monitor how well they're doing. So that seems to be a a growing prevalent myth and issue I think uh among educators who work with high ability kids.

[00:45:39]>> Oh, okay. Great to um get that info. Um we have another question here from Jodie. She asks, "Um, I'm curious if there's any information on how to support students who have been told that they are gifted as adolescents, but may no longer be considered gifted and talented as they transition from high school to university, and they now have to work harder than they ever have. Um, they may not have the study skills that less gifted, less gifted students will have um learned um leading to significant discouragement during the initial stages of university. How do we support them?

[00:46:18]>> Wow, that's another fabulous question.

[00:46:20]Um, I'm not familiar with anything that's been published um specific to that unique issue that I could recommend sharing with practitioners who could share with parents and and high ability high school kids going off to college. But it it's a great question and I think it requires a sensitive knowledgeable school psychologist, school counselor working with parents and kids to prepare them for the challenges that come each time you change uh the environment, the school environment that you find yourself in. Um, so I I I just think it fits in with what I've been talking about that um changes occur in the lives of gifted kids and they need to be exposed to this sense of continuing to work very hard to achieve at a high level.

[00:47:22]>> Okay, thank you for that.

[00:47:25]Um, what assessments or intervention practices are you are in your opinion most helpful for uncovering both strengths and needs in two e-learners?

[00:47:37]>> Um, oh my gosh. Um, I completed a few months ago an actual webinar on the twice exceptional student and it's uh it would be a challenge in a minute or two to summarize uh that. I just think that we're learning more and more about the unique um challenges in understanding bright kids who also have a coexisting disability or exceptionality.

[00:48:09]And there's been a lot that's been published on the twice exceptional student that talks to how to provide support for their exceptionality, their uh disability while at the same time respecting and nurturing their gift. So, I would encourage um the person who asked that question to check out the literature because there's a lot of good um stuff that's coming out on the twice exceptional learner.

[00:48:44]>> Okay, thank you so much. Um we have a question about the interview that you shared. Um in the interview you shared you discussed giftedness as developmental rather than fixed. How does this reality shape reassessment practices over time?

[00:49:02]>> Well, I'm glad the person asked that question. In in my paperback book on gifted assessment, what in fact I recommend is that practitioners should consider getting into the practice of re-evaluating kids who are identified as gifted every two to three years. So it shouldn't be first grade, you found the child gifted, so you no longer have to monitor their progress, their performance, how they're doing in the classroom, how they're developing socially and emotionally. So, I encourage school psychologists that I work with to consider reassessing the youngster in the same way that you'd reassess a student who you identified as having one of the 12 or 13 uh categories of disability that is recognized by the US Department of Education. Um there's a lot that changes in the lives of all kids including high ability kids. So I think that 2 to threeyear reevaluation period um one can argue makes an awful lot of sense in gaining new information on the student so that we can make adjustments accommodations uh to them. The same is true I might add for a student who was recommended to be evaluated for gifted consideration but didn't quite um make the mark. I would encourage schools to consider re-evaluating that youngster in two to three years because what we find in our work and the research that I reported in my talk that there is shifts among kids who were identified as gifted no longer holding onto that category through 12 years of education but also kids initially who weren't found to fall into the gifted range who two or three years later do shift into the gifted range. So reassessment, re-evaluation, I think makes an awful lot of sense for gifted and talented students as it does for all the dis um disabilities exceptionalities that we work with in the schools.

[00:51:07]>> Okay, thank you so much. Um, somebody is asking there's a lot of literature available but which are the most helpful books or articles that every teacher should read before teaching gifted class of students?

[00:51:24]Well, I I I hope uh a teacher and educator has at had at least one class where they've been exposed to special education exceptionalities and within that class they had at least a couple weeks readings on the gifted and talented youngster. Um and most of the special ed handbooks do cover have a couple of chapters on the gifted and talented. So I think it it exists in most of the standard um handbooks of special education. Um a few of my books have focused specifically on the high ability student. So, I'd encourage someone to take a look at uh what I've published um on the gifted learner. Um and NAGC is the national organization that uh encompasses all educators and parents who are interested in high ability youngsters and they have recommendations for readings, articles and books on the high ability student that is easy to access. Many of these are free. uh and I would encourage um the person to check with NAGC about recommended articles and books as well.

[00:52:48]>> Thank you so much. That's that's great.

[00:52:51]Um that does uh take us to the end of our webinar today. So, thank you again Dr. Feifer for that informative presentation. I'd also like to thank all of our attendees who joined us today. If we didn't get to your question in this webinar, please send us an email at [email protected] and we'll forward your questions along to Dr. Feifer or a member of our staff.

[00:53:14]As a reminder, um you will receive a copy of the webinar recording in a few weeks. Thank you so much.