Encouraging Young Learners

1
Encouraging Young Learners

• Dr. Richard Cash
• District Coordinator of
• Gifted and Talented Programs

2
Typical Characteristics of Bright Children

• What parents can do
• Read to/with your child
• Allow children to play naturally
• Expose children to various cultural, artistic,
  sporting events
• Laugh everyday with your child
• Provide resources that stimulate wonder and
  questions

• Unusually large vocabulary for age
• Ability to read earlier than age mates
• Greater comprehension of the subtleties of
  language
• Ability to learn/acquire skills more quickly
  with less practice
• Wide range of interests
• Unusual sense of humor
• Interested in experimenting and doing things
  differently
• Shows less patience with routine procedures and
  drills

3
Typical Characteristics of Bright Children

• What parents can do
• Take trips to museums, the zoo, the library,
  amusement parks, live theater, nature centers,
  etc
• Visit science labs, auto body shops, woodworking
  studios, etc
• Provide choices and options
• Provide a nutritious diet and healthy sleep

• Ability to retain a great deal of information
• Possesses a sense of wonder
• Highly developed curiosity and limitless supply
  of questions
• Longer attentions span, persistence and intense
  concentration
• Tendency to put ideas or things together in ways
  that are unusual and not obvious
• Self-initiating needs little help in knowing
  what to do pursues individual interests seeks
  own direction

4
Typical Characteristics of Bright Children

• What Parents can do
• Enroll child in theater or creative dramatic
  classes
• Plan trips using maps, globes, atlases, internet
  sites
• Provide a supportive home environment that
  infuses a strong value system
• Allow child to solve problems
• Let child play with artistic, musical, athletic
  materials

• Reveals originality in oral and other forms of
  expression (i.e. music, dance, drama, drawing,
  playing)
• Generates alternatives or suggests several
  directions exhibits flexible thinking
• Visualizes relationships from disparate data or
  concepts
• Perceptually open to environment employs all
  senses in new/unfamiliar settings
• Thrives in problem situations selects more
  difficult tasks
• Uses imagination
• Elaborates well
• Possesses a high degree of common sense

5
Developing a Childs Creativity

• Creative Thinking
• The ability to solve problems or find solutions
  by thinking outside the box. There is no
  decisive definition of creativity, but we know it
  when we see it. As our world changes more
  rapidly each year, our children must be provided
  with the skills to develop their own creativity
  and creative thinking abilities.

6
Developing a Childs Creativity

• Fluency
• The ability to generate many ideas.
• This skill requires children to tell what they
  know either through speaking, drawing, writing or
  acting.

7
Developing a Childs Creativity

• Flexibility
• The ability to generate a wide range of ideas.
• Thinking of things in different ways helps
  children build perspectives they may overlook
  when trying to solve complex problems.

8
Developing a Childs Creativity

• Originality
• The ability to create unique, unusual and not
  thought of ideas.
• Development of this skill is an essential
  component of higher-level learning.

9
Developing a Childs Creativity

• Elaboration
• The process of providing extensive and extended
  details.
• When a child is pushed to color in all the
  spaces they will develop a more holistic sense
  for solution building.

10
Resources

• Bloomington Public Schools, Gifted and Talented
  Department
• www.bloomington.k12.mn.us
• Minnesota Council for Gifted and Talented
• 5701 Normandale Rd., Suite 345, Edina, MN
  55424 www.mcgt.net
• Minnesota Educators of the Gifted and
  Talented 1358 140th Ave NW Andover, MN
  55304
• www.megt.net
• Gifted Development Center www.gifteddevelopment.
  com
• National Association for Gifted Children
  www.nagc.org
• Free Spirit Publishing www.freespirit.com