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Home | Assessing the Educational and Social Needs of a Gifted Child

Assessing the Educational and Social Needs of a Gifted Child

Gifted child at schoolWe all think our kids are brilliant (well, most of us do, anyhow), but how can you tell if a child is really gifted? What do you look for, and how do you assess their needs?

We posed this question to the staff and parents at the Dunham Academy, Marin's independent school for gifted children in grades K through 8. One of the first things that comes to mind for many people when they hear the phrase “gifted student” is the straight-A student who effortlessly excels at everything he/she does. The common misconception is that if a child is smart, he or she will just sit and do schoolwork quickly without much supervision; after all, everything comes easy and the student will eventually have his or her pick of Ivy League Universities, right?

Not so, according to Dunham academy. The truth is that school is a veritable minefield for gifted students trying to fit in with both teachers and other students. These students need a great deal of support and understanding and are very much “at risk.” Highly intelligent students are often not property identified. Gifted students:

  • Master ideas and learn quickly
  • Have a strong need for constant mental stimulation
  • Have intense interest in certain subjects
  • Have keen powers of observation and great intellectual curiosity

But at the same time, they:

  • Have heightened sensitivity
  • May be bored quickly
  • May resist doing work they find to be simplistic or repetitive
  • May be hiding abilities in order to fit in

Research shows that not having meeting the needs of gifted children can lead to underachievement, or even dropping out of school entirely. The best way to connect with these students is to meet their intellectual needs. Currently, our school system places students according to their age rather than their educational abilities. Gifted students are better matched with their cognitive peers rather than age peers—other students who think like them and who understand them. Once they feel understood, they will be more opened to understanding others.

While there are gifted programs like GATE (Gifted and Talented Education), many of them have been reduced or eliminated with the recent budget cuts. According to the San Francisco Chronicle, while $8 billion in federal funding has been granted to help the country’s lowest performing schools, only $7 million has been set aside for GATE programs, or approximately $140,000 for each of the 50 states. The California Department of Education estimates that there are 480,000 public school students identified as gifted in the state, so this comes out to about 29 cents per student.

If your child fits the above profile, perhaps a dedicated school for gifted children is the right choice for his or her education. For the last 13 years, Dunham Academy has been able to serve some of the Bay Area’s brightest K through 8 students by meeting both their educational needs and their social and emotional needs. Dunham academy is based in San Rafael, on the Saint Vincent's campus in Marinwood. Students come from both Marin and around the Bay Area, with some students commuting from as far away as American Canyon, Berkeley, and San Francisco. The independent, co-educaitonal school offers small class sizes and year-round schooling, and students end up ready to move on to any high school, prepared to succeed both academically and socially.

For more information on Dunham Academy, and to learn more about giftedness in children, visit www.dunhamacademy.com. You can contact them by phone at (415) 491-4700. The school is located at 1 Saint Vincents Drive, off Highway 101 in San Rafael's Marinwood area, just south of Novato.