by Joanna Fletcher

Created on: February 20, 2010   Last Updated: July 22, 2010

Gifted children are rarely served by the regular school curriculum. Their thirst for knowledge is simply too strong. A combination of skipping grades or subject acceleration is usually necessary, sometimes in combination with extra help for learning disabilities. There are some children who are “globally gifted”, but most show a range of skill in different areas.

Gifted children need the opportunity to socialize and develop with close age peers who are also highly gifted. This is why magnet schools and programs can be so helpful, as it allows them to meet and mix with people who think more like they do. Each gifted child needs an individual education plan that is continuously reviewed to keep pace with their rapid development and changing focus.

High IQ children are not just normal children who learn faster and learn more. They have a completely different experience of life, in ways that are very difficult to explain without metaphor. To attempt a comparison, if most children are red, beautiful and highly various shades of red, then gifted children are the entire rainbow.They are so various that it is extremely difficult to make generalizations about them, or make recommendations that are globally applicable. Most researchers agree that gifted people are open to more stimuli than the average person. They are just more sensitive to the world around them, and the world inside them, than the average person.

The idea that gifted children need to be held back to develop social skills is incorrect. No matter what school class or age group they find themselves in, gifted children who are not socially gifted will not "fit in" anyway. Their abilities, interests, emotional life, and even their vocabulary is not the same as their age peers and may not be the same as any group outside of their areas of expertise.

Gifted children by definition are outside of the norm. We should never forget that schools are designed to cater to a narrow band of the population that happens to include the majority, mainly those whose IQs fall between 95 and 125. No one questions the need for services whose IQs are low, because they cannot cope with the mainstream program. We should not question the need for differentiated program for those whose IQs are high.

When gifted children are not treated as individuals with personal educational needs, they will adapt, with varying degrees of success. A great opportunity to acknowledge and support their special gifts and unique sensitivities exists in the school system. When this most precious and alive side of them is denied, ridiculed, or simply ignored, as happens so often, they may struggle with their giftedness for the rest of their lives.

More than one gifted child whose needs have been continually denied becomes seriously mentally ill. Giftedness does not disappear once they turn 18 but there is even less research and help for gifted adults, and many have taken their own lives. The need for sensitive and continuously funded gifted programming in schools will continue as long as the school system exists in its present form.

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