Introduction
Hello! I’m Darren Charlton and I have completed this blog as part of the class EPSE 408 – Educational Programming for Highly Able Learners. It looks at the impact freedom or lack of freedom has on the learning of gifted students in the classroom. If you are a teacher, parent, student, or random web surfer, I hope you find something that triggers your thinking about the role of freedom in learning.
In the shoes of a gifted learner…
A pig in shoes. Retrieved from http://www.suradiolive.net/cute-animals-in-shoes/cute_animals_02/
Have you ever placed yourself in the shoes of a gifted child in an uninspiring classroom? Imagine you are sat your desk, going through a generic textbook, answering questions etc…; are you learning anything here? Are you excited, engaged, or bored? Perhaps you have focused on the bulletin boards that are curling the corner and using that image to transport yourself to an altogether more interesting place.
You may have been a gifted students. How did you find school? Were you challenged? Or did you feel chained? Was your creative bird caged, unable to fly to a whole new world of learning?
This blog looks at the importance of providing freedom in the classroom for gifted students. Let’s commence with a provocation. Go to the menu and click the “Provocation” link and see what Roger Waters from Pink Floyd has to say about his own school experiences….
Goals
VanTassel-Baska and Wood (2010) discussed the importance of gifted students creating their own goals. Indeed, to grow as a teacher, I believe that professional goals and goals for my students are essential; having targets directs the drive required to continually improve practice. Therefore, for most of the pages on my blog, I have included a professional goal and a goal for my students. EPSE 408 has helped me place myself in the shoes of gifted learners; Goals will help embed my learning in my practice.
Professional Goal: Read ‘too clever BY HALF’ by Carrie Winstanley.
Goal for Students: Students will express their opinions about activities provided in an appropriate way.
Critical Questions
Mirman (2003) discussed the need to captivate and challenge gifted students with critical questions. I have therefore placed a critical question at the bottom of each page in the hope that it fosters your own thinking about the issues discussed.
Question: What drives people to place something/someone in a cage?