School Attitudes

Gifted and talented students grow up in a world of mixed messages where their gifted behavior is both expected, yet often, unaccepted. It's no wonder there is still a great mystery about why the attitudes of gifted and talented students differ. Much of the conflict gifted students experience in schools is a consequence of their advanced developmental rate and the emergence of more complex abilities and interests, which causes them to be “different” from the “expected” behavior of non-gifted students of the same age. Questions such as, “Why does one gifted and talented student achieve and flourish in most traditional educational settings, and yet another not?” remain unanswered. Sometimes educators encourage their students to be creative and show what they know, but other times such ...