Characteristics of an Intellectually Gifted Student

Characteristics of an Intellectually
Gifted Student
(Discussion)

Prepared by:
Babas, Quinea
Bacani, Rosalinda
Bacog, Minerva
Balangan, Arianne
Balas, Richelle
Barino, Hazael

HUMSS 12 C

September 10, 2018

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Characteristics of an Intellectually Gifted Student

There are certain characteristics that can already be seen at a very young age. Students

who can competently read and write at the age of 7 are presumed as “gifted” most of the time

however they are just being obedient students who studies hard and work well. This leads to an

assumption that these types of students are already qualified to have good academic results.

Good verbal communication skills, active and also attractive, these types of presumptions lead to

a belief that the intellectual performances are said to be the common characteristics of an

Intellectually Gifted student. However, there is still a huge gap between “good student” and

“Gifted” wherein psychologically, their behaviors and attitudes towards school differs. For an

Intellectually Gifted student, they are generally deemed as a difficult child. It is hard for them to

blend into a group of people since they do not want to be noticed for being too bright. These

students are considered as lazy, disorganized, disturbing or a “daydreamer” by their teachers and

can be heavily observed as to having no interest in class discussions. Even so, these children

dislike the fact that they are either denied, rejected or ignore for being “too bright” for an average

student. This can result to a teacher, who faces this kind of challenge from an Intellectually

Gifted student, to disregard their capability of doing tons of activities that can be an advantage

for both students and teachers by saying that it is the giftedness’ duty to adapt to an average kind

of atmosphere. This type of perception should be given a solution so that gifted students would

feel more comfortable for being what and who they are ("Swiss Association for Gifted Children",

2010).

Moreover, according to Greene, a physicist, he expressed his idea about intellectual

giftedness by believing that intelligence is the ability to take information from the world and to

find patterns in that information to allow you to organize your prospection and understand the

external world. Being intelligent is one of the abilities where gifted people learn by their own

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Characteristics of an Intellectually Gifted Student

discoveries they can learn easily and excel in some outstanding way. Furthermore, Giftedness is

an advance cognitive ability to create inner experience, wherein they are curious in everything

about what they see and what they hear and in order for them to know they will seek for the

answers through studying And when they failed to resolve the problems they encountered they

immediately think of themselves as a failure.

Students who are Intellectually Gifted must be given the appropriate curriculum that is

relevant to their learning capabilities. The Tennessee Department of Education defined an

intellectually gifted child as, “A child whose intellectual abilities and potential for achievement

are so outstanding that special provisions are required to meet the child’s educational needs,”

(State Department of Education, Division of Special Education, 2003, p. 2). A student who is

intellectually gifted does not fit in a traditional classroom wherein that gifted student is being

surrounded by average or below average students in which the intellectually gifted student

eagerly awaits for his classmates to catch up with the lesson he already masters. For the gifted

student, it is not effective for him to gain more knowledge that he should be acquiring comparing

it to the average students.

In addition to that, according to the Department of Education in the United States of

America, an Intellectually gifted person is a child whose potential for achievement are so

outstanding that special provisions are required to meet the child’s educational needs. It was

stated that the equality of opportunity demands that each child, must be given the type of

education which is best for them to be able to meet the needs of the students. Schools should

provide an educational program for gifted students in order for them to develop and enhance

their intelligence. This will also provide the chance for the gifted ones to interact with other

gifted students with similar interests and personalities.

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Characteristics of an Intellectually Gifted Student

Due to that case, some of the universities in United States of America like the University

of Iowa, University of Northern Colorado and University of Connecticut have a specialized

education program designed for gifted and talented students to satisfy their needs and benefits as

a student. Cortona Academy is one of the homes for Gifted and Talented students, making sure

each student in their Academy reaches their full potential quoting, “Giftedness at Cortona

Academy equals reaching ultimate potential.” They answer questions that would encourage

gifted students to enter a specific school for them. There are two important components that are

focused on the wellness of a student, (1) Assess the child’s emotional well-being. How happy is

the child in classes, in school, and with friends? (2) Makes sure that there are no pressure coming

from the teachers. These are important elements to consider when we think about gifted students

(“Gifted & Talented Students at Cortona Academy”,n.d). Meanwhile here in the Philippines, the

Headway School for Giftedness (HSG), located in Quezon City, is the only educational

institution in the country that focuses primarily on gifted children. The curriculum of the school

strikes a balance between science and arts, taking inspiration from Philippine Science High

School and Philippine High School for the Arts over which some of the intellectually gifted

students are interested in. On the other hand, James Bishop, a professor in the Health Physical

Education Department at Texas State University, defined intellectually gifted child that “The

field of gifted education, though, views high ability more broadly than just one’s IQ score

(National Association for Gifted Children, 2010), including other domains such as specific

academic ability, music, creativity, and leadership.” So being an intellectually gifted student does

not mostly focuses on having an above average IQ but rather exercising some additional abilities

and characteristics that makes them capable of outstanding performances.

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Characteristics of an Intellectually Gifted Student

Educators must also be responsible for guiding an intellectually gifted student because of

their difficulties with peer relationship, prefer to study independently rather than in mixed ability

groups and dislikes being responsible for the learning achievements of his/her classmates. Yet

parents must also advocate their gifted child to sharpen their skills.

Johnsen a professor of Baylor University in Department of Psychology, expresses her

idea about the Definition and Characteristics of Gifted students, wherein she defines the term

"gifted" and "talented" is used to respect students,childrens,or youth means students,children,or

youth who give evidence of high performance capability in areas such as

intellectual,creative,artistic,or leadership capacity, or in specific academic fields, and who

require services or activities not ordinarily provided by schools in order to fully develop such

capabilities.” (Johnsen,n.d). The term gifted and talented are words to appreciate and describe a

student who perform an extraordinary credentials which makes them different, when compared

to others of the same age and status especially in aspects of cognitive, creativeness, artistic,

leadership, and excel in academic field. Gifted students are defined developmentally advance in

language and thought. (“Characteristics of Gifted Students”, n.d). They surely enjoy verbal

languages and communications and desires to satisfy their curiosity about certain things because

they feel that they are restricted in analyzing the problem on its allotted time and acquire them to

know everything which school could not provide for them. This could result in, students who are

Gifted could easily got bored and do unrelated stuff in school but also can build and enhance

their competency.

Furthermore, their competency can sometimes be misunderstood as being a perfectionist

based from a study conducted by Glenna Pruett (2004) entitled “Intellectually Gifted Students’

Perceptions of Personal Goals and Work Habits”. Competition can sometimes lead to the

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Characteristics of an Intellectually Gifted Student

eagerness of students to achieve high grades and quality work. They can easily be read as

perfectionists however, it is ruled that it can be negatively astounding as it forces students the

need to achieve high grades at all costs and to be better than anyone. It then results to unhealthy

relationship with the other students that are not included in the above- average category. Most of

the gifted students are commonly known to have this kind of personality that drives them to

compete with anyone that is in their way. Hence, having enough knowledge on the different

characteristics of Intellectually Gifted students can be a great way of providing their necessary

needs basing it from different factors that affects them the way they act or behave. It is all about

improving ones condition and contributing to their above-average mental capabilities.