How to Prepare Your Child for the Admissions Process of a Gifted School

You know what gets your gifted child excited. You know that they possess a vast library of information related to their subjects of interest, but that doesn't mean that your child can confidently discus their strengths and weaknesses to a stranger. While you have seen proof of their brilliance time and again, that doesn't mean that they have the personal skills to display that brilliance for gifted school staff.

For starters, understand that not all gifted schools will sit your child down for a formal interview. They may allow your child to come into the school to shadow other students, or they may ask your child questions while interviewing your family as one unit. In one way or another, a gifted school is going to study your child's behavior and engage them in direct conversation in an effort to learn about their personality, their personal interests, and their ability to learn at an accelerated pace.

There are three things that you can do to prepare your child for these situations:

1. Help your child recognize their strengths and weaknesses. Many parents focus exclusively on their child's strengths and ignore their weaknesses, but that isn't the best approach if you want your child to enter the gifted school admissions process with maximum confidence. Help them identify past accomplishments so that they can use those achievements as proof of their strengths while conversing with teachers and administrators at the school.

Then discuss ways in which other students may outshine your child. This isn't always an academic weakness. For instance, some children are quieter than others and may not naturally stand out in a group interview or on a shadow day. If your child is aware of potential shortcomings, they can think of ways to highlight their strengths during the interview process. School administrators or recruiters may also see that your child is self-aware and willing to improve upon weaknesses rather than ignoring or hiding them.

2. Present this as a positive opportunity that your child should get excited about experiencing. Rather than telling your child that they must make a good impression or that their admittance to the school rests on this interview or school visit, tell them that the gifted school is impressed with their application and wants to meet them in person. This will ease your child's anxiety and prevent them from overthinking their answers to questions. You want their true personality to shine, and that is more likely to happen if they aren't stressed out over every word that they speak.

3. Introduce your child to the gifted school before the interview or visit. Your child should walk into the school excited about the academic and creative programs that match their personal interests. It's best to find other children who have visited or attended the school so that your child has more information, but at least go through the school's website and all materials that they have provided prior to the interview. If your child is excited about the school, representatives of the school are more likely to get excited about your child.

You never know what questions a recruiter or teacher may ask, and you don't want your child to practice their answers excessively. Gifted school representatives want to see your child's authentic personality, and they want to hear sincere responses rather than rehearsed lines. If you send your child in with a smile on their face and confidence in their abilities, you've done your job.

Signs You Have a Gifted Learner

Children learn at different rates. Whether they need extra help or additional challenges, adapting a curriculum to their level is the best way to keep them engaged and learning to the best of their abilities. Gifted learners often suffer from boredom and frustration in traditional classes, which can lead to underperformance and disruptive behavior. Keep an eye on these signs, and you just may help a child find a quality education.

Language Skills

Kids who pick up on new vocabulary, take strongly to reading, learn to talk early and otherwise express themselves with striking efficiency are often gifted. You can further test this by pushing them in conversation and vocabulary. If you have any doubts, a certified test can let you know for certain.

Tough Questions

Children who learn quickly usually enjoy it. This may lead them to ask deeper and more specific questions about what they see and hear and how things work. If you struggle to keep up with their inquisitive nature, then you are seeing a telltale sign that they are an exceptional learner.

Direction Following

Another key indicator is when a child can follow very specific or multi-step directions without struggling. Advanced learners are often able to organize information in their minds, making it easier to keep track of multiple things and keep to an instructed order.

Self Teaching

In some cases, advanced learning can make the process fun for children. Those who have exceptional abilities of understanding will often explore explanations on their own. While this may come in the form of questions, it can also lead to reading informative literature and even attempting learning based experiments.

There are many more signs a child could be a gifted learner. Talk to their educators and seek a professional opinion. The sooner you assess their capacity, the better they will be able to master their education and secure a bright future.

Testing Your Gifted Child

Having a gifted child means considering the best academic course of action to take in order to provide him or her with the tools they need to encourage further growth. The purpose of gifted schools is primarily to do just that, and to ensure that gifted children continually learn new things that standard schools may neglect. Many parents suspect that their child is gifted, and one way to confirm this theory is by having your child tested. Here are some of the characteristics often associated with gifted children:

·         Advanced academic ability: ability to memorize quickly, special interests and expertise in a certain subject.

·         Creative thinking: ability to think independently, cultivate originality in written and oral assignments.

·         Leadership: often assumes responsibility for peers, sets goals, strong sense of self-expression.

·         Visual perception: observant and possesses strong sense of spatial relationships.

The Specifics of Testing

If the above characteristics apply to your child, the next step is to have him or her undergo educational testing, as recommended by the National Association for Gifted Children. Testing includes intelligence quotient (IQ) and cognitive abilities. Here are some of the tests accepted by most programs for gifted children:

·         Stanford Binet

·         Wescher Intelligence Scale for Children

·         Woodcock Johnson

·         CogAT

·         OLSAT

·         Hemmon-Nelson

·         Ravens Progressive Matrices

Once you have received the scores from the testing center, you can make an informed decision about whether or not you wish to send your child to a program specially designed for gifted children. Getting in touch with a school is often the first step in familiarizing yourself with the program.

Finding the Right Program

If you believe your child may be gifted, you might consider sending him or her to a school that caters to their individualized needs.  As is the case for all enrolled in an education program, is important for gifted children to be in an environment that cultivates learning at a level that matches and challenges their abilities.