Every Child’s Right: Academic Talent Development by Choice, Not Chance PDF
Preview Every Child’s Right: Academic Talent Development by Choice, Not Chance
Every Child’s Right Every Child’s Right ACADEMIC TALENT DEVELOPMENT BY CHOICE, NOT CHANCE Lauren A. Sosniak and Nina Hersch Gabelko Teachers College, Columbia University New York and London To Frankie Temple Assistant Dean, University of California–Berkeley, Graduate School of Education The Academic Talent Development Program would not have started, and could not have persisted, without her. Published by Teachers College Press, 1234 Amsterdam Avenue, New York, NY 10027 Copyright © 2008 by Teachers College, Columbia University All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, or any informa- tion storage and retrieval system, without permission from the publisher. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Sosniak, Lauren A. Every child’s right : academic talent development by choice, not chance / Lauren A. Sosniak and Nina Hersch Gabelko. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-8077-4870-1 (pbk : alk. paper) — ISBN 978-0-8077-4871-8 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Gifted children—Education. 2. Gifted children—Identification. 3. Academic achievement. I. Gabelko, Nina Hersch, 1942– II. Title. LC3993.S59 2008 371.95—dc22 2007045115 ISBN: 978-0-8077-4870-1 (paper) ISBN: 978-0-8077-4871-8 (cloth) Printed on acid-free paper Manufactured in the United States of America 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 ✺ Contents Preface ix Acknowledgments xi Introduction 1 1 Grow Talent, Don’t Mine It 8 What’s Talent? Who’s Talented? 8 Is She Gifted? Is He Talented? Who Studies It? Who Cares? 10 It’s Less About Differences in Kind, More About Speed or Amount 10 What Comes of Searches to Measure “It”? 14 Looking for Talent in the Wrong Places or at the Wrong Times 16 More Dynamic Ways of Thinking About Talent and Its Development 18 The Shift from Innate Characteristic to Alterable Variable 19 Here’s Where Our Conversation Starts: The Academic Talent Development Program 22 The Do-It-Yourself Gifted Program 25 Nearly Twenty Years as ATDP: So What Have We Learned? 26 2 Welcome to the Academic Conversation! 29 One More Advantage for Some; for Others, It’s Much More Significant 30 Welcome to the Academic Club! 30 Traditions from the First Meeting Set the Tone 31 What Brings You Here Today? A Volkswagen Phaeton 32 The Academic Conversation and the Work Begin Immediately 33 There’s Always More Happening Than Meets an Uninformed Eye 39 Your Ideas Not Only Count, They Inform Others 41 Who Joins the Club? Who Lives in the ATDP Community? 41 v vi Contents A Brief History: From Mining Talent to Growing It 43 Becoming ATDP 44 Development Isn’t Only for Students; It’s for Programs, Too 46 ATDP Is Not Small, but It’s Very Personal 47 The Good News Is That Even Good Things Change and Evolve 48 Especially “Sticky,” Virtually Speaking 49 3 When Learning Is Child’s Play 52 While Figuring Things Out, Changes Begin 52 Finding a Home and Consolidating Lessons Learned 54 Inviting Young Students Into the Academic Community 54 Play: The Best Way to Accrue Intellectual Capital 57 Evoking Curiosity, Inspiring Persistence 63 Elementary and Secondary Divisions: Two Approaches Toward One Goal 65 Exploration and Purposeful Learning Aren’t Just for Kids: Inviting Novice Teachers into the Conversation 71 4 Every Child’s Right: Academic Talent Development in All Communities and Classrooms 76 Starting with Things as They Are 76 Just a Little Deconstruction 81 Putting Things Together: It’s All About Context 94 5 Changing College-Going from Chance to Choice 100 It Still Helps (a Lot) if Your Parents Are College Grads 100 We Knew We Had to Go to College; We Just Didn’t Know What College Was 102 While Things Are Good for Some as Is, They Don’t Improve on Their Own 107 A Sense of Belonging and an Actual Place to Belong 108 Rituals, Traditions, and Symbols to Convey the Spirit and Purpose of ATDP 109 Learning the Steps That Change Chance to Choice 111 Rituals and Traditions for Teachers Who Play Expanded Roles 114 It’s More Than an Image of College; It’s a Way of Conducting Business 116 ATDP Is Like College, Except When It’s Not 118 It’s Not Just a Sense of Place; It’s a Sense of My Place 122 Contents vii 6 The Gift of Community and the Community of Gifts 125 Those Who Choose to Return to the Community, and Those Who Choose to Remain in It 126 Would You Like to Return? Would You Recommend the Class to a Friend? 129 If Responses Are So Similar, Can Students’ Backgrounds Really Be That Different? 133 A Community of Gifts, Gladly Shared 134 Membership Has Benefits Not Available to Visitors 136 The Students Voted with Their Feet; What Did They and Their District Say? 137 Gift of Community, Community of Gifts: Belonging, Creating, Conferring on Others 139 Even with the Best Intentions, Schools Can’t Do It All 144 Please Consider the 91% Solution: Rich Learning, Inside and Outside of Classrooms 145 References 149 Index 157 About the Authors 164 ✺ Preface Lauren, an Appreciation At the Academic Talent Development Program (ATDP) Lauren A. Sosniak was known as the “Maven.” She was so named by Lloyd Nebres because she really was one. She had started her academic career working with Benjamin Bloom on the landmark Development of Talent study, and she carried forward the passion she developed for studying ways to de- velop talent in all children and youth. Of course, in her work with ATDP, she was ever the ideal researcher and academician. The ethical stands she took and the careful attention she paid to every detail assured that her research was always to a standard that outstripped by a mile the demands of any institutional review board and was warmly received by a wide com- munity of readers. Lauren wore the ATDP maven crown. Actually, it’s an old paper Burger King crown that says Latin Verbs on one side and Maven on the other— waste not, want not. And actually she didn’t wear it voluntarily; we would put it on her head when we sought her council. She didn’t like it much, but the rest of us thought it terribly funny and we tried to make her hold court. She refused, and instead took people out to lunch for deep conversations. That did look like she was holding court, but always a democratic one. Offhand, I can’t think of an area in which she had not read widely and to which she could not add interesting insights. We’d listen in awe as she switched topics when she chatted with different people, moving effortlessly from the stock market, to the accomplishments of Lance Armstrong, to any facet of politics. She loved music—classical, popular, and liturgical. Folks who otherwise try hard to avoid meetings would always check first to see if Lauren would be present, before they’d decide to cut. If she was there, so were they. Over the years, her contributions to ATDP fac- ulty meetings—even the ones where she intended to be a fly-on-the-wall notetaker—created opportunities for teachers to become aware that the things they were doing were both extraordinary and acknowledged by people they respected. Lauren could put seemingly unrelated or even incom- patible points of view and ideas together in unique ways that encouraged ix
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