When I interviewed for the eTAG Specialist position, I was asked the question, “How has your most recent job prepared you for this role?” My job at that time was an interventionist in Round Rock ISD. On the surface of it, it seems that the two roles are worlds apart. TAG specialists work with students who are academically often high above their peers, while an interventionist usually works with students who struggle to meet the minimum standards. I answered immediately, “The two roles are 95% the same job.” Their faces of the committee said, “We’re going to need you to explain that statement!”
What makes the two jobs different is in the previous experiences of the students. Children in intervention groups have experience in not grasping the material quickly, while gifted students rarely have that problem. How, then, can the two groups be so similar?
Gifted students often identify themselves by their ability to perform in class (as do intervention students). Both students are used to being associated with certain labels, and these labels then become definitions of themselves. This can lead to eerily similar issues when working with both groups in an academic setting. My intervention students, for example, generally disliked a challenge. For them, it was just more proof that they were not ready or not capable. And my gifted students? These were the ones whose parents assured me that they loved challenges and needed them. But a funny thing happened on the way to the challenge. For many of my students, TAG class was the first time that they had been truly challenged in an academic way. Yes, they were challenged by difficult video games or fun enrichment scenarios where they were to build something new and different. Those were great challenges! Instead of those, though, Ms. Risinger introduced unfamiliar ideas such as the “order of operations” or “negative numbers,” all coming with a set of new rules they’d never seen before. For years, the gifted students had picked up concepts quickly (or had often known them previously), but now instead there is confusion and uncertainty. The gifted mind rebels! “Confusion and uncertainty are not my labels!” the gifted brain cries. I hear grumbling, stress, and just a bit of panic in their voices. “I don’t get it! I don’t understand!” I assure them that we’ve seen the new topic for all of ten minutes, and that they will absolutely get it if they will just hang in there with me for longer. They give me another five minutes…and decide that all is lost. I hear mumblings of “I don’t get it, I never will…I’m stupid.” I am right back in my intervention days, trying to reassure them that this is not the case and that the sun will come out tomorrow, and they will be fine. I am again encouraging my students, whether they be intervention or gifted, to try a little harder and to not give up or get down on themselves.
Ian Byrd, noted gifted educator, gave a marvelous speech on the emotional gymnastics that gifted students often go through as they wrestle with the unfamiliar and unwelcome idea that perhaps learning might involve more work than they are used to. I encourage all parents of gifted students to listen to it…it would be a great audio for your next commute time, or even listen to it with your student if this is about the time he seems to feel he doesn’t belong in a TAG class. It’s excellent!
Ian Byrd’s Keynote Speech, So Much More Than Smart Kids
Tina Risinger is a TAG teacher at Deep Wood Elementary School