Academic Advocacy for Gifted Children: A Parent's Complete Guide [Paperback]

Barbara Jackson Gilman (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: November 1, 2008

Formerly titled Empowering Gifted Minds: Educational Advocacy That Works, this book is the definitive manual on gifted advocacy for gifted students. The author tells parents and teachers how to document a child s abilities to provide reasonable educational options year by year. This book provides imperative information on testing considerations, curriculum, successful programs, and planning your child s education. It is an essential guide.

Editorial Reviews

Review

"(Academic Advocacy for Gifted Children) has an acute sense of the gifted child's emotional sense of being. And as the introduction mentions, a parent's perspective lends a more in-depth and emotional tie to the child and their growth pattern. The social issues and emotional cues were good prompts to pay attention to, not only in a youth, but also in the adult." --Christine Ohtani-Chang, Board Member, Hawaii Gifted Association

"This book a rare combination of intimate frustrations and joys (the commentary from Quinn O Leary), and the step-by-step action guide with many specific examples, is a much-needed resource for parents and for educators. As advocates for gifted students, we can no longer hope and wait. We must act." --Jacquelyn Drummer, President, WI Association for Talented and Gifted

"All the priceless information that it took me years to collect, all in one easy-to-read book! Barbara Gilman pulls together the collective wisdom of decades of parents and professionals, from identification to accommodations to acceleration and beyond...This is the manual we all wish came with our gifted children." --Carolyn K., Hoagiesgifted.org

"The best book I've ever read about advocacy for gifted children. Gilman provides us refreshing nitty-gritty reality, equipping parents and teachers with specific skills to advocate for real children in real schools." --Kathi Kearney, M.A., M.Ed., Gifted education consultant and nationally recognized expert in curriculum for gifted students, home schooling, and assessment of gifted students

"This book is a treasure. It provides the advice parents need...based upon Gilman's professional training, as well as her own experiences as a parent of highly gifted boys. The chapter devoted to teachers is among the best I have seen. If the advice in this book is followed, one could almost guarantee a rewarding education experience for a gifted child." --Karen Rogers, Ph.D., Author of Re-Forming Gifted Education: How Parents and Teachers Can Match the Program to the Child --Jacquelyn Drummer, President, WI Association for Talented and Gifted

"(Academic Advocacy for Gifted Children) has an acute sense of the gifted child's emotional sense of being. And as the introduction mentions, a parent's perspective lends a more in-depth and emotional tie to the child and their growth pattern. The social issues and emotional cues were good prompts to pay attention to, not only in a youth, but also in the adult." --Christine Ohtani-Chang, Board Member, Hawaii Gifted Association

"This book a rare combination of intimate frustrations and joys (the commentary from Quinn O Leary), and the step-by-step action guide with many specific examples, is a much-needed resource for parents and for educators. As advocates for gifted students, we can no longer hope and wait. We must act." --Jacquelyn Drummer, President, WI Association for Talented and Gifted

About the Author

Barbara J. Gilman, M.S., is the Associate Director of the Gifted Development Center in Denver, CO. She holds degrees in Child Development and Psychology, and has extensive experience testing gifted children, making educational recommendations, working with the highly gifted, and gifted children with learning disabilities. A mother of highly gifted sons, she is a veteran of gifted committees, helped create an accelerated charter middle school, and is a popular speaker for parents and teachers on advocacy and classroom accommodations for the gifted.

Product Details

• Paperback: 440 pages
• Publisher: Great Potential Pr., Inc.; Revised edition (November 1, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 091070788X
• ISBN-13: 978-0910707886
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #95,883 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars expert insight and advice for parents of gifted kids, November 25, 2008

By 

Lorel Shea (New England) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Academic Advocacy for Gifted Children: A Parent's Complete Guide (Paperback)

Barbara Jackson Gilman of the Gifted Development Center wrote this book to assist parents who need assistance in advocating for their gifted children. Because Barbara has worked closely with gifted children and their families for over 15 years, and parented her own gifted children, she knows firsthand that highly intelligent kids need support just as any other children who are outside the norm. She has seen the damage that may be done when gifted kids are not challenged in school, and has worked with many brilliant kids who tune out or give up and drop out of school. This book also contains heartfelt essays written by Quinn O'Leary. Quinn shares his reflections on growing up as a precocious boy who didn't often find adequate challenge in school.

Academic Advocacy for Gifted Children-A Parent's Complete Guide is a complete handbook on advocacy, but also a useful resource for parents who are striving to understand their gifted children. Barbara explains that gifted children often experience the world differently, and devotes a generously sized chapter one to this topic. Chapter two is titled, "What Do We Mean By Gifted?" and it covers asynchrony, personality traits, levels of giftedness, and more. Chapter three will be tremendously helpful to those who are still considering testing or assessment, as well as those who are trying to determine what exactly, their child's test results mean. Sometimes it is important to choose the right instrument for testing. Gilman states, "The WPPSI-III can be given to six-year-olds, but the WISC-IV is usually a better choice when the child is likely gifted." My son's score on the WPPSI taken at age six was in the gifted range, but nowhere near what we'd anticipated based upon his developmental milestones. I wish we'd known enough to request the WISC. School administrators tend to assess more kids who are at the lower end of the spectrum, and are not always familiar with how to do things with extremely bright children.

Chapter seven outlines varieties of gifted programs and educational options. Gilman is a proponent of homeschooling, especially for kids who are highly to profoundly gifted. She points out which school programs are more successful for gifted students, and which are not so successful. The further reading suggestions at the end of the chapter include some terrific books, articles, and websites related to gifted education.

The must-read chapter for parents who need help with school advocacy is chapter eight. The author carefully walks the reader through the steps necessary to get academic accommodations in place. She explains, " Parents should trust themselves to assess the level and urgency of their child's needs, and they can wisely consider various alternatives. Sometimes the best choice is to work with the school and the current teacher to provide accommodations; sometimes it is to move to another classroom, grade, or an entirely different school; and sometimes it is best to remove a child form school altogether. There is no benefit to teaching a child to graciously accept being held back. " If advocacy steps don't lead to an appropriate placement, she advises the reader on when to give up, how to look for a better school, and how to get started in homeschooling.

Gilman also interviewed several extraordinary teachers and talked to them at length about how they work with gifted students. These vignettes will be helpful if a parent is still wondering what it would be like to have their child in the care of a motivated teacher who actually enjoys working with bright students.

7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Get This Resource NOW!, December 15, 2008

By 

J. Bernish (Cincinnati, OH United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Academic Advocacy for Gifted Children: A Parent's Complete Guide (Paperback)

Academic Advocacy for Gifted Children is the book I wish I had written. It is filled with truisms and insightful observations. The author clearly has been there - and not in a clinical sense - but in a real world in-your-face all politics aside public school system sense. No matter the state - no matter the "gifted" program in your school - no matter how the classroom teacher is "differentiating the curriculum" - you must read this book! If you suspect that your child is bored in school regardless of the accommodation in the gifted program - you must read this book. If you have a child with other exceptionalities who is being treated by his school as less than average in spite of having a photographic memory - you must read this book. If you have a child or grandchild who you suspect may be gifted - read this book! And if you are a teacher and have ever had or expect to have a gifted student, you definitely must read this book!

As I continue to experience the world of gifted education in schools across the state of Ohio I have my own longitudinal data to draw from. I have seen children literally fall off the map and been astonished at how many gifted children become unproductive adults - dropping out of high school, self-medicating in their misery of not belonging in an average world, or worse, leaving this world because it seems to offer them nothing yet expects everything from them. Giftedness has more to do with the way you learn and process information and I am so glad that someone has taken the time to explain this! The label "gifted" is highly charged and quite misleading - perhaps this book will open the discussion and help parents and educators understand what has taken me a lifetime - that high ability is not a "gift" or a "special favor from God" - or an unearned honor. When we talk about giftedness we are really talking about a learning style and the way the brain processes information. Using the term "gifted" to describe high ability is like using the term "cursed" to describe low ability. You would never do so! When parents and adults understand that accommodations are necessary to support learning for that particular child - then the student's needs are met and the risk of losing that student to underachievement are minimized.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A solid and recommended guide for parents, November 9, 2008

By 

Midwest Book Review (Oregon, WI USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Academic Advocacy for Gifted Children: A Parent's Complete Guide (Paperback)

One could have all the intelligence in the world but it means nothing if it's not nurtured. "Academic Advocacy for Gifted Children: A Parent's Complete Guide" is aimed at parents at gifted children who want cut through the piles of bureaucratic red tape and give their child the education they need to make the most of their gifted skill in the field of academics. Covering everything from other parents experiences with gifted children, the definition of the subject, testing, classes, what to do about under achievement and much more, "Academic Advocacy for Gifted Children" is a solid and recommended guide for parents, a must for those who suspect their child is more than just the average student.