Encouraging Achievement: Challenge, Persistence, Responsibility

1. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement Through Challenge, Persistence, and Responsibility

2. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility “It should go without saying that a nation’s resources of intellectual talent are among the most precious it will ever have.” Lewis Terman Genetic Studies of Genius

3. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility State Goal for Gifted and Talented Students Students who participate in services designed for gifted students will demonstrate skills in self-directed learning, thinking, research, and communication as evidenced by the development of innovative products and performances that reflect individuality and creativity and are advanced in relation to students of similar age, experience, or environment.

4. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility “The purpose of gifted programs is not simply to get in them but to provide challenging curricular options that demand effort and outcome…The new state plan emphasizes to both educators and students that high performance is not only applauded, it is expected.” A Call for Excellence: Raising the Bar for Gifted Students Texas Education Agency, 1999

5. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility • TEA GT Student Performance Standards • Knowledge and Skills • Innovation and Application • Analysis and Synthesis • Ethics/Unanswered Questions • Multiple Perspectives

6. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility • TEA GT Student Performance Standards • Methodology and Use of Resources • Communication • Relevance and Significance • Professional Quality

7. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility • Mindsets • Expectation of the “Easy A” • Unacceptable Failure and Mistakes • “Buy Now - Pay Later” Syndrome • Achievers Aren’t Cool

8. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility Strategies • Understand that achievers need four qualities: ability, discipline, confidence, and good work habits. • Teach your child that education is the backbone of his or her life, necessary to build a successful future. • Provide a nurturing atmosphere where your child is encouraged to maximize his/her potential.

9. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility Strategies • Emphasize the importance of high personal standards for everything your child does. • Convince your child that he/she must put in as much time as it takes to produce good work they are proud of. “Be proud of what you have done.” • Constantly reinforce this message to your children: “You can be anything - if you are disciplined.” • Realize the uniqueness of your child. Use his/her interests and insights as the foundation for expectations.

10. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility Strategies • Apply pressure intelligently. • Provide more structure. • Diagnose/analyze problems together. • Supply direction and guidance. • Provide more assistance. • Provide support, love, and encouragement. • Help the child explore his/her feelings toward poor performance. • Develop more self-responsibility.

11. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility Strategies • During the early school years, give less independence and more guidance. Your goal should be to establish excellent work habits and high personal standards. Less guidance will be needed later on, and you can push for more academic independence.

12. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility Strategies • Intertwine pressure with performance. You must keep informed of what is happening in school each day. • Listen, observe, comment. • Be consistent. Both parents must support each other. Inconsistency undermines everything. • Supervise work at home to reinforce all school learning.

13. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility Strategies • Establish times for homework and studying each day. • Create a homework area that is free of distractions. • Have references at your child’s fingertips. • Flood your home with lively periodicals. • Ask about homework every day. • In the early years, inspect homework. • Establish serious consequences for not completing homework. • Do not allow TV viewing before homework.

14. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility • Strategies • Provide career or college counseling. • Capitalize on interests. • Maintain high, firm expectations. • (Teachers + Students + Parents = Success) • Help students plan. • Demonstrate real world connections. • Provide opportunities for networking. • Teach stress and time management strategies. • Praise persistence and effort.

15. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility • Learning From Mistakes and Failures • Encourage self-evaluation. • Use non-threatening group self-assessment. • Don’t steal their struggle! • Guide different perspectives and answers. • Encourage step-by-step approach to positive risk-taking.

16. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility • Learning From Mistakes and Failures • Discuss worst case scenario and go beyond it. • Pre-Assess basic skills. • Teach organization and study skills. • Use motivational quotes. • Have students share research of people who have overcome fear and anxiety.

17. “Don’t Steal Their Struggle”Encouraging Achievement ThroughChallenge, Persistence, Responsibility • Encouraging Responsibility • Communicate clear expectations to students and parents. • Teach and model responsible behavior. • Discourage “parent to the rescue” syndrome. • Include students in decision making. • Encourage daily chores at home.

18. What Can You Learn From the World of Sports? 1. Show up for practice and the main event. 2. Know where you are heading and know what the goal is. 3. Have several game plans, not just one. 4. Don’t count on the one thing that is the least likely to occur. 5. Work toward small goals to reach larger ones.

19. What Can You Learn From the World of Sports? 6. Practice skills before the big performance. 7. Don’t give up because you get a penalty or make a mistake. 8. Figure out what you want to accomplish and then plan backwards. 9. Have a coach and people to cheer you on. 10. Work as a team to get things done.

20. What Can You Learn From the World of Sports? Other Thoughts: If you don’t show up prepared, you won’t be allowed to participate in the event. The work ethic is essential. A coach will not play you if there isn’t some measure of confidence that you are going to do your best during the performance. The coach gets that sense from watching you on a daily basis.

21. “Providing an appropriate education for the gifted and talented student is neither a luxury nor a frill…What better way to meet the challenges of the next century than by enabling our brightest students to go as far as possible in their learning?”Why Give “Gifts” to the Gifted?Lita Linzer SchwartzPennsylvania State University

22. To Our Gifted ChildrenDr. George Betts At last, we are beginning to understand you. We realize your beauty, your abilities, your potentials. A lifetime of excitement, joy, involvement, creativity, and passion awaits you.

23. But first we must nurture you… We must give you the opportunities… the opportunities to accept and value highly your strengths and your differences… to accept and value highly the strengths and differences of others.

24. The opportunities to actively pursue your passions, your areas of adventure and your dreams... to help make our world a better place to live in, where as you choose, you may become the explorers, the inventors, the artists, the poets, the leaders of tomorrow.

25. But most importantly, we must allow and help you to become your true selves to withstand the pressures from the outside and listen closely to your hearts, so that you may develop your potential, so that you may become what you truly can be...