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GIFTED PRIMARY SCHOOL children from socio-economic disadvantaged areas got the chance to develop their academic talents at a program run by the Centre for Talented Youth.
Up to 200 children, aged 10-12, from areas with low-college attendance rates took part in the course in the University of Limerick.
Sarah Cantillon is one of the children who attended the course and she told TheJournal.ie, “I learned loads about tsunamis and volcanoes.
I want to be a geologist when I grow up. The course was very interesting and it made me like it.
“I really enjoyed it, it was on for five weeks and it was so much fun.”
The children graduated just last week after being identified as ‘top of the class’ by their teachers. The Centre for Academic Achievement programme stated that:
Before this course many of these students would not have thought of attending university as an option for their future but now they are more confident to achieve their potential.
“This project hopes to encourage these students to fulfil their potential, and continue on to be successful in both second and third level education.”
The CAA provided the free after school courses in ‘forensic science’, ‘medicine’,‘volcanoes & earthquakes’, and ‘cartoons & illustrations’.
The course started in Dublin in 2006 and this was its first year being run in Limerick.
Centre for Talented Youth Ireland Director, Dr. Colm O’Reilly, said “The CAA programme has been successfully implemented in Dublin and we are very excited to expand it to Limerick.
“The students here have been fantastic and hopefully will go on to attend university in the future.”
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A + to the CAA!
Great uplifting story!
Every Christmas stocking should contain at least one book IMHO.
Easons and other bookshops are selling copies of the classics – eg Dickens, Bronte, Hardy, Joyce…etc – for under €2 each.
What a great idea! I applaud the University of Limerick
Brilliant! Great stuff! Congratulations and continued success!
http://www.academia.edu/1389611/Gifted_and_talented_a_label_too_far
“Educationalists should, at the very least, be keenly aware that the gifted and talented label is a gross, misleading over-simplification of learners’ abilities and potential.
There are many other differences between learners which find no place in this, or indeed in other categorisations – personality, background, preference and propensity among them.
More important too may be differences in the social environment of learning – the cultural context,the physical environment, the teacher’s perspective – which influence (or determine) how any pupil responds to and is or is not challenged by the teaching and learning process at any one time.
We might also take the perspective of Simon (1981) that ‘…to start from the standpoint of individual differences is to start from the wrong position’. This perspective sees the similarities between children as greater and of more importance than the differences between them – collective pedagogies should therefore be the basis of our thinking, rather than an immediate rush to separate pupils conceptually from each other.
Only closer awareness and understanding of the qualities which pupils share, the diversity and fluidity of their differences, and their interaction within the social and cultural context of their learning, can lead to a less divisive and educationally positive approach for each and every learner. Fletcher-Campbell (2003, p.5) summed it up well:
It can be argued that if we are clear about the curriculum and have an intimate knowledge of the strengths and weaknesses of the vast resource represented by the pupil group, then categorisations such as ‘gifted and talented’ and ‘special educational needs’ pale into insignificance … A more fruitful way forward is to consider how the specialness can be embodied in all activities, using the widest repertoire at our disposal, developing through constant sharing of practice and reflection and whether the enhancement, whatever it looks like, ought not to apply to all pupils.
Michelle: As a parent, the real value of these programmes for many kids is social. Clever kids can feel isolated and CTYI can be a place they find people of their age to talk to freely.
When my child was 6, someone suggested CTYI & my immediate reaction was “what pushy parent would send their child to school on a Saturday?” (without checking it out).
2 years later my wife read an article about it and we both thought “our child would love to go there!”.
Over the following 7 years, he loved it.
Many other kids with equal intelligence would have no interest.
And for kids without academic role models, I think they should get an opportunity to understand the doors that their talent can open for them.
As for not using the label “talented”, that is a word we regularly use to describe other human beings’ capabilities. Those with an academic talent are clearly talented.
Alan M.
There really is no science behind notions that some children are more ‘gifted’ and smart than others… They are all gifted, exceptional and smart – if they are not learning well, it is because they have been let down by their education system – I thought this was an accepted fact now – schools in disadvantaged areas who reject the notion of streaming, labelling, segregating, and who give each and every child in their care the belief that they can achieve at the highest level are the ones that get great outcomes for all.
Michelle, I think the science on nature vs nurture is proven and the capabilities of a brain are dependent on BOTH nature and nurture.
The nurture only view is equally wrong as the nature only view. The nurture only view is the same logic that (in 1970) blamed parents for autism.
But what created a child’s capabilities should have no impact on how children should be educated.
I assume that mixed ability classrooms are better for Primary school children and streaming makes sense at some stage during secondary school for some subjects (e.g. Maths).
Alan.
http://www.davidmyers.org/davidmyers/assets/Arent.Child.Gifted.pdf
Brilliant article on the wrongness of labelling some children as gifted and talented and, by implication, the other 95% as not gifted and talented…
Every child is born gifted in something and its up to adults to recognise it
Russia has such a system.
Some years ago my gifted son was to receive ECT through HSE for being too intelligent, too articulate and strong willed and needed to be normalised with ECT.
Same was done to gifted Native Americans too as I learned from a psychiatrist there.
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