Wild And Wonderful: The West Virginia Department of Education

Since your gifted son or daughter lives in West Virginia, you will want to make use of the services for the gifted that our state offers.  I recommend going to the WVDE website, specifically http://wvde.state.wv.us/osp/gifted.html and clicking on Resources For Parents.  Once you click on this, several links will appear including the West Virginia Association for the Gifted and Talented (WVAGT), the National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC), Parenting for High Potential magazine, and a fantastic PowerPoint presentation entitled Social and Emotional Development of Gifted and Talented Students posted there with permission from Nadia Webb, Psy. D., ABPdN.  

Wild And Wonderful II: The West Virginia Association for the Gifted and Talented

WVAGT is beneficial because it will increase your knowledge about various state and national conferences, possible opportunities, and helpful information as it pertains to your child’s social, emotional, and academic success.  It can be accessed through www.wvgifted.org where you can click on Resources.  Gifted Resource Links For Parents and Teachers will provide useful information such as: links, websites, contacts, and supportive organizations.  The contact person for the parent committee is Judy Werner. 
WVAGT

God Bless America: The National Association For Gifted Children

Along with being knowledgeable about gifted topics in West Virginia, I also highly recommend becoming involved or at least aware of giftedness on a national level through the NAGC website at www.nagc.org.   NAGC is parent-friendly and research based.   They even offer family conferences.  Accessing it will keep you abreast of the newest occurrences in the field of giftedness as well as being a source of social and emotional support for you and your child. 

It’s A Bird, It’s A Plane, It’s the Coordinator of Gifted Programs

Vickie Monacky is the Coordinator of Gifted Programs at the Office of Special Education in Charleston, WV.  She is an excellent source of information as you look to meet your gifted child’s needs.  She can be reached at vmohnack@access.K12.wv.us or by calling 304-558-2696.

Don’t Try To Pronounce It, Just Remember It: SENG

SENG or (Supporting the Emotional Needs of the Gifted) is an essential component for parents dealing with the sometimes daily struggles of raising a gifted child.  They can be reached at www.sengifted.org, office@sengifted.org, or through the WVAGT site.  Their phone number is 845-797-5054.  SENG has pertinent articles and research along with annual conferences.  They also offer free webinars on topics such as parenting gifted children.  Although it is no longer free, a specific example of one past webinar is “This Isn’t the Child I Dreamed of Raising” by Barbara Probst.

Books Or Bust: Bibliotherapy

Using bibliotherapy, or the approach of using books to emotionally support gifted children, can be a powerful preventative counseling idea for gifted children and their families (Moon, 2002).  Reading and discussing books about gifted children can help gifted students explore ideas, share feelings, learn about conflict resolution, and feel better about themselves.  One excellent source of bibliotherapy information is teacher Tamara Fisher’s (2009) blog article in Education Week called "Using Bibliotherapy with Gifted Children".  She discusses how bibliotherapy can help gifted students cope with their social and emotional needs by identifying with a book character who shares similar hardships.  Her explanations regarding the benefits of bibliotherapy are helpful, and she offers a list of possible book choices to use with students on a pre-middle school (5^th/6^th) grade level.  The link is below.
http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/unwrapping_the_gifted/2009/03/using_bibliotherapy_with_gifted_children.html

 

Click here for an additional informational video!!! 

                                           by (Willams, Bethell, Burrows, & Hanna, 2013)

Please Pass The Popcorn: It’s Cinematherapy

Watching movies involving gifted children, along with reading books, enables movie watchers to identify with main characters creating understanding, self-acceptance, and healthy determination in gifted students (Moon, 2002).  See Hoagies' Gifted Education Page for an extensive listing of movies featuring gifted kids at www.hoagiesgifted.org/movies.htm.

Some movie choices for the elementary and middle school age range:         

             

•         Angus  PG-13 
•         Black  NR (intense)
•        Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs  PG
•        Cold Comfort Farm  PG
•        Contact  PG
•        Dead Poets Society  PG (contains suicide)
•        Empire of the Sun  PG-13
•        Explorers  PG
•        Finding Forrester  PG-13 (some violence & language) 
•        Finding Neverland  PG
•        Fly Away Home  PG
•        Gifted Hands  NR
•        Hard Problems: The Road to the World's Toughest Math Contest  PG
•        Harriet The Spy  PG
•        any Harry Potter movies  PG
•        Holes  PG
•        Hoot  PG
•        How to Train Your Dragon  PG
•        Infinity  PG
•        The Iron Giant  PG
•        Little Man Tate  PG
•        Matilda  PG
•        Meet the Robinsons  PG
•        The Mighty  PG
•        Mr. Magorium's Wonder Emporium  G
•        October Sky  PG (about a West Virginia boy)
•        Real Genius  PG
•        Searching for Bobby Fisher  PG
•        Sky High  PG
•        Spellbound  G
•        Stand and Deliver PG
•       Vitus  PG
•       Whalerider  PG-13
•       Willow  PG