Why "Gifted and Thriving"?

Written by Rosemary Hammerton Saturday, 06 November 2010 13:35

The name of my Blog "Gifted and Thriving" is borrowed from the title of a GERRIC Summer Seminar presented by Professor Michael Sayler in 2007. I knew instantly I had to attend his seminar because here was someone articulating what I had intuitively felt for so long. Talent development is important, but is not the sum total of our goal as educators of gifted children.

I would express the argument thus: For an intellectually gifted person to be achieving at a level, more or less, commensurate with their potential (to be ‘talented' in Professor Gagne's terms) is a necessary but not sufficient condition for what I am referring to here as the state of personal thriving or flourishing. I have known some to dispute that it is even a necessary condition, arguing that there are some very fulfilled PhD's out there working as gardeners or office workers. And it is true, measures of life satisfaction - the degree to which one is unfulfilled or fulfilled - will always be subjective.

While not wanting to negate the very real import of the concepts of academic achievement and underachievement, I think it's worth quoting James Delisle who once said (I think provocatively) "underachievement is a myth, existing in the eye of the beholder who deems it to be there." (1994) More helpful, perhaps, is his distinction between underachievers and "selective consumers", the latter defined as those independent, non-conformist learners, who exhibit variable performance, largely dependent on their personal interest in the content and its intrinsic level of challenge.

I have come to realise after many years of teaching, and parenting, that the label of ‘underachiever' is a mixed blessing. Who defines, for example, the criteria by which potential is reached and/or demonstrated? Do we sometimes teach or assess in ways that define achievement too narrowly?

Other writers who have consistently challenged the singular focus on talent development are Stephanie Tolan and Linda Silverman. Like Sayler, they are more cognisant of the self-actualising aspects of the gifted trajectory, the need to become all that one is capable of becoming - intellectually, emotionally, socially, spiritually, ethically. When we focus exclusively or predominantly on talent development, we risk inadvertently giving children the message that we value them for what they do more than who they are.

BTW, if the name sounds familiar, Michael Sayler is best known in Australia for his parent checklists, Things My Child /Young Child Has Done.