Austega's Gifted Resource Centre

Welcome!

It is my endeavour to make this site a rich and helpful resource for you. I am planning further articles and some dynamic data feeds for this site in the near future. Please send me your suggestions and comments!

David Farmer

What's new?

• Gifted Education Press Quarterly Fall 2007 - Renzulli & technology, gifted minority students, visual arts, Stephen King & writing
• Tasmanian teachers sail to the Antarctic - follow their journey (which starts 4 Sep 07) and ask questions
• Australian government announces further $1.2m funding for teacher and parent workshops
• Online conference - Perfectionism: The Road to Recovery with Tom Greenspon, 17-19 Sep 2007
• Online conference - Practical Curriculum Extension for Gifted Students with Lynne Kelly, 10-12 Aug 2007
• May 07 - Gifted Press Quarterly Summer 2007 Online Edition looks at 1. creativity, and 2. teacher referrals
• Aug 05 - Gifted Education Professional Development Package available & distributed to Aust schools
• Nov 04 - Revised NSW gifted education policy and guidelines approved
• 11 Nov - NSW Govt to expand gifted programs in high schools from 2005
• 27 Sep - Twice Exceptional (Gifted with Disabilities) online conference (8-20 Oct) with Fernette Eide
• 8 Sep - Biology Olympiads to be held in Brisbane
• 9 Aug - Excellent UK site on teaching the gifted & talented
• 5 Jul - Searchable database of international education research available
• 28 Jan - Success/problems with gifted Maoris reviewed
• NZ Govt supported gifted & talented programs in schools - 29 Nov
• "Living & Learning with Dabrowski's Overexcitabilities", a teaching unit by Cindy Strickland - 17 Oct
• OGT online conference (5-12 Oct) "Gifted children & the Dabrowski's Theory of Positive Disintegration" with Elizabeth Mika's notes - 12 Sep
• State & National Libraries launch AskNow chat access to reference librarians - 29 Aug
• Earlier what's new items...

Information on this site

Some thoughts on what giftedness might involve:

• What is a gifted child?
• Characteristics checklist
• Moral development (Kohlberg)
• "Flow" and Csikszentmihalyi
• Theory of Positive Disintegration
• Living & learning with overexcitabilities

Some thoughts directly for parents:

• Parenting gifted preschoolers
• Parenting & socio-emotional nurturing
• Choosing a school
• Dealing with problems at school
• Good reading for gifted readers
• Bibliotherapy for gifted students
• Are you ready to parent? (humour?)

Some school provisions that generally assist gifted children:

• Ability grouping
• Acceleration/flexible progression
• Guidelines for acceleration
• Curriculum compacting
• Curriculum differentiation
• Independent learning
• Mentoring
• Vertical unitised timetabling
• Research synthesis on school provisions
• Teacher G&T professional development

Some alternatives to traditional schooling may be appropriate:

• Home schooling
• Montessori
• Waldorf Steiner

It is important to be as fully informed from a wide range of viewpoints - find out more:

• Australian organisations for gifted children
• Oz-Gifted mailing lists
• Good print resources
• Links - good electronic resources
• NSW P&C gifted students policy
• Education news (not just gifted)

Online learning?

The web provides access to a huge range of learning goldmines for gifted children, both free and commercially based. We have annotated links to a large range of rich learning websites in our Links Library.

The articles collection

Browse our growing collection of thought-provoking articles on the various aspects of giftedness.

Some particularly good sites

• Hoagies gifted education site
• Gifted learning disabled (GLD)
• NSW Assn for Gifted & Talented Children
• Qld Assn for Gifted & Talented Children
• All Kinds of Minds
• State Library of NSW Reference
• Wikipedia - collaborative encyclopedia

Australian gifted policies

• Australian Senate Inquiry 2001
• Australian Capital Territory
• New South Wales Government
• NSW Parents & Citizens Federation
• Northern Territory
• Queensland
• South Australia
• Tasmania
• Victoria Government
• Western Australia

1,250!

That is the estimated number of gifted children across Australia who will drop out of school this year.