Happy Blog Birthday!

Sprite’s Site Blog celebrates its birthday in June and all the characters get together for a group picture.
The theme of the blog birthday party this year is The Flowers of Giftedness.
Click on the picture to see an enlargement of it. To see an enlargement of the Flower bowers for the Twitter Birds see https://spritessite.wordpress.com/2012/06/26/flower-bowers-for-twitter-birds/

The blog has now received 82,615 individual page viewings since it started.
For the stories of all the previous blog birthdays see https://spritessite.wordpress.com/tag/birthdays/

Language Garden

While Sprite and I were setting up the Flower Bowers for the Twitter Birds for the blog birthday celebrations many of the Twitter Birds were still busy bringing me links to great education sites.
One pair arrived with a link to David Warr’s language program Language Garden.
“As you are already in the garden, come over here and see this!” they chirped.

I have been intending to visit Language Garden again for several weeks.
I first met David Warr and learned about Language Garden when I participated in David’s webinar at the Reform Symposium https://spritessite.wordpress.com/tag/reform-symposium/ and we have corresponded several times since.
Language Garden is a combination of a language learning program and a mind-mapping program.
It is great for visual learners as it shows clearly the structure of a sentence and its parts of speech.
Nouns are shown in blue, verbs in red, adjectives in green, adverbs in yellow, determiners in grey, prepositions in purple and connectives in brown.
I can see that it would be a useful tool for learning English language or foreign languages.
Read all about Language Garden, have a go at making a Language Plant and playing with some activities on the website http://www.languagegarden.org/

There is also a Blog at http://languagegarden.wordpress.com/
I loved the post about depicting a Chinese saying as a Language Plant in the Spanish language at http://languagegarden.wordpress.com/2012/06/17/reap-what-you-sow/

I knew Sprite, who is very much a visual learner, would love Language Garden and, sure enough, she did!
She started to create a Language Plant of her own. Intellectual Dabrowski and P’est pour Parfait are telling her that she must finish it properly!

Language Garden also has a Facebook Group where members can share the language plants they have created http://www.facebook.com/groups/331499710262972/
The Facebook Group is described on the blog at http://languagegarden.wordpress.com/2012/06/25/the-king-is-dead/

Flower Bowers for Twitter Birds

Here are the Flower Bowers for the Twitter Birds who are attending the Birthday Party for Sprite’s Site blog.
Click on the picture to see an enlargement.
I think there are 100 Twitter Birds in the picture but when I recounted the score was 101 – maybe I counted one twice!
See if you can count them all and see how many of them you can name. You probably recognise Tweet and Retweet, Tweetil, Tweetelle and Great Aunt Hashtag. But what is the name of the lone bagpipe player?

Preparing for the Blog Birthday Party

Preparations for the Sprite’s Site Blog Birthday Party are in full swing.
Sprite has made floral garlands for the Dabrowski Dogs and is bringing out her poster for the Flowers of Giftedness theme.
Imaginational is helping with suggestions for setting up the party area.
Intellectual noticed that Lisa Conrad of Gifted Parenting Support Blog http://giftedparentingsupport.blogspot.com  had left a basket of morning glories in the Comments box and is bringing them to her.
And Psycho Motor is contributing a stick with the comment “Throw the stick! Throw the stick!”

Sprite has made floral garlands for the Black Dogs

The Taste Tester Dogs have been summoned and have posed for a group picture.

The Topiary Tessellation Flower Leaf Tree has been installed and the Topiary Tree Octopus, Octopus Topiarii, has very quietly taken up residence there.

Imaginational suggested that Flower Bowers would be the best way to accommodate the growing number of Twitter Birds who would be flocking to the celebrations.

In the News

On Tuesday 19 June 2012 Victoria experienced its most powerful earthquake in 109 years. The quake struck at 8.53pm and lasted for 30 seconds. For the full story complete with maps and diagrams see The Herald Sun report at
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/more-news/strong-tremors-rock-victoria/story-fn7x8me2-1226401623358

People flocked to the Internet for information and to share the news with friends via social media sites. The Geoscience Australia website crashed under the load.
#earthquake and #Melbourne were trending Twitter topics.
When I next signed in to Facebook I was greeted with concerned messages from the US, Ireland, New Zealand and Denmark.
One was even so thoughtful as to ask after the safety of Sprite who was seen only the day before on the beach at low tide waving to New Zealand and the mental state of the Dabrowski Dogs.
My reply was
“Emotional is feeling a bit shook up! Sensual thought the fleas were being hyperactive. Psycho Motor thought it was really exciting. Imaginational was wondering whether the planet had hiccups and Intellectual was telling him not to be ridiculous – that it was a 5.5 magnitude earth tremor with its epicentre 9.9km underground in Moe. Sprite was feeling very confused by all the conflicting opinions of the Dabrowski dogs!
Then Sensual  told me that I had seriously understated his feelings (typical -he said – just like calling him Itchy!) He said that he had felt distinctly uneasy all day – a feeling as if something was not in balance.”

Yesterday Wednesday 20 June 2012 the report of the Victorian Parliamentary Inquiry into the Education of Gifted and Talented Students 2011 was tabled and the report posted at http://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/etc/article/1341
with the full 336 page report in PDF form at http://www.parliament.vic.gov.au/images/stories/committees/etc/Past_Inquiries/EGTS_Inquiry/Final_Report/Gifted_and_Talented_Final_Report.pdf 

The Age newspaper reported on the findings of the inquiry at
http://www.theage.com.au/national/education/gifted-students-go-dumb-to-fit-in-20120620-20ogw.html
I have not had time to read and digest the full report as yet.

(You may remember that at about this time last year I was busy writing a submission for this inquiry and had delayed celebrating Sprite’s blog birthday because of it.)

And in very local news, which, as far as I can see, has not been recorded in any newspapers, last Saturday night a young man had a miraculous escape from death when his car hit a telegraph pole. Apparently he was not drunk and not speeding but as he rounded the corner there was a car coming towards him on the wrong side of the road. He drove onto the nature strip to avoid it, hoping to go between the fence and the pole.
The pole almost snapped and part of it speared through the windscreen missing impaling him by only centimetres. At the time he was not complaining of any injuries.
God certainly took very good care of him!

Blog Birthday

While I have been busy writing posts for the New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week blog tour  http://ultranet.giftededucation.org.nz/WebSpace/696/ Sprite has been planning the celebrations for her blog birthday.
She has chosen the theme The Flowers of Giftedness and created this poster to use for decoration and promoting the event.
It combines the stationery P’est Pour Parfait, the perfectionist poodle had produced belatedly when she was searching for invitation cards and the Flowers of Giftedness that Imaginational Dabrowski had suggested.
Intellectual Dabrowski insisted that I should include references to the reasons for including the various flowers.
So…
Sunflowers and  irises were  included because of the paintings by Vincent Van Gogh, one depicting a jug of sunflowers and the other a bed of irises with just one white iris in a large group of purple irises.  The symbolism of the one white iris was explained in the film Little Man Tate. 
Orchids were included because of an excellent blog post poem by Lesley Graves at http://innreach.wordpress.com/2012/04/26/giftedness-and-nurturing-blooms-66/

Poppies were chosen because of Miraca Gross’ article Small poppies: Highly gifted children in the early years at http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Articles_id_10124.aspx
NZAGC magazine Tall poppies http://www.giftedchildren.org.nz/national/tallpoppies.php 
The logo for The Soul of Giftedness 20th World Conference on Gifted and Talented Children is a poppy http://www.worldgifted2013.com/

The tree in the centre of the poster in the Topiary Tessellation Bird Leaf  Tree decorated as a Topiary Tessellation Flower Tree

Sprite has already received some greetings for the card shelf for her blog birthday. If you would like to send a greeeting please reply in the comments box.

New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week 2012 – TBA Post 4 Part 4

I am very happy to be participating in the New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week blog tour again this year.
For news of the events to be held during New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week 2012 see http://www.giftednz.org.nz/awareness.html
and for links to all the posts for the blog tour see http://ultranet.giftededucation.org.nz/WebSpace/696/

This is Part 4 and the final part of my post on the topic TBA

“Clear the landing bay for the Twitter Birds who are bringing the links to the gifted Associations (A) in Australia and New Zealand” barked Intellectual Dabrowski.
“Here are the links to the national and state Gifted and Talented Associations in Australia and the links to the New Zealand national association and a PDF of all the New Zealand associations and organizations which are participating in New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week 2012.”

AAEGT http://www.aaegt.net.au/

A.C.T. http://actgifted.net.au/actgt/

New South Wales http://www.nswagtc.org.au/

Northern Territory http://www.ntaegt.org.au/

Queensland http://www.qagtc.org.au/

South Australia http://www.gtcasa.asn.au/

Tasmania http://www.tasgifted.com/info.php?id=1

Victoria http://www.vagtc.asn.au/

Western Australia http://www.gatcawa.org/

New Zealand

The New Zealand Association for Gifted Children http://www.giftedchildren.org.nz/

PDF File of all the Associations and Organisations participating in New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week
http://www.giftednz.org.nz/GAW%202012/ORGANISATIONS%20SUPPORTING%20GIFTED%20AWARENESS%20WEEK.pdf

“Now we can go down to the beach and wave to New Zealand like we did last year!”

New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week 2012 – TBA Post 4 Part 3

I am very happy to be participating in the New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week blog tour again this year.
For news of the events to be held during New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week 2012 see http://www.giftednz.org.nz/awareness.html
and for links to all the posts for the blog tour see http://ultranet.giftededucation.org.nz/WebSpace/696/

This is Part 3 of my post on the topic TBA

Intellectual Dabrowski had now rounded all of us up and was giving us the working dog stare, delivering a motivational talk and barking out orders.
“Nobody goes down to the beach to wave to New Zealand until we have finished.
Come on! Let’s see some action here!
Clear the landing bay for the Twitter Birds who are bringing the links to the gifted Associations (A) in Australia and New Zealand.

Echidna and Kiwi stop drooling over Stomp out the ANTs. It is not a cookery book! Find some books and articles relating to Twice Exceptional (T) students.

Sprite, there is room here for a heart-warming personal anecdote.
Put your best foot forward!
Bring out your Feetspeak Quest map and the DeBono 6 Action Shoes Collection catalogue. We don’t need the whole album – just some pictures of the signposts Emotional, you should help her. She always gets all choked up when she looks at that stuff”

Sprite is the poster child for Feetspeak: 2E shoes which is a method of planning education programs which are suitable for students who are both gifted and have a learning disability or difference in learning style.
We have been on a Quest to find the ideal education for Sprite within the school system, supplemented by extra activities and holiday programs.
Edward De Bono’s 6 Action shoes are used as the tool for planning and they are road tested on Gagne’s DMGT (Differentiation Model of Giftedness and Talent) road from innate giftedness to fully developed talent.

First I decide what type of gifted programs would be produced using each of De Bono’s shoes as the planning tool and then I look at whether the programs would be suitable for 2e students. See http://www.giftedresources.org/gr/feetspeakforweb01.htm

“Here!” said Intellectual “If you want something to be done right – you have to do it yourself! Here are the references and the websites Jo used when she was writing Feetspeak 2E Shoes. I have personally checked that they are still current and I have added a couple of extra references as well.”

BAUM, Susan M., Owen, Steve V.  and Dixon, John
To be gifted& learning disabledMelbourne, Hawker Brownlow Education, c.1993

COWIE, Maxine  Breaking the cycle of learning difficulties c. Starjump 2003

DE BONO, Edward Six Action Shoes” © The McQuaig Group 1991 Harper Business 1991

GAGNE Francoys PhD  A Differentiated Model of Giftedness and Talent  (DMGT) Year 200 Update http://www.curriculumsupport.education.nsw.gov.au/policies/gats/assets/pdf/poldmgt2000rtcl.pdf 

MARTIN,  Areva D. The 2e Dilemma: Understanding and Educating the Twice-Exceptional Child This article first appeared in the June 2006 issue of Los Angeles Parent Magazine
http://www.2enewsletter.com/article_2e_dilemma.html

NEUMANN, Linda C.  What Can We Learn from a Tale of Two Cities?
http://2enewsletter.com/article_two_cities.html

SILVERMAN, Linda Kreger Upside-Down BrillianceDenverColorado, DeLeon, 2002

SINGER, Lee   If Gifted = Asynchronous Development, then Gifted/Special Needs = Asynchrony Squared From Uniquely Gifted: Identifying and Meeting the Needs of Twice Exceptional Students, Kiesa Kay ed., Avocus Publishing: Gilsum, NH, 2000.

STRICKLAND, Cindy Living and learning with Dabrowski’s Overexcitabilities  or I can’t help it I’m overexcitable A teaching unit by Cindy Strickland
http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/strickland_dabrowski.pdf

TOLAN, Stephanie    Is it a cheetah?  c1996 Stephanie S. Tolan http://www.stephanietolan.com/is_it_a_cheetah.htm

TOLAN, Stephanie  Dabrowski’s Over-excitabilities A layman’s explanation
Written for Hoagies’ Gifted Education Page, February, 1999
http://www.stephanietolan.com/dabrowskis.htm

TOLAN, Stephanie  The problem of pain
Revised, originally published in the Gifted Education Communicator (California Association for the Gifted), Volume 31, No. 4, Fall 2000    http://www.stephanietolan.com/problem_of_pain.htm

Edward De Bono
http://www.debonothinkingsystems.com/about/Edward.htm

De Bono Institute Melbourne
http://www.debono.org/

Francoys Gagne’s DMGT model 2000 Update
http://www.curriculumsupport.education.nsw.gov.au/policies/gats/assets/pdf/poldmgt2000rtcl.pdf

http://www.templetonfellows.org/program/FrancoysGagne.pdf

2E Newsletter http://www.2enewsletter.com/

LD Online http://www.ldonline.org/

Dr Linda Kreger Silverman http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/

http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/Articles/learning_disabilities/learningdisabilities_index.html

http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/Articles/visual_spatial/visualspatial_index.html

Lesley Sword Articles http://giftedservices.com.au/handouts/index.html

Twice exceptional (Hoagies list of sites)
http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/twice_exceptional.htm

Cybrary Man’s Educational Web Sites http://cybraryman.com/2e.html

Lesley Graves Leslinks Livebinder http://www.livebinders.com/play/play_or_edit?id=25701

(Gifted Resources list of sites)
http://www.giftedresources.org/gr/webgifgld.htm

Visual spatial Allie Golon http://www.visualspatial.org/

Meredith Warshaw http://www.uniquelygifted.org/

Maxine Cowie http://www.starjump.com.au/

Stephanie Tolan  http://www.stephanietolan.com/

Drs Brock & Fernette Eide Neurolearning Blog  http://www.eideneurolearningblog.blogspot.com/

Wendy Stewart Abilities only parents see http://www.aaegt.net.au/Conference2008/Papers/Stewart.pdf

John Munro Understanding & supporting gifted learning disabled students
http://www.edfac.unimelb.edu.au/eldi/selage/documents/GLT-Understandsupport.pdf

“Now we are just waiting for a delivery from the Twitter Birds and then we can go down to the beach and wave to New Zealand”

New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week 2012 – TBA Post 4 Part 2

I am very happy to be participating in the New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week blog tour again this year.
For news of the events to be held during New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week 2012 see http://www.giftednz.org.nz/awareness.html
and for links to all the posts for the blog tour see http://ultranet.giftededucation.org.nz/WebSpace/696/

This is Part 2 of my post on the topic TBA

While Echidna and Kiwi were inspecting Sally-Anne McCormack’s book Stomp out the ANTs Columbus Cheetah took the opportunity to present me with information in the form of Books (B) and Articles (A) about the giftedness related topic closest to his heart – Acceleration (A)

Columbus Cheetah’s choice Books
Radical Acceleration of Highly Gifted Children: An annotated bibliography of international research on highly gifted children who graduate from high school three or more years early by Miraca U.M. Gross PhD and Helen E. van Vliet MBBS M.Teach. Supported by a 2001 grant from the John Templeton Foundation
Published by Gifted Education Research, Resource and Information Centre, The University of New South Wales, Sydney Australia.

Twitter Bird link find of the complete book as a PDF file http://www.templeton.org/pdfs/funding_areas/10112_Final_Rpt_Bibliography.pdf

Iowa Acceleration Scale Manual: A Guide for Whole –Grade Acceleration K-8
The Connie Belin & Jacqueline N. Blank International Center for Gifted Education and Talent Development
Susan Assouline Ph.D., Nicholas Colangelo Ph.D., Ann Lupkowski-Shoplik Ph.D., Jonathan Lipscomb B.A., Leslie Forstadt B.A
Published by Great Potential Press
http://www.accelerationinstitute.org/Resources/IAS.aspx

Columbus Cheetah’s favourite articles about Acceleration included several by Lynne Mackenzie-Sykes which he found in the files of articles and the collections of conference handouts in the Gifted Resources library.

Acceleration: an expanded vision c. 1996 Lynne Mackenzie-Sykes

Acceleration: Real-life perspectives Presented to The 12^th World Conference of the World Council for Gifted and Talented Children – Connecting the Gifted Community Worldwide Seattle, Washington July 29- August 2, 1997

Acceleration: Real-life perspectives Presented to Maroondah Gifted Children’s Parents’ Assoc on Tuesday 10 October 2000

The Twitter Birds found this one online
http://www.world-gifted.org/sites/default/files/wg-21(1).pdf

I also found a photo of Jennifer Grant reading those articles when she was considering the education of the eldest of her children. Jennifer now speaks to parents and teachers about ‘The Advocacy Journey’ which covers the provisions used for meeting the needs of her exceptionally gifted children ranging from early entry, through enrichment, enhancement and extension to acceleration, radical acceleration, dual enrolment, gifted programs and holiday programs, outside school activities and groups such as choirs and scout groups.

The Twitter Birds found great collections of articles about acceleration at

Les Links Livebinders http://www.livebinders.com/play/play_or_edit?id=218888
Hoagies Gifted Education Page http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/acceleration.htm

Having presented his selection of resources, Columbus Cheetah was eager to move on.
“Can we go down to the beach and wave now?” he asked
I will admit the idea was very tempting; but Intellectual Dabrowski was giving me the working dog stare and reminding me of the text which I had read only a few hours before
It is better not to make a vow than to make one and not fulfil it. Ecclesiastes 5:5 (NIV)
“Not yet” I said “I still have to write about Twice Exceptional Gifted Students. That will be the theme of the next post.”

New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week 2012 – TBA Post 4 Part 1

I am very happy to be participating in the New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week blog tour again this year.
For news of the events to be held during New Zealand Gifted Awareness Week 2012 see http://www.giftednz.org.nz/awareness.html
and for links to all the posts for the blog tour see http://ultranet.giftededucation.org.nz/WebSpace/696/

For last year’s blog post I sent a greeting and good wishes for a successful  and enjoyable week by posting a picture of some of the characters from Sprite’s Site waving ‘across the ditch’ to New Zealand and described the information which could be found on Gifted Resources website and Sprite’s Site blog.

This year when booking my place on the blog tour I wrote that my topic would be TBA – that is To Be Advised. However I decided that I would really write on the theme TBA and you may have been following the progress of my planning with the “help” of the characters from Sprite’s Site in my recent posts. Kiwi from New Zealand and Echidna from Australia were going to make selections from the books and articles in the Gifted Resources library and the Twitter Birds were to bring me links to websites.

So my plan is to point toward some helpful resources such as Books (B) and Articles (A) on the topics of Acceleration (A) and Teaching Gifted Students and 2E Twice Exceptional Students (T) and give some links to Australian and New Zealand national and state Associations (A) for the gifted.

Books about Teaching Gifted Students

Kiwi’s choice: They’re not bringing my brain out: Understanding and working with gifted and talented learners by Rosemary Cathcart A Hodder Education Book 3^rd ed.
Published in 2005 by Hachette Livre NZ
http://www.reachgifted.org.nz/pdf/orderform_2books.pdf

Echidna’s choice: School provisions for gifted students: Resource sheets for parents and teachers by Judy Parker Published in 1997 by Hawker Brownlow Education
http://www.hbe.com.au/

Twitter Birds useful links for publishers and booksellers of books about Teaching Gifted Students:
Hawker Brownlow Education http://www.hbe.com.au/
Free Spirit Willow Connection http://www.willowconnection.com.au/free-spirit
Great Potential Press http://www.greatpotentialpress.com/
Hoagies Gifted Education Page – Books on Gifted Topics http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/gifted_books.htm

Twitter Birds useful link to Online Teaching of Gifted Students
GO Gifted Online http://www.giftededucation.org.nz/giftedonline.html
Twitter Birds useful links to some great pages and blogs about Teaching Gifted Students
Cybrary Man’s Educational Websites Gifted and Talented http://cybraryman.com/gifted.html
Hoagies Gifted Education Page http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/
Byrdseed Gifted http://www.byrdseed.com/
Krissy Venosdale http://venspired.com/?author=1

Both Echidna and Kiwi became sidetracked from their task of selecting books on specific topics when they came to the book about dealing with anxiety and depression titled Stomp out the ANTs (Automatic Negative Thoughts) by Sally-Anne McCormack Published in Melbourne in 2009 by Sally-Anne McCormack http://www.sally-annemccormack.com.au/

And I realised that it was nearly 2.00am and decided to post this first part of the blog post and finish the post later.