Raise Genius Kids

The first and last thing demanded of genius is the love of truth Goethe, German 1749 – 1832

“Even if you’re not a genius, you can use the same strategies as Aristotle and Einstein to harness the power of your creative mind and better manage your future.”

The following strategies encourage you to think productively,
rather than reproductively, in order to arrive at solutions to problems. “These strategies are common to the thinking styles of creative geniuses in science, art, and industry throughout history.”

Nine approaches to creative problem solving:

1. Rethink! Look at problems in many different ways.
2. Visualize! Utilize diagrams and imagery to analyze your dilemma.
3. Produce! Genius is productive.
4. Combine! Make novel combinations…
5. Form! Form relationships.
6. Opposite! Think in opposites.
7. Metaphor/simile! Think metaphorically.
8. Failure! Learning from your mistakes is one example of using failure.
9. Patience! Don’t confuse inspiration with ideas.

Nine approaches to creative problem solving:

1. Rethink!
   Look at problems in many different ways.
   Find new perspectives that no one else has taken.
   Solutions example: Finding a job or internship:
   1. Ask friends or colleagues for potential leads
   2. Over-sell yourself
      Send samples of your work or portfolio to anyone that might respond.
   3. Check local resources like Craigslist or your school’s job search
   4. Broaden your target audience.
      What other fields could you specialize in?
2. Visualize!
   Utilize diagrams and imagery to analyze your dilemma.
   1. How can you use pictures, images, graphs, etc. in your studies?
   2. Visit guides on concept or mind maps, picturing vocabulary, flashcards, etc.
   3. Write out one example of how you can use imagery, then print and post it in your study area.
3. Produce!
   Genius is productive.
   1. Perhaps originality is not the key, but rather constant application of thought and tools to arrive a solutions.
   2. Geniuses are the luckiest of mortals because what they must do is the same as what they most want to do.
      W. H. Auden (1907–1973) Anglo-American poet
   3. Genius is nothing but a great aptitude for patience.
      George-Louis Leclerc de Buffon (1707–1788) French naturalist
4. Combine!
   Make novel combinations…
   Combine and recombine ideas, images, and thoughts into different combinations no matter how incongruent or unusual.
5. Form!
   Form relationships.
   Make connections between dissimilar subjects.
   1. This doesn’t always apply to objects: form relationships with people and ask them questions!
   2. Get to know people in your field that can help you excel to the best of your ability.
   3. Write down one person that you could get in contact with, why you think this person can help, and print/post it for reference!
6. Opposite!
   Think in opposites.
   Don’t always stick with the obvious solutions.
   Get outside of your comfort zone.
   1. “Opposites” bring two approaches to a situation but they do share a basic similarity.
      Example: “right” and “left” are both directions, but which is the right choice?
   2. The Sesame Street Muppet Elmo teaches small children the concept of opposites!
7. Metaphor/simile!
   Think metaphorically.
   1. Metaphors are connections that are unusual or not an ordinary way of thinking:
      A sea of troubles; the heart of a lion; raining cats and dogs.
   2. Similes use “like” or “as” to illustrate
      The boy was as agile as a monkey. The miner’s face was like coal.
      The task was as easy as ABC. Dry like a raisin in the sun.
8. Failure!
   Learning from your mistakes is one example of using failure.
   1. As strange as it seems the human brain is failure machine: it generates models of reality, acts on them, and adjusts or creates new, successful models based on failures.
   2. From Daniel Coyle’s the Talent Code on Adam Bryant’s weekly interview: “every single CEO shares the same nugget of wisdom: the crucial importance of mistakes, failures, and setbacks… mistakes create unique conditions of high-velocity learning that cannot be matched by more stable, “successful” situations.”
9. Patience!
   Don’t confuse inspiration with ideas.
   Apply your ideas with patience for the reward they may deserve.

Adapted from:
Michalko, Michael, Thinking Like a Genius: Eight strategies used by the super creative, from Aristotle and Leonardo to Einstein and Edison (New Horizons for Learning) as seen at http://www.newhorizons.org/wwart_michalko1.html, (June 15, 1999) This article first appeared in THE FUTURIST, May 1998. Michael Michalko is the author of Thinkertoys (A Handbook of Business Creativity), ThinkPak (A Brainstorming Card Set), and Cracking Creativity: The Secrets of Creative Geniuses (Ten Speed Press, 1998).

Meet the world’s best calendar calculator, who considers numbers to be his best friends.

Photographic memory training exercises are used to develop and improve and individual’s memory. Most techniques taught in books focus on the ability to retain and recall information when needed. However, photographic memory training exercises should focus on the learning process, rather than the memorization. It is the learning process that creates links in the mind, allowing it to recall the information at a later time.

There are many common photographic memory training exercises, such as list building, word association (also known as visualization and association) and story telling. These exercises are useful in remembering lists such as birthdays, telephone numbers, or your shopping list.

Whilst there is great controversy regarding the existence of photographic memory, it is without a doubt that these exercises when used, can train the mind to improve on its mental capacity and memory.

The best method that we recommend would be the picture game. This is one that can be adapted to use with children or adults, and the best element of this exercise is that it is fun. This makes it an interesting experience, and people are more likely to remember what they learnt and put it into practice. When working with children, it is also a good suggestion to involve a reward, as this will motivate them to work harder and pay attention to what you are trying to teach.

The Picture Game

This is a fantastic exercise for improving your sensory memory, especially your vision. Start with a simple picture that involves at least a foreground and a background. Study the picture for a minute, then put it away and see how much of it you can recall. For example, what were the people wearing? What colour was the house? How many apples were on the tree? These are simple questions which will inspire you to want to recall everything about the picture, making it a great exercise. With constant practice, you can move on to more complex pictures, and soon you will find yourself on the way towards developing a photographic memory!

Greg Frost is a leading innovator in the memory field, and he specializes in helping people improve and develop their photographic memory To find out more on how to deal with memory loss, learn advanced memory techniques, and have all your questions regarding memory answered, visit this site: http://www.photographic-memory.org

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Greg_Frost

The week of November 23-27, 2009, is observed as National Week for the Gifted and Talented.

The observance is pursuant to Presidential Proclamation No. 199 signed on October 19, 1999, which aims to build public awareness on the education of the gifted and talented in the country and to provide them opportunities, encouragement, greater attention, and assistance to maximize their full potentials.

With the theme “Gifts and Talents:

The Means for Productive Life,” the celebration is geared to strengthening academic excellence, leadership, value formation, and love of country among the gifted and talented.

The Department of Education which leads the five-day celebration has prepared activities which can be integrated in school activities. Among them are visual and performing arts competitions, arts and crafts exhibits, leadership training, academic competitions, educational field trips, fun games and sports activities, symposiums on parenting the gifted and talented on meeting their needs, and lectures on the theme of the celebration.

Filipino talents are known all over the world. Let us support the programs in developing potentials of children who are gifted and talented.

They will be future excellent leaders of our country. www.mb.com.ph

FINDING OUT WHETHER YOUR CHILD IS GIFTED IS THE FIRST STEP IN GETTING HER THE CHALLENGE SHE CRAVES
Article Appeared in the Chicago Tribune
September 19, 1999

Is your child truly gifted, or are you just one of those pushy, “stage mother” types who thinks his or her bright child is really a genius? “Parents’ observations of their own child’s gifts or special talents are the greatest indicator,” says Linda Kreger Silverman, who is director of the Gifted Development Center in Denver. “If your child’s teacher says your child isn’t gifted, and you feel certain that he or she is, seek testing. Of the 3,000 or so children we’ve seen at the center, 84 percent of the parents who thought their child was gifted were right; and 95 percent had a child gifted in some area, even if their total IQ did not fall into the gifted range.”

Mary Edwards of Denver says having gifted children is “a wonderful and amazing world. I have a 12-, 9- and 4-year-old, all gifted; each one is unique. In many ways, it’s like any other parenting.” The term “gifted” is applied, generally, to people with an IQ of 130 or higher. That, in turn, is broken down into subcategories of “moderately gifted” (130-144 IQ), “highly gifted” (145-160) and “profoundly gifted” (161 or higher.) Because most media images of giftedness are at the profoundly gifted extreme (think “Good Will Hunting”), many parents who suspect their child may be exceptional dismiss the idea because little Johnny or Susie isn’t playing Mozart concertos at 4 or working on integral calculus in 1st grade.

Parents of gifted kids are often gifted themselves, so they tend to think their child is not different from other children. (More than 2.5 million children, or 2 percent of the total number of children in the U.S., have been identified as gifted.) The Institute for Behavioral Genetics at the University of Colorado has identified the genetic markers related to giftedness, and there have been numerous articles in Scientific American on the subject. Thus, if the parents are exceptional, having children who are highly intelligent is the norm — for their household, anyway.

Here’s the catch when it comes to giftedness: It’s well known that children’s early development sets them on the path for future learning. Educational psychologist Maurice Fisher, publisher and owner of Gifted Education Press of Manassas, Va., says, “All the research evidence that I have read about the human brain shows that if infants don’t get proper stimulation at an early age, their brains don’t develop properly. This is true in humans; it’s also true in lower animals, as shown in controlled scientific studies. “If the gifted child is not stimulated in infancy, preschool and early elementary education,” Fisher says, “they lose their potential. If we don’t pay enough attention at ages 3, 4 and 5, which are critical periods to develop their brains to their maximum ability, they will lose their giftedness because they are not challenged and nurtured by their families and/or schools.”

Meanwhile, most public schools that have gifted programs don’t start with students until around 4th grade, which is past this critical period. Some gifted children begin school just like every other child, when they’re 5. That’s when the trouble can start. By definition, giftedness is “out-of-step” development. That is, intellectual, physical and emotional development occurs at different rates — higher, faster growth that’s out of sync with the norm. So a child who is 5 years old may read at a 10-year-old level, understand math at a 7-year-old level, and be socially adept at a 4-year-old level.

In her book “Counseling the Gifted and Talented” (Love Publishing, $45), Silverman points out that gifted children are two standard deviations from the norm, or the top 2 percent of the population, just like those children who comprise the lower 2 percent of the population. Because public schools are set up to attend to the needs of those in the middle, Silverman writes in her book, those children on either end of the spectrum are left outside. Gifted children have tremendous difficulty learning within the structure of a “normal” classroom, she writes; they require special education in order to meet their unique way — and speed — of learning.

Elizabeth Meckstroth is author of several books on giftedness, including “Guiding the Gifted Child” (with J. T. Webb and Stephanie S. Tolan; Columbus Ohio Psychology Publishing, $18) and “Teaching Young Gifted Children in the Regular Classroom” (with Joan Franklin Smutny and Sally Yahnke Walker; Free Spirit Publishing, $12.95). Meckstroth used this analogy: “If we were TV sets, some of us would only get five channels. Others are wired for cable — the general population — and some of us (the gifted) are hooked up to a satellite dish. That makes these gifted children capable of making connections that others don’t even know exist! “Teaching those types of voracious minds in a regular classroom without enhancement is like feeding an elephant one blade of grass at time. You’ll starve them.”

Edwards’ experience with her three children has convinced her that gifted kids seek stimulation. “One of the most common misconceptions,” she says, “is that the parents are pushing the child. In my household, my children are dragging me through the muck and mud, and I have to struggle to keep up with them. I spend an average of three hours a day driving the three of them to and from school and sports activities. They basically choose their own interests — passions, really. If my children aren’t challenged, their behavior deteriorates. Their minds have to be occupied at a high level for all our lives to run smoothly.”

There are factors that may hide or “mask” giftedness in a child, particularly when the parents and/or teachers don’t know what to look for or when learning disabilities and giftedness exist within the same child. Those children are considered “twice exceptional” and can languish in a public school setting without the proper identification and support, says Meckstroth. Experts point out that gifted children can have an enhanced nervous system, which translates into a boundless supply of curiosity and physical energy. According to Meckstroth, it’s a common mistake to assume a child like this is hyperactive. She says most gifted children who are misdiagnosed with ADD (attention deficit disorder) or ADHD (attention deficit hyperactivity disorder) are those high-energy, high intensity, brilliant young children who are expected to sit still in a traditional classroom and listen to information they already know.

Some ways to tell whether your child is hyperactive or merely in need of intellectual stimulation? In Silverman’s book “Counseling the Gifted and Talented,” she writes, “Hyperactive children tend to lack voluntary control of attention and behavior, such as interrupting and then losing the thread of the conversation. Gifted children who are high in psychomotor energy are simply very active, with few other symptoms of hyperactivity. They are capable of focused attention and intense concentration when they are interested; aimless activity seems to occur most often when there is insufficient mental stimulation.”

Surviving on less sleep than their “normal” counterparts, gifted children are capable of multiple focusing (watching TV, talking on the phone and doing their homework), and in fact may find working on one task at a time more difficult than “multiplexing.” As Meckstroth puts it, “It’s like asking them to nail Jell-O to a tree — these children need more to sink their teeth into than one simple task at one time.”

FINDING SIGNS OF GIFTEDNESS

In many cases, parents of these children suspect giftedness long before kindergarten. Joan Franklin Smutny, director of the Center for Gifted at National Louis University in Evanston, says these are some of the early signs of giftedness in preschoolers:

Has curiosity about many things.

Asks thoughtful questions (why, how, what if).

Has an extensive vocabulary.

Solves problems in unique ways.

Has a good memory.

Exhibits wit.

Has a sustained attention span.

Is very observant.

Shows talent in making up and telling stories.