As two educators who have worked in an inner-city high school with nearly three decades of combined experience, we’ve seen quite a few curricular programs come and go. We’ve seen several programs help our struggling students. Read 180 was tested to see if it would assist struggling readers and ELL students. The Cambridge Curriculum was adopted to see if it would aid our general education students. Writing labs and tutoring centers were opened for our students who needed additional help. The population that was often left to fend on its own, however, was the gifted population. It was wrongfully assumed that this population would succeed without intervention. Gifted = self-sufficient, right?
In a faculty of more than 200, there were two teachers at this school who had completed the necessary steps to get a gifted endorsement (12 credit hours and two plus years of verifiable direct work with gifted students). One taught an enrichment elective written for gifted students; the other acted as the gifted facilitator, liaising with the district and testing and labeling gifted teens. That was the extent of gifted expertise on a campus of 5,000 students with about 150 gifted teens. Both teachers advocated for the gifted population through parent nights and professional development, and by trying to place gifted students in the enrichment course. To change the perception that these kids were self-sufficient, the faculty needed to build personal relationships with them.
Some common questions emerged: How could we inspire kids meeting standards to exceed them? What could we do to help students who seemed self-sufficient reach their potential? One educator without formal gifted training saw that students who had made a personal connection with an educator consistently exceeded expectations. She wanted to increase that connection for all students and started an advisory program.
Advisory Programs
Advisory programs have been in place in secondary schools for decades. Research (e.g., Simmons & Klarich, 1989) indicates advisory programs improve school climate by increasing belonging and security. Advisories help students learn to work together and develop a caring environment; this offered a way to establish personal connections. Research shows advisories succeed across socioeconomic contexts. With such adaptability, what benefit might they add to the gifted population?
Advisory programs are often offered for one class period a day and act as a homeroom. The curriculum can include character education, relationship building, enrichment, and productive citizenship. The purpose is to build and maintain relationships throughout high school, creating a custom environment of learning and encouragement provided by a significant adult. An advisory offers time for teachers and students to develop relationships that support emotional, social, and cognitive development; each year students return to the same advisory, reinforcing those bonds.
Advisory and Gifted
For gifted students, advisories allowed connection with educators who might not have formal gifted training but who could get to know them personally. Advisors could tailor curriculum for a group of about 30 students and address socioemotional behaviors often associated with giftedness—perfectionism, low self-confidence, difficulty forming relationships, disorganization, isolation, and overexcitability. Advisory teachers began witnessing these difficulties and sought strategies to help.
Beane and Lipka (1987) indicate advisory programs can help adolescents manage peer relationships and socioemotional development. This proved true for the 150 gifted students; teachers began asking how to teach coping strategies and how to address perfectionism. Non-endorsed teachers consulted literature and resources, and a philosophical change began as more educators sought to connect with their students.
A Need for Relationships
In secondary education, socioemotional support for gifted students is often lacking. Gifted adolescents are rarely in programs that address their socioemotional need to belong or to develop positive relationships with adults and peers. Courses meet academic and creative needs, but which meet the need to belong? Where do gifted students learn to cope with socioemotional effects of giftedness?
Individual attention and personalization reduce dropout rates, provide tutoring, and improve achievement. This suggests advisories benefit underachieving students; if advisory teachers are gifted endorsed or supported by a gifted facilitator, advisories can serve gifted students as well.
Curricular options can include coping skills for perfectionism, rejection, or competitive criticism. Goodenow (1993) describes adolescents’ desire to be recognized and wanted; that desire applies to gifted students too—they want support and to be held in high esteem.
Concluding Remarks
The intent of an advisory program is to give students the self-worth needed to survive high school socioemotionally and academically. A sense of belonging is linked to academic success and encourages help-seeking. Students who struggle are more likely to seek help from adults or peers with whom they have a positive relationship. Students who like school tend to be more successful, and this holds for gifted students as well.
To help gifted teens combat negative socioemotional behaviors, they need opportunities to develop relationships with guiding educators. Convincing an entire faculty to earn gifted endorsements is unlikely; offering professional development alone is not enough. On our campus, even with gifted-endorsed teachers and enrichment courses, educators lacked time to build relationships. Once teachers knew students personally, labels mattered less and practical support—helping Jose turn in imperfect work or helping Donna manage tears—became the focus. Advisors had to get to know the kids, not the label, and advisory provided that venue.
Citations
[1] Simmons, L., & Klarich, J. (1989). The advisory curriculum: Why and how. NELMS Journal, 2 (2), 12-13.
2 See Educators for Social Responsibility: http://esrnational.org/professional-services/high-school/partners-in-learning/advisory-program/
[3] Vialle, W., Heaven, P., & Ciarrochi, J. (2007). On being gifted, but sad and misunderstood: Social, emotional, and academic outcomes of gifted students. Educational Research and Evaluation, 13(6), 569-586.
[4] Pratt, M. (2009). Looping to Meet the Needs of Gifted Children. Principal, 88(5), 22-24.
[5] Beane, J., & Lipka, R. (1987). When kids come first: Enhancing self-esteem. Columbus, OH: National Middle School Association.
References
Selected references include Beane & Lipka (1987); Educators for Social Responsibility (2011); Forte & Schurr (1993); Goodenow (1993); Hallinan (2008); Hebert & Kelly (2006); Newman (1991); Pratt (2009); Simmons & Klarich (1989); Vialle et al. (2007).
