While many students revel at the opportunity to kick back for a few weeks or months, gifted students might appreciate some higher-order enrichment.
While many parents face difficult decisions during the school year trying to find the best match for their gifted child’s needs and what’s available at their school, in their county, or even in their state, finding a program that operates on weekends or during vacations can be even more of a challenge.
Parents of gifted students are always on the lookout for opportunities to advance their child’s academic and intellectual curiosity, while still allowing for some fun. Weekends and vacations are perfect for this kind of exploration, because having fun is a necessary and important component for gifted children.
It is important to remember that just because a gifted child may sound or act like an adult at times, gifted kids are still children and enjoy playing. Playing is an important function for children as they explore and learn about their world and environment, and gifted children who have heightened senses of imagination and creativity especially have a need to play and have quality down time.
The Best of Both Worlds
Therefore, in the best of both worlds, enrichment programs during weekends and vacations should have both high educational standards and be an enjoyable experience for the child. Programs that stimulate curiosity and creativity can be based in any field of interest depending on the child’s preferred intelligence: the arts, athletics, conventional problem solving, writing, reading and mathematical kinds of intelligence, drama, space exploration, or whatever he or she prefers.
Perhaps the best way to approach the question would be to do a small version of a needs-assessment. In other words, what is the most important thing or things to be accomplished over a break?
Where to Go and What to Do?
Both parents and student should complete a top-ten list of what programs each sees as a top priority for break time. For example, the student might feel that taking an advanced computer class might be the most rewarding, or maybe camping in the mountains might be a desirable new skill to obtain. The parents might opt for having the gifted child develop better writing skills or taking the next level of chemistry.
If there is no clear winner on both lists, the next step would be to focus on skills acquisition rather than on specific programs. This list would include skills, either broad or specific, that the child should be able to acquire or learn about. Examples would be learning better social skills, or developing leadership potential, or honing academic skills. It might be a little easier to rank order this kind of list first, and then brainstorming programs that would best fit the need.
In either case, before this process gets too far along, everyone needs to take a timeout and do a reality check and ask some fairly fundamental kinds of questions. For example, how much capital does the family have to invest in a vacation program? Some specialty camps can last for up to six or eight weeks and can get fairly expensive. Also, how much travel is involved – is the student accustomed to being away from home for long periods of time? Are there special medical considerations that need to be made?
Homework Over Vacation...
As a final consideration, take some time and do some homework on whatever programs make the final cuts. Make sure the program has a good track record and is approved by the state or county it operates in. Ask for some parents’ names of students who attended the program the previous year and call for a reference.
While many parents might face difficult decisions finding a suitable program that operates on weekends or during vacations, it is time well spent and can go a long way in helping their child’s overall development.
