Since gifted students can see connections that others might miss, extending reading and writing into every discipline makes sense for differentiating instruction.
In Greek legend, the goddess of wisdom, Athena, was born fully ready for battle from the head of Zeus. As far as anyone knows, this is the only time someone has been born knowing everything he or she needs to succeed in life. The student who claims to have written an 'A' essay at one in the morning the night before it was due is either a fibber, a genius, or Athena.
Gifted children can see connections among different things usually faster than other students. They can find connections and patterns that others might miss. Keeping this in mind, one way for schools to adjust the curriculum to challenge gifted students and benefit all students is to make reading and writing a central focus in each of the disciplines. In many schools, reading and writing have always been thought of as the providence of English and Reading classes only; however, today’s research tells us that these are skills that must be honed in every class our students attend, especially the maths and sciences.
Write Across the Curriculum
The key to writing in each discipline, or writing across the curriculum, is an understanding of process writing. Much the same way that math teachers send homework back for “re-do’s,” all disciplines must maintain that answers be written out and given back for correction if the writing needs work even if the correct answer is given. Imagine a mathematics teacher asking for a grammar correction on a word problem even if the formula is correct! It will work well for gifted students because it demands a higher level of preparation and thought, and is a good way to differentiate learning for gifted students.
New Learning is Based on Previous Learning
Part of functioning in a global community means understanding how to work within a team, and appreciating how things that may seem different are actually connected. This interdisciplinary understanding of connectedness in education is critical to a student’s pedagogic growth. Learning only takes place when the new learning is based upon a previous learning, and gifted children have a wide base of information. A student’s learning new material based upon what he or she has previously mastered is much like a spider building his web when each new thread is built upon the strand beneath it.
Teaching must then parallel the spider’s weaving. Teachers constantly need to bring in to the discussions the lessons that have come before, and to show the connections among what is being learned. History comes alive more vividly when it is connected with an English class in which stories are being read that correspond to the historical time period being studied. Math makes more sense when the visual arts teacher has the students studying architectural renderings in famous paintings.
This brings us to the unifying practice of writing across the curriculum. Through it students become educated readers and writers who do not work in intellectual isolation but who actively look for connections among all of their life's pursuits and the world around them. In fact, gifted students can help everyone learn through peer editing.
Maybe Athena was born fully ready for battle from the head of Zeus, but for the rest of the world and gifted students in particular, not only the information is important, but also how and how often it is delivered.
