"After reading this handout it does appear that "Gifted" children may lack problem solving skills. But I do not think that is truly the case. I believe that they are just trying to approach the problem from a more logical stand point. When asked a simple and open question such as, "How do you suppose birds fly?". They are wanting to receive more directions or instructions on how to correctly, and logically answer the question. These "Gifted" students may actually be logical thinkers. Because of their ability to logically think about things this helps them find specific answers and conclusions to problems, and this makes them want to do things such as homework near perfect. Comparing them to "Street wise" students, who came up with out of the box answers for everything. But when looking at the answers these kids gave to questions their conclusions to things were not logically sounds, and most of them impossible. On the question about how to weigh a giraffe some of the responses were to weigh one on a kitchen scale or even an elaborate plan to weigh a truck then call the giraffe into the truck and weigh it again. These answers are seen as "critical thinking" because the kids are brainstorming ideas, but the answers are outrageous. When put into a real world situation, such as weighing a giraffe, the "Gifted" student will probably take time to research and find a direct and sound conclusion to the situation. But then the "Street Wise" student will probably immediately start running off and brainstorming idea after idea on how to weigh a single giraffe. Ideally it would be best to find one single direct answer in an allotted time compared to creating multiple answers in the same time.
While reading this I actually remembered a time in elementary when I took a type of test to determine whether I was gifted or not. From what I remember some elements of the test was problem solving in an allotted time period and finding solutions to things. I being a dancer, I was extremely creative and tried to answer all the problems creatively, which apparently was wrong. They were looking for logical answers and logical thinking which I did not have. From this experience being told that I was not "gifted" was actually very rude and hurt my feelings. How could someone who barely knew me tell me whether I was "gifted" or "special" or not. I believe these terms need to be thrown out of schools and education altogether. Instead the terms logical and critical thinking can replace "gifted" and "street wise".
I do think that creative dance can be beneficial for both logical and critical thinkers. And there can be a lot of benefits to both types of thinkers working together. It can continue to expand the thinking of critical thinkers and help them continue to think beyond the norm and in more creative ways. And it can benefit the logical thinkers by giving them a new method or resource on how to solve problems. Because problems are sometimes better solved creatively or logically. Students need to know how to solve problems in both ways. Creative dance will help the logical thinkers with their critical thinking, but they can help the critical thinkers think more logically. During a partner or group exercise these are the best opportunities to have students learn from other students. The critical thinkers may begin to brainstorm out of the box ideas and then to counteract that the logical thinkers will then ask or share that something will probably not work because of certain reasons."
This next response was also done as a blog post for the same class. It was in response to "The Inverse Power of Praise" by Merryman. Again, this was responded from my own experiences and observations.
"Before reading this article I have researched and read a lot about how to talk to children. One of the biggest things was telling little girls that "You're beautiful!" all the time. And not talking about their minds, brains, or smarts, only praising them on their looks. This could then follow them into adolescent where that's all they think about is how they look and could potentially be harmful to their self-esteem and bodies. It can even lead to eating disorders and not caring about academics. A lot of parents want their little girls to grow up the independent women, and by continuously praising them only on their looks could set them back. So one of the things that I read was to instead praise them on their smarts or minds. But now in this article there's evidence that even telling kids they're smart is also harmful. So if you can't tell them they're pretty and you can't tell them they're smart then what do you tell them?
After reading that it is better to praise kids on their effort I started to agree more with what she was saying. But I think that continually telling them they had good effort could also be potentially back firing. What if that then leads to these kids only believing they put in good effort but never have good results, or that they aren't really good at anything, they're just good at the effort. Doing things does take effort but it also includes using smarts and your brain. So I believe that with kids there needs to be a balance in the praise they are receiving. Don't say too much of one praise, but praise them in all aspects in moderation. I also think that when a child becomes old enough the parents can then point out to the kid that they are not as good in one subject as they are in another. This does not have to be a negative thing though!!! This is more informational and could help the child succeed better. I know personally when I was elementary and I struggled with sciences and math that my mom straight out told me, "You have trouble in mathematics, but you are very good in language arts." I carried this with me to this day. She would help point out the things I had trouble in or the things I did not do very well in so I would know that I wasn't stupid, but I just needed to try a little bit harder. And by helping me notice the things I was naturally good at I was then excited for those subjects and because I was excited I put a lot of effort into those things.
I think this could be related to creative dance. We, as teachers, can tell the dancers that they are beautiful dancers and doing a beautiful job and how smart they are etc etc. and it could potentially be harmful or it could not be harmful at all. But sometimes we will be faced with a child that maybe struggling and then we can implement the praising for effort. We can guide that child to not give up and in the end praise for their effort"
