NURTURING GIFTEDNESS IN YOUNG CHILDREN C. June Maker Margaret A. King 1996

 

Preface

This book is about children and classrooms real children and real classrooms. It is about how to create classrooms that are humane, nurturing, and excitingclassrooms that enable and encourage the unfolding of giftedness in young children. It is not written as a scholarly treatise on education, but as a real and practical sharing process both between us and from us to you. Throughout our careers as educators, we have been struck by the powerful impact that people's stories can have on their thinking and practice. We want to share some of our stories about children and classrooms and encourage you to share yours with us and with your colleagues. At various points throughout the telling of our stories, we will stop the narrative and reflect on the principles and underlying beliefs that are brought to light. These principles and beliefs come from two fields: early childhood education and education of the gifted. Some educators in both fields have perceived the principles as incompatible with or in opposition to one another. However, as we listened to each other and to the other participants in the Symposium on Nurturing Giftedness in Young Children sponsored by The Council for Exceptional Children, we were struck by the similarities in our beliefs and in our interpretations of the principles and practices in our respective fields. A list of Symposium participants can be found in Appendix A. A videotape transcript reflecting the ideas of Symposium participants can be found in Appendix B. To help you resolve any inconsistencies you may see and to construct your own interpretations

of our stories and yours, we will ask you to reflect on your beliefs and identify principles and practices you think are important. Through these reflections, we intend to reach understandings about practices that are developmentally appropriate in the education of young children practices that encourage and enable growth but do not force children to try to be who they are not. We will not neglect the ideas and research of others, for this also is important in gaining understandings about the appropriateness of practices and the nature of children and their development. Ideas from participants in the symposium and two institutes sponsored by The Council for Exceptional Children will be a part of our discussions, for it was out of these meetings that our ability to collaborate unfolded and grew. However, this book should be viewed not as a review of research or a presentation of the principles agreed upon by a group of educators, but as a selected presentation of ideas and some of the most relevant research related to the practices we are describing. Finally, and certainly not least important, are the visual images. To add richness and depth to the text, we will include images of the children and the classrooms as seen through the eyes of a photographer (June Maker) and a visual artist (Darrell Anderson). To protect the children and the classrooms, we have changed some of their names and locations without losing the essence and truth of the stories. Enjoy!

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