VAGTC Conference 21-22 May 2015

Last week I was very fortunate to be able to attend the VAGTC Gifted Education Essentials Tools for Putting Theory into Practice conference which was held at CQ Function Centre Queens St Melbourne on Thursday 21 and Friday 22 May 2015 http://www.vagtc.asn.au/vagtc-conference-2015

Some of the presentations can be read at http://www.vagtc.asn.au/conference-2015-presentations

The conference was officially opened by Judith Graley Member for Narre Warren Sth and Parliamentary Secretary to Hon. James Merlino, the Victorian Deputy Premier and Minister for Education who spoke of collaborating with the VAGTC to make Victoria ‘the Education State’ by acting on the accepted recommendations from the report into the Victorian Parliamentary Inquiry into the Education of Gifted and Talented Students
https://giftedresources.wordpress.com/2012/08/20/victorian-parliamentary-inquiry-into-the-education-of-gifted-and-talented-students/
Funding has been allocated for increasing opportunities for rural and outer suburban students, Koori students, ESL students and low socio economic group students.
The VAGTC has been contracted by DET to deliver teacher and parent half day seminars in 5 country towns in Victoria. VAGTC are writing an online resource for teachers to be placed on the DET website.
DET were the major sponsor for the conference.

Day 2 was opened by Judy Connell from Catholic Education Office, also sponsors of the conference.

Conference participants were treated to musical performances by Sadie Mustoe 2014 from The Patch Primary School winner of The Maldon Minstrel Award for country music singer-songwriters on Thursday http://www.maldonfolkfestival.com/maldon-minstrel-award.htm  
and Alby Sands, a young jazz musician and composer from St Leonards College on Friday.

Photo Jo Freitag

The excellent opening Keynote address presented by Dr Katherine Hoekman, the Consultant: Academic performance at the Association of Independent Schools NSW was titled Play, Passion and Performance.

Dr Hoekman also presented two mini keynote sessions Creating Agile Learning Spaces to Connect and Support the Community of Learners
and Applying Universal Design for Learning (UDL) Principles: Creating Opportunities for Depth and Complexity

The Keynote address on Friday 22 May given by Manoj Chandra Handa, a Gifted Education Consultant at Oceans of Excellence http://www.oceansofexcellence.com/ Sydney NSW was titled Building Differentiated Schools of Curious Delight.
He also presented an inspiring session titled Strategies for Identifying and Addressing Underachievement among Gifted Learners

There was a great selection of presentations and workshops.
I enjoyed attending these sessions

Andrea Blake It All Starts with Identification
http://www.vagtc.asn.au/sites/vagtc.asn.au/files/Copy%20for%20website%20Subjective%20identification%20presentation_0.pdf

http://www.vagtc.asn.au/sites/vagtc.asn.au/files/Andrea%20Blake%20Resource%20list%20for%20Subjective%20Identification%20VAGTC%20Conf%20presentation%202015.pdf

Christine Ireland Tools, Practical Examples and Important Considerations for Teaching Creatively across Domains
http://www.vagtc.asn.au/sites/vagtc.asn.au/files/Christine%20Ireland%20creativity%20and%20innovation%20presentation%20%20.pdf

Michele Juratowitch “Boring!” Understanding and Alleviating Tedium
http://www.vagtc.asn.au/sites/vagtc.asn.au/files/VAGTC%20Conf%2015%20Boring%20HO.pdf 
PARENTS SEMINAR
A Parent Seminar was run in conjunction with the conference on Thursday 21 May
At this seminar Jenny Gotz Papillo spoke about her experiences in an excellent presentation titled One journey http://www.vagtc.asn.au/sites/vagtc.asn.au/files/Jenny%20Gotz%20Papillo%20Parent%20Seminar.pdf

Next a panel of experts moderated by Paul Double answered the parents’ questions on issues and concerns relating to parenting and educating gifted children.
The panel comprised Dr Gail Byrne, Andrea Blake, Kate Mitchell Dr Anne Grant and Jenny Gotz Papillo

Photo Jo Freitag

After lunch the parents were addressed by Derek McCormack of Raising Children Network http://raisingchildren.net.au/

Then Michele Juratowitch of Clearing Skies Brisbane http://www.clearingskies.com.au/index.html presented ‘Gifted and Happy?’
Michele observed that whenever she speaks to parents the thing they most often say to her is “I just want my child to be happy!” Her own research influenced by the work of Dr Martin Seligman, Prof Miraca Gross, Dr Linda Silverman and Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi showed that students who were suitably placed in terms of educational challenge and true peers could be happy and did not have to make a forced choice.
I really enjoyed the experience of participating in the conference which ran very smoothly and catching up with friends and colleagues, especially the members of the VAGTC Committee, and also meeting and learning from so many people who are passionate about the education of gifted students.

Featured flyer: VAGTC Twilight Seminars

For full details see http://www.vagtc.asn.au/vagtc-seminars-2014

VAGTC EmpowerED for Giftedness Conference

Last week I was very fortunate to be able to attend the VAGTC EmpowerEd for Giftedness conference which was held at CQ Function Centre Queens St Melbourne on Tuesday 23 and Wednesday 24 April

The conference program can be read here
http://www.vagtc.asn.au/sites/vagtc.asn.au/files/Program%20at%20a%20Glance.pdf.

The main theme of the conference was differentiation and the keynote speakers were Susan Winebrenner from the US http://www.susanwinebrenner.com/and Debbie Youd from Tasmania. It was wonderful to hear Susan Winebrenner speak as her books are favourites of mine and ones I often recommend.
Susan Winebrenner’s opening keynote presentation was titled Compacting and Differentiation are Easy!  Her closing mini keynote was The most equitable way to provide gifted education services – The Schoolwide Cluster Grouping Model.

The conference also saw the launch of the ‘New opportunities for the gifted and talented directions paper’
http://www.education.vic.gov.au/school/teachers/teachingresources/diversity/Pages/gifted.aspx
This directions paper builds on the findings of the Victorian Parliament’s 2012 Inquiry into the Education of Gifted and Talented Students (the inquiry) by signalling a renewed focus on the needs of gifted and talented children and young people, their educators and their families. For the final report for the 2012 inquiry, see: Inquiry into the Education of Gifted and Talented Students

Jewel Topsfield wrote about this in The Age newspaper
http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/political-news/more-state-schools-may-cater-for-gifted-students-20130422-2iaqr.html

David Southwick MP, chair of the Parliamentary Inquiry launched the ‘New opportunities for the gifted and talented directions paper’ and presented a conference session titled Unmasking Economic Potential of our Gifted Students in Victoria.

Sarah Humphreys of ACARA spoke about newly added provisions for adjusting the National Curriculum to meet the needs of gifted students See
http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/
Gifted and Talented
http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/StudentDiversity/Gifted-and-talented-students
Student diversity and the Australian curriculum
http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/StudentDiversity/Pdf/StudentDiversity

A Parent Seminar was run in conjunction with the conference on the morning of Tuesday 23. At this seminar Dr Anne Grant spoke about research into giftedness in early childhood and the factors impacting the transition to school.
Lynne Maher, the president of the Tasmanian Association for the Gifted, and her son Jonathan Geeves spoke about acceleration and the various types of acceleration which Jonathan had experienced. It was very helpful for the parents to hear about the social/emotional as well as the academic aspects of acceleration from a student’s point of view.
Susan Winebrenner also spoke to the parents covering many topics including differentiating instruction for gifted students and perfectionism

I also attended an excellent practical workshop presented by Andrea Blake and Kylie Graham titled Differentiating for Gifted Learners within an Inquiry Framework , a session presented by Christine Ireland titled Making differentiation work for gifted students: strategies, options and pitfalls and a session presented by Mark Smith describing the provisions for gifted and talented students at Macedon Grammar School titled Using Differentiation to Build Classroom Engagement and Uncover Student Talent

Conference participants were also treated to a display of fencing by Gabriel Spano and Sam Gilfillan, members of VRI Fencing Club https://www.vrifencing.com/   organised by Kayt Spano and Dr Zoltan Vilagosh directors of Fencing Victoria
Kayt describes fencing as ‘physical chess’ and says that it can be a sport for gifted students which builds transferrable skills in physical co-ordination and strength while appealing to their mental strategic and problem solving skills.

There were also performances of Ave Maria and Gloria by singers from Salesian College, music from Mary McKillop College Leongatha, hip hop dancers from Damm School of Dance see their news item at http://www.daamdance.com.au/news.html  and the songs “Don’t write us off” and “If you could see the world through my eyes” written and performed by twice exceptional students from Kids Like Us http://www.kidslikeus.org.au/

A Tribute to Professor John Geake was given by Jonah Oliver and the book Explorations in mind A collection of articles by John Geake edited by Wilma Vialle was launched

At the Conference Dinner life membership of the VAGTC was conferred on Christine Ireland in recognition and appreciation of her excellent commitment, contributions and service to the VAGTC and gifted education over many years.

I enjoyed the experience of participating in the conference which ran very smoothly and catching up with friends and colleagues and also meeting and learning from so many people who are passionate about the education of gifted students.

Featured flyers: VAGTC Conference and Parent Seminar

For full details of the program and to register go to the conference page on the VAGTC website at http://www.vagtc.asn.au/empowered-for-giftedness

For full details and to register go to the VAGTC page http://www.vagtc.asn.au/vagtc-parent-seminar-with-susan-winebrenner-this-not-be-missed-event-for-parents

 

Jo’s CHAOS Plan 2

C-Creation:

What exactly do you want to love into existence?

I am going to use this challenge ( See https://giftedresources.wordpress.com/2013/01/19/jos-chaos-plan/) as an opportunity to consider the 2013 version of Gifted Resources, Sprite’s Site and my personal life– which in some cases means continuing with services and activities in their present form and in other cases means revising, updating or discontinuing them or creating something completely new.

H-How:

How will you know you’ve accomplished it? What kind of parameters do you need to complete your creation?
Using my image ‘Getting the 2013 wheels turning as an idea starter I will regard each activity as a separate wheel and  will be considering the activities individually with the help of mind mapping and then posting the resulting thoughts as blog posts

Gifted Resources will continue to engage in project  work with Borderlands  http://www.borderlands.org.au/
The main foundation of Gifted Resources is the website http://www.giftedresources.org/  I intend to leave the website very much as it is but to update it as needed. Some sections need a complete revision, some just need updating and some need all the links to be checked and made to open in new windows.  Possibly a shopping cart may be added in future – I am still considering this.

The other main activities of Gifted Resources are the monthly email newsletters and the four Holiday Programs newsletters. I will continue to produce these.
At present the newsletters are sent as a PDF attachment to regular emails and are also posted on the Gifted Resources website. The most recent edition can be read by following a link on the main page and back copies can be read in the Newsletter Archives http://www.giftedresources.org/gr/newsletter.htm

I may consider changing the form of the newsletter as I have seen some very attractive templates for email newsletter which are not sent as an attachment.

For many years now I have been compiling the Gifted Resources Information Pack.
See http://www.giftedresources.org/gr/infopacks.htm

It is a collection of brochures, pamphlets, articles and business cards from psychologists, education consultants, parent support groups and extension programs and information about conferences and events relating to giftedness and to gifted and twice exceptional students.
The contents of the pack vary from time to time to reflect the currency and availability of the information. Although most providers now have websites and publish their information digitally, the Information Pack collection of hard copy flyers is still useful in many circumstances.

I am currently compiling the 2013 Info Pack

At present most of my consultation work is conducted by phone, email and post.
Using Skype has enhanced the effectiveness of phone consultation and made it a more affordable method.

Presentations can be given in person or in the form of webinars or Skype sessions
Last year I gave presentations for Jo Hart’s Fine Focus webinars http://johart1.edublogs.org/?s=Jo+Freitag  using Blackboard Collaborate and hope to do so again this year.

I will be talking to a group of parents at Village School in March and would like to give other in person presentations during the year.

Last year I presented a Film Discussion on the film The Incredibles to a Lunch n Learn Group in Texas using Skype   
It worked well. The Skype connection was so good that I felt as if I were in the room with the participants. I would be happy to do more Film Discussions in that way.
Also as I have 3 plastic crates filled with Film Discussion kits another option would be to add the kits to the Gifted Resources Library collection and groups can borrow a kit to facilitate holding their own Film Discussion.

I am in the process of re-cataloguing the Gifted Resources library

See https://giftedresources.wordpress.com/2012/11/23/re-cataloguing-the-gifted-resources-library/

And https://giftedresources.wordpress.com/2013/01/04/re-cataloguing-the-gifted-resources-library-2/

When the re-cataloguing is complete the Library page can be restored to the Gifted Resources website.

In August 2012 I received an email telling me that I needed to either close the Gifted Resources blog or update it to the newer format. My tech guru, Jamie Tarling, put in a lot of work to update the blog and transfer old posts into it.
See: There’s life in the old blog yet
https://giftedresources.wordpress.com/2012/08/18/theres-life-in-the-old-blog-yet/
Since then I have posted reviews of books, programs, conferences, webinars etc to the Gifted Resources blog and I will continue to use it the same way in 2013.
At present I am reading three books published by Gifted Homeschoolers Forum and hope to post a review soon.

Sprite’s Site blog http://spritessite.wordpress.com/   has the theme of Giftedness and 2E Twice Exceptional issues
In About the Topics http://spritessite.wordpress.com/about-the-topics/  you can read about the issues that have been discussed
The About Sprite page http://spritessite.wordpress.com/  describes the main theme of the blog.
Sprite is the twice exceptional (gifted with a learning difficulty or difference) cartoon character who is the Poster Child to illustrate Jo Freitag’s Feetspeak: 2E shoes presentations.
Feetspeak: 2E shoes is about planning programs that will be suitable for gifted students who also have a learning difficulty or different learning style using Edward De Bono’s 6 Action Shoes as the planning tool.
Sprite is always depicted as having an injured left ankle and needing to wear different shoes on each foot to illustrate the concept that she needs different educational provisions for both her giftedness and her disability.
The About the Characters pages describe the other characters you will meet on the blog.

I enjoy posting to Sprite’s Site as it gives plenty of scope for imagination and creativity as well as being able to present facts and opinions in a narrative form.

I would love to be able to produce books or e-books about the Sprite’s Site characters.
Last Christmas I gave mouse pads with the Twitter Bird bowers printed on them as gifts to some techie friends and I can imagine Twitter birds adorning mugs etc.

Currently I enjoy participating in groups relating to giftedness and 2E issues on Facebook and Twitter, especially the weekly #gtchat sessions on Twitter.
I will consider possible expansion of participation in these areas – perhaps a Gifted Resources Facebook page or revisiting my Linked In profile which I set up but have not used.

I also belong to a couple of NING communities and should visit them more often.

There is always so much to learn!

There are conferences in real life.
I will be attending the VAGTC EmpowerEd conference in April.
http://www.vagtc.asn.au/empowered-for-giftedness
Local libraries and groups offer real life opportunities.

MOOCs, webinars, global education conferences and many others offer so many online opportunities.
At the end of 2012 I participated in an online course about Digital Badges  which led to Khan Academy http://www.khanacademy.org/ and several other sources of self education which I would like to pursue if I have the necessary time, energy and ability.
At the moment I am trying to learn about creating computer games at Gamestar Mechanic and programming with Scratch http://scratch.mit.edu/

This is an area which gives me so much satisfaction and happiness.
I will continue to participate in the Brilliant Chaos Group on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/brilliantchaosonline/  
monthly creating challenges
http://www.facebook.com/#!/groups/brilliantchaosonline/doc/253263591368971/

Regarding my personal life –  this year we will be celebrating 40 years of marriage.
I am enjoying the quiet pace of life in Rosebud and would like to continue to walk on the beach and appreciate the many species of birds that visit the garden.
In the past I have been very involved with writing and teaching church Sunday School programs and I have several plastic tubs of programs which I have written over the years which I would like to turn into online programs.  The church we are currently attending does not have a children’s program at the moment.

You can see on the mind map the purple dotted lines and text. These are the Wish lists or Possible? to do lists. They are the maybe I could?s . They are the What if…?
They are the Perhaps and the Imaginational Dabrowski says…. Lists
But it sounds more lofty and official to call them Aspirations!