Gender Identity And Gifted Students: Article Analysis

Gender coding is not a natural or biological characteristic. People are born with different physical and biological characteristics, but make sense of their gender roles through cultural influences. “Stereotypes are amazingly powerful, and we may not realize the degree to which our thoughts, beliefs, and actions are shaped by them” (Silverman, Rader, 2010). Boys and girls are labeled as masculine or feminine, which is considered the “norm” for society. Children are not born masculine or feminine, they learn these roles from parents, peers, media, and even religion. Concepts of gender identity are sometimes placed on children even before their birth, such as with the selection of paint colors for the nursery.” Children begin to form concepts of gender beginning around the age of 2, and most children know if they are a boy or girl by age of 3” (Martin & Ruble, 2004). From an early age, children are encouraged to identify with gender coding. Gender is formed at birth, but self-identification as being male or female is imbedded into their minds by parents and society. A child learns to understand their gender role and their identity by what is taught and expressed to them by others. Yet as a child grows, gender coding can cause cultural confusion, and insecurity issues throughout the course of their life.

Gifted students have a higher risk of dropping out of school due to a number of factors including a lack of challenge in academic areas, feeling disconnected to their fellow students and their teachers, potential drug and alcohol abuse and the lack of coping skills to deal with increased sensitivities. Additionally, gifted students are known to experience a lack of community or none acceptance at school, a high sensitivity not acknowledged in school, no help in learning coping skills for dealing with a major loss such as illness, death or changing schools, issues with authority but most importantly, they often do not have an advocate to help bring out meaningful change (Hansen and Torso, 2007). These factors have led to gifted students being underachievers, dropouts, or students who have developed an overall negative impression on school and learning in general.

Middle school is a period of transition for adolescents. Students are no longer the children were once were in elementary school; they are beginning to mature into the adults they will need to become. Gifted learners at the middle-school level face the same developmental and tasks tasks and challenges that their peers do. Yet, gifted learners also possess traits that are different from their peers, which often make them misunderstood or ignored. The need for teachers to identify these students and differentiate instruction in a way that addresses the needs of the gifted students in the classroom is becoming more crucial than ever.

gifted students within those states, and are not consistent across the United States. “Seven states

Children learn as early as age two what it means to be a “boy” or a “girl” (Aina & Cameron). This is described as gender identity, a person’s sense of self as male or female. Gender stereotyping emerges hand in hand with the development of gender identity in Early Childhood (Halim). Gender roles are society’s expectations of the proper behavior, attitudes and activities of males and females. When babies are born they are either put in pink or blue, as they grow up they still maintain the same “gender” colors. As young children start to socialize, they are playing with either “girl” toys or “boy” toys. When they get older they

Gender identity is defined as the identification of a human being as being male or female. The knowledge that we have about gender acquisition is still not as accurate as we would like. Biological and environmental factors are at play and not one or the other seems to be completely wrong. Biological views relating to gender identity are supported by chromosomal and hormonal based differences. Environmental perspectives emphasize on modeling and experience (individual and cultural) affecting gender acquisition. However, the only unbiased way to assess gender identity is by taking into account both biological and environmental factors (McCabe, 2007). This paper focuses on gender identity in early childhood development.

Consequently, underachievement is a significant and complex schooling challenge. With regards to her home environment, Clare has been brought up in low socioeconomic household and is responsible for the after-school care of her two younger siblings. A low-income background has been identified as a significant risk factor for underachievement in gifted students, especially among students who act in a carers role at home (Department for Children, 2009, p. 7). Furthermore, poor socioeconomic status is also one of the strongest risk factors for gifted students not participating in gifted and talented programmes (Olszewski-Kubilius & Clarenbach, 2012). Like most gifted students, Clare demonstrates superior social skills in most categories including interpersonal relationships (França-Freitas, Del Prette, & Del Prette, 2014). However, Clare is experiencing aspects of social isolation in and outside of the classroom environment. These negative peer interactions and attitudes may lead to feelings of low self-esteem and insecurity and anxiety, all of which can increase the likelihood that Clare will not achieve her full potential (Montgomery, 2009, p. 6) and become a Type III gifted underachiever who chooses peer acceptance over excelling academically (Betts & Meihart,

Based from the information provided by VanTassel-Baska, et. Al. (2009), gifted and talented students face the same issues as their regular peers but they have different way of viewing these issues and it affects them differently as well. The book discussed different issues that gifted learners face and recommendations on how to address these issues were also available for teachers, administrators and other school personnel. Also, Carol Strip Whitney (2011) in her book entitle Helping Gifted Learners Soar discussed stress as a factor that can distract

My experience the past two school year has disproven these two myths. Gifted students are not always high achieves and are not always welcomed addition to a classroom. They can have the same socially and emotional limiting problems and less than desirable characteristics as non-gifted peers. The bottom line is that gifted students are individuals with their own personalities and environmental influences. Their giftedness does not take these

However, they also learn gender-role expectation from their own observations (Bandura, 1986, 1997). Peers, the media, children’s literature, and preschool classroom practices all influence a child’s gender-role development because they often apply stereotypes about “girl” or “boy” behaviors and capabilities (Alexander & Hines, 1994; Maccoby, 1998). Gender identity and sexuality or often confused as the same. Just because a 5-year-old boy wears a pink party dress it does not mean he is a homosexual. Gender identity is the roles that society place on men and women and sex is based on

From the minute we are born our gender identity begins even thou we are not conscious of it. We are allocated roles, like buying pink clothes, dolls, and teapots for girls, and blue clothes, monsters, and cars for boys.

It comes as no surprise that our gifted and talented education program is growing in the United States as we are recognizing more students who need a higher level of academic content than the grade level they currently reside. According to a policy brief compiled by Rachana Bhatt (2011); the percent of students in the United States in the gifted and talented (G&T) education program has grown from 6.3% in 2000 to 6.7% in 2006 (A Review of Gifted and Talented Education in the United States, 2011). What seems to be lacking however, is the array of diversity found in our general education classrooms into our G&T programs. Within a nation that strives to provide an

The myth you stated first, “Gifted Students Should Be With Students Their Own Age” (Cross, 2011), it is true that most educators fear that those student will not be ready for an accelerated program/class. Cross also states the following, “it is clear that gifted students need opportunities to be with their intellectual peers, no matter their age difference” (Coleman & Cross, 2001), this supports

Throughout today 's society, almost every aspect of someone’s actions is based on whether or not he or she fits into the social norms that have been created. It is now clear that males are the dominant figures in our society. Norms in society do not just come randomly to one 's life; they start since a child is born. When a child is born the first question asked by the parents, family, and friends is the gender of the child, whether it is a girl or a boy. In contrast, the terms sex and gender have always been interdependent terms but have distinct meanings. Sex is male and female while gender is masculine and feminine. In essence, sex refers to the biological differences and hormonal profiles. For example females have boobs and males do not. In the other hand, gender describes the characteristics that a society or culture present as masculine or feminine. For example, the color blue is for boys and pink is for girls which not has always been the case. The article from the publication Earnshaw 's Infants ' Department “The generally accepted rule is pink for the boys, and blue for the girls. The reason is that pink, being a more decided and stronger color, is more suitable for the boy, while blue, which is more delicate and dainty, is prettier for the girl”. Jayme Poisson, a journalist, in her article Parents Keep Child 's Gender Secret she describes a family who has decided to raise their child named Storm without revealing their gender, in order for Storm to feel free to

It is normally thought that gender is something that is developed at birth and is something that is set in stone. More recently in time, people have started to express that they feel that their gender identity is different and separate from their sex at birth. Egan and Perry are considered very important researchers in the field of gender identity and psychology. The two proposed that gender identity is multi-faceted and is made up of five different components that are generally independent of one another. The categories are as follows: knowing one belongs to one gender or another, how much they feel they belong to the category, how happy they are with that gender, how much pressure they feel to conform to gender stereotypes and how much they feel their sex is superior to the opposite (Carver, Yunger & Perry, 2003, p. 95). All of these relate to adjustment in different senses. Egan and Perry found that by middle childhood, most have a fairly stable idea of their standing on all of these categories. Their perception thrives most when they are confident in themselves and when they feel that they are not constricted in their freedom to explore other