Living With Live Wires

Lets look a little further into how gifted kids are wired for creativity.

Psychomotor overexcitabilities (OE) is a surplus of energy or the expression of emotional tension “through general hyperactivity” Manifestations include excess physical energy, workaholism, nervous habits (such as tics and nail biting), rapid speech, love of movement, impulsivity, and pressure for action.

Rapid speech – one recommendation by Daniels and Piechowski is to use IQ sheets. These are photocopied sheets with an I for Interesting Ideas on one side and a Q for Questions on the other. Thus, intense ideas and urgent questions have a waiting place – or parking lot – to be saved for later exploration at a more opportune time.

Sensual OE includes responsiveness of the senses, aesthetic appreciation, sensuality, and enjoyment of being the center of attention.

Imaginational OE is the capacity to visualize events very well; inventiveness; creativity, fantasy; and poetic, dramatic, or artistic abilities.

Intellectual OE includes probing questions, analytical thinking, reflectiveness, problem solving, and interest in abstraction and theory. This OE appears to be most closely associated with intellectual giftedness, but gifted individuals have repeatedly been found to be high in emotional OE as well.

Emotional OE involves intense connectedness with others; the ability to experience things deeply; fears of death, embarrassment, and guilt; and emotional responsiveness.

Piechowski suggested that the OEs or “original equipment” are basic components of giftedness shared by many types of gifted and creative individual. 

The overexcitabilities may be regarded as the actual psychological potential of the creative person.

Piechowski stated, “The OEs contribute significantly to the creator’s drive, vivid sensory experience, relentless searching, power to envision possibilities, and the intensity and complexity of feeling involved in creative expression.”

Piechowski and Colangelo (1984) emphasized that the OEs are not specific domains of talent or prodigious achievement. “Rather, they represent the kind of endowment that feeds, nourishes, enriches, empowers, and amplifies talent.”

This is telling us that the overexcitabilities of gifted children are the actual source of energy, intensity and emotions that power the creative process for these kids. It is the OEs that will enable them to actualize their creatively.

This is a key point to keep in mind when the gifted children in your classroom show their overexciteabilities in disruptive ways. It is easy to get irritated and frustrated, but with practice, it gets easier to redirect children from an empathetic stance. It is imperative to find ways to guide the OE of children in ways that will help them realize their potential.

Jan Piirto, Ph.D. in Understanding Creativity (2004) she says of creativity:

• What is unnatural and sad is for it to be repressed, suppressed, and stymied through the process of growing up and being educated.

• What happens to most of us is that somewhere along the way, and often necessarily, we begin to distrust our creative self. Survival dictates that we subordinate our creative poetic self to a more practical, self. We go along and forget who we are or who we were.

So it is a worthwhile exercise to recapture some of our lost creativity and rejuvenate the energy and enthusiasm that comes from fostering creativity. It takes a commitment and practice.  We can all hope that the next generations of kids will be able to experience more encouragement to develop their creativity.

Creative thinking is inherent in all humans, but research has shown that in many (maybe most) gifted children this drive is even more intense and this need to be creative is more fundamental to their basic needs. In terms of the special needs of gifted and talented children:

• A gifted child’s view of the world is often non-traditional and divergent; he sees numerous possibilities hidden to others (Webb, Meckstroth, & Tolan, 1982)

• Being able to see, hear, feel and experience aspects of life that most people miss is a necessary part of creative production (Dixon, 1983)

• High levels of sensitivity may be what drives intellectual giftedness; they allow the child to pick up on vast amounts of input from his environment (Freeman, 1985).

• Generally, when children are allowed to learn creatively, we unlock powerful and amazing learning potential (Rivero, 2002)

This new series of posts is intended to help teachers, parents and children integrate more creativity into thier lives and learning.  The goal is to give you reasons to pursue a path of creativity for yourself so that you are better equipped to pass these traits on to your students and children.

We are going to begin by taking a short journey.  As you read, let your mind create the world presented.

I want you to use your imagination to put yourself in someone else’s place. Imagine you are an educator in a regular classroom with gifted student clusters, the year is half over, the winter is getting long, there have been too many cold days, it is gray and dark outside most everyday.

Your classroom has two gifted kids that are getting disruptive, Tim has troubles at home with his parents, who are going through a divorce and he tends to get put in the middle of their conflicts, Charlie gets pressured at home by his parents to get high grades – both of them are heading down the slippery slope of underachievement. They are distracted in their work and distracting to others. Nothing you try seems to work to get them under control or to help them. They are beginning to take down another gifted student, Sam, who is highly sensitive and is exhibiting nervousness more often. The disruptions are beginning to affect the entire class, and you.

The parents of the Charlie – the ones that put a lot of pressure on their child – have come to you repeatedly insisting that you do something to make his slipping grades improve. They claim no responsibility to help, they view that as your job.

The gifted coordinator provides some assistance, but her position has been reduced and barely has time enough to visit all the schools. The pull-out programs were cut out of the budget and it is up to you to provide the gifted kids with all they need to survive and thrive. In addition, you still have the rest of the class with diverse needs to attend to.

Your own life has been in transition. You have recently ended a significant relationship and you are trying to help your own child with her struggles. You have been experiencing health issues and there seems to be no time for friends or interests of your own.  You are really feeling the stress. You are overwhelmed, overworked, and under pressure to turn it around.

One day, you are trying to lead a creative thinking and problem solving unit with the gifted cluster. You barely have enough energy to deliver the lesson, much less try to keep their attention and manage behavior. As you attempt to get through the lesson, the irony hits you -

You THINK to yourself – I am trying to teach these kids to be creative and think of creative solutions to problems, BUT I can barely make it through this lesson. What am I going to do now?

This scenaio is among typical circumstances that can make us feel fenced in.

We all have bad days, pressures, budget cuts and times when the kids seem to need extra attention. And, times when our own lives need extra attention and some creative problem-solving.

How do we FENCE OURSELVES IN?

What is our response to difficult situations and challenges in life? Do you feel the contraction of energy? The feelings of being trapped, with no way out? The feeling of wanting to run away and hide?

This may often be our first reaction. But hopefully, you feel the instinct to find solutions when you become challenged.

Let’s continue with our scenario.

Something sparked inside as you read a creative thinking workbook. You knew you had to do something. You searched through the resources you had gathered over the past couple years from workshops and conferences, and searched on websites.

Then . . .you found what you needed.

You have found someone to be a mentor and a coach. This person is someone who will help you with your personal and professional goals, give you ideas, resources, and challenges to assist you in becoming more satisfied in your life and in your career. Your mentor will challenge you to discover your talents and strengths, inspire you to explore, stimulate your creativity to discover new possibilities, help you find ways to invigorate your energy and inspire hope and optimism in the future.

This mentor is very busy, and has a lot of clients – sometimes you attend classes with others, sometimes you have one-on-one time. But even though the time you have with them may be limited, you have found that the benefit and value of that time is immeasurable.

When your mentor speaks to the group, you feel encouraged and inspired because they seem to speak from a place of compassion and wisdom.

Your mentor is someone who listens to you with their full attention, is unhurried when you talk, is just as concerned about your emotional needs as your professional goals. Most of all, you feel you can trust your mentor.

After working with your mentor for a few months, you feel lighter and more grounded at the same time. You are happier and more patient with others. You feel more relaxed without the previous feelings of agitation, anxiety, and nervousness that arose when trying to cope with the never-ending challenges, pressures and stresses. You realize that other people are there to help and support you, you just didn’t realize how much, until your mentor showed you ways to notice.

Life is more meaningful, your inner purpose is clearer, your life is on a self-correcting path. Your relationships have improved, your career is looking brighter, and most of all you are hopeful, optimistic and resilient to the changes that come your way.

Your mentor did not do the work for you. They did not change your life circumstances. They guided you on a path of new perspectives and new possibilities.

The mentor was mindfully attentive to the your needs. They modeled resourcefulness and adaptability by showing you how to get out of her “stuck” ideas, feeling, beliefs and thoughts.

This is the essence of creative thinking. And, in order to teach students creative thinking, it is important to model it for them so they can experience it in action.

True creative thinking does not just produce a product or new solutions to a problem,
true creative thinking affects your entire mind, emotion, will and relationships.

You cannot think your way to becoming more creative. You have to allow space for it to arise. You must embrace reflective skills in your life, and in the classroom. You have to develop a trust in the creative process. You need patience and to practice creativity over time.  You will be pleasantly surprised with the results.

When you get on the path of creativity development and begin to practice it, you feel creative thinking, you experience creative thinking, you become the embodiment of creative energy which opens a channel for creativity to come in to your life.

When this happens- you are motivating to other people, your students experience the change, they become your partners and collaborators in creativity. They imitate you, give you ideas, and begin their own creative change.

…there is a general ambivalence in our schools and in society about gifted children, and they are often criticized for the very things that make them what they are (sensitive, intense, etc.).  Both at home and at school, they hear, “You’re too sensitive! You’re too intense!  You have a strange sense of humor! Do you always have to be creative?  Why do you have to question every rule?”  What is a child to make of criticisms like these?  He may believe these messages and decide that something is wrong with him.     Webb, et. al. (2007)  A Parent’s Guide to Gifted Children.

You may appreciate your gifted child’s advanced abilities, but it can be difficult and challenging to have a child that is always outside the norm.  Parenting books describing “normal” behavior for most children usually don’t fit gifted children.  They seem to be on a developmental path all their own.  Many gifted children reach developmental milestones much earlier than most children.  They may have one or more subjects in school that they are learning much faster than those in the middle of the learning curve.  Gifted children often process logical thinking and abstract ideas at a younger age.  And, they react to stimuli with more sensitivity.

To help and support a gifted child, it is vitally important to realize that they ARE thoroughly different, they are not just smarter than other kids.  Next, you must understand HOW they are different, because gifted children are vastly different from each other as well.

Oftentimes a gifted child is far above the normal development curve in one or more areas.  If you are to follow traditional advice in parenting books, you will not find help in the section that speaks to your child’s chronological age.  Your child may be ahead in some academic areas, at grade level in others and maybe behind in social and emotional development.  This is the definition of asynchonous development.

If you seek help from educators who are not experienced with giftedness, they may say,

 ”Your child is a child first, and the giftedness is secondary and only a part of him.”  But the giftedness is integral to the child; it affects everything he thinks, feels, says, and does.  It is a key to who he is. A Parent’s Guide to Gifted Children, James T. Webb, Ph.D., et.al., (2007).

You cannot separate out the gifted aspects of your child.   They are not a child with gifted tendencies, they ARE a gifted child with a complex set of unique traits and special needs.  All of which do not fit neatly into the normal development curve.  

Once you fully accept that your child is gifted and that they will always be unique, you can see them for the wonderful, amazing child that they are.  Together, you can embark on a journey of self-discovery and learning together.