“Gifted and talented pupils" means pupils enrolled in public schools who give evidence of high performance capability in intellectual, creative, artistic, leadership or specific academic areas and who need services or activities not ordinarily provided in a regular school program in order to fully develop such capabilities. WI Statutes 118.35
The G/T Specialists of the Howard-Suamico School District will provide gifted and talented students the opportunity to become independent learners and decision makers who recognize their potential and responsibilities in a changing global society.
The Howard Suamico School District Gifted and Talented program will provide continuous and systematic programming and services that address the needs of highly capable learners with intellectual, creative, artistic, leadership and/or academic strengths.
The state of Wisconsin recognizes five domains of giftedness: general intellectual, specific academic, creativity, leadership, and the visual and performing arts. Our program is dedicated to serving our students in a variety of creative, and innovate ways to meet their enrichment needs.
Math
Students participating in math enrichment focus on developing their critical thinking skills and building a greater depth of knowledge of the concepts taught. They analyze and synthesize complex problems and work to justify their answers to others through daily math talk. Accelerated math pathways can begin as early as fourth grade depending on student needs.
Reading & Writing
Our Literacy enrichment focuses on authentic learning experiences and opportunities for students to dig deeper into text through critical thinking and depth and complexity strategies. Students work to build their skills in the higher level of Bloom's Taxonomy of drawing connections, justifying a stand or decision and producing new or original work. Students also partake in local and national writing contests.
Leadership
Students in our program focus on further developing their leadership skills. The GT team developed this program, with structural support from Initiative One in Green Bay. We applied game design elements to the lessons, each interwoven with 4th grade social studies content about Wisconsin. Participating students work in teams to earn “The Scrolls of Leadership” by taking initiative, having positive accountability, developing intrinsic motivations, learning through failure, and managing conflict. Students work to build resilience and self-taught exploration. Learning in this environment is an important way for students to become life-long independent learners.
Creativity
Our creativity retreats were such a success that we decided to expand our creativity activities from a one day retreat into a themed unit based on third grade science content to be taught over an 8-10 week period. The creativity quest focuses on recognizing creativity and helping our students to develop strategies to be more creative. We accomplish this through a variety of learning opportunities. Students build marble runs, perform improv comedy and draw from different perspectives. They also reflect on their progress through group discussions and journal activities.