Review
A Parent’s Guide to Gifted Children goes beyond the “must-knows” about raising gifted kids. Rather, it’s a comprehensive, all-inclusive parentinghandbook, addressing the most pressing realities of raising children in today’s complex world, but all through the lens of respecting and supporting the unique intellectual, social, and emotional lives of gifted and twice exceptional children. This is THE book any parent or caregiver of a gifted child must have on their shelf. ― Debbie Reber, CEO & Founder or Tilt Parenting, author of Differently Wired
A Parent’s Guide to Gifted Children has long been a foundational piece in the literature about gifted children. The new second edition brings a much-needed update to this pivotal work. With sections dedicated to neurodiversity within the framework of twice-exceptionality, gifted adults, self-regulation, trauma, and finding support, the second edition of A Parent’s Guide to Gifted Children provides much-needed explanation and resources to parents, educators, and all advocates who aim to ensure that gifted children can best realize their potential. Amend, Kircher-Morris, and Gore have done an outstanding job with this new edition, highlighting the latest research and adding valuable insight to current conversations within gifted and twice-exceptional populations. An important and necessary read that should be part of every GT library. - Christine Fonesca, LEP, author of Emotional Intensity in Gifted Students and Raising the Shy Child.
About the Author
Edward R. Amend, Psy.D., is a Clinical Psychologist at The Amend Group in Lexington, Kentucky. The Amend Group is a comprehensive center for psychological, educational, and gifted services. Dr. Amend is licensed to provide services in both Kentucky and Ohio, and his work focuses on the social, emotional, psychological, and educational needs of gifted, talented, and twice-exceptional (2e) youth and their families.
Emily Kircher-Morris, M.A., M.Ed., LPC, is a mental health counselor for gifted and twice-exceptional people and host of "The Neurodiversity Podcast." Growing up as a twice-exceptional kid led her to pursue supporting neurodivergent kids for her career. She has two identified twice-exceptional kids, and her youngest is still to be determined.
Janet L. Gore, M.Ed., has over 30 years experience with gifted and talented students and their families, first as a teacher and later as a school administrator, guidance counselor, policy maker, state director, and parent. She is co author of two award winning books, A Parent’s Guide to Gifted Children, and Grandparents’ Guide to Gifted Children. For five years she worked as a designated counselor/advocate for gifted high school students in Tucson, Arizona, and for three years served as State Director of Gifted Education in Arizona where she helped to draft legislation.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Chapter 2
Complexities of Parenting Gifted Children
Every parent wants to be successful, but what defines success? What are the goals? Parents of gifted children have seven important tasks or goals:
• Accept and appreciate the child’s uniqueness.
• Help the child like herself and relate well to others.
• Develop a positive, trusting relationship with the child.
• Help the child find a sense of belonging within the family.
• Nurture the development of values.
• Teach the child self-motivation, self-management, and self-discipline.
• Allow the child to discover his passions and commit to letting him explore.
This book focus on approaches and techniques to help you achieve these goals. We recognize that parents have quite different ideas about what is an appropriate parenting style, and usually their style comes from the way they themselves were raised. There is no one best way to rear a child; it depends upon the child. The best way for your family is whatever you and your partner agree upon and implement consistently to accomplish the goals above.
Mistakes are a part of life, and part of parenting. Our parenting will not always be what we want it to be. As the psychologist Haim Ginott declared, no parent wakes up in the morning planning to make life miserable for their child by yelling, nagging, and humiliating whenever possible. Despite our best intentions, we find ourselves sometimes saying things we do not mean or using a tone we do not like. We are wise to learn from these incidents and keep trying to improve.
As with many aspects of life, being a successful parent involves some element of chance or luck. Many parents seemingly do all the “right” things, yet their children still do not turn out as they had hoped. Parenting is a very humbling experience. We must struggle through, doing the best we can. As our children grow, we have to trust that we have laid a solid foundation and instilled proper values in our children, but we cannot know the results of our efforts immediately and may not know for quite some time. We hope that this book will help you plant the seeds of success so that you can watch them flower.
Influences on Modern Parenting
Being a parent of a gifted child is demanding, sometimes even exhausting, and is more complicated now than in previous decades. Parenting has changed in many ways from our childhood and our parents’ childhood. In our grandparents’ day, it was common for a father to take a young boy to the woodshed and whip
