iGifted School Online Debate & Math Club For Gifted Students

At iGifted School we are often asked why it is that we use avatars for our students.  The answer is simple, to encourage intellectual risk and to ensure online safety for our students.  I want to share our thinking about online safety and how we implement it.  

As a student registers for any of our programs, we require that they create and name an avatar, and you will see examples above of their work.  Once we approve the avatar, the student is registered in the name of the avatar, and from that point forward is known to other students and teachers as the avatar.  However that is only the first step. 

Posted by Jim O'Reilley at 7:28 AM | No Comments | Categories: Education | Methodologies | Technology | Virtual Debate Club

iGifted School, an online education provider, announces its free innovative summer program for all Eastern and Central Time Zone students. The virtual school seeks students for its summer debate program iGifted School, a 501(c)(3) organization is pleased to announce its free summer virtual debate program starting June 15 and running until August 10th. Students will debate virtually using avatars and compete in teams.

Posted by Bob Mandell at 12:46 PM | No Comments | Categories: Virtual Debate Club

Our friends at Gifted Homeschoolers Forum recently posted an article today that speaks volumes. It is written by a school teacher who was trained to correct errors in the work of students. In this piece a thought is shared that perhaps we should be more focused on building strengths. Thanks to GHF for sharing this important thinking by a teacher... What if…and this is perhaps crazy talk…what if we instead began every single lesson and every single interaction, heck, every single moment just concentrating on finding their strengths? Finding out who they ARE, not who they AREN’T.

Posted by Jim O'Reilley at 3:48 AM | 3 Comments | Categories: Education | Methodologies

Introducing the Big Questions and the Big Ideas Chat

iGifted School is pleased to tell you about the Big Questions from MIT Opencourseware.  A few years ago MIT offered a program where high school students could attend lectures on Sunday afternoons to hear about the Big Questions.  Big Questions include subjects like was there a beginning of time, what is the Big Bang Theory (not the TV show), can aliens exist, and so on.

Posted by Jim O'Reilley at 6:06 AM | No Comments | Categories: Big Ideas Chat Room | Education | On Gifted Eduation

MIT has really been focusing in on what we feel is an extremely important area of interest to young minds, namely presenting a free online course for pre-university students called “The Big Questions”.   Our experience at iGifted School is that Gifted and Talented students really enjoy discussing and challenging each other about important things in their lives.  It is really enjoyable for us to create places where these exchanges can take place, which is why we have recently created a Big Ideas Chat Room for our students.

Posted by Jim O'Reilley at 8:23 AM | 3 Comments | Categories: Education | On Gifted Eduation

"Results flatline for top students is the headline in a just published Australian study conducted with 36,000 students in years three to ten in reading comprehension, the Maths and critical thinking".
Just like in the US, bottom performers made dramatic gains in the testing leading Professor Patrick Griffin, an associate Dean at the University of Melbourne the study’s lead researcher, to comment that Australian governments were preoccupied with "closing the gap" between stronger and weaker performers rather than improving the results of all students. He also noted that many teachers assume that high ability students can learn independently! 

Does any of this sound familiar?

Posted by Jim O'Reilley at 2:23 AM | No Comments | Categories: On Gifted Eduation

Supporters of the Debate Club have suggested that we provide a closer view of what it is like to be an active member.  Last night we kicked-off the 2013 season for beginning debaters.  The following is a summary of the session.

After exchanging greetings and welcoming new members, Prof Colburn began by relating portions of the heritage we enjoy from the life and speeches of Martin Luther King Jr..  Dr. King was a tireless worker for many things but three of those particularly relate to educational debate. 

Posted by Jim O'Reilley at 12:09 PM | No Comments | Categories: Virtual Math Club

Hello and Happy New Year!

We are sending this Progress Report because of your interest in iGifted School. This is the first of a series of newsletters about the school and our programs. We hope you find it interesting and informative.

2012 was an exciting year for us. Organizationally we have begun to develop a Board of Directors, attract interest from outside leaders in the field of Gifted Education, and we received approval from the IRS which will allow us to raise funds and grow our programs. Educationally we introduced our Debate Club, and grew it through a test of our Learning to Debate Series, and then a further test in an Advanced Debate Group where students worked on how to better build arguments and present speeches in a competitive environment. Our Math Club has been in a hiatus due to a lack of resources, but we have had and are continuing to have discussions about what prominent mathematics professionals think we may be able to due to deliver a world class program in the near future.

Posted by Jim O'Reilley at 1:20 PM | No Comments | Categories: Board of Directors | Methodologies | Parents