Educational Options Newsletter
June, 2007

Greetings: This spring has been especially busy here at Educational Options. Our scheduling book is packed into August, and this has caused a delay in getting out this month’s newsletter. But here it is, and we hope you will find the information useful.
In the meantime, we wish you a safe and happy summer!

Sincerely, Kathy Hara, Editor
 

In this issue:

  1. New Educational Options Procedure
  2. Personality Types 
  3. Mind Games
  4. Teen's Essays
  5. New Educational Blog
  6. Books for Parents
  7. Minnesota Events
  8. Keeping up with Dr. Ruf

New Educational Options Procedure

In order to keep a schedule that allows time for writing and volunteer obligations, while at the same time meeting the needs of clients on a timely basis, Dr. Ruf has initiated the idea of mini-phone conferences. If a client who has previously been through Dr. Ruf’s assessment process has a question that cannot be answered in a quick sentence or two by email, they may schedule a 15-minute (or 30-minute) telephone conference, charged at the usual rates. Such a mini-consultation can be slipped into an otherwise full schedule. We hope this will be helpful to people.

Personality Types

In the course of her working with families, Dr. Ruf has realized more and more the importance of paying attention to personality type. We recently learned of a study by Jane Piirto which was presented in the Proceedings of the CAPT conference in 1998, titled Feeling Boys and Thinking Girls: Talented Adolescents and Their Teachers.

Here is the abstract of Piirto’s article: The MBTI [Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator] was administered to 226 tenth and eleventh graders who qualified as gifted and talented. Sixty teachers of the talented and 25 elementary and high school teachers were also administered the MBTI. Talented teens preferred ENFP. Gender differences were calculated as well among artistic youth and academically talented youth. Male artistic youth preferred F and academic females preferred T. Teachers of the talented preferred ENFJ. Other teachers preferred ESFJ. Implications for teaching these students are discussed.

To read the entire article, go to http://personal.ashland.edu/~jpiirto/mbti.htm.

Mind Games

More than 200 Mensans recently selected the top five Mensa Select board and card games. During the three-day event in Pittsburgh, members played and rated 59 board and card games, and the five selected as the best may now use the Mensa Select seal.

The winners are:

bulletGemlock, by Pywacket (http://www.pywacketgames.com)
bulletGheos, by Z-Man Games (http://www.zmangames.com)
bulletHit or Miss, by Gamewright (http://www.gamewright.com)
bulletQwirkle, by Mindware (http://www.mindwareonline.com)
bulletSkullduggery, by Outset Media Games (http://www.outsetmedia.com)

Teen's Essays

Newsday, founded in 1940, is one of the largest daily newspapers in the nation. The paper serves Long Island and New York City with its print editions, and publishes its website at http://www.newsday.com.

One of Newsday’s features is NEW VOICES, a weekly opinion piece of original, nonfiction essays by college, high school and middle school students. The students may send submissions of up to 400 words to Opinion Department, Newsday, 235 Pinelawn Rd., Melville, NY 11747; send e-mail to newvoices@newsday.com; or fax to 631-843-2986. Please include a photograph of yourself along with your address and your telephone number.

New Educational Blog  

Dr. Liza Cardona is founder of Smart Kids PR, and she would like to invite you to take a look at a new educational blog, http://smartkidspr.blogspot.com/. Every month there will be a focus on a different topic. For instance, in April the discussion centered on dyslexia.

As a passionate supporter of building stronger kids, Smart Kids PR aims to support a free on-line support system, resources and information to parents, teachers and members of the community in order to improve the well-being of children and their families. Smart Kids PR focuses on parents as educators, gifted children, teaching children with special needs (autism, adhd, learning disorders) home-school links, family learning, education for parenthood, and related topics. They hope to be a catalyst for change in how education should be perceived and their main goal is to create a safe, fun environment for the exchange of ideas and information.

Books for Parents

While the Educational Options website has a long list of recommended books for parents, Mensa has a book list that you may find interesting. Go to http://www.us.mensa.org/Content/AML/NavigationMenu/Programs/GiftedChildren/BookList/Gifted_Children_s_Bo.htm. 

For Minnesotans

Lighthouse Program in Spring Lake Park: After visiting the Lighthouse Program in Spring Lake Park earlier this spring, Dr. Ruf said, “I would love to see all schools do a version of this.” This challenging alternative learning program is grounded in Problem Based Learning, where student engagement is the essential focus. Bright students aged 10 to 18 take responsibility for their own learning, which increases their sense of accomplishment and their motivation to learn more. For more information about this program, go to http://www.springlakeparkschools.org/Schools/la/LAprograms/lighthouse.homepage.htm.

Keeping Up With Dr. Ruf...

bulletJuly 4-7: Attending and making presentations at the Mensa Annual Gathering in Birmingham, Alabama. http://www.ag2007.org/

Deborah Ruf’s book, “Losing Our Minds: Gifted Children Left Behind,”
is available through Great Potential Press or Amazon.com.

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