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Holly Springs Intermediate School
Gifted Program
Mission Statement
The Mission of the Intellectually Gifted Program of the Holly Springs School District is to challenge the Intellectually Gifted Students in the areas of communication, thinking skills, creativity, metacognition, research, and self-directed learning. The student will be given the opportunity to demonstrate mastery, understanding, and abilities at a much younger age and in greater depth and breath than other students. The Holly Springs School Gifted Program is intended to open the door of opportunity and challenge the students to do what others think cannot be done by students of their age, educational, or experiential levels.
Definition: Intellectually gifted students are developmentally advanced in language and thought.
Their advanced language ability includes superior comprehension skills, a large working vocabulary and a large store of information about many topics. The child may grasp complex and abstract concepts and relationships that are normally learned at an older age.
Characteristics:
Intellectually gifted students are identified by their incredible intellectual, creative and problem solving abilities. Gifted children often ask unforeseen questions, make unusual connections between ideas, overflow with creativity and show intensity and complexity in thinking. Intellectual giftedness may be displayed in various areas, including critical thinking, verbal and mathematical reasoning and advanced academic achievement.
- Type 1 - Mass Screening Referral
Mass screenings of all 1st graders is conducted annually beginning in January. A normed group measure of intelligence is used in the Mass Screening Referral Process.
- Type 2 - Individual Referral
These referrals can be made by anyone. This includes teachers, parents, counselors, administrators, peers, the students themselves, or any and all persons who have a reason to believe that the student may be intellectually gifted. Once the student is referred, the district personnel shall collect the data required to satisfy the referral criteria.
For students moving forward in the referral process, the next step in the process will consist of the collection of substantiated student data obtained from academic tests, parent and teacher observation surveys, student surveys, and student portfolio work samples. Alternative tests are used for students who are English Language Learners
Student Reassessment
A committee meets once a year to reassess each gifted student's continuation in the gifted program. The committee includes the Gifted Instructor, Coordinator, as well as the Principal. As stated in the Mississippi Department of Education Regulations, "Participating in the gifted program is an entitlement under the law; the student should remain in the program as long as they are being successful in the program. Grades and/or success in the regular education program are the responsibility of the regular classroom teachers and should not be considered as a reason for removal from the gifted program."
Home Work and Class Work
Gifted students do not receive homework assigned in the Gifted classrooms. On occasion students may need to conduct interviews or bring in materials from home in order to complete a project but as a rule the majority of gifted work will take place in the classroom.
Student Exiting Program
Should a parent want to remove their child from the gifted program, they must notify the gifted coordinator in writing. However, once this is done, the child may not return to the gifted program for the remaining time in the semester. Also, this removal may only happen once in a school year (August- May).
Holly Springs Primary/Intermediate
Intellectually Gifted Program contacts:
Carolyn Bredosky,Gifted Teacher
662-252-2183