Guidance For parent Dick Kelly, love means sleeping on the dirt. Kelly, president of the San Diego Association of Gifted Children, finds the key to raising gifted children is to follow their lead and feed their interests. When son Matthew developed a passion for environmental science, the whole family turned into hikers and campers. Parents such as Kelly work from inside the system to improve gifted programs. Every school district with a gifted program has a parent advisory committee, and there is a vast network of associations and foundations that share information and lobby for public policy changes and funding for gifted children.
Books are available for parents who want to be better advocates for their gifted children.
As with parents of children who are disabled or athletically gifted, the advocates emphasize that parents of intellectually gifted children are duty-bound to push for what is best for their children. But it also means doing your part at home. Just more than half the states require specialized education for gifted children, according to the National Association for Gifted Children. California isn' t one of them. Most districts in the state require a test to get into the state' s Gifted and Talented Education program, known as GATE, with the first round of testing administered in the middle of second grade.