This issue of MonTAGe is devoted to information, tips, and techniques that I hope will help you increase your effectiveness when dealing with teachers, principals, and others as you negotiate for the adaptations and changes your child needs in order to be happy and academically challenged in school. Negotiating from a position of strength also requires that we know our own weaknesses. I hope this information will help you to evaluate your own ways of adapting and coping.
Communication is more than simply understanding the words being spoken.
It's reading the subtle nuances in the other person's behavior and understanding the mental processes underlying the individual's communication and interpersonal relationship styles. In future issues, we'll revisit the issue of adaptive mechanisms and look at how to help our gifted children develop more appropriate ways of coping with the stressful situations they face in rigid classrooms or in schools which either cannot or will not allow changes to accomodate each child's unique educational needs. So many of our children face lowered self-esteem due to being misunderstood by their teachers and peers. It becomes a downward spiral that, if not caught and reversed, pulls the entire family into the maelstrom. Parents and children become caught in feelings of hopelessness and powerlessness.