#smithingifted
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🤖 Why VEX Robotics Belongs in the Gifted Classroom: It’s Not Just About Coding!
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Gifted Students Need Gifted Peers: It’s About More Than Academics
Beth Smith, M. Ed. |#smithingifted | Gifted Education | Learning & Innovation When we talk about meeting the needs of gifted students, the conversation often focuses on curriculum, acceleration, differentiation, and academic challenge. But there is another important component of gifted education that sometimes gets overlooked. Gifted students need opportunities to interact with other gifted…
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Gifted Is More Than Just a Deep Dive!
Gifted Is More Than Just a Deep Dive! Gifted education is about more than providing deeper or more elaborate assignments. While depth and complexity are important, gifted students also need acceleration, curriculum compacting, meaningful challenges, and opportunities to explore new learning. Effective gifted instruction begins by identifying what students already know and determining what they…
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💻 Why Coding Belongs in the Gifted Classroom
It’s Not Really About Teaching Kids to Code By Beth Smith, M. Ed. | #smithingifted When people hear that we use coding in #smithingifted, they may assume I’m trying to turn every student into a computer programmer. I’m not. Some of my students may eventually become software engineers. Others may become doctors, teachers, architects, scientists,…
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#smithingifted Teacher Lab: Where Teaching Ideas Get Tested
The #smithingifted Teacher Lab is a place where teaching ideas move from theory into real classrooms. I’ll share the successes, challenges, surprises, and adjustments that come from using gifted education, STEM, robotics, technology, and creative-thinking strategies with real students. But the Teacher Lab isn’t just about my classroom—teachers who use #smithingifted curriculum can share their…
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Why I Use the 24 Math Game in My 3rd–5th Grade Gifted Classroom
The 24 Math Game is a simple but powerful way to build number sense, flexible thinking, problem solving, and productive struggle in the 3rd–5th grade gifted classroom. Students use four numbers and different operations to make 24, but the real learning goes far beyond getting the correct answer. Students must explain and defend their reasoning…
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✍️ When Messy Handwriting Meets a Gifted Brain: Why Cursive May Help
Gifted students often have ideas that move faster than their handwriting. For some students, cursive can help by making writing feel smoother, more rhythmic, and more automatic because letters connect instead of being formed one at a time. Cursive may also encourage students to slow down, notice patterns, and pay closer attention to letter formation.…
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Sometimes the Best Learning Is Locked: Using Breakout EDU in Grades 3–8
This blog post explores how Breakout EDU can transform grades 3–8 classrooms by turning academic content into engaging, collaborative problem-solving experiences. It highlights how Breakout EDU supports critical thinking, productive struggle, communication, perseverance, differentiation, and student reflection across subjects like math, reading, science, and social studies. The post also encourages teachers to move students from…
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Stop Doing All the Talking: How to Use Socratic Seminar in the 3–8 Gifted Classroom
By Beth Smith, M. Ed. | #smithingifted One of the biggest shifts we can make in gifted education is surprisingly simple: Stop doing so much of the thinking for our students. Gifted students do not need a teacher standing at the front of the room explaining every idea, asking every question, and confirming every correct…
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Every Drop Counts: Exploring New Mexico’s Water Resources in the Global Innovation Lab 💧🌵
This blog post explores New Mexico’s water resources through The Global Innovation Lab’s Every Drop Counts challenge, helping students connect science, geography, agriculture, technology, law, and systems thinking. It also explains how the Texas v. New Mexico and Colorado Rio Grande case and the 2026 Supreme Court settlement affect groundwater use, farming, communities, industry, and…