CLASSROOM 5.0

THE FUTURE OF LEARNING

Season 2, Episode 9: Gifted Awareness Week

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CLASSROOM 5.0

THE FUTURE OF LEARNING

SEASON 2

Episode 9: Gifted Awareness Week

Busting Myths and Understanding the Challenges, Strengths and Untapped Potential Within our Gifted Children: Gifted Awareness Week

With Melinda Gindy and Nina Thomas from AAEGT and Kylie Burrett from Splat 3D

For many, the term ‘gifted’ evokes an image of a privileged child, set for a life of success. As we explore in this week’s episode, that assumption is far from reality. We explore the lived experience of four women (including our co-founder, Mariane) as they share their personal and professional understanding of the complex needs, vulnerabilities and strengths of these children, and discover the many ways we can identify and support their differences, to ensure they grow in confidence, and develop and share their potential in the world. 

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About our Guests

Melinda Gindy, President of Australian Association for the Education of the Gifted and Talented (AAEGT)

Melinda is passionate, committed and experienced in governance and the work of the AAEGT in furthering the national gifted agenda through constructive collaboration. Melinda has worked in a volunteer capacity across multiple education sectors, including the recently delivered NSW DoE HPGE Policy and associated resources, in addition to her teaching and diverse learning coordination roles. Melinda has been an invited/sessional presenter at many state, national and international conferences, and was awarded the Honorary Fellowship of the Teachers’ Guild of NSW in 2019 for her work in gifted education. Melinda is currently an Educational Leadership Doctoral Student majoring in Leading Diverse Learners. Qualifications: BArts (Mus), GradDipEd, GradCertGiftEd, MEd (SpEd), MMTA, HFTGN, MACEL

Nina Thomas, Chair of Gifted Awareness Week, Director at AAEGT

Nina began her career in the RAAF before entering the mining industry. She then studied to be an accountant owning a business that allowed her to work from home with her twice-exceptional son. Later, she trained as a teacher and is now the gifted and talented coordinator at a primary school in Perth. Nina has completed both a Masters in Educational Psychology and a Masters in Gifted Education and is currently undergoing study in the area of neuroscience.

Kylie Burrett, Creator of 3D Splat

Kylie Burrett (Lawrence) is a dynamic educator and award-winning designer who aims to help teachers and students fulfill their creative potential for success in STEM. With qualifications in Film & TV Production, Bachelor of Education, Bachelor of Health Science, and a Masters in Education (Information Science) Kylie has over 20 years of experience working in education and media, and has worked at and consulted for ABC TV, alongside teaching in both International Baccalaureate and Reggio Emilia schools.

Kylie’s love of early education and media has seen her work with some of the world’s most creative minds in children’s entertainment, including the Academy Award-winning team behind Weta Workshop (NZ) and Keith Chapman Entertainment (UK). For the past 7 years she has been collaborating with industry and schools to resource and develop innovative STEAM programs. As co-creator of the Splat ® – Engineers Australia sponsored 3D design tool – Kylie’s creative out-of-the-box thinking is helping students develop their design and spatial skills for improved STEM outcomes. Her exceptional capacity for innovation and developing tools, that support diversity in design, has seen her ideas adopted by STEM programs throughout Australia and overseas. For more on Splat 3D, visit https://splat3d.com and connect with Kylie over on Instagram and Facebook using the handle @splat3d. Kylie also featured as our 3rd guest on our first season of the podast. You can find out more on the episode page, Design That Makes a Difference.

'As teachers, we're being encouraged to move away from that model that if a student's performing well, they must be gifted because what we know, overwhelmingly, is that the really highly gifted and gifted students often underperform. And that's a marker."

~ Kylie Burrett

Keen to take a deeper dive?

Find links to the resources and reads recommended in this episode:

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'Of the 37 universities in Australia that offer pre-service education degrees, less than 10% of those have a stand alone unit in Gifted Education.'

~ Melinda Gindy

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SEASON 2 EPISODES

CATCH UP ON SEASON 1

We acknowledge the Traditional Owners of our homeland, Birpai Country, and of the lands throughout Australia. We celebrate the diversity of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples and their ongoing cultures and connections to lands and waters. We pay our respects to Elders past, present and emerging.