Underachievement Amongst Gifted Students

Todd Stanley

Gifted Services Coordinator

www.thegiftedguy.com

Twitter @the_gifted_guy

Statistics concerning underachievement

• Speculation is that anywhere from 10 to 50% of gifted students suffer from underachievement
• 25% of females could be considered underachieving while 50% of males
• 18-25% of students who drop out of high school have been identified as gifted

College success

• In a study of gifted students, 100% percent of the high achieving students went on to a four-year college
• Only 87% percent of the underachievers moved on
• Out of those students who went on to a four-year college, 83% of the high achievers graduated
• Over half of the underachievers did not (47%)

Long-term effects

• A study of underachieving gifted students 13 years after high school showed that they tended not have the stability in their careers and even their marriages that high achievers did
• Still display the characteristics they did as students such as low self-concept, low perception of abilities, lack of persistence, and the inability to accept responsibility for their actions

Signs of underachievement?

• take "easier" classes to avoid work that would require much effort
• avoid competitive academic activities, such as the debate team or math contests, to evade potentially envious or angry reactions from peers
• refuse to try anything that might lead to failure or rejection, such as auditioning for the lead in the school play.
• procrastinate until the last minute to see how quickly they can write a paper before the deadline. 
• take pride in only reading SparkNotes and still getting A's in their AP English class. 
• avoid opportunities to challenge themselves when given the chance by teachers or assignments
• gives minimal responses to assignments, enough to answer the question but not enough to probe it at a deeper level

​

What is underachievement?

1. Underachievement as a discrepancy between potential achievement and actual achievement.

2. Underachievement as a discrepancy between predicted achievement and actual achievement.

3. Underachievement as a failure to develop or use potential.

​

Diagnosis

Cause #1

Boredom

• Students not being challenged
• Students having to stay with the class
• Teachers that misinterpret behavior issues for boredom

​

Strategies

• Pre-Assessment
• Project-Based Learning
• Alternative Assessment

​

Cause #2

Social/Emotional Needs

• Low frustration tolerance
• Lack of impulse control
• Not willing to take risks

​

​

Strategies

• Allowing students to challenge the teacher
• Advisory groups
• Activities that encourage risk-taking

​

Cause #3

Peers

• Cannot relate to children the same age (peermates vs. agemates)
• Get made fun of for doing well in academics
• Feels bad that is smarter than peers

​

Strategies

• Magnet programs
• Cluster groups
• Acceleration

​

Cause #4

Home life

• Parents may not value education
• Parents could have too high an expectation
• Home dynamics

​

Strategies

• Before or after school enrichment
• Parent education seminars
• Field trips

Cause #5

Twice Exceptional

• Learning disability
• Attention deficit disorder
• Hyperactivity

​

​

Strategies

• Teach students how to set realistic short-term goals
• Global learners who prefer visual and tactile-kinesthetic formats for learning success
• Provide specific instruction in organizational techniques

​

Cause #6

Lack of Intrinsic Motivation

• Avoiding the L word
• Goal valuation (degree to which task is important, interesting, and attainable) is also a factor
• Not willing to play the game of school
• Finding the proper carrot

​

​

Strategies

• Independent research projects
• Mentorships
• Passion projects

​

​

Cause #7

Lack of skills

• Answers come easily to gifted students in their younger years
• Many teachers assume these students already have these skills
• Focus on memorization and not 21^st century survival skills

​

Strategies

• Test taking skills
• Note-taking skills
• Research Skills

Cause #8

Lack of programming/trained teachers

• Might not be gifted programming
• Might not be proper gifted programming
• Teachers may not have skills to teach gifted students (teacher mismatch)

​

Strategies

• Learning centers
• Differentiation
• Student as teacher

Cause #9

Not challenged

• Solution is often to give them more work
• Have to use Bloom’s taxonomy to make it more challenging
• Lack of differentiation

​

Strategies

• Gifted seminars
• Higher level questioning skills
• Four corners projects

Cause #10

Too smart for own good

• Perfectionism/Obsessive Compulsive Disorder
• Abstract thinkers cannot translate to concrete answers
• Know how to play the system

​

Strategies

• Translating abstract to concrete
• Dealing with perfectionism
• Showing them the long term benefit of the lesson

Profiles of an underachiever

• Go to https://www.thegiftedguy.com/prof-development
• Read the Profiles of an Underachiever and try to diagnose what the cause of the underachievement would be.
• If you go to Underachievement Prescription, you can write up some possible strategies to use with any of these profiles or use it with a student you know.

​

​

The “CARING” factor

To learn more about the caring factor you can watch a free tutorial at https://youtu.be/JV8I4hbquog

Remember

“Children are not born underachievers.

Underachievement is learned, therefore it can be unlearned.”

(Davis and Rimm, 2004, p. 317)

​

• For further information

Website www.thegiftedguy.com

​

Twitter @the_gifted_guy

​

Email thegiftedguy@yahoo.com

​

A PDF version of this slide deck can be found at https://www.thegiftedguy.com/prof-development