Welcome to the Virtual Gifted Classroom!!!

Google Meet Link


Contact Me

  Send

Holly Springs Intermediate School

Gifted Program

The Holly Springs School District provides a program of enrichment for the intellectually gifted students in the second through sixth grades.  The students in the Holly Springs Gifted program attend these enrichment classes for 50 minutes, five days a week, for a total 250 minutes.   Second through sixth grade classes are taught by Ms. Carolyn Bredosky.  She holds a masters degree in Education and an Endorsement in Gifted.  Mass screenings of all 1st graders is conducted annually beginning in the spring.  Referrals for students can be made by anyone .  This includes teachers, parents, counselors, administrators, peers, the students themselves, or any and all persons who have a reason to believe that the student may be intellectually gifted. 

Mission Statement

The Mission of the Intellectually Gifted Program of the Holly Springs School District is to challenge  the Intellectually Gifted Students in the areas of communication, thinking  skills, creativity, metacognition, research, and self-directed learning.  The student will be given the opportunity to demonstrate mastery, understanding, and abilities at a much younger age and in greater depth and breath than other students.  The Holly Springs School Gifted Program is intended to open the door of opportunity and challenge the students to do what others think cannot be done by students of their age, educational, or experiential levels.

Definition: Intellectually gifted students are developmentally advanced in language and thought. 

Their advanced language ability includes superior comprehension skills, a large working vocabulary and a large store of information about many topics. The child may grasp complex and abstract concepts and relationships that are normally learned at an older age.

Characteristics:

Intellectually gifted students are identified by their incredible intellectual, creative and problem solving abilities. Gifted children often ask unforeseen questions, make unusual connections between ideas,  overflow with creativity and show intensity and complexity in thinking. Intellectual giftedness may be displayed in various areas, including critical thinking, verbal and mathematical reasoning and advanced academic achievement.  
  • Type 1 - Mass Screening Referral  

 Mass screenings of all 1st graders is conducted annually beginning in January. A normed group measure of intelligence is used in the Mass Screening Referral Process.



  • Type 2 -  Individual Referral                                                                                

 These referrals can be made by anyone. This includes teachers, parents, counselors, administrators, peers, the students themselves, or any and all persons who have a reason to believe that the student may be intellectually gifted. Once the student is referred, the district personnel shall collect the data required to satisfy the referral criteria. 

 

For students moving forward in the referral process, the next step in the process will consist of the collection of substantiated student data obtained from academic tests, parent and teacher observation surveys, student surveys, and student portfolio work samples. Alternative tests are used for students who are English Language Learners

Student Reassessment

A committee meets once a year to reassess each gifted student's continuation in the gifted program.  The committee includes the Gifted Instructor, Coordinator, as well as the Principal.  As stated in the Mississippi Department of Education Regulations, "Participating in the gifted program is an entitlement under the law; the student should remain in the program as long as they are being successful in the program.  Grades and/or success in the regular education program are the responsibility of the regular classroom teachers and should not be considered as a reason for removal from the gifted program."

Home Work and Class Work

Gifted students do not receive homework assigned in the Gifted classrooms.  On occasion students may need to conduct interviews or bring in materials from home in order to complete a project but as a rule the majority of gifted work will take place in the classroom.

Student Exiting Program

Should a parent want to remove their child from the gifted program, they must notify the gifted coordinator in writing.  However, once this is done, the child may not return to the gifted program for the remaining time in the semester.  Also, this removal may only happen once in a school year (August- May).

Holly Springs Primary/Intermediate

Intellectually Gifted Program contacts:

      Carolyn Bredosky,Gifted Teacher

       cbredos@hssdk12.org

       662-252-2183

During the 2023/2024 school year the Intermediate Gifted classes will be competing in the Future Problem Solvers International Program. They will complete competition booklets on four topics.  The Junior team (6th grade) will have the possibility of being invited to the International Competition Bowl held during the summer of 2024 in Idaho.  The Primary Gifted classes will also be learning the Future Problem Solving six-step approach to problem solving in their  classes. 

All curriculum in the gifted classrooms is different from the curriculum offered in the regular education classroom.  The gifted curriculum is aligned with the Mississippi Department of Education Gifted Outcomes.