Gifted & Talent Development

You are in luck! Black Hawk Middle School is home to some of the hardest working, highest achieving students in the state! We have students that earn excellent grades, high test scores, win contests and learn new and fabulous things every year. It is amazing to watch their growth from sixth to eighth grade.

Students will have the opportunity to join various activities, clubs and groups to enrich their daily learning. They will also be challenged right in their regular and elective classes. We have something for everyone at Black Hawk Middle School.

A lot of students will find new hobbies, interests and learnings in their middle school years. They will also have an opportunity to meet new people and find new best friends. Their chances of success will only grow as they learn new things and get involved.

More specifics about how the GT program works at the middle school level in ISD 196 can be found at the end of this page.

Thank you,

Mr. Herem

David Herem

GT Coordinator/Social Studies Teacher

School: 651-683-6969 x85524

Explore More Activities

Battle of the Books

Battle of the Books is a fun reading enrichment opportunity open to all Black Hawk students seeking an extra reading challenge. Students will work in teams of 4 or 6 and read the 30 books from the attached Battle of the Books list. (They can divide the titles up so each student on the team reads around 5 books by the end of the year.) We will meet once a month to discuss a book from the list. In June, the teams will meet to take the group trivia quiz that will have questions from all 30 books. Groups are encouraged to come up with a team name and a costume idea for the day of the group trivia quiz. Fun prizes will be awarded!

Learn more about Battle of the Books

Future Cities

Join Future Cities!

Future City is a project-based learning program where students in 6th, 7th, and 8th grades imagine, research, design and build cities of the future.

See Mr. Herem for an information sheet and to sign up for 2022-23

Schoology access code: V82G3-2NDXQ

Learn more about Future City Competitions at futurecity.org >

Future City starts with a question—how can we make the world a better place? To answer it, 6th, 7th, and 8th grade students imagine, research, design, and build cities of the future that showcase their solution to a citywide sustainability issue. Past topics include stormwater management, urban agriculture, public spaces, and green energy. The 2022-2023 theme is a Climate Change Challenge.

Participants complete five deliverables: a 1,500-word city essay; a scale model (or multiple model segments) built from recycled materials; a project plan, a presentation video, and a Q&A session with judges. Regional winners represent their region at the international Finals. After completing Future City, student participants are not only prepared to be citizens of today’s
complex and technical world, but also poised to become the drivers of tomorrow.

Details on whether some elements of the competition will be taking place in-person this season, will be announced later in the year.

To be in Future Cities these items are non-negotiable:
*Attend Black Hawk Middle School
*Be a GREAT teammate
*Willing to compromise
*Be a hard worker

Future Cities can be time consuming and might involve choosing not to participate in other activities. Your team will HAVE to meet outside of school hours.

Future Cities is a team competition with as few as 3 people and as many as you want. There are ONLY 3 team members who are the presenters at the regional finals. If you win the regional
finals, the competition only pays for the 3 presenters to travel to Washington D.C. If you have more than 3 presenters BHMS may fundraise (to help costs) but there is no guarantee that you
will have your trip paid for.

Group of sixth-graders showing off their future cities project — *2018 Future City* group won the "Readiness for Natural and Manmade Disasters" category with their design.

Future City News

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Geography Bee

Spelling Bee

Writing Contests

Middle School GT

The middle school gifted and talented (GT) experience is different from the elementary school GT experience, and that is intentional. Students in the middle school GT programs start by being "clustered" in classes. This provides the students with groupings or whole classes of learners of similar abilities. However, we appreciate and value the uniqueness of each child. These "clusters" provides the teachers with opportunites to challenge students through adjusted lesson plans and differentiating curriculum. In District 196, this is called Levels of Service. Our GT teachers are experts in their subject areas.

What the District 196 middle school GT programs excel at is offering students choices and opportunities. We have a variety of enrichment opportunities at Black Hawk Middle School, and the offerings only continue to grow. Enrichment opportunities are open to any student, they do not need to be a GT-identified student.

We have clubs for strong readers, writers and spellers, mathematicians, geographers, computer programmers, trivia buffs and artists, just to name a few.

Students choose what they want to be a part of and we believe that makes it much more enjoyable. That is part of growing up and maturing as a student is choosing what activities I want to participate in. Students receive passes from their GT coordinator to attend these opportunities, which usually take place during our Flex Time and do not take students out of class time. However, sometimes they might meet before, during or after school. We believe middle school is great time to expand curricular horizons and harness strengths as a leaner.

Gifted and talented children are those students with outstanding abilities and capable of higher performance when compared to others of similar age, experience and environment. They have significantly different educational needs from their peers and require educational differentiation as a regular part of their school day to ensure they reach their full potential.

Learn more about Gifted and Talent Development in District 196:

District 196 Gifted and Talent Development

These services are available at all elementary and middle schools.

Gifted and Talent Development contacts by school/location.

Letters will be mailed to the primary address of newly identified students the week of March 25-29.

Families may submit an appeals request for identification between April 1-14. This appeals process is available for families of currently enrolled 2nd and 4th grade students.

GTD Identification Reconsideration Request form

Parent Resources

Gifted and Talented Advisory Council (GTAC)

Service Model

Click here for more information- District 196 GTD Services and Identification

GTD in District 196 Middle Schools

District 196 Gifted and Talent Development Service Model Goals:

Enrich, enhance, and extend core classroom curriculum and instruction within the literacy workshop and math workshop blocks. Staff utilize critical and creative thinking strategies, problem-solving and inquiry to help students become independent investigators.
Engage and empower learners across the full day
Equip PLC (professional learning community) teams and individual teachers
Empower collaboration among classroom teachers, GTD teachers, content coaches, parents, students, and community

Flexible and Fluid Service Model:

District 196 elementary schools cluster identified gifted students in grades 3-5. GTD specialists support cluster classroom teachers with differentiating for advanced academic needs in core instruction and in guided groups.

Students whose advanced academics needs extend beyond what can be provided in a cluster classroom may be referred for single subject and/or grade level acceleration.

Gifted and talent development services in District 196 is an inclusive, flexible and fluid model. A student does not need to be formally identified as gifted to receive support for their high academic and learning ability needs. GTD services are provided through flexible grouping based on formative and ongoing assessment of student learning in the classroom based on the content and standards being presented at that time.

Gifted Identification

Click here for more information- District 196 GTD Services and Identification

Screening and identification process

District 196 conducts universal screening at a district level to identify students who are demonstrating outstanding abilities and are capable of higher performance when compared to their grade level peers at their school. We use multiple criteria for a strengths-based identification in math and reading.

We screen and identify students annually in grades 2 and 4.

All second and fourth grade students enrolled in District 196 are universally screened.
Students in grade 5 who are not previously identified but are demonstrating outstanding abilities may be identified by school request following a data collection process.

The identification process begins in October and ends in March. There is no screening available outside of this process. Notification will be mailed to the families of newly identified students in March. An appeals process will be available. Information about the appeals process will be posted in March.

Currently enrolled students

Advanced learner identification for currently enrolled District 196 students considers the following multiple measure criteria:

Assessment of cognitive abilities (Cognitive Abilities Test- CogAT 8)
Assessment of academic achievement in reading and math (MAP)
HOPE rating scale (Having Opportunities Promotes Excellence - HOPE)
All data is locally normed for each school and grade level. District 196 uses local norms for identification.

If a student has been identified in another district or state, contact Teri Emery, K-8 GTD District Program Facilitator, Teri.Emery@district196.org, for information about documentation for identification in District 196.

Grades 3-5 Cluster Classrooms

Click here for more information- Elementary GTD Cluster Classrooms

A cluster classroom is a regular grade level class with a small group of identified GTD students together in the same class. The cluster classroom teacher receives additional training to meet the learning needs of advanced students in math and/or literacy in their class. GTD cluster classrooms in 3rd-5th grades is an efficient way to provide gifted education strategies to students throughout the school day.

Every District 196 elementary school has cluster classrooms in 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade. Many schools have more than one GTD cluster classroom in each grade level. A cluster class includes identified GTD students and students with a range of abilities. The number of identified GTD students in a cluster class varies. It is recommended that the number of identified GTD students in a cluster class not exceed one third of the class.

Acceleration

District 196 recognizes that students with superior abilities may have their needs best served by grade acceleration or single subject acceleration. Grade acceleration or single subject acceleration will be recommended only after other appropriate program changes or modifications have been deemed inadequate to meet the academic and emotional needs of the student in the student's current grade placement. This determination will be made by an assessment team.

For more information- District 196 Acceleration Information

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