Image courtesy of Johns Hopkins University
For the past three weeks, it has been my privilege to find myself working in beautiful Palo Alto on the campus of Stanford University under the employment of Johns Hopkins University.
Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth started back in 1972 when Dr. Julian Stanley, a professor at Johns Hopkins, started a Talent Search, whose purpose was to identify and challenge gifted students with special academic attention. The first official Center for Talented Youth Program sprung from Dr. Stanley’s Talent Search in 1979, and since then, the program has spread to several states across the nation, with an international site in Hong Kong. It has served over 100,000 talented youth, and continues to be synonymous with academic achievement among educators and parents.
I was recently hired to be a Teaching Assistant for their Writing and Imagination course for gifted children ages 10 to 11. I had a wonderful time assisting students in their study of classic poetic form, including sonnets, cinquains, haiku and tanka, as well as fiction writing, which included fables, legends, myths, short stories, and one act plays. I was honored to have this opportunity, and it was amazing to see the progress of my students over the course of our three weeks together. I was fortunate to have an international group, with students hailing from America, China, and Korea, many of whom were ESL/EFL students.
Since returning, I have made updates to my CV, which now includes my time with the Center for Talented Youth. I have also uploaded a lesson I presented to my class on the writing of legends and myths. You can find a more detailed explanation of the lesson on the Legends and Myths page under the Instructional Work heading.
Adam Garnica 