14. With Understanding Comes Calm! Let’s Talk 2e with Julie Skolnick

Julie Skolnick is the Founder of With Understanding Comes Calm, LLC, through which she passionately guides parents of gifted and distractible children, mentors 2e adults, trains teachers on how to understand and address 2e strengths and struggles.

Julie serves as Secretary to the Maryland Superintendent’s Gifted and Talented Advisory Council and is an advisor for “The G Word” full feature film. Julie is the SENG (Supporting the Emotional Needs of the Gifted) Maryland liaison, a SENG Model Parent Group (SMPG) trained facilitator and on the Simultaneous Supports committee for the National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC). She is trained in the suite of tools “Putting the Person into Personalized Learning” through the 2e Center for Professional Development at Bridges Academy. Julie is also an invited member of the Gifted Homeschoolers Forum Professional Membership Committee.

A frequent speaker and prolific writer, Julie is also the mother of three twice exceptional children who keep her on her toes and uproariously laughing.

TAKEAWAYS FROM THIS EPISODE:

Giftedness is much more than the intelligence part, it is essentially heightened awareness
2e, also called Twice Exceptional means gifted plus a learning disability / learning difference
2e kids need to know about their neurology to understand who they are and are able to thrive in social settings
Only when you understand yourself, you can understand various situations, be it at work or in a relationship and understand why others react differently than you would
Gifted people do best when they are with gifted people
2e does not cancel itself out: The strength may mask the challenge and the challenge might mask the strength
With understanding comes calm!
Being 2e is not a shortcoming, look at it as a Superpower
Executive Functioning difficulties are challenges for example with processing speed, working memory, organisational skills
ADHD & giftedness can look similar in therms of executive functioning
Overexcitability can be in one or more of the following areas: intellectual, emotional, imagination, sensual, (sensory) and psychomotor
Gifted people have bigger antennas so there is more data the gifted brain has to crunch through
Perfectionism, Imposter Syndrome and Gifted Underachievers are all part of the gifted profile
Start from your strength! Use a strength based approach. Do what you love, not focusing on what is hard for you. If you don’t start with what you love, you will never get to do it! You got to focus on your strength first!
You do not have to watch the News! Protect your sensitive self. These are crazy times and you are allowed to protect yourself from the negative News. Instead, do something kind for someone else and do something kind for yourself.