WORKING WITH A TWICE EXCEPTIONAL PUPIL

Paper

Twice exceptional students or gifted students with special needs represent a special challenge for teachers. It is necessary to master the methods of work and forms of assistance that a student needs with regard to his or her disorder. At the same time it is necessary to develop the potentials. The school system mostly still focuses on detecting weak points or deficits. Therefore, twice exceptional students often remain recognized only as students with problems or some sort of disorders. Since they are students who often have difficulty adjusting to the social environment and do not manage well at school, their potentials are often overlooked. The development of twice exceptional students is highly uncoordinated as they have strong potentials and significant deficits. They often experience frustrations and hardships to which they respond in different ways: aggressive outbursts, withdrawal or passivity. The teachers of a double exceptional student must take into account both student's extremes. They have to design a method of work that will stimulate potentials and reduce deficits, or find ways to compensate for them. In doing so, it is necessary to maintain expectations on the level of student's intellectual abilities. Otherwise the student is deprived of the chance to make mistakes and look for new solutions. Learning tasks need to be complex and creative enough to facilitate the student’s further intellectual development. Depending on the individual's shortcomings, it is necessary to adjust the way of teaching in such a manner that the student can acquire and demonstrate new knowledge. In the article I want to present methods of working with a gifted pupil who has Asperger syndrome, emotional behavioral disorders and speech and language disorders.