Emotional Intensity in Gifted Students: Helping Kids Cope with Explosive Feelings

By Christine Fonseca

Designed to provide support for the difficult job of parenting and teaching gifted children, "Emotional Intensity in Gifted Students: Helping Kids Cope With Explosive Feelings" provides the resource parents and teachers need to not only understand why gifted children are so extreme in their behavior, but also learn specific strategies to teach gifted children how to live with their intensity. Presented in an easy-to-read, conversational style, "Emotional Intensity in Gifted Students" uses real-world examples through case studies and role-plays that show parents and teachers how to interact with gifted children in a way that teaches them how to recognize, monitor, and adjust their behavior. Worksheets, tip sheets, and checklists are included to help parents, teachers, and the students themselves learn to cope with the explosive feelings that often accompany giftedness. Specific strategies for stress management, underperformance in school, perfectionism, and social anxiety make this a must-read for anyone wishing to make a positive lasting impact on the lives of gifted children.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Sourcebooks
• Release date: Oct 1, 2010
• ISBN: 9781593635893

Christine Fonseca

Christine Fonseca is dedicated to helping children and adults find their unique voice in the world. Christine worked as a school psychologist in the elementary, middle, and high school levels for more than 17 years. Currently, she works as a consultant helping school districts support the behavioral and social-emotional needs of students. She also coaches children and parents to work through their anxieties and is the parent of two young adult daughters.

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Reviews for Emotional Intensity in Gifted Students

[hippielunatic · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This was a good primer book for reviewing the challenges that gifted children may face as they have to navigate social interactions and dealing with their self-inflicted stress. There are concrete examples of steps to take to help children who may be having difficulty with their emotional intensity, but I would warn readers to not expect quick fixes to be offered up. Rather, this book teaches that there are many issues to consider in the child's life, as to what may be helping and what may be hurting his chance for success. Teaching children social skills is a difficult journey, especially for children whose minds work in more rigid ways, as gifted minds tend to.I appreciated the help that was provided to both parents and teachers, as children today have many mentors through their life. The more each and every one of the can understand about the difficulties a child is having, the better the chance of success for that student.

[missmimsy · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This book is well written and regularly refers to peer-reviewed publications and so it seems reputable. The early descriptions of gifted children remind of many children I've known. I also appreciate the special for teachers sections. However it takes a while to get past descriptions and on to concrete strategies to help these children.

[donnerlibrary · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I don't know if my daughter actually qualifies as "gifted" in the strictest sense, although she is very bright, but we have been dealing with emotional outbursts that seem to go beyond the norm here so I was hoping this book would give me some insight.I found the first section of this book incredibly helpful in understanding how her emotions and the way she displays them are tied to her personality and way of thinking rather than her just "being difficult." I could recognize many of the example scenarios as versions of events that have happened in our house.The second portion of the book was supposed to provide more concrete strategies for working with emotions and gifted children and unfortunately I felt like this area was somewhat lacking. While it was encouraging to realize that I am already using several of these techniques at home, it was discouraging in that so many of the ideas seemed common sense for working with all children. I was hoping for something more in depth and targeted specifically toward gifted children.

[insightsgal · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This book is a comprehensive resource for both parents and teachers for dealing with gifted kids and teens who exhibit extreme emotional behavior. The book is thorough in its research and teachings and interspersed are some very helpful "real world" case studies. The latter half of the book deals with "now we know this information, what to do with it" and includes some handy checklists and tips.

[kphillip9 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This book was okay, but it basically told us what we already know about kids who are ahead of their peers in terms of intellect.

[heatherms · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Good book on helping to understand some of the emotions that gifted children have to deal with and how to help them with feelings and emotions that are positive.

[swingdancefan · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Wow, did I recognize all three of my children in this book! Our house runneth over with emotions. The anecdotes were interesting and especially relatable for me. There are concrete strategies for actually helping children to channel their emotions, and I'm looking forward to trying some with the one child left at home.

[nmele_4 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I read this book because I have several grandchildren who are gifted but very emotionally intense, and I wanted some insight and understanding of their emotions. To my surprise, I also recognized myself as a child in many of the behaviors described by Christine Fonseca. This book was a double gift, because it increased my understanding of my grandchildren's emotional life and of my own development. She offers techniques for helping children, parents and treachers deal with difficult emotions and situations which seem to me me sensible and relatively easy to use.

[scottjpearson · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

I picked up this book in an attempt to dive deeper into the psychological concept of emotional intensity. I'm an intense guy myself; I live in an intense workplace full of gifted people; my boss is intense; I have an intense wife and daughter at home. I'm trying to learn how to keep all these intense people (including myself) from boiling over. I could not find any management books on the concept of emotional intensity, so educational books served as an adequate substitute.

The first thing Fonseca taught me in this book is that intensity is not the enemy. It is not perfect, but neither is it wrong. It's just a dynamic in the situation. This fact makes me feel better because many times, people can make intensity out as evil. It is not. Rather, it is the means by which many gifted people live. Gifted people see reality more deeply than most; this perception is a great aid in life, but it is not perfect. It must be managed.

The second thing Fonseca taught me was that some people, including myself and some close to me at work and at home, are "dually exceptional." This means that besides being gifted, the person has another dynamic at play like a learning disability or a mental illness (e.g., autism or bipolar). This makes the picture way more complicated. In fact, with these people, rarely do first instincts prove to be reliable because the dynamics are much more complicated. These realities make my life much more entertaining.

I enjoyed this quick read. I read the entire book in about 24 hours. It's good for parents and for teachers - as well as colleagues and people who engage in self-therapy. It makes the whole complicated mess just a little more simple - and more bearable.