Intellectual giftedness

Intellectual giftedness is an intellectual ability significantly higher than average. It is a characteristic of children, variously defined, that motivates differences in school programming. It is thought to persist as a trait into adult life, with various consequences studied in longitudinal studies of giftedness over the last century. There is no generally agreed definition of giftedness for either children or adults, but most school placement decisions and most longitudinal studies over the course of individual lives have been based on IQ in the top 2 percent of the population, that is above IQ 130.

The various definitions of intellectual giftedness include either general high ability or specific abilities. For example, by some definitions an intellectually gifted person may have a striking talent for mathematics without equally strong language skills. In particular, the relationship between artistic ability or musical ability and the high academic ability usually associated with high IQ scores is still being explored, with some authors referring to all of those forms of high ability as "giftedness," while other authors distinguish "giftedness" from "talent." There is still much controversy and much research on the topic of how adult performance unfolds from trait differences in childhood, and what educational and other supports best help the development of adult giftedness.

Gifted (novel)

Gifted is the debut novel by author Nikita Lalwani longlisted for the Man Booker Prize and shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award. It was first published in 2007 by Viking.

Plot introduction

The novel is set in the 1980s Cardiff where maths prodigy Rumi Vasi grows up with her Hindu parents. Subjected to her father's strict tutoring he is determined that she be accepted by Oxford University at the age of only fifteen. But on starting University she finds it hard to adapt to her new-found freedom.

References

External links

Astonishing X-Men

Astonishing X-Men is the name of three X-Men comic book series from Marvel Comics, the first two of which were limited series. The ongoing series began in 2004, with its first run written by Joss Whedon and art by John Cassaday. It was then written by Warren Ellis with art by Phil Jimenez.Daniel Way and Christos Gage then took over the title writing alternating stories. They were followed by James Asmus who wrote one issue, then Greg Pak, who took over for four issues in November 2011.Marjorie Liu wrote the final 21 issues of the series until its end at issue #68 (October 2013).

Publication history

Limited series

1995 series

The original Astonishing X-Men was a four-issue limited series that replaced Uncanny X-Men during the 1995 alternate universe storyline Age of Apocalypse, in which all X-titles were given new names and issue numbers. In this storyline, Professor X was murdered 20 years in the past by his own son, Legion. Magneto, witnessing his friend's death, committed himself to Xavier's dream and created his own team of X-Men. However, he was unable to prevent the rise of the despotic Apocalypse and hence the series primarily dealt with the X-Men's battle against him.