Not Your Typical Sixth Grader’s Summer

By Tanjua Damon

She is bright, full of life like many 11-year-olds, but Kayleigh Metviner is not your average sixth grader. She spent three weeks this summer in a gifted and talented program where she was reading and discussing college literature.

Kayleigh took part in the Johns Hopkins University Center for Talented Youth gifted program that was held at Mount Holyoke College in South Hadley, Mass., July 15 through August 3. She will be attending Newtown Middle School this year.

For three weeks Kayleigh spent time in the program with other fifth and sixth graders who read college-level literature and studied different writing styles like narratives and poems.

“You never knew what was going to happen tomorrow, which was a good thing,” Kayleigh said. “It was fun. I was always having trouble writing before I went.”

Kayleigh admits the program was challenging, but that is what she strives for – a challenge.

“Some people wouldn’t be right for it,” she said. “If you don’t want to be challenged, it isn’t for you.”

The summer program helped Kayleigh realize that she has to think more about her subject content before she begins writing. She found that by observing an object before writing at the summer program, she was able to write better.

“I need to think more about the subject matter,” she said. “Depending on what you are doing, sometimes just looking at something can spark you to write.”

The program provided the gifted students an opportunity to work on their strengths and weaknesses while receiving feedback from their teachers and working in a small group.

Jackie Scaringella, Kayleigh’s mother, is grateful her daughter had the opportunity to attend the gifted program so that she could learn more about herself as well as have an educational experience that she can use continually.

“With Kayleigh, I think not having busywork and knowing everything had a purpose, I think that made her a lot more relaxed,” Mrs Scaringella said. “It was such an awesome opportunity. She got more out of it than I ever imagined.”

Not only was the program a learning process about writing; it was also a personal learning process for Kayleigh, according to her mother.

“I’m so glad because she is more relaxed and she has a thirst for writing now,” Mrs Scaringella said. “All the stuff she has on the inside, she has the confidence to write.”

Kayleigh has been a part of the Newtown School District Discovery Program in fourth and fifth grade and plans to continue in the Gifted and Talented Program at the middle school.