Jupiter Academy is now offering a gifted enrichment program for students who have been identified as gifted in grades K through 8. The learning is project based encompassing many themes throughout the year. This is an exciting program with many off campus field trips.
Students in the gifted enrichment program have access to all the technology available at Jupiter Academy, some of which include Panaboards, iPads, PCs, Classroom Performance Systems, and microscopes. Using this technology provides our students with multisensory and hands-on learning that fully engages learning. Our new Panaboards provide the ability to collaborate when solving math problems and to use Google Earth to tour the Taj Mahal. Students may also view multimedia lessons, as well as produce presentations using audio and video.
In addition, students have the opportunity to participate in virtual field trips. One possible virtual field trip would be to the Modern Museum of Art in New York City to see the ‘Art Project’ where art from museums all over the world can be viewed in virtual reality. Guest speakers, as well as, live podcasts take place in the gifted classroom. When learning about mythology, students were able to participate in a live podcast with Rick Riordan, author of the ‘Percy Jackson and the Olympians series’.
The projects are designed to be both challenging and exhilarating. An example for study is “How do we tell stories?” With this study, students ‘travel’ around the world reading stories from diverse cultures. They learn various techniques of storytelling i.e. story boards, shadow puppets, and dance. Students compare and contrast how stories are told today. Field trips will be to various live theater performances throughout the year. In addition, a professional story teller will perform for the students with additional time given for our gifted students to have dialog with the professional.
Lynn Bently is the gifted program teacher and middle school teacher at Jupiter Academy. She has 18 years experience in the education field. She came to Jupiter Academy in August 2005. Ms. Bently earned her degree in education from the University of Dayton in Ohio. She is certified Florida teacher and is currently working on her gifted certification. Ms. Bently is a member of the National Council for Social Studies, the National Association of Gifted Children, and the National Science Teachers Association.
Before joining Jupiter Academy, Ms. Bently taught at the Singapore American School as a middle school teacher and team leader teaching a range of subjects from core curriculum to elective courses. After spending eight years in Singapore, she moved back to the United States and worked in New Jersey teaching fifth grade and in their middle school teaching American and World History.
Ms. Bently has fulfilled several roles and duties at Jupiter Academy. Before accepting her new position as the gifted program teacher, she was the middle school team leader at Jupiter Academy. She organizes and coordinates the standardized testing at Jupiter Academy and has done SMART board training for her peers. This past year she served on the AdvancEd team guiding Jupiter Academy to a successful accreditation. Ms. Bently has participated in a variety of extracurricular activities at Jupiter Academy, including being an instructor for the afterschool homework program called “Power Study”, the coordinator for Jupiter Academy’s student government, being a leader for the knitting club, and forming a geography club that competed in the National Geography Bee. She also organized Jupiter Academy’s Earth Day celebration and April’s poetry festivities.
Ms. Bently loves teaching because she believes she makes a positive impact on her students’ lives. With an obvious passion for teaching, her organization, creativity, and her love of learning are Ms. Bently’s clear strengths which have gained her an excellent reputation amongst her colleagues. In turn, her knowledge and innovative approaches to teaching have made Ms. Bently a teacher that students also respect and admire. In particular, Ms. Bently’s strengths are her ability to ask higher level thinking questions, her experience with technology, her travel experiences, and her communication skills. As well, she enjoys the interaction in a small classroom and the one on one interaction inherent at Jupiter Academy.