From the SENG (Supporting Emotional Needs of the Gifted) web site:

CALL FOR PROPOSALS AND PRELIMINARY REGISTRATION FOR SENG CONFERENCE 2016 

Most conferences about giftedness focus primarily on educational issues. While they may include a few presentations about the social and emotional development, and needs of the gifted and the challenges facing the gifted population, these presentations play a minor role.  SENG conferences reverse the priorities.  

Founded 1981, SENG was formed to bring attention to the unique emotional needs of the gifted.  We believe that recognizing, understanding, and accepting the social and emotional needs of this unique population are the first priorities for parents, teachers, and counselors. SENG supports strong gifted education programs, but we believe the emotional piece is the foundation for the development of healthy, happy, well-adjusted, appropriately educated, and contributing gifted members of society. 

2016 marks SENG’s 34th Annual Conference; dedicated to Gifted: Our Past and Our Future, this year’s conference shall be held in Colonial Williamsburg, Thursday July 21 to Sunday July 24, 2016.    

We invite advocates, educators, entrepreneurs, healthcare providers, individuals, parents and professionals interested in presenting to this unique community to submit their proposal for consideration on or before Thursday, December 31, 2015.    

Conference Themes 

Topics of particular interest include: 

  Social and Emotional Needs 

 Twice Exceptional 

 Counseling 

 Diversity 

 Gifted Adults; Gifted Elders 

 Homeschooling 

 Outliers among Outliers 

 Parenting / Gifted Families 

Conference Structure 

The Conference will be organized over three days Thursday July with a keynote address, Continuing Education Programs, SMPG Training, parallel sessions, an exhibitor’s hall, sponsorship and advertising opportunities.    

Projected attendance 500 persons. 

Call for Proposals 

We would be pleased to receive abstracts from interested presenters that follow SENG Conference 

Themes.  Abstracts should clearly define the objectives of the presentation, topics covered, key conclusions reached, and potential benefits for the gifted community.  Abstracts should be no more than 300 words in length and shall include:  

 Name / Contact Information 

 Presentation Title 

 Brief Description of Presentation.  Please summarize the presentation in 50 words or less   

 Presentation Theme

 Level of Content for Audience 

 Format of Presentation  

 References 

To submit your proposal follow the link.

Well, it has happened to me.

There was a time when I looked forward to this day. Like when my younger daughter was 12 months old and I was running on a year of sleep deprivation because she was still mostly not sleeping through the night. Or when she was three and had what we learned were hunger tantrums so frequently and at such volume that she had a sultry, jazz singer voice that my neighbors said would be so sexy when she grew up, though I really hoped she would grow out of it! Or when she was 4 and asked “why…” a hundred, no a thousand times a day and challenged absolutely everything I said or did.

But now that it has happened, I reflect back and adore every minute I spent with my kids, even the most trying ones. Like the day the same daughter cried inconsolably for well over a half hour. When I finally had her calmed down enough to talk she told me that she was crying because I had finally made it clear to her that she was not going to have a little brother or sister. Man was I puzzled, but I persisted with my best mom skills. Well it turned out she would always be the youngest in our family and so everyone else would die before her and she would be all alone in the world. She was three.

I could reminisce all day, but since it is her 18th birthday, I think I will take her out for her favorite meal instead. Me, the parent of two adults.

In partnership with Make:Magazine, Barnes & Noble stores are holding Mini Maker Faires at most locations.

If you're a tech enthusiast, crafter, educator, tinkerer, hobbyist, engineer, science club member, author, artist, student, entrepreneur, or maker of any kind—join us! We're getting together in stores to learn from each other, hear from the experts, and work on projects.

Make Workspace: Join us in all Barnes & Noble stores to see demonstrations that will amaze and inspire you! In the Make Workspace, a tech-educational expo, we’ll do product demos for 3D printers, drones, robots, coding, programming, and more. This is the future—come see it unfold before your eyes.

Meet the Maker: Come meet the leaders of the Maker movement! These are the people changing the way we learn, ideate, design, create, and build the future. They’ll be visiting your local Barnes & Noble store to talk about their process, their creations, and their vision.

Make & Collaborate: Makers are DIY-ers with a tech twist. Come make and collaborate—then share! We provide the materials; you dream up the product. The only limit is your imagination. Get hands-on experience in design, handcrafting, and construction in the spirit of collaboration and teamwork.

See complete details here.

ts.

When my daughter was eight years old I figured out that the end of soccer season was a real problem for her.  It took me a while to put it all together.  At the start of the school year, everything was fine.  She got along with her sister.  She was happy enough to go to school. She could tamp down her perfectionist tendencies long enough to get her homework done. She could get to sleep and stay asleep.  Then mid-November tempers flared, homework took forever, and she couldn’t sleep, became moody, and didn’t want to go to school.  Oh my.

Turns out she really needs exercise to keep herself balanced mentally.  And I mean all out completely exhausting physical exertion. What a valuable lesson for her, and one she has been able to embrace over time.  She learned to take on sports year round, and later to take up running, something you can almost always do.  She trained for a marathon in high school, and played high level club ultimate (Frisbee) for years.  She chose a college in southern California, so she could do outdoor activities, such as hiking and unicycle riding, year round.  And when she moved to New York City for her first job, finding a gym was her top priority, followed by joining the work yoga group and two different dancing groups. 

And it turns out this is not unusual for highly gifted children!  Who knew? Come join us in November for a discussion of the psychomotor overexcitabilities found in many gifted children and how these relate to AD/HD.  Learn more! 

See complete schedule and details at the Festival web site:

http://www.facets.org/children+youth/festival/

From the Facet's web site:

What is the Chicago International Children's Film Festival?

The Chicago International Children's Film Festival is the largest festival of films for children in North America, welcoming 25,000 Chicago-area children, adults, and educators each year, and featuring over 250 films from 40 countries. The Festival screens a wide range of projects, from live-action and animated feature films to shorts, TV series, documentaries, and child-produced works. One of the most unique festivals in the country, the Chicago International Children's Film Festival showcases the best in culturally diverse, non-violent, value-affirming new cinema for children, and is one of the only Academy Award qualifying children's film festivals in the world.

For more than 30 years, the Chicago International Children's Film Festival has set new standards for what children's festivals can achieve. As the largest and longest running children's film program in North America, the Festival discovers the best in world cinema and continually raises the bar for quality children's programming. 

From the University of Chicago web site:

Every Saturday morning beginning October 3 through December 12, 2015.  There will be no lecture on November 28th (Thanksgiving weekend) or December 5 (“Physics with a Bang!”).

Lecturer: Manos Chatzopoulos, Fermi Postdoctoral Fellow 
Topic: "The Cosmic Fireworks that Synthesize the Building Blocks of Life: Supernova Explosions"

Kersten Physics Teaching Center
5720 S. Ellis Avenue, Room 106
Chicago, IL 60637

Supernova explosions mark the violent deaths of massive stars and the ignition of ultra-dense cores of stars called white dwarfs. The luminosity produced by these cosmic catastrophes is millions to hundreds of billions times greater than that of the sun, meaning that they can outshine their entire host galaxy. The massive stars that evolve into supernova explosions synthesize heavy nuclei that are some of the main ingredients of life. The immense intrinsic brightness of these events allows us to discover them at great distances and use some of them as “standard candles” to measure large cosmic scales enabling us to explore some of the most fundamental properties of the Universe. Supernovae are observed to be a very diverse group of astrophysical objects with many ranges in luminosities, durations and chemical composition. The onset of modern fully-automated wide field telescopes and the large number of amateur astronomers searching for them has allowed us to better understand their nature and explosion mechanism. Furthermore, realistic three-dimensional supernova simulations run on supercomputers have given us a unique insight on the physics associated with the explosion mechanism.

Each week we will explore the conditions that lead to supernova explosions by first understanding the evolution of massive stars, the variety of mechanisms proposed for the explosion itself, and the associated numerical supercomputer simulations largely performed by the astrophysicists here at the University of Chicago.  No scientific background is required -- just bring your curiosity. 

PURPOSE OF THE COMPTON LECTURE SERIES

The purpose of these lectures is to make accessible some of the remarkable recent developments in physical science to the non-specialized public, and to share with laymen some of the intellectual and cultural excitement associated with scientific developments that may affect in some way the lives of all of us and are a significant part of our cultural heritage. The lectures often, but not exclusively, are focused on areas of research being pursued at the Enrico Fermi Institute.

The idea of these lectures originated with John Simpson when he was Director of the EFI and holder of the Compton chair. Funds from a bequest of John W. Watzek, a good friend of Compton, supported the lectures from 1976 through 1986. Presently, funding is provided within the budget of the Enrico Fermi Institute, with much welcome additional support from our generous lecture attendees.

From the outset, Compton lecturers have been nominated by the Director of the EFI from the group of young scientists active in research as Fellows or post-doctoral associates. It is this group, which is in many cases at the center of research, that attacks frontier questions with a fresh view and new ideas. Awarding the Compton Lectureship to the best of these scientists is in general appreciated as a sign of recognition and encouragement that seems more important than the modest stipend also included in the award. Compton lectures are neither given by graduate students nor by full-time faculty members.

Compton lectures are presented in every Spring and Fall quarter; each set of lectures comprise 10 one-hour presentation on successive Saturday mornings in the Kersten Physics Lecture Hall. The lectures are advertised through letters and posters sent to area high schools, libraries, colleges and to individuals, through local newspapers and radio stations (WFMT), and by word of mouth. Depending on the popularity of a particular lecture (or topic), the attendance varies from fifty to "standing room only", and includes people with a wide variety of backgrounds: from faculty to laypersons, and from Hyde Parkers to commuters from distant suburbs.

Of the 78 lecturers since 1976, ten have held faculty positions at the University of Chicago, and many now have faculty positions elsewhere. There are at least two books (Robert Wald - Space, Time and Gravity, UC Press, 1977) and (Nickolas Solomey - The Elusive Neutrino: A Subatomic Detective Story, Scientific American Library, New York, 1997) which grew out of a set of successful Compton Lectures.

What is 100 Years / 100 Events?

The Forest Preserves of Cook County has been protecting and restoring land for 100 years, but preserving nature is only half our story. The other half is written by you, and how you choose to explore and connect with your preserves.

From September 20 to 27, we’re hosting over 100 events for our 100 Years / 100 Events centennial celebration. Join in one, or several, of the activities happening near you and start writing your part of the Forest Preserves story!

See Forest Preserve web site for complete listing of events.

The Jack Kent Cooke Foundation seeks high-achieving high school seniors with financial need for its College Scholarship Program, the largest undergraduate scholarship in the nation. Selected students receive college planning support, ongoing advising, and up to $40,000 per year to attend a four-year accredited undergraduate institution. If you know students who stand out for their exceptional academic abilities and achievements, persistence, leadership, and desire to help others,please encourage them to visit the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation’s website to learn more. The application closes on November 3. 

See http://www.chicagomuseumweek.com/ for all the details.