Expectations of Self

By the time a student discovers that they learn faster, or easier, or differently than other students they have already been assigned a label.  When that labelis gifted not only are the expectations of the adults set, but often the student has expectation that gifted means that they will not have to work as hard to achieve top grades.

Self-esteem sometimes suffers in gifted students because of these expectations or assumptions.  In one example, a gifted student who normally did not have to review, or even study for tests hit a concept that was particularly difficult for her.  She scored a 70% on a test, far from her normal upper 90s to perfect scores.  She began to think that that one score defined her and her ability to learn.