You don't have to be a Tradewinds family to benefit from the Center. Whether your child attends Tradewinds, another school, or is homeschooled—raising a gifted kid comes with questions that most parenting resources don't touch. We want to be a place you can turn to.
Resources for Gifted Families
Find Us on Facebook
One of the hardest parts of raising a gifted child is feeling like you're the only one dealing with it. You're not. We're building a Facebook group for gifted families in Hawaii to share experiences, ask questions, and connect with people who understand.
Rabbithole
Rabbithole is our open source AI learning platform, currently in early testing. It uses Socratic dialogue to follow a child's curiosity wherever it leads—no curriculum rails, no multiple choice. A child asks a question, and Rabbithole asks one back. The conversation goes as deep as the child wants to take it.
Any gifted family can use it. We built it for our own classrooms, but there's no reason to keep it behind our walls.
Online Enrichment Classes
We partner with Cresconova to offer online enrichment classes designed for gifted learners ages 6–13. These are small-group sessions taught by master teachers—topics like cryptography, urban design, and scientific investigation that let kids go deep on something real.
Classes run for 6–8 weeks in live online sessions. Students from anywhere can join.
Talk to Carl
Our Head of School, Carl Sabatino, offers free 45-minute conversations with any family navigating giftedness. Carl has 30+ years of experience working with gifted learners and has built programs across the country. He's genuinely happy to talk through what you're seeing with your child, what options exist, and what to look for in a school or program.
This isn't a sales call. Many families who book with Carl aren't considering Tradewinds at all—they just want to talk to someone who gets it.
Reading List
If you're just starting to understand your child's giftedness, these three books are where we'd point you first. Each one helped us think differently about what gifted kids actually need.
5 Levels of Gifted by Deborah Ruf
A framework for understanding that “gifted” covers a wide range. Helps parents see where their child falls and what that means for their educational needs.
A Parent's Guide to Gifted Children by James Webb et al.
The most comprehensive single resource for parents. Covers intensity, perfectionism, peer relationships, and the emotional side of giftedness that schools rarely address.
Living with Intensity by Susan Daniels & Michael Piechowski
Grounded in Dabrowski's theory of overexcitabilities. Essential reading if your child experiences the world with unusual depth—emotional, intellectual, sensory, or all of the above.
Cognitive Assessment
We believe every family benefits from understanding how their child's mind works. A cognitive assessment (like the WISC-V) isn't just an admissions requirement—it's a window into your child's strengths, how they process information, and what kind of learning environment will serve them best.
Whether or not you're considering Tradewinds, our testing partner Dr. Tolly Amaxopolous at Psychology Center Hawaii provides WISC-V and WPPSI-IV assessments with fast turnaround and detailed reporting. Just mention the Tradewinds Center when you reach out.
Other Resources
We're not the only ones doing good work for gifted families. These organizations have been at it for years.
- Hoagies' Gifted Education Page
The most comprehensive directory of gifted resources online. Articles, book lists, testing info, and links to programs organized by topic and age.
- Davidson Institute
Focused on profoundly gifted children. Offers the Davidson Fellows scholarship, free consultations for families, and a database of research and articles on high-ability learners.
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