Frances's exceptional abilities have introduced her to pressures and demands that make her childhood and early teenage years quite different from those of most other kids. Our society provides numerous examples of such "prodigies" and the challenges they face, often with negative consequences as they grow older. These include child actors, students with exceptionally high IQs placed in advanced educational tracks, and young athletes in sports like gymnastics, tennis, and swimming. The parents of these children often struggle between two desires: ensuring their children receive the necessary training to hone their talents, and allowing them to have a "normal" childhood as a foundation for future well-being. Research the lives of three such "Wunderkinder," examine how their parents have attempted to balance these priorities, and analyze the impact their early experiences have had on them. Write an essay that details your findings and presents your conclusions on the best way to raise such children.

In her examination of "Wunderkind," Alice Hall Petry notes that much of the story’s energy stems from "the capacity of music to evoke intense emotional responses, including sexual ones: 'Wunderkind' would never materialize as a story if Bilderbach were teaching Frances to pitch horseshoes." From the earliest ballads, music and storytelling have often been intertwined: songs of all types (from opera to rap) are used to narrate stories, while music becomes a crucial component in "narrative arts" such as religious pageants, movies, and Broadway musicals—as well as in films, plays, or stories centered on music and musicians. Choose two examples from different media (e.g., a film musical and a short story with a musical theme, or a rock opera and the background music in a soap opera) and write an essay exploring how music specifically enhances the storytelling in each case.

Teenagers—their challenges, trends, and issues with parents, peers, and relationships—are prominently featured in various cultural productions, often portrayed in exaggerated ways. They may be seen as hopeless misfits or love-struck dreamers, lazy slackers or ruthless criminals, but their appearance and behavior almost always stand in opposition to adult norms. Consider how teenagers are stereotyped in films, stories, or news reports written from an adult perspective, as well as how adults are stereotyped in media aimed at teenagers. Choose two examples of each type, compare these stereotypes to the realities you observe, and explain what these exaggerated depictions reveal about how each group perceives the other across the "generation gap."