Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Musing on the importance of early advocacy

As I was putting DS7 to bed, we had a little chat about next year. He is currently in a great-fit school situation, in a 2nd grade class at a school for HG kids after a grade skip. The plan is for him to stay at the same school through 5th, when the program ends, so he'll probably be with most of the same kids throughout. I asked DS7 if he was excited that he'd be moving to 3rd grade with the same kids. He said he'd rather go to an easy school, because they're currently doing 3rd grade work in his class, so if he went to the easy school he'd already know everything next year, and then he'd be happy.

Just got me thinking that if he hadn't had such a breeze of it in kindergarten and the first half of second (before the transfer to his current school), he wouldn't even know that sitting in class daydreaming (his fave activity) was an option. Of course, this is surely also related to my little one's perfectionism and not liking to try new things unless he's sure he can do them, but I just wanted to share that I'm glad that we figured out a few things while he's still young.

The thing that strikes me most strongly about this is how great it is that you managed to intervene before he realised that having to sit there doing work that's too easy for you isn't bliss!

SPG, awesome that you found a good fit - and I really agree with CollinsMum too!!

Question for you in the K period, what was DS's attitude about the other students? My
DS 5 has not really learned anything new in pre-k and the social part has fluctuated because of the differences in knowledge etc but it's been ok. But in the last few days, DS has made a few comments about the other kids, they don't know the hard stuff, they don't read etc, he really seems to be drawing a distinction between them. Did you see that when it was so easy for your DS. Mine spends a lot of time in his own head as well. The year is almost over and I am hopeful for a better placement next year, particularly in terms of really connecting as friends. He hadn't really mentioned being bored even though he must be, but I wondered if you noticed any social side effect in addition to the knowledge of how easy it was.

DeHe

DeHe, We had our DS tested before he went to kindy, and the psychologist told us that it was a good idea to explain how his brain works a little differently from some other kids. We told him that sometimes he could know something after just learning it once, and that some kids needed to be taught things several times before they learned it, so they there might be some stuff repeated that he already knew. I really think this helped our DS be more accepting that everyone learns differently, and we didn't really get a lot of comments from him about the other kids. He did end up hanging out with a girl who could read, so they probably gravitated toward each other.

Another thing we did was to advocate before kindy to make sure that our DS would get some differentiation, which probably helped. He was able to do some things closer to his level.

What my DS was really interested was commenting on the kids who misbehaved, not so much what they knew. That was about the only thing he'd talk about "so and so got consequences for doing this..." He skipped 1st, and commented that the 2nd graders were much better behaved, but he was still most intrigued by the kids who were troublemakers. Ironically, once one trouble-maker was tested and found to be GT, and was given more appropriate work and grouped with my DS for some things, the acting out stopped. But my DS would much rather pretend to read his books and watch the other kids and daydream before he got to his current school.

As for making friends, it takes awhile for my DS to warm up to kids, and it was about half-way through kindy before he became friends with someone. And then at the 1st second grade class, it was just before we transferred halfway through the year that he started getting closer to another student. But I have noticed a difference in how he chose his friends earlier. I think he liked the kids who would go along with all the games he made up on the playground. At the new school, it seems there are lots of kids making up different types of games, and so he seems to be more involved with more kids. He made a couple closer friends right away, but when I said "we should be sure to get so-and-so's phone number before summer", DS7 said, "Well, I'm not sure if I'm that good of friends with him yet." He's a little weird with friends - he gets along with everyone, and even if he really likes people, we've always had to work at getting him to go do things with those friends. He's kind of a homebody.

Must be bedtime, I'm babbling....

SPG
thanks for sharing - I'm glad you babbled - it helps to see your DS to try to understand what is going on with mine.

The brain working differently is interesting -I have portrayed it as not everyone is good at everything right off the bat, sometimes you have to work at it, and he understands this in terms of working at writing which he had to do. But I don't think he gets it in terms of reading because from his perspective he has always known how, he doesn't really remember not. But he was talking about knowledge accumulation, and I think he was also saying he is interested in things that other kids aren't. This all just heightens my desire to get him with kids that are doing what he is doing - but I also think he is now exacerbating the differences between himself and these kids, possibly because everyone is going to different school - like your DS he plays with them but doesn't ask for playdates - I think he is done with this place. I also really want him to meet kids in his age range that do know more than he does - we went to a science thing on a weekend once and there was this 8 year old boy who knew everything which was great - but it was a one time thing.

My DS is not so interested in the misbehaving - because he is often the one getting in trouble - he knocks things down, sometimes by accident, sometimes on purpose - the other kids tell on him a lot and he never tells about what they do to him, so its not helping either. He has some weird mannerisms, which when combined with his vocabulary seems to put the kids off.

The pre-k teacher at our meeting was so proud of DS - oh he is joining, and other kids ask to play with him, she feels like she has turned the caterpillar into the stage out of the cocoon but not quite butterfly because he is abandoning the books to play - not really believing this I asked DS if he had read all the books in the classroom - he said he had!!

There was absolutely no differentiation in this class - there is another who is reading and the parent believes the teachers do not even know! Up till this point DS had been very accommodating of the lack of differentiation, always saying he was learning new stuff - and about the reading I bet he was, we never did phonics or anytime like that - I think it was that they were doing a "science" topic this week, and he was so disappointed it was so easy for him and he knew all of it and the others didn't. I think he is so desperate for new inputs while there, he gets them at home - 3 more weeks!!

thanks! I guess I babbled too - I don't know what I would have done if I hadn't found the people here - getting the BTDT really helps - although it also really worries me for the future - I hope this means that karma-wise i get it back on the college end, and all those choices are easy!

DeHe

DeHe

DeHe,

Glad my babbling was useful to someone! (Usually my DH says "just answer the question already.")

I think that it's key to try to find other kids with your kid's interests. But even the kids my DS loves to do things with can't beat the lure of being a homebody with mom and dad these days. I'm not worrying until he's older.

Sorry about the lack of differentiation. What I did in kindy (and this year in 2nd too) was donate books to the classroom that I knew my DS would like. He didn't like to stand out by having a book from home, but he'd happily select something from the class library. You can slip some Basher science books in there too, so your DS can get his science fix...

Great idea! I've thought about donating to the pre-k for the next above reader that goes there, but donating forward hadn't occurred to me

DeHe