Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy New here, with a question...

I am so glad to have stumbled upon this site tonight. I am getting very worried about school next year for my daughter. She's currently in Kindergarten at the neighborhood public school, and her teacher is one of the best in the district, but she has still complained of being bored. I hate to think of what next year holds for us, when she is in school a full day instead of the 2.5 hours she's there for now.

She is reading at a mid-second grade level, and her math and writing skills are at the end of first grade. This is all according to the tests my husband has administered to her, and his assessment of her work. He is a second grade teacher. We have not had her formally tested at all yet. My husband was not a gifted child and really does NOT want to deal with the possibility that our daughter might be. He wants her to be "normal" and has brought that up several times. I was a gifted child, and I am terrified that my daughter is going to have the same negative experience in school that I had.

She's very creative and writes imaginative, detailed stories. She's also very sweet and nurturing... too much so, IMO. She tends to be something of a doormat with her classmates. We happen to live close enough to her school that I can actually see the playground when she's at recess, so I can watch her interact without her being aware I'm doing so. I have only done this a couple of times, so hopefully it's a fluke, but I've noticed that she's very much a follower on the playground. The other little girls run around holding hands, and she runs behind them, but they don't seem to include her. She's very, very tall for her age, which adds to her being "different" (a full foot taller than most of her classmates). She's also an only child, and young for her grade (May birthday), which might also contribute to what I see as the differences between her and her classmates.

She also totally lacks the "killer instinct" that you usually see among little girls. When we take her to the park, any child there is her "friend" in her eyes - she does not differentiate between "friends" and "non-friends" at all. And while I love that she's so willing to be friends with anyone at any time, I think she's headed for a world of hurt on her current path.

In our school district, they don't even start testing for gifted education until second grade, with programs starting in third grade for highly capable students. But the programs are all pull-out programs - they do not have separate classes. And they are very big on "balancing" the classes, meaning they want an equal number of highly capable students, average students and struggling students in each classroom. As far as I'm concerned, that does a disservice to all of the students, but especially to the highly capable students.

I am writing a novel here, but basically I'm in need of some guidance as to what to do here. I don't want to watch as my daughter falls down the black hole, and I feel like that's where we're headed right now. My husband, bless his heart, is indoctrinated in the public school teacher philosophy, and his opinions are influenced by that. He frequently comments about what is best for all of his students, and I have to remind him that I don't care about any other student in his class or in our daughter's class. My concern is what is best for her, and my obligation is solely to her welfare. Sorry if that sounds harsh... I sometimes feel like I'm fighting a battle on all fronts.

Anyway, we've talked to the principal, who basically said that we can't even request a specific teacher for next year, but that her current teacher will assess her and put her in the best classroom for her. I like her teacher, but I don't trust her to put my daughter's needs first over everything else. They balance classes to have an equal number of boys and girls in each, and the balance out ability levels, too, so even if one teacher is better equipped to handle highly capable students, there is no guarantee my daughter will be placed in that classroom.

We've discussed fighting with the school to skip her a grade. This is what I wish my parents had done with me, and in retrospect, my mom wishes she'd done that as well. But I was a December birthday, not a May birthday. I'm not sure skipping would be the best option for our daughter because of her age.

The nearest private school that is geared towards gifted children is a 45 minute drive from us. My husband is pretty adamant against private school in general (being a public school teacher...), but he's especially adamant against taking her so far out of our community and away from the neighborhood children.

Homeschooling isn't really an option for us. My husband is totally against it because she's an only child and he wants her to be in school with her peers. I work from home, so I'd likely be the one doing the homeschooling, and I can't see that working out well. I don't have the teacher gene at all.

So, if you made it through all of that, bless you! If you have been in my shoes, what did you do? Any guidance or suggestions for where to look next would be very, very appreciated. I have a feeling this won't be my last sleepless night wrestling with this subject.

Good Mornnig AnneMarie,
It's too bad that your school is so into balancing! I have lots and lots of ideas, but the first one is to start thinking about LOG, level of giftedness. Think about the shape of the bell curve. It predicts that most kids will closer to the middle. Even at the tail, most of the kids in the tail with be on the side closest to the middle. So if you are lucky, your daughter is advanced, but advanced in a way that is somewhat 'normal and expected' and very often the teachers will be able to provide enrichment to met her needs, which combined with what you do at home, summers, afterschool, will give her 'enough' opportunities to work at her readiness level, so that she learns how to learn.

It's true that many school teachers are quite invested in 'not seeing' that kids of more unusual LOG exist and have special educational needs, so you do have a tough road ahead with your DH. Time to start asking questions about his childhood, and his relatives' experiences, and telling stories about your own. If he 'gets your jokes' then likely he is a similar LOG to you, even if he wasn't identified as a Gifted Child. But maybe he was the youngest by chance, or lived in a district that had a higher average than your current district. Also ask him about students from his past experience who didn't have a good work ethic, but were bright.

Bottom Line: It's a journey, go slow and expect it to take a while, for both of you. Figure out the best way for you to share book info with him - do you preread and share passages? do you give him books and say: "You're the expert - can you read this and give me some perspective on it." One of the sad things in this situation, is that if one parent (often Mom) gets concerned and goes into mama-lion, hyper-learning mode, and becomes convinsed of a perspective, the other parent can feel 'left behind.' Due to Sexism, it's really hard for many men to fully back the hard work that women do to 'figure all this out.' And of course we feel hurt by that. Plus we feel scared because we percieve our children as underattack. So the goal is to learn, and lead your family without leaving DH in the dust. In otherwords, Job One is to document the 'problem' in enough detail to make sure that DH is as emotionally upset about it as you are. That may mean having him spend time at the school and observe first hand, or setting up a playdate with some 'friends' that it's his turn to 'be in charge of' while you go get a pedicure, or something. Complaints of boredom can mean lots of different things. Document in as much detail as you can. Is she 'out of it' socially because she is younger? I was at that age, yet I needed to be where I was for the academics. ((shrug))

Well, that's enough for now, but you can get more of an insight into LOG through testing or you can try a more controversial 'home brew' approach - The checklists start about halfway down the page:
http://www.educationaloptions.com/levels_giftedness.htm

It's a bit tough to understand, but the book it's based on goes into much more detail - Losing our Minds, gifted children left behind, by Dr.Deb Ruf

Best Wishes
Grinity

Annemarie - is it possible for you to sit in on a first grade class or talk to one of the teachers for next year just to see what the usual routine is?

I have a son in 1st grade. There are several children in his class who are working 1 to 2 years ahead of grade level who I'd say are quite happy and challenged. They get a third grade spelling list, a 2nd grade math packet, and individualized reading material. I would ask your husband to reasses her towards the end of the summer. If she is fluently reading chapter books independantly (around 4th grade level on up), this is where being in first grade becomes really quite painful IMHO and you may want to talk to your school administration or look at plan B.

Just take it a few months at a time. We are looking at homeschooling right now, which a year ago I wouldn't have dreamed of doing. It all depends on how things play out and it takes some patience to let it sort itself out! Take care!

Interesting Grinity! I am a June birthday, and always felt like I could have been held back a year socially. But pushed ahead a year or 2 for academics. I was fine socially by high school.

My DD at 3.5 is also a June birthday, but is so much better socially than I was as a preschooler. She runs confidentally with the 5 year olds. I guess that's the beauty of a good preschool experience and having parents who run you all over town. And, of course, being the 2nd kid.

Thank you Dottie, Grinity, and Kimck!

Dottie, I think he means based on CogAT scores, but I will ask him for further clarification. I know he tested her with something, and I know she scored a 2.6 (second grade, sixth month) on whatever test he gave her. She's stronger academically than a good number of his students (based on his subjective observations), but she wouldn't be the strongest in his class if she were in it. He said he'd be very happy with her work if she was one of his students, but she wouldn't be one of the ones he'd need to challenge further. But then again, he teaches second grade, and she's only 5.

She does have two classmates who are in a reading group with her. I think they are both at a similar reading level, but I don't know for sure. They don't actually read together, they are just "grouped" together, whatever that means. One of the two children in her group is the daughter of a former Kindergarten teacher at their school. We aren't allowed to request certain teachers for next year, but we are allowed to request that our child be placed with other specific children, so I plan to request that she stay with this other little girl. My hope is that this other little girl will wind up in classes that are best equipped to meet her needs, because her mom was a teacher there and has a good relationship with all of the other teachers.

I was so sad that she said she's bored. And she was very specific about why. When they are given worksheets, the teacher wants them all to sit and listen as she reads the directions to them. My daughter can read them herself, and wants to start working, and it is frustrating that she has to sit there and have something explained to her that she already understands. I think that, once left alone to do the work, she does a pretty good job of entertaining herself. But she struggles when she has to sit and listen to instructions she's already read. The teacher basically said that she needs to learn to sit and listen, and while that's true to an extent, I really don't like seeing her getting bored and frustrated with school already.

I have not heard of the Iowa Scale of Acceleration, but I will look into that. I would LOVE to have her tested, and I asked the school about that. They said to ask her doctor. And the doctor, in turn, said to ask the school. Soooo... that didn't get me very far. Are there private testers out there? If so, where would I start to look for a good one?

If we do try to skip her, it will be an uphill battle with the school, and I will need to really have my ducks in a row before I approach them about it. The principal is very anti-skipping...

Thank you for that link and book recommendation. I will share that with my husband, and I think I'll pick up the book and try to summarize it for him as well. My husband is pretty clearly not academically gifted. His gifts lay elsewhere. He's a really talented athlete and the sweetest man, but he is very normal academically. He has pretty much been a straight B student his whole life. He studied hard for his SATs and barely broke 1000. I studied for two weeks for the LSATs and got an almost perfect score. We joke all the time about it, but yeah, academically speaking, we are on totally different planes. We would probably not have even been friends in high school if we'd known each other. He actually teaches now in the district he grew up in. Mine was in another state, so it's hard for me to compare, but from his perspective, my district was a lot more academically challenging than his was/is.

I have not done a lot of research about this yet, but I really appreciate the pre-reading idea. I will definitely do that, as he does not have the patience to wade through stuff like this. He is open to talking to me about it, and I know he wants what is best for our daughter, but he's not sure what that is. And he has definitely been influenced by his education background, which says that children do best when kept with other children their own age. That policy applies to children who are behind the curve as well as those who are ahead of it. They frequently promote children who should not be promoted, because they want to keep them with their peers. So there is a "default mindset" of sorts, I think, that he's operating from, that says that children should stay with other children their own age.

Anyway, based on what I read on the link, my daughter falls right around Level 2/3, but I will be interested to read the book and learn more.

I asked about sitting in on a first grade class, but didn't really get a straight answer, unfortunately. The principal did tell me which curriculum they are using, and she said that all of her teachers are very good at customizing the curriculum to fit the needs of each child. But honestly, what else would she say?

With regard to her reading level, she's able to read some chapter books independently (Junie B. Jones books are her favorites), but she's a snuggler and prefers to have one or the other of us snuggling with her if at all possible. We don't usually have to help or prompt her much, though. My concern about first grade is that the curriculum centers around phonics, and I just can't see her spending another year learning "a says ah", at this point. I can tell we've been talking about her reading abilities too much among ourselves lately, though, because she's started to not want to read, and to act embarrassed about her reading ability.

I wonder if she's a little slower socially because of her age, too. That's actually the only thing that concerns me about her skipping. I have absolutely no doubt that she would thrive academically, but I don't know how it would pan out socially.

Anyway, thank you all for your detailed and thoughtful responses! I think I have a lot to think about and research, and I appreciate you pointing me in the right direction!

My two cents - and I must admit, first, to being new to this, and second, that it sounds like your DD is at a higher LOG than my kids - but now seems the perfect time to do something about your dd's education, before problems come along and underachievement sets in. I'd consider having your DH read articles about the importance of keeping gifted kids challenged - print them out from Hoagies, etc. Here's one of my favorite quotes:

"When gifted children are not given opportunities to work at their own level and pace, they settle for less than their best. They learn to slide by without stretching themselves. Patterns of underachievement are subtle and cumulative; they become harder to overcome with each year. Students who attain A�s on their papers with no effort are not prepared to take more challenging classes in high school and college. When work is too easy, self-confidence to attempt difficult tasks is steadily eroded. A student who has the potential to win a scholarship to an Ivy League university settles for a B average at a state college."
http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/About_GDC/whytest.htm

There are private testers. There is a list of recommended testers at Hoagies. http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/psychologists.htm We went to the Gifted Development Center, which fortunately is local to us.

(and lol about comparing your test scores with your DH's. My DH likes to lord it over me that he scored 1 point, or two-tenths of a percentile, ahead of me on the lsat. Speaking of the importance of gifted ed, DH is a product of gifted ed and I am not. Which one of us do you think got into HLS? It wasn't me - my college grades weren't good enough - I didn't learn how to study, or even to think, until much later. And at the moment I like to blame elementary school for being far too easy )

I'm 37 - so if that is young, thank you very much! Our cutoff was Aug 31 and had an older class with several intimidating held back boys. I was the shortest in my kindy class and chock full of OE's that didn't help at all.

AnneMarie - definitely get your DH to start doing some reading up on issues gifted children can and do have. My husband who IS GT was still slow coming around to understanding why our child can't sit bored and bitter in class all day.

And if you can request a classmate, that could be huge!

Excellent point! I'm the first born. Being 2nd born 'usually' helps tremendously with the social skills, in my observation.

Grinity