Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Knowledge gaps with a double grade skip

Hi. I've been reading this site for a while but finally need to jump in for some advice. Ds6 was accepted to DYS back in May while we were working with his school to figure out placement for this coming year. He will be jumping from K to 3rd and as the start of school approaches I am beginning to worry over gaps that he is going to face. For example today he was looking at a workbook and had to ask me what plural meant.

I'm worried about other gaps like this and if they will be stumbling blocks. Any body have experience with a double grade skip and have advice?

There will be knowledge gaps, but he will get through it and over it very quickly. You are so lucky to get this acceleration. My son only got a one-year acceleration from 2nd to 45th, when he really could have used at least two additional grade skips...

No experience with double-skips here, but my DD's school used the nebulous fear of gaps as an argument against a single skip. Once we'd gone around that issue for a few laps, it became apparent that it was basically a fear of an unknown, at which time it became apparent that the only rational response was "get the data!"

My recommendation would be to have him take a normed achievement test at end-of-second-grade level to identify these gaps, then begin teaching the areas of weakness. You can't address what you don't know.

We'd expect that he'd naturally pick up anything he's missing as the class progresses. There are potential consequences while that process unfolds, though. He might ask questions that seem obvious to others, which can be used as evidence to himself and to others (peers, teacher, school admins) that he doesn't belong.

@WhatMom, Keep your son talking by reinforcing him with "That's a great question... what makes you ask... " etc in a casual conversational tone. Especially feel free to share with him when you do not know or are not sure of the best answer to something he may ask about, and reassure him that you can look it up together and learn more together. This may encourage him to take it in stride that different people know different things and learn them at different times (at younger or older ages) depending upon their individual circumstances and experiences which happen to bring a question to mind. Instilling this mindset or worldview may help him with many future situations in which he may be way ahead or even possibly behind his cohort in becoming aware of different things.

PG kids may be more asynchronous in their development, and being accepting of this (not feeling a burden that he must consistently know the most) may help him skate over any real or perceived gaps with a strong sense of self-acceptance as well as acceptance of others (not feeling thin-skinned or picked on or excluded by any difference because he will realize that having differences is a universal experience which everyone encounters to some degree).

You may also wish to read everything you can in the Davidson Database on grade acceleration. There is very good research and guidance.

We don't have experience with a double-grade skip, but if you're wondering *where* gaps might show up, you can probably find your school districts curriculum listed by grade and subject online, and a quick glance through that might give you a good idea of where gaps *might* show up - and I'm guessing at this age that just a tiny bit of tutoring at home to fill in would be all you'd need to get past the most obvious things that might crop up.

Best wishes,

polarbear

We did this with our DD.

It will probably make you feel better if you (prior to placement in the coming year) go over some scope-and-sequence for 1st and 2nd from your local district. That way, you will know if there are any BIG gaps.

You could even do what we did-- have your ds take an achievement battery for, say, 2nd grade. We were a LOT more comfortable with DD being a 3rd grader after we did that, because she 99-ed all of the subsections. So she didn't really have any big gaps. She had a few things like the one you mention-- but those are just a missing definition, not a lack of understanding for a major curriculum component (like "fractions" or "suffixes" or something).


LOL-- the tally marks. Oh my. Well, it took DD until she was almost 13. (Doctor Who, by the way.)

I know that a lot of school use gaps as a reason for not doing skips which does make me feel silly about worrying over them when our school is not.

The school did all kinds of end of year tests last year and we know that the skip is appropriate, if not enough. He scored high 90% on 2nd grade around 85% on the 3rd grade test. He spent the second half of last year going to 2nd grade for reading and scored in the 90's on all the weekly tests. He also went to 5th grade for math, which he will be doing again this year (with the ability to test out of sections and move onto 6th grade material - nobody could stomach sending a six year old to the middle school for math everyday).

I am hoping that he will find something to struggle with, and it does seem to be missing definitions (love that phrase) but for some reason him not knowing plural through me for a loop. He also has age appropriate hand writing, so that may be a struggle.

LOL on learning tally marks from Doctor Who... had to explain it to DS because I actually laughed out loud. DS loves competition so he has learned tally marks to keep tract of coin flips, dice rolls, and how many green days he got last year.

We're making DS10 read the four books from 6th grade science that he missed in the process of accelerating and skipping. Science is the only class that he had with 5th grade last year, and all his other classes were 6th/7th, so now when he goes straight into 7th he misses that year of science class.

Summer homework, yay!

So your DD marked the 'fives' by drawing a flower instead of 'closing the gate' and she was dinged???

Wow - that's a new low! Did the teacher have a pulse? Did they give the teacher an EEG - I am sure that the result would have been a continuous horizontal line.

I am assuming that the school didn't (and shouldn't) just relied on his DYS status for the acceleration. They must have provided to him some end-of-year testing where he demonstrated sufficient mastery as well. While I do not have experience with a double grade skip, DS did a double acceleration in 2nd grade from 2nd grade math to 4th grade math. Then in 4th grade, he skipped 6th grade math and studied Pre-Algebra instead. At the time of the initial double-skip, there were some issues with vocabulary and writing and the evaulator from the district office noted that he had his own unique way of solving problems probably because he was not taught the math that he would be skipping. In hindsight, these issues were minor so I wouldn't worry too much and just let him pick up what he needs naturally.