Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Advocating for a two-grade acceleration

Hi! I have just found you all via the private psychologist who tested my boy; she recommended we look into the DYS program. First, I am working with the school to accelerate him two grades and wondered if anyone had any experience accomplishing this. Second, I am wondering how to best help him.

I have just started to read the forums but if you have a handy link or reference, I'd love to view it as I have a TON of material to sift through right now.

And I guess I should post some about him.

He is 8 and in second grade; he's very bouncy and talkative but just an overall great kid. His test results just came back with:

Verbal Comprehension (VCI) 158 (>99.9%)
Perceptual Reasoning (PRI) 133 (99%)
Working Memory (WMI) 141 (99.7%)
Processing Speed (PSI ) 88 (21%)
Full Scale (FSIQ) 141 (99.7%)
General Abilities Index (GAI) 155 (>99.9)

Thank you in advance! :-)

Welcome!

You obviously have a very gifted DC on your hands!

Our DS12 skipped 6th grade this year and went into compacted math so it's like he's taking three years of math in one. He's doing quite well in all aspects though he needs some support in his executive functioning. Your DS's scores have a similar distribution with the VCI being the highest, then PRI, then WM, and then PS. Your DS's working memory is much higher though and that will be a great asset when grade (2?)skipping I should think. The processing is lower than the rest but is still low average, right? Did you get some insight into why it was low? For instance, our tester attributed DS's lower PS to perfectionism.
Davidson has some wonderful links to articles regarding lower processing speed as do other gifted sights. It's very common as you'll see, and remember, one of the reasons it looks so low is that the others are SO high.
I don't know if you're in the states but another useful tool to determine whether or not grade advancement would be good is the Iowa Assessment Scale which takes into consideration a number of different factors.
I would think your DC would be an excellent candidate.

I hope this helps.

I would be very careful about a two grade skip at one time. Your DS scores are very high. However, you are talking about putting your 8 year old in the 5th grade and there is a lot more to school than academics. Will he end up being the "baby" of the class or do you think the other 5th graders will accept him as a peer (both in and out of the classroom). I might advocate for one grade skip, see how it goes and then decide later if you want to try for another. Also, we are considering a grade skip this year (1st to 3rd) and someone on the board suggested the Iowa Acceleration Scales to me. We used it and it was very helpful to us in making the decision. Best of luck:)!

We didn't skip two grades at once, but had a somewhat comparable situation (8yo in 5th grade). Have you done achievement testing with your son? Obviously, a highly gifted student will learn things very quickly, but I'm wondering why the push for two grades instead of one for the skip? Honestly, I'd have some hesitation. It wasn't a big deal for my first dd to be younger compared to her classmates, but I did find that her overall maturity wasn't really where it needed to be. There was no bad ending - she got through HS, went to college on full scholarship, worked for three years, and will be starting her PhD program in the fall at 23-but I don't know that I'd choose that route again. Our second dd started teaching in TFA at 20 (after college) and she will be going to law school at 22 after 2 years in the work force. And yet... I always felt that being a year or two older would have helped them, and I felt that even more strongly for my boys (we chose not to accelerate our significantly younger boys after choosing that route with our girls). Ds11 is very gifted, but we've managed to find accommodations that work (doing algebra in 6th, instead of 7th or 8th; strong gifted program) and I think he benefits from being with his age-mates. I might be over-reacting based on my own situation (ds is also "bouncy and talkative"), but I find that there is so much more to MS and HS than just academic ability. I'd also be-potentially- concerned about your ds's processing speed. It may cause no problem whatsoever, but it could affect him when he has much greater reading demands, timed in-class essays, etc...
I truly don't mean to be negative. As I said, for the most part, my dds' experience turned out well overall and I don't know that we had a better option at the time, but my understanding of having an 11- or 12-year old in high school is much more comprehensive now than it was when we made the decisions. I was absolutely correct about the academics (neither has "hit the wall" there), but I wasn't as aware of everything else. In any case, there aren't any perfect solutions in these cases, so whatever you decide, I'm sure your son will be okay. I hope the board will help you find a lot of great resources!

You might want to have achievement testing done like the Woodcock Johnson Achievement or WIAT and see if those percentiles are high enough to warrant skipping grades. Or ask the school if they have done above-level testing, such as a computerized test for math/reading. You don't want him to miss a lot of academic material that he hasn't learned yet. Did the psych say anything about the processing speed score? That is a very large gap and it could indicate a disability. My 8 year old DD's scores are very similar but her perceptual reasoning score and verbal comprehension scores are reversed, with PR being the highest. She is very strong with math and not quite as strong with reading (but advanced with both). She skipped a grade already and is in third grade and doing fine, but because of her lowish processing speed (34th percentile?), she is slow with written work which has caused some problems. Her fine motor skills are not the best, so she writes slowly. Plus she has ADHD and that slows her down as well. Ask the teacher if he is slow with written work.

Two grade skips have worked wonderfully for my DD13, though I should note that they were two single skips rather than one double. Personally I would recommend that route, but I am probably (confirmation) biased since that is how we did it.

--S.F.

My DS was 8 in 5th grade this year, but he started kindergarten a year early and then moved up again from 4th to 5th. He's in a small school and was already really close friends with most of the 5th graders, so the bump up was good for him both academically and socially. He's also very tall and mature for his age, so he barely stands out. The biggest challenge has been with organizational skills (bringing the right books home, doing the right assignment), but the school has been very flexible and willing to work with him.

One of the reasons I was so hesitant about a grade skip with my own DC is consistent with momoffour above. I graduated from high school at 16 and left for college. While I was fine academically (university honors program etc) I was not ready in many ways. As a middle aged woman I still can't help but feel like I missed out on some experiences because I was a few years younger than my peers. I simply was not ready to deal with some of the social stuff. Academics are not the only thing that matters and sometimes dealing with peers that are having sex, drinking etc when you are much younger than them can put pressure on a child that they are simply not ready for. Also, how are you going to structure rules? Will your child have freedoms that are consistent with their age or that of their peers? It can get tricky:).

Your DS’s profile is very close to my DS who is now 10 (he was tested at 7.5) – his VCI and PRI are almost identical. My DS’s WMI is lower and PSI is higher. By the time he was tested, he had already been grade skipped once and we tested him for admission to an HG program. He has been in that program for 3 years and it was good for the first 2 and it is ok now. He is not going back next year.

I will tell you a few of the issues that have come up with this type of profile for us. First, his mind is fast, but production is slow. He has never been the type of kid to blast through work. His written output is just starting to catch up – I believe this is partly age, but the relatively lower PSI has been an issue in completing work (his PSI is 109). He also has some executive function deficits. Organization is an issue, memory is good because his WMI is in the gifted range (though not as strong as your DS) but he forgets assignments, lunch boxes, etc. . and needs reminders to initiate and persist through tasks sometimes, especially those that are mundane or tedious or challenging for him. We work on breaking assignments down and setting small goals to complete homework or projects.

My DS could use another skip at this point for the academic part, but because of the executive function issues, we are going to do a combination of online classes and brick and mortar next year – as a 6th grader. He will be able to do some subject acceleration through the online.

Are you comfortable sharing what this double-skip is based on? Iowa Acceleration Scale? Having older friends? Strong portfolio of accomplishments? High achievement test scores? Teacher recommendation?

Some may see this as a red flag. Does he process what is being taught in a timely manner to stay on task? Finish tests within allotted time? Keep up in class so as to not disrupt teaching pace and slow down the class? Would he be able to compensate for any possible speed deficit amongst students 2 years older? If there are shortcomings in processing speed, while they could possibly be accommodated in the classroom, they may not enhance social relationships amongst new pupils 2 years older and the ability to make friends when introduced to an older cohort; Rather the older students may believe they are moving slower for him because he is younger.

You don't mention especially what it is you wish to help him with. Many parents upon learning their child is gifted want to be prepared to help their child in a general sense. You may wish to get and read the book "A Parent's Guide to Gifted Children".

My son has a similar profile to your son (with the VCI and PRI reversed).

We homeschooled K-4 and then my son entered a small private school the next year in 6th grade (skipping 5th). He skipped 7th and is currently in 8th. He is further accelerated in math (one year ahead of his current placement).

Because of his processing speed issues, he has accommodations at school where he is allowed double time on tests, but he rarely uses it.

Honestly, from a cognitive demand standpoint, two skips haven't been enough, but from an executive functioning perspective, it is bordering on too much. Since we don't want him to burn out before he even starts high school, we have decided to have him take a gap year (or two) before entering 9th grade. We'll be homeschooling again. I hope to work on skills that have been difficult for him and at the same time stretch him intellectually--something that's been lacking for the last two years.

Thank you! Some of the processing speed was attributed to fine-motor coordination (not unusual in boys especially and also a problem for me as a child) and some was probably due to motivation. He is very unhappy in school right now and really did not want to be there doing anything school-related with a teacher (which is how she asked me to present it to him.)

I ordered the IOWA Assessment manual and am just waiting on that to arrive but ty for the recommendation! :-)

He would be going from second grade to fourth grade (February baby). He already has friends in the third and fourth grades from the playground and his aftercare program so I do not anticipate they will treat him like a baby. Added to that is his sheer physical size where he is often mistaken for a ten-year-old from being so tall.

Thank you for the recommendation; we are waiting on the IAS to arrive! :-)

Thank you for sharing your experience. I also am a middle-aged woman who was skipped up two grades and it worked out quite well for me but I took time off before college so that may have made the difference.

We negotiate rules based on his maturity level, with the understanding that "I am not Jason's mom; I am your mom." That one is the least of my concerns. :-)

His first-grade teacher (Montessori where he was working at a third grade level) last year recommended he be bumped to third grade. We moved and the new school assured us they would differentiate for him. The second-grade teacher has tried by getting materials from the fourth-grade teacher for him to use but he is miserable and has asked to move to fifth grade.

The psychologist who tested him also thinks it would be good for him though she does not anticipate the school agreeing to it. Neither do I, to be frank, but I'd like to give it the best possible shot.

He is very popular and has lots of friends across the grades but does not have friends who "think like me, Mom."

He comprehends quickly and finishes his tests quickly; his Chinese tests on Friday, for which they allot one hour, takes him about fifteen minutes. I do not know how long it takes the other students. He is currently a peer helper for math, so I think it's safe to say he isn't slowing down the class and in fact, the teacher has asked him to let the other students have a turn answering.

I have read a bit about the processing speed with respect to working memory and I am not convinced it would hold him back.

Yes, I can see this being a concern; I'm still terrible with it and I want him to develop those skills now rather than in college or never. :-) We are working on habits of organization now but it's an uphill battle for both of us. When I was in college, I would type my papers without writing a rough draft the night before or the morning they were due and I still don't know how to study. I have a friend who returned to college for a biotech degree and I admire the relentless way he studies but I could never duplicate it.

We were very fortunate to have a Montessori program available to us for his first two years but that is no longer an option. We are considering the Davidson Academy for middle and high school, if I can transfer to the office there.

Sounds promising, especially since your son requested it and a previous teacher suggested and it hopefully may back it with a letter of recommendation, or may offer to help complete the IAS?

Best possible shot is often the Iowa Acceleration Scale, you've probably seen this.

LOL! Thank you! You are the third person to recommend the IAS; it must be good! We are currently waiting for the manual to arrive. :-)

This is about what our situation has been with our DD14, too. She's now (finally) catching up to peers in EF (that is, 17yo, not agemates) and surpassing them, even... but we were pretty nervous about this heading into her senior year, to be honest.

The way that we did this is as follows:

delayed entry into formal school until 6.5yo-- and at that point, provided out of level testing that was all 99's, arguing for a 3rd grade placement (that's 2y right there, since she didn't turn 7 until the summer after she finished 3rd grade).

The FOLLOWING year, she compacted 4th and 5th into a single academic year, and the year after that, was placed as a 6th grader in the GT program.

The last skip was finalized when she was a high school freshman, and her grade placement was adjusted at the end of that year to be "11th grade" without ever having been 10th grade, if that makes sense.

What worked about this was that if her EF and written output hadn't begun closing the gap in 9th grade (it had) we wouldn't have HAD to have her graduate this year-- we could have had her graduate at (almost) 16y instead, and just spend 5y taking "high school" coursework.

I can't say that the academics have been terribly meaningful, but some really good teachers can go a long way to helping your child find ways to enrich the curriculum as they go, provided that they are open and nurturing about that.

IMO, the easiest way to advocate for a multiple skip like this is the way that we did it (and others here have done it, too); make sure that you're ENTERING a new educational setting, and that the child is way over-prepared to be dropped into the incoming grade, convincingly so via test results, etc.

Homeschool to school is the simplest way of getting that done, because there isn't a "gap" for a school to really consider a "skip" in academics-- it's just that the placement is "individually determined" instead of "chronological."

I'll also add, though, that the processing speed would be a red flag for me here, too-- ouput demands REALLY increase sharply now at Gr 4, and again at Gr6/7 (the transition to middle school) and Gr9. Each of those particular years is a "transition" year where kids are specifically taught EF and academic support skills.

As far as we can tell, my DD's profile has only her written expression as a limiting factor in the 3y acceleration that she's effectively been operating at since 6th grade-- but realize that as a 7th grader, she was clearly at about the 80th-90th percentile there as compared with her GT (mostly MG) classmates. It's only now that it's bounced back up to 99 levels-- but like everything else about her, it's a total black box HOW that happens, and it's not been a slow steady improvement, either-- fits and starts. It's a step function, her development. {sigh}

I would love to be able to homeschool him. Unfortunately, he likes to eat so I have to work. :-D

How did you compact 4th and 5th grades? That may be a solution if they only allow one grade skip.

Well, WE did it by using an online virtual charter school, so she could work mostly self-paced.

The other solution is a split grade classroom, where your child can work (mostly) self-paced and move smoothly up through to the top level in the UPPER grade, develop peer relationships within that peer cohort, and transition with THEM to the next grade up...

I've seen that done, and it's what we'd have tried ourselves if DD had been in a brick and mortar setting.

Hmm...he's in a split class 1/2 right now. I shall have to inquire as to whether there is a 3/4 class available; thank you much for that tip! We're planning to learn 4th grade over the summer in any event; it's all I can do to keep up with him! :-)

Addressing the slow processing speed question:

I do not know why that is with reference to his work unless it is that he is working out things in his head first. It may also be a touch of perfectionism. I have asked the psychologist for more information on that but she just went on vacation so it may be a while.

As to what his teacher says...from his report card:

First trimester:
"...His writing is currently on grade level and I can see great improvements through conferencing with [TW] on personal stories written in class. He often works quickly through the material, I would like for him to work on slowing down so that his handwriting might improve and so that he does not make simple mistakes from his rushing."

That's not all she wrote but it answers the pertinent "how fast is he working?" His handwriting is awful but...so is mine; the brain is just working way faster than his hands can process.

Sadly, the school has decided that DS8 is not ready for a grade skip due to:

1) his penmanship

2) his answering the principal for the group when he was leading the group at play

3) and the fact that he still counts on his fingers and hasn't memorized his multiplication tables yet...though they have not asked him to do so.

They photocopied the tests to which he was subjected and it made me realize how much they were against accelerating him.

For example:

His teacher asked him to write an essay about water conservation and he did. It was clear and thoughtful with proper grammar including an introduction and conclusion. It was difficult to read due to his penmanship, which was atrocious and much worse than last year. It was still legible. His teacher stated that there was no conclusion and I rightfully pointed out his conclusion statement. She then said his ideas were disordered; they were clearly in order as he had used terms such as "First", "Second", etc. and he segued gracefully between paragraphs.

At this school currently, third-grade students are tested for the GATE program in fourth grade. The principal took advantage of this meeting to let me know that the GATE program is being discontinued altogether so they can focus on Common Core. "Common Core focuses on depth, not breadth" were her precise words.

Overall, it was a disheartening meeting; not because I was forced to accept that my special snowflake ;-) isn't really special but because I realized that his school is not interested in educating him because "he's smart; he'll do fine." They intend to have him join the writer's workshop for 2nd/3rd grade as differentiation for language. It's better than nothing, I suppose and thank the stars the school year's almost over.

On the other hand, my work is transferring me to Reno and we are looking into the School-Within-A-School program in the elementary schools. They've found him eligible; we are just waiting on the commitment letter. :-)

Wow. Sorry to hear the outcome, but not surprised. My grade-skipped DD's current school has mentioned her handwriting more than once (she entered that school post-skip and there was nothing they could do about it). I remember getting grief about penmanship as a kid. I suspect you're right; they don't want to skip your son and are finding reasons not to do so. In a circumstance like this, you can't win. Unless, that is, you move to Reno.

I've heard from one or two Reno-area parents that the schools there are aware of the Davidson Academy and are trying hard to keep very bright kids in the local school system. Can you keep us posted?

This is the third time this week I've heard of a G&T program being cut back in the name of the Common Core...

Best of luck in Reno!

Thank you and yes! I will be glad to post our experiences with the SWAS. I can tell you that so far, the administration has been GREAT! They have been very responsive.

For anyone in the area or considering the area, the guy to talk to is Tim Robinson; you can reach him through the Washoe school district GATE site.

http://washoecountyschools.org/dist...y-school-programs/school-within-a-school

The GATE team meets once a week on Tuesdays to discuss students who are recommended or applying to the program. If a parent is requesting evaluation, it will take some time to set up the evaluation so they are looking at the following year. If you already have test results, that speeds the process considerably. In our case, we already had the WISC-IV and the WIAT-II so they took his scores and used them to determine eligibility so that he can go right into the program.

We're not trying to accelerate him through the school grades; I don't care if he wants to be with age-mates. I just want for him to be with friends who think the way he does and for him to be in a learning environment that isn't trying to stifle him so in the name of social development. That alone will make school a much more interesting and pleasant environment.

It's actually a bit funny. After having DS8 in her class for an entire school year, his teacher still doesn't know how to motivate him to complete his reading questions. He's gaming the system by reading until he runs out of time and telling her he will do the question journal tomorrow.

When tomorrow comes, he "needs to read the chapter again to remember what happened." When she told me that in the meeting, I just started laughing; probably not the best response. Then I told her that he's motivated by learning and reading; if you want the questions completed, you have to tell him that they must be finished before he is allowed to continue reading.

After the meeting, I spoke to DS8 and told him that he must do his question journal and that if it's not completed, reading privileges are suspended. We haven't had that problem since but here's the thing: I never knew it WAS a problem. She could have emailed me at any time and I could have fixed it but I can't fix what I don't know...grrr...

Yes, it is a handy way to divert funds that were being used for GATE programs. No one can argue with a mandate. >:(

HowlerKarma: Did this freak you out? Did it make it hard to plan? I don't just mean for the coming year or whatever, but your entire picture of what trajectory she was on?

Yes, it freaked me out. Both then and now. It's basically living with a child who has NO books describing that kind of development, and it also doesn't provide you with much of a handle on what level of "push" is appropriate-- or when.

Ultimately, it has meant being infinitely flexible in terms of our current estimate of what "trajectory" even means.

One day at a time, serenity prayer territory, I'm afraid.

There IS no big picture accessible to us-- and it has meant coming to terms with that.

Ergo, we evaluate fit anytime things seem "off" in any way-- and we ride the train until the track runs out, or seems about to-- and then we try to figure out what happens next. It's also the reason we have become such incredible neurotic freaks about documenting everything-- that's our metaphorical life raft if the ship sinks under us all without warning. We've had that happen once before (it's the reason I showed up here, basically, when she was about nine, and started posting in desperation when she was about ten or eleven).

DD has developed the metacognitive skills now (since she was about 12 and we discussed this kind of development-- and various NT, non-NT developmental trajectories) that she is able to help us to anticipate when these jumps are occurring, which is useful. Well, to a point. What to do about them, and evaluating "what level are we on now" is still a challenge.

Jonothan Livingston Seagull. That's my kid. This is the facet of my DD, more than all of the others, that makes me desperately wish that I had my father alive to ask questions of.

Oh, darn you. That is not what I wanted to hear.