Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Acceleration and sibling question

I know that IAS says accelerating into a siblings grade is a no no, but I was wondering if anyone had successfully done it anyway. We ar looking into acceleration options for DD. Whole grade would put her in third with her brother. They are very close and we've always called them our "twins". I realize there would be possible social implications, but right now they are both ok with the idea. I doubt it will happen but am curious if it has worked for anyone.

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While the IAS lists having an older sibling in the receiving grade as a no-go for acceleration of the younger sibling, at the same time it acknowledges successful occurrences of acceleration under this circumstance.

This post is part of a thread about a year ago in which a family on this forum was weighing pros and cons of just such a grade skip.

Acceleration success!!! is a recent update from that member.

I've always thought that that part of the IAS is a bit unfair to the younger sibling in need of acceleration. Still, the IAS is based on research.

On the more anecdotal side, one of my family members was accelerated into the grade of a sibling. It did not cause any problems whatsoever, but has lead to some VERY funny family stories that those siblings still love to share.

That's us! The family that successfully got a grade skip for younger DD into big sister's grade. Some quick thoughts:
A)I found a copy of the Iowa Acceleration Scale online so I knew what I was up against concerning the school. I knew IAS warned against a child accelerating into a sibling's grade. I ignored that and adding all the points, DD (then 9), scored very high for a successful grade skip.
B)We had a psychologist who recommended the grade skip. DD(now 10) was very unhappy in 4th. We had the psychologist go to all the school meetings as support and "authority figure".
C)Had all the testing done privately except for out of level testing which was done by the school (ITBS).
D)Found that the principal, asst. principal, and district AIG specialist were helpful! Very surprising. And when the "BIG MEETING" occurred (10 or so people?), the school district pooh poohed the idea that you don't accelerate a kid just because his/her sibling is in the receiving grade. I was pretty shocked, but happy.
So we have a little over 2 months of 5th grade under our belts. DD10 is happier. I think part of that is getting away from the 4th grade teacher, part is the realization that mom and dad went to bat for her, and part is she found it's not nearly as boring as 4th because she has separate math, language arts, and science teachers so she can actually get a bit of differentiation. She and DD11 still fight like cats and dogs sometimes, but that happened before the skip. Plus they work on homework together. DD11 couldn't do a math problem today, and DD10 exclaimed, "Oh, I can help you with that!" and did! That made my heart warm.
Weird stuff - social. I am not always sure who is getting the Evite for birthdays! Mom's are getting better at specifying who is invited or just inviting both, like twins.
Emotional business: Most of the time DD acts like a 5th grader yet at home and elsewhere she jumps into my arms like a little one. Also, since the skip she has wandered into our bed in the middle of the night quite a bit so she's feeling a bit anxious. We have a "how's it going" meeting soon so I asked if DD was doing ok with the grade skip. I told her if it wasn't going well she could go back to 4th. She was horrified, and said she wanted to go to middle school next year!!
Hmmm, the only other thing I can think of is that DD went through her closet tonight. She dumped some things because they are not middle school-worthy. DD is the size of a peanut, so she can wear little kid clothes, but she is determined to be a real, cool, middle schooler.
Oh, another point. I don't think DD has learned that much more, or she's just absorbing everything like a sponge because she sure isn't struggling! She (and big sister) will be in a compacted math class next year and is supposed to be in an advanced LA class as well.
Oops! This was not quick! I hope it was helpful though!

I think it is unfair to the younger child too. I would definitely fear a glass ceiling whether it is real or perceived.

If they're so close they feel like twins, and they both feel okay about the proposed situation, I'd go for it. If they're going to disagree and fight it'll always be something if not the skip, so I wouldn't worry about problems between the two of them. If they're a girl and a boy that helps too -- they'll be less likely to end up competing against each other socially. Just make sure they know that if one is skipped and one isn't, that doesn't mean anything, and even though they are siblings, they are people independently of the other and should support one another instead of being jealous of friends/grades/attention/the last cookie/etc.

As the younger who skipped, I did not know the impact on my older brother until we were adults. It affected him greatly, self esteem etc. He set the bar lower for himself, lower than he had to. But as I said, it was long after that I realized. Nothing that would be noticeable at the time.

Wren, I don't know your family, but I'm not sure that skipping into the same grade was what impacted your brother. I was 11 months older than my brother and skipped so that I was two years ahead of him. He too set a lower bar for himself--I was the smart one; he was the athlete.

However, I also think that we were who we were, and that I would have been the smart one and he would have been the athlete, regardless of who was older or younger, and whether I'd skipped or not. I think that would have been true even if we'd each been only children.

I think you have to do the right thing for the individual child.

That happens among siblings all the time, regardless of whether there was a skip involved. Siblings often seek to differentiate themselves with some sort of specialty in order to carve out an identity and earn parental approval. Once one of the kids locks down the "smart one" role, the others tend to look around for something else.

This tends to play out in other domains, too, as kids may become "the athlete," "the funny one," "the popular one," "the leader," "the artist/musician/actor," etc. A sibling with a similar talent may hold themselves back/out of such activities simply because they think they'll never be as good as their sibling, so what's the point?

Or, as in one family I know, one of the siblings chose not to pursue an area of significant talent because filling that role was too important to the other sibling's self-image to jeopardize with perceived competition.