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    I'm so sorry that the meeting didn't go well. What I don't get is isn't is possible that some of his social and emotional issues due to his being bored in class? How is holding him back going to fix that?

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    According to the school despite working above grade level in all assessed areas they do not feel that he has fully completed the complete 1st grade curriculum and socially/emotionally it is in his best interest to attend 1st grade next year!!!!!!!!!!!

    Oh Crisc!! My stomach knotted up when I read your post. It sounds altogether too familiar! Our school is mostly accepting of grade skips and acceleration. But they have an unusual preoccupation (in my opinion) with wanting highly gifted kids to be perfectly well behaved. There is some research that says that educators expect highly gifted kids to be more advanced socially and emotionally than average kids. They hold them up to a different standard. Behaviors that are acceptable in average kids are not acceptable in bright kids. There is a stereotype that highly gifted kids are anti-social, and they worry that the gifted kids are more likely to go off in that direction (think Ted Kaczynski hiding out in a Montana cabin). Therefore I think they are willing to put more emphasis on the "emotional needs", as defined by good behavior, than the "academic needs" in order to raise "good citizens" for the future. That is what we are experiencing at our school at least.

    They are completely clueless that to the fact that highly gifted little boys need to be academically challenged in order to keep from acting out due to boredom. There have been so many times in the past year that I wanted to shout this at DS8's 4th grade teachers, his gifted instructor, and his principle. I have held up reading assessments (done in class, by his teacher) that clearly show that DS is reading at the 9.7th grade level. I have held up two books in front of them: Lord of the Rings (book 2) and his current AR book and tried to show them what he reads at home verses what he reads at school. And if he gets up and wanders around the classroom when he is suppose to be reading his AR 4.1 level book (which he finished a week before), then perhaps he might be bored out of his noggin???

    All of this is met with glassy-eyed expressions and quoting of school policy: Students need to be able to sit in class and behave, even if they are bored senseless. Okay, the last part of that sentence is not official school policy, since they can not fathom that any child could be bored senseless with their exciting and challenging curriculum!

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    Currently DS6 is severely underchallenged and has completely given up on school. He is no longer making any real effort to complete his work.
    We are seeing the same thing with DS8, even with a full grade acceleration and a jump up to 7th grade science. He has realized that he can write down answers from his previous store of knowledge without ever opening a book or studying and he can still get A's and B's. It is so frustrating to watch him stop trying at school. I don't have any suggestions for you, unfortunately! I hope others do.

    The only thing that I can add is that the first half of this year, after the grade and subject skips occurred, DS8 loved school. There were few behavioral problems and he focused on school work. However, ever since January, he has become increasingly bored and increasingly frustrated with school. And correspondingly, the tolerance with non-challenging assignments and teachers that don't understand him or his needs has dwindled. There is, without a doubt, a correlation.

    I would have your school give him the end of the year tests for 1st grade, and the beginning of the year (or even mid-year tests for 2nd grade) and see where he is academically. Then show them research on the emotional needs of highly gifted kids.

    Here are some of the links that I posted earlier that show a connection between boredom and behavior. The book Exceptionally gifted children by Gross, Miraca is particularly good for this. The book follows about 15 highly gifted kids and looks at the correlation between the schools willingness to advance the child and the long term effect on the child in terms of success in jobs, marriage, and happiness. I printed out some of these references and showed them to the powers that be at our school, with no effect. I hope you have better luck!
    http://giftedissues.davidsongifted....ck_of_services_and_emotio.html#Post33546

    Hang in there! It is really too bad that we are all fighting this battle alone in our own little school districts. Sigh! frown I wish there was a way that we could flood each other's school with a letter writing campaign... a form of testimonial to say that "My child is a highly gifted child whose behavior and progress in school dramatically improved after a grade acceleration!" We could stuff your Assistant Principle's mail box to the brim!


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    I agree with Dottie. I believe that a large part of the reason that my son gets what he needs in school is that the school know that in this particular subject, I have way more knowledge than they do. Debating with me would just show them how off their thinking is when it comes to a PG kid.


    Shari
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    Originally Posted by Dottie
    Originally Posted by Ebeth
    Hang in there! It is really too bad that we are all fighting this battle alone in our own little school districts. Sigh! I wish there was a way that we could flood each other's school with a letter writing campaign... a form of testimonial to say that "My child is a highly gifted child whose behavior and progress in school dramatically improved after a grade acceleration!" We could stuff your Assistant Principle's mail box to the brim!
    Oh yeah, I could help!!!

    My son has benefited though from the scattered others. I literally have a story or situation to meet with every objection my school throws at me.


    Maybe I spent too much time working for a dotcom in the late 90's, but this smells like an enormous opportunity for someone to create highly useful website.

    Are any of our web/software programming savvy young adult gifties out there up for the challenge? Build it, and they will come ...

    I am envisioning a searchable, quotable, quantifiable database of experiences. more than just a list of anecdotes or eye-rollers (ridculous things I heard today...) (No offense to Hoagies. It is an awesome site and an awesome resource.) But I think you are on to something here eBeth and Dottie... How can we aggregate our experiences into an easily accessible format?

    I am thinking it would have to be anonymous, like this site. But built in a way so that individual incidents of setbacks and successes could be compiled into a nationwide reference tool.

    example: you could go to a site and fill in some brief (hopefully non-identifiable info)
    J.Smith: 10 yrs old. (or childqqR752)
    school: public middle
    tests completed: WISC... received FISQ of XXX on a good test day
    grade level: full grade skip in X grade
    accomodations: meeting student needs for the moment
    teacher: supportive of child's needs.

    etc.

    Then once enough data was compiled other folks could go back and reference it. Like pull a report that says: In the last 6 months there were 578 reported instances of children who walked out of the classroom when the book being read was X years behind their current reading level. Or: In the last X months, 72 parents reported behavior issues improving after their child was accelerated at least one grade level. ETC.

    OK, I am starting to ramble here but does anyone see where I am going with this?

    Anyone interested in building it? After all Hoagies, craiglist, and many other great sites were once a just labor of love of a single person.


    Last edited by EastnWest; 04/24/09 01:52 PM. Reason: changed wording
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    That is a wonderful idea, EastnWest. smile It would be a tremendous help to all of us. I tend to scour books on gifted education and the emotional needs of gifted kids for just such information. The book that I recommended by Miraca Gross has just that kind of information, except that it is taken from a limited number of kids from Australia. It would be wonderful to have a current database of hundreds of kids in the U.S.

    Unfortunately, I'm not too terribly web savvy. I can only imagine the data being gathered in a quick and dirty fashion by a detailed questionnaire-type survey, in order to compile it easily. I don't know enough about web design to be able to envision data mining from a testimonial format. It sounds fascinating though. Anyone have ideas on how to do this?

    For the quick and dirty approach: If you had very specific questions, then you could glean such information and tabulate it into the necessary statistics. It would be a fun questionnaire to write!! grin

    "How many hours a week is your child bored senseless in school?"
    1-2 hours/3-4 hours/ 5-9 hours/10-20 hours

    "How many times a week do you get a phone call from exasperated teachers?" whistle
    1-2 times/3-4 times/ 5-9 times/10-20 times per week

    "Is there a correlation for your child between boredom and teacher's phone calls?" yes/no

    "Does your child enjoy school?" yes/no

    Maybe you could calculate a compatibility score between your child's experiences and other kid's experiences, and then compile a list of testimonials to read that are similar to yours? Although I'm sure that there is a much better way to do this! What an interesting thought!!


    Mom to DS12 and DD3
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    According to the school despite working above grade level in all assessed areas they do not feel that he has fully completed the complete 1st grade curriculum and socially/emotionally it is in his best interest to attend 1st grade next year!!!!!!!!!!!


    If a child has no friends but does age appropriate work, social/emotional issues never factor into acceleration. Present them a gifted child and it is primary factor they consider. Ask your school how his social and emotional wellbeing will benefit from being bored silly all day.

    Last edited by marieg; 04/25/09 05:59 PM.
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    Crisc,
    I am so sorry that you and your son are going through this. I can empathize and hope that you are able to get some positive resolution. In the meantime hugs to all of you!

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    Crisc - i just read your post, and I'm angry along with you! I'm so sorry about this awful meeting. It makes no sense. And since it is a public school, they have no right to tell you that they cannot help your child; it is their duty, isn't it?

    I would ask them more specifics about what sort of social/emotional behaviors they are talking about. I would ask if he is socially/emotionally in a normal range of all first graders. If there are current 1st graders who exhibit any similar behaviors, ask if they are also being held back or promoted to the next grade. If he is working ahead of his chrono peers in everything, explain to them that keeping him in 1st grade is like making a 3rd grader do 1st grade again, or a 2nd grader do kindergarten again. Would that 3rd grader be likely to happily do the work he already knows how to do?

    Sorry - i don't really have any concrete advice, but I hope that things work out.

    Last edited by st pauli girl; 04/27/09 12:09 PM. Reason: sounded like i was angry with you - meant "along with you" not at you!
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