Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Update on grade skip

I wrote in a while back about a grade skip offered to my 2nd grader, and said that we had a choice between the current bi-lingual school and new school that groups kids by ability, not age. We were torn because of the 2nd language issue. Well, we decided on the new school.

The thing that did it was an abysmal meeting I had with one of my kindergartner's teachers on Friday. I had asked if she could help him with his reading. He wasn't really into reading until Christmas and since then he's become enthusiastic and has moved pretty quickly. I figured it would be nice to get something at school. You know, just a little something.

She told me that kids his age are too young to learn long vowel sounds, which can damage their ability to learn to read. I tried to explain that some kids can learn at this age, even younger, but she cut me off and said she'd heard people say this before, and knows it's not true from experience. She said kids need to learn how "to track from left to right" at this age, and that's what she's focusing on. Argh. She kept cutting me off.

I got so frustrated, and even said so. She let me speak at that point, but in retrospect I think she was arguing with me internally while I was talking.

Oh well!

Val

Sounds like the new school was an easy choice after that conversation. How frustrating.

I hope the new school has more nurturing teachers who understand gifted youngsters--that makes all the difference(though there are always issues I'm convinced)

I haven't heard anything so stupid for a very long time. Hard to believe she's never met a child who could read in K.

Did she mention a longterm psychological damage too? May be that could explain why DS5 was such a pain today My poor damaged kids

Good luck with the new school. You can always hire a tutor to teach them the second language or have playdates with native speakers. At least you know the rest will be taken care of.

They'll start in September, but they're both going Wednesday for a day. They're on vacation this week, and my eldest had a lot of fun there for a day last October.

I was thinking of starting a thread called "Lamest thing I've been told and how I handled it." If anyone is game, feel free to add something here.

When I was a child, my mother taught me to manage my anger by throwing an old shoe at the garage wall. She's always said "It's okay to be angry. It's how you handle it that matters." I threw a shoe at the garage when I got home!

Val

No doubt! She's lucky you didn't throw a shoe at her!

I think I'd have had a hard time keeping myself from laughing at her when she said that. Or I'd have said something snotty like, "Well, I read at 3. So did my sister. So are we an impossibility or something?"

Ay-yi-yi!

I'm stunned!? I think she was begging for the shoe!? You just have to wonder what people are thinking sometimes?

Congratulations on coming to a decision. Sometimes it's helpful just to get slapped with a comment like that to come to a conclusion!

True, kimck. My DH and I say that the lousy 1st grade teacher who drove us to take DS6 out of the public school system may actually have done us a real favor. It makes it very easy to make decisions when you get nonsense like "long vowel sounds" as a wake-up call!

So shall we thank the teacher first, or throw the shoe at her first? Maybe simultaneously?

I would love to know where people get ideas like this to begin with.

I didn't actually tell the whole story, for space reasons: she also told me that she has them sounding out words, and that they had been working on "queen" and "quilt". I guess the irony of the silent E in "queen" was lost on her, unless she didn't consider that second e to be silent???

At that point,I had a lot of sympathy for the poor things that really do need to learn to track from left to right. Imagine throwing "qu", silent e, and "lt" at a bunch of kids who are still figuring out that you go from left to right. I mean, whatever happened to "Dot sat" and "Run, Tag, run"???

Argh.

Val

Ha, ha! I know why! It was "Q" week. They could only do Q words. You know they are damaged if they don't go in alphabetical order, don't you?

Cathy