My son is in fourth grade at a local public school. Our district has no gifted programming whatsoever. He's not had much testing -- he did achieve scores in the 9th stanine across the board in a second grade CogAT -- but I suspect him of being in the HG range. We've gotten by up until now with engaged teachers who've done various sorts of differentiation, and I've done some enrichment outside of school.

(Every time I come here for advice I feel awkward because we haven't tested, so I end up asking for advice on how to find testing resources. But despite all that, I still don't feel like testing would add a lot of value for us in understanding him. I know his traits because I was a gifted child, and I know he needs more than what standard pedagogy offers. His second grade CogAT confirms he's got above-average ability, and that's enough for now, you know?)

Anyway, our current issue is that the work load is higher in fourth grade so it's been hard to add enrichment. And although we discussed differentiation at the fall teacher conference, we haven't seen much of a change.

This week my math-talented little guy was crying over his math homework AGAIN, stressing out because it was so tedious but he kept making simple typos that caused the computer-adaptive program to add MORE problems to the already-excessive amount of practice, so I promised him that I would explore some alternatives that I can present to his teacher at spring conference time in a few weeks.

So I'm wondering, what does math differentiation, subject acceleration, or other accommodation look like for your math-loving HG public school student?

My son is very very reluctant to consider accelerating into the fifth grade classroom for math time, and anyway it would be tough to coordinate and wouldn't help him very much since the pacing would still be all wrong. He's willing to consider individual tutoring (since I have a math/science degree I'd be taking that on, pulling him out for one-on-one work during math time,) but he is concerned that even this would stand out too much among his peers.

What other options can I consider and suggest?

Have you looked at Beast Academy. You could start at 3A and work a bit quicker.

If he's doing a computer adaptive program, can he do it at a higher grade level? Another option is Khan Academy...just make sure you put him at the correct grade, not 4th grade. My fourth grader did Khan Academy in 2nd grade as well as some workbooks that I sent in that were a couple grade levels up. It wasn't a great long term solution and our school district has so many issues that we finally went to a different district and they immediately subject accelerated him 3 years. Now a middle school teacher comes in and teaches him and 3 other kids for an hour, then she leaves again (she is a math intervention teacher I think but took on these 4 gifted kids). I didn't ask for it, the district set it up. I'm not sure what will happen next year because he needs to take Algebra and the other kids will be moving to middle school and he will not. The problem with math has been probably the most difficult thing I've encountered (other than special ed). Its all too easy for people to claim that differentiation is going to happen, but it doesn't actually. Most kids are fine with grade level work and if they need enrichment, they can do some word problems or something. But when a few kids need to move at a really fast pace the schools just don't know what to do. I think the only solutions are to either do online learning (which is unfortunate) or subject acceleration to the correct level. Neither one of those are optimal. Having a kid stare at a screen by themselves isn't good, and subject acceleration isn't good if the pace is still too slow. DS moves at a pretty fast pace now because all of the kids are able to move quickly.

puffin: He first did 3A when he was 6. We currently own 3A-D and 5A/B, and he loves it all. He prefers to jump to the starred problems and wrestle them into submission. LOL. We just don't have a lot of time for it.


He says they typically do math first thing. So I suggested that he should just come to school an hour later, and we'll do the math bit at home. (It's a 5 minute drive, so this isn't a hardship.) Or I could pull him to work in the hallway or library. He's sort of okay with this. But he's worried that he'll feel like he's bragging if he ever discusses *why* he's doing things differently. You're absolutely right, it's not like the other kids don't know. And plenty of kids get pulled from various subjects for all kinds of reasons, mostly remediation. It wouldn't be that weird.

Maybe just move on to prealgebra then. He could do alcamus at school if they want on line stuff. If he likes BA, Khan probably wouldn't do it for him. My 9 year old has just started 5th grade and has been finally advanced 2 years in maths. Unfortunately that puts him in the top class and I think he might still be near the top in the advanced class. I am going to start him on AOPS PA to give more depth to what they do in class then hope I can organise his maths for the two years after this.

Eta. If you could get permission to start school late the kids would accept it pretty quickly and may even be envious. Ds9 just has someone from the other class fetch him when it is time.

The problem, as you might also experience, isn't the starting level so much as the amount of repetition. The teacher seems to think that when they use Front Row (which is adaptive and pre-tests them into a level where they need work) it serves as enough differentiation -- but it's asking him to do tens, if not hundreds, of problems on topics that he grasped within the first few minutes of instruction, you know? And they do Khan sometimes, but you're exactly right that subject acceleration is no good if the pace is still too slow (and the instruction is still overly procedural, which I find is the drawback of Khan.)

I'm kind of liking the flipped classroom suggestion. He loves Alcumus...if we were permitted to forego homework, I could possibly teach him AOPS Prealgebra and then let him do Alcumus during class, especially when they have Chromebook time anyway. Hrm.

I'm super jealous of your kiddo's individual instruction. Good luck with next year!

Cross posted! I think AOPS/Alcumus would be a great fit. DS loves the "dive in and break your brain" aspects but hesitates over the more structured aspects of (any) textbook. I might just have to buy it and see how it goes. >.<

His concern about being treated differently, starting late or pulling out at math time or whatever, is that he knows it's not appropriate to brag about being more advanced. But everyone knows he's the "smart kid" and knows that's why he'd be pulled for special treatment during math. And he doesn't know how he'd talk about it without coming off as bragging, you know? So he hesitates when I suggest those kinds of solutions. He would LOVE a small group situation where he could share special instruction with peers -- but from what I'm gathering so far, there might not *be* any peers, at least not in fourth grade. He's trying so hard to find coding buddies to help him with his pet project of creating a video game in Javascript or C, and no one is as motivated as he is. Such a tough age in a lot of ways. :\

When my ds was in 4th we had talked to the school about doing AoPS pre algebra. They agreed we cold but it all fell through pretty quick. Backup plan was to do it after school at home. DS would do AoPS at home every evening and one night a week we had a tutor (High School Boy) come by for an hour or so to answer questions and work on some solutions with him. It worked wonderful.

DS was subject accelerated 2 grades in math since 1st grade so he took 5th grade math in 3rd so he was out of curriculum in that building. They had wanted him to do a whole grade skip several times but we chose not to. They had a High Ability program but it was really just in name only IMO.

In 5th we switched to a private school for gifted kids where middle school starts in 5th. It was a very good match. You could test into upper level math classes.

So it seemed to me that 4th grade forced our hand.

Yeah, fourth feels like a pivotal year. We're not just playing around any more, we're setting genuine foundations. Plus, we're at this scary cusp: he is currently very motivated to go way farther, way faster. He sees all the applications of advanced math and he wants it NOW. But...the repetition, and the busywork, are grinding him down. I'm watching his enthusiasm get crushed and it horrifies me.

Early on I did try to keep his enriched content limited to the topics they were covering in school. This helped reduce the amount of sheer boredom before third grade, but of course it's now backfiring. Because there are a few topics in fourth and fifth grade math that he's not yet fluent in, and it's a lot harder to convince them that he doesn't NEED direct instruction in things like unit conversions because he will easily fill those holes on his own. But if he's not given something to sink his teeth into, math is going to be lost to him forever.

He also has a talented sister coming up behind him and I'm realizing that she actually needs me to advocate for her even more than he does. Because she is content to do the assigned work and doesn't push or complain, I haven't had as many teaching moments with her to encourage a growth mindset and a love of challenge. So we need to figure out how to work with teachers and administration to get both their needs met.

Unfortunately there aren't other districts or private schools feasibly available to us. I hope we can make this work.

In 3rd and 4th grade we started doing some local math competitions. In the AoPS pre algebra book it kind of goes that way. They use some problems from previous math counts and AMC 8 competitions. If he likes grinding them out he will like these. I used to print out some of the competitions and cut single problems out and tape them to his binders. I had him go over them and try to solve them and then we would go over the solutions sometime that week. It was different than school math.

Sometimes it is not so much just acceleration when it comes to math but doing problem solving problems. You can buy a lot of time by just doing harder or different problems. He will still be sharpening his addition, multiplication and such but understanding how it all links together.

There are more problems with solutions out there then you will ever use.

This is just what we did in 4th to get through.

We did the Edfinity competition earlier this year, and he liked it except for the time limit attached. It's a cool idea to just sort of offer him open-ended invitations to work on an interesting problem, like competition problems. I do something like that when we have time at home, I'll drop a new resource near him like the Borac competitive math practice, or I'll load up a section of Alcumus, saying, "Oh, just thought you'd like to see this, but if you're too busy..." and he'll sit down and crank through a bunch and come out blissful.

I think my current game plan is to bring the teacher some examples of the work he's done and the work he enjoys, so we're all on the same page. I don't think he knows what I'm talking about in terms of true problem-solving math. And I don't think he gets that *I* know what I'm talking about, LOL. If we can just both see the problem, then hopefully we can work on a solution, whether that's giving DS more appropriate things to do in lieu of class work, or letting me come in and teach him, or I don't know what.

Singapore Maths elementary books along with challenge problems was what we used with our DD. She was able to teach herself with these until AoPS superseded them from pre-alg in.

Sunnyday, look and see if there is a Julia Robinson math festival near you anywhere - I think it would really appeal to your DS.

Ooh, I'd never heard of that! There was one two hours from us last month, but none in our state for the rest of the year. Ah, well.

madeinuk, how did you use Singapore with public school? I have Singapore 1A, 1B, 2A, 2B, (most books including the HIG, textbook, workbook, IP) and 3A IP on my shelf. The last one is a decent fit for my DD8, who does like follow-the-steps math with a bit of challenge to it. But DS10 has embraced mind-bending math and advanced topics to a point that I don't really feel like Singapore is a good choice any more. That said...maybe the teacher will accept it since it's a well-known curriculum? I'd love to hear more about how it worked for you!

Our DD did these for fun, believe it or not, at home. She learned nothing at school until 6th grade and what she did learn was only the common core dross that she hadn't seen before.

She started AoPS when she was 9/10 with pre-algebra so it may work for your DS10.

We were allowed to give her AoPS work packets that we made for her to work on during school hours one year. The next year we didn't have such a supportive teacher so that didn't work as well...

Well, I had a meeting with the teacher this morning and I think it went well. He showed me a printout that says according to the Front Row program DS is working at about a 6th grade level. That gave me a lot of credence when I said, "If he pretests and passes a topic, can he use his classroom time another way?"

For starters DS is going to do Khan Academy during class time, and will also have some flexibility for homework time, including letting me find him some challenge work or having the teacher offer at least a weekly challenge problem from the fifth grade curriculum. I will also have the option to send in a packet for class time if I find something I think would be valuable for him to do. Although the teacher still doesn't seem to understand the kind of learner DS is (he keeps conflating the frustration of having to do many intermediate steps, with the struggle of working on a worthy challenge) I think it was a productive conversation, and leaves the door open for us to keep exploring the best fit for the rest of the year.

Sounds like a step in the right direction.

I'm late to the conversation, but thought I'd say that our DS (9, but grade-skipped to 5th) had been going up to 6th for math this fall. We then decided to switch to AOPS PA for more rigor. He has access to a chromebook, which he works on in the back of the classroom when his class does math. While not ideal, given the lack of gifted programming in our district it has been the best solution since 2nd grade. He has enjoyed the pace and challenge.

The past two years I went in and did a "Math Challenge" group for him and students in the grade above him. This worked well and helped him to connect with some academic peers. (They are two years older than he is, but have been very welcoming.)

Last thing, I resonated with what you said about needing to advocate even more for your younger daughter. With DS, teachers have expected me to ask for extra challenge in math. DD has similar >99% math scores, yet when I asked about how she was being challenged in math a teacher replied, "Her handwriting is quite messy for a girl and perhaps she could work on working more neatly." I was stunned, since that had nothing to do with challenging her in math!

I am stunned.

While showing work in a legible and organized way is essential post-arithmetic I am still taken aback. Especially these days when so much is done without handwriting. Perhaps your DD has a future in Medicine if her handwriting is that terrible.

What age/maths level is your DD at?

DD8 is in 3rd grade and stays in her class for math, although she does 4th/5th challenge math at home.

Our oldest two are quite different in their approach to school. DS desires new input and DD is happy to have time with friends. DS craves extra challenge and his peers have always recognized this. When he leaves the class it has never had any negative social implications. However, with DD, she resists any in-school challenge, as peer relationships are much trickier. She, too, is the youngest in her grade and I readily admit that when she does anything different it tends to create tension. I don't want to hijack the thread, so I should stop typing!

Unfortunately, I'm familiar with frequent wordplay on the word "challenge"... where a teacher may be nit-picking, encouraging perfectionist tendencies, etc, rather than focusing on academic growth in the subject. This experience may serve to undermine the growth of gifted pupils and/or invalidate the academic needs and/or social inclusion needs of gifted pupils, making them collateral damage of the system.

In the context of education, especially gifted education to meet the needs of gifted learners, "challenge" aptly refers to advanced curriculum, pacing, and instruction at the child's level of ability and readiness... some may say in their zone of proximal development (ZPD). In reading the Federal Definition of Gifted and Talented from the website of the National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC), we see: In this context, "challenge" would refer to the advanced academic curriculum, pacing, instruction "services or activities not ordinarily provided by the school in order to fully develop" the high intellectual, creative, artistic, leadership, or academic capability.

Outside of the context of education (especially gifted education to meet the needs of gifted learners)... in general day-to-day usage, the word "challenge" can mean: (the situation of being faced with) something that needs great mental or physical effort in order to be done successfully and therefore tests a person's ability (definition source: Cambridge dictionary online) or a variety of other things, according to other definitions of the word (such as challenge to a duel, legal challenge, etc). Using the definition from the Cambridge dictionary, a "challenge" can be a focus on a perceived deficit or the provision of any stumbling block or difficulty (which is the opposite of focusing on and encouraging the child's gifts/talents). Some may say that a focus on perceived deficits may encourage negative and debilitating perfectionism. For example, exacerbating gender inequality by focusing on a girl's penmanship in math class rather than teaching the girl at her ZPD.

Possibly when working with someone whose response seems to indicate a bit of wordplay regarding "challenge", a parent may want to respond by rewording the question to incorporate the contextual definition of "challenge" rather than the word "challenge". For example: Instead of asking "How is she being challenged?" ask: How is she being provided with curriculum, instruction, and pacing in her zone of proximal development to support and encourage fully developing her high mathematical abilities?

To further clarify, this is the type of challenge which kids need in order to learn work ethic, responsibility, coping with disappointment, self-worth stemming from the accomplishment of a challenging task, time-management skills, study skills, goal setting, decision-making and problem-solving skills, and sacrifice.

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Other links for Federal definition of GIFTED AND TALENTED:

1) NAGC Glossary of Terms

Originally Posted by NAGC Glossary of Terms

The federal Elementary and Secondary Education Act defines gifted and talented students as “Students, children, or youth who give evidence of high achievement capability in areas such as intellectual, creative, artistic, or leadership capacity, or in specific academic fields, and who need services and activities not ordinarily provided by the school in order to fully develop those capabilities.” [Title IX, Part A, Definition 22. (2002)] Many states and districts follow the federal definition. Find out more about how giftedness has been defined in the research.

2) U.S. Department of Education, Title IX - General Provisions

Originally Posted by U.S. Department of Education, Title IX - General Provisions

(22) GIFTED AND TALENTED- The term gifted and talented', when used with respect to students, children, or youth, means students, children, or youth who give evidence of high achievement capability in areas such as intellectual, creative, artistic, or leadership capacity, or in specific academic fields, and who need services or activities not ordinarily provided by the school in order to fully develop those capabilities.

Particularly for girls, highlighting the soft skills (work ethic, study skills, self-efficacy, leadership/social skills) that are closely tied to and often dependent on appropriate instructional levels often communicates more effectively to teachers and school personnel the value and urgency of providing students with their zone of proximal development than a narrow focus on academic development may.

Well said!

I will add that this approach may be particularly effective at this time as we are in an era ushered in by common core, which is focused on equal educational outcomes. Both standardized testing and data collection are used to evaluate teachers on closing achievement gaps and excellence gaps among their students. Therefore parent advocacy for advanced curriculum which results in furthering advanced student achievement may work against the school's goals... but parent advocacy for advanced curriculum which results in a child building study skills, etc, may be more palatable.

aeh and indigo,

Thank you both for your phrasing, which I hope will help me -- and others -- when talking about goals with teachers.

Ditto! I really do need to keep developing a strategy to counter some of this gender-linked treatment of differently-skilled advanced learners. I'm fortunate that our teachers have really been well-meaning so far. I can't imagine any of them talking about handwriting as a math challenge. They might not always *see* the need for challenge, or recognize that the *student* would prefer more challenge vs. being at the top of the class, or recognize that whether she prefers it or not she *needs* more challenge for her educational development and mental health! But when it's brought up, teachers have always worked with me in some way. I think that if I get the chance for a quick conversation on portfolio night, I will ask DD's teacher to be on the lookout for new solutions for her.

DS is already feeling a little better about math now that we have this agreement in place, so we'll see how this week goes for him. We listened to an audiobook presentation of quantum mechanics yesterday, and I think it stoked his already-fierce desire to get to the meaty math that will let him understand advanced physics equations. I'd kind of like to make the flipped classroom thing work.

Thinking along the lines of phrasing, and talking about goals with teachers...

It took me a while to find, but here is a report from 1997, titled What it Means to Teach Gifted Learners Well, by Carol Ann Tomlinson, Ed.D., University of Virginia. This report is on the website of the National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC).

Unfortunately, it appears that much of what was known 20 years ago has been forgotten or pushed aside with the introduction of common core and the focus on creating equal outcomes for all students.