Hi, everyone... I'm Cassy. I should post an introduction, but I haven't much time before DD12 gets home from school. I'm on this forum because of her... She is 12 years old and in a state school. For years, we've all known that she is different, very bright - but now I'm worried that she is gifted and I've overlooked something.
When DD12 was young, until she was 9 in fact, she was at a Montessori school in London and thrived. The hardest decision that her father and i ever made was to pull her out. He had lost his job, we were having trouble paying the fees and decided that DD12 would make a better transition to secondary if she got a year in primary first... At the Montessori, DD12 had always played with older children (she was miserable during her last year because they had all left for secondary, and this absence of friendds was also a key factor in changing school) but suddenly she was expectde to spend time with pre-teens her age. She was way ahead of all the work they gave her that year, especially in English and in Science, but we were happy because we thought that this was because of the Montessori education she had received since age 3.

Her first SAT, she scored a 95% and her second a full 100% (both in Science) At the time we laughed but now I think this was an important thing I overlooked! She had never taken a SAT before in her life as the Montessori school she was a part of didn't go in for tests.

I always thought that DD12 was just a normal only child sort of a kid, but she takes everything in at such a deep level, she is so sensitive (everything touches her - everything affects her too much).

She is 12 and reading Plath... She studies extra chemistry formulae at home just "to know more," she talks about medicines and about bomb making (this worries LoneWanderer (her father) because he says she doesn't have a normal teenager's life. He was also worried about her interest in bombing terrorist attacks, and subsequent research into howw to make and wire such bombs)... She comes home from school crying. She begs us to give her harder work. It's got so much worse over th last school year, I'm very worried about her.

I went to the head teacher, asking could they give her extra maths and science. She said that DD12 was already taking up extra time in Chemistry and in Physics, that the teacher didn't have time for her, that if she wanted harder work, she should skip a year or two. She eventually asked me "is your daughter gifted?"

People have often said that DD12 is very bright, when she was a smaller child, they said that she was a talented writer (now she only concentrates on her Chemistry reserach... she is failing everything (even English, which I know she is good at) but Maths, Physics & Chemistry. People have called her "gifted" but she was never IQ tested because her old school didn't do that and because she is a self-destructive perfectionist... She can't handle the strain of "real" tests and I never wanted her to feel that she was different from her classmates.

She is so miserable, and a week ago, told me she wanted to drop out of school. It was a sort of ultimatum, and made me panick into finding out evrything I could about giftedness - she said that she can't cope with her boring school life, atht it is taking away from her real learning and that she is so unhappy, mummy, isn't there everything you can do? I've tried everything I can, she said, but I'm only young and I needd your help.

I have no idea what I can do - DD12 has been running up against teachers quite a lot this year and so I'm used to finding solutions together with her school's board, but i really don't know how to figure this one out. If DD12 [/i]is [i]gifted, then maybe I can find a way... Does the child I've been describing sound gifted to you?

(Sorry for weird spelling - I'm using a crazy computer and I'm rubbish at IT!)

Thank you so so much -
questingmum