My DD6 who was my rebellious, intense, out of the box thinker, is suddenly a model student in first grade. She is attentive, gets work done quickly with no careless mistakes, helps others, is developing and refining social skills, is very popular, and has been called mature repeatedly by her teacher. This sounds very much like a success story (esp since we were looking at a possible ADHD diagnosis two years ago), but a part of me feels uneasy.
Her teacher clearly sees she is way ahead and called me in for a meeting to discuss my DD6's academics and made promises to have her working ahead, but nothing much comes to fruition. The teacher is overwhelmed with a difficult class that seems to be moving at a slow academic pace, even slower than the others, and I am sure she likes having someone mature who can help others and set a good example.
My DD6 helps her third grade reading buddy just like she helped her fourth grade reading buddy when she was in K. She helps other kids in her class in so many ways and even holds morning meeting. These are all good things, but she never gets material at the right level. Her so called enrichment words were way too easy as were her math enrichment packets. There is no official gifted programming until second grade and even then, it isn't even called gifted and may serve kids at the 90th percentile and up. The school is strongly against a grade skip for anyone any time and I am not sure I would even want one.
I hate to be a thorn in their side, but her model student behavior sets her up to be a teacher's helper and not to learn more while at school.
It is early in the year so this honeymoon may wear off after months of easy work. She reads entire books (long chapter books)each day at school and writes page after page of her own stories, but doesn't get any approprite instruction in either area. She is strong in math too, but is more drawn to language and science. The math curriculum is also not a match. Maybe I am looking for a problem when one doesn't exist. She isn't much of a squeaky wheel right now, but I think it is because she LOVES being a teacher. She gave a presentation the first week of school and the teacher was impressed by her ability to get the students to pay attention to her.
Has anyone else had a gifted girl go through this stage where she switches from being challenging to a mini teacher and if so, what was the outcome? I am almost embarassed by finding a problem when things look so good on the surface, but I worry that she is primarily interested in how she is perceived and this may morph into hiding her talents down the line.
thanks for letting me ramble. I may come back and edit this when I have more time.
