I've decided it is time for me to come out of lurkdom. I have learned so much from reading the posts on this site - you all have such great insight. I could really use some advice for an upcoming meeting with our county's Coordinator for Gifted and Talented Education and the principal of our local school.
My DS5 will be starting at our local school in the fall. A recently administered WPPSI IV identified him as gifted. His scores were high average for everything but verbal sections. He got perfect scores on three verbal subtests. He has tested at the 6th grade reading level.
DS5 is highly social and loves to have conversations with people. He is highly verbal and has an excellent vocabulary. This has sometimes been challenging when trying to relate to children his own age and he often prefers to talk with adults or teenagers. This year he has made great strides in relating with other kids at his school and his teachers are happy to report that he has very thoughtful conversations with other children during the school day. This is something he was having trouble with previously, as he would choose to talk to teachers instead of students.
He is very engaged with learning and excels in both reading and math. He learns very quickly and only has to be taught a concept once and then quickly masters it. He has been very interested in dinosaurs and construction vehicles since he was 2 and knows a lot about both. One area he has trouble in is writing. He dislikes writing and finds writing numbers and letters difficult. He sometimes writes them backwards. He can spell very well, however. He enjoys typing on the computer.
He is very sensitive to stories that are scary, especially fictional ones. We are working to help him acclimate to things that are mildly scary or startling. This has helped.
He is highly focused when he is doing something that he finds interesting. However, mundane tasks do not keep his interest and it can be difficult for us to keep him on-task when getting ready in the morning or evening. I made a wall chart for him to check off completed tasks and this seems to have helped.
We are concerned that it will be difficult for our local school to meet his needs. We are committed to advocating for our son and getting him the education that he needs, but are not sure how exactly to go about it. The cognitive therapist we met with suggested that a particular private school in our area or homeschool would be best for him given his wide range of ability, however we cannot afford to do either at the moment.
Is there anything negative that could come of us sharing his cognitive test results with the school officials? What would you recommend as the best course to take in helping our son get what he needs at school?
