Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Advice on how to approach dd's teacher

Dd9 (FSIQ 149) is currently in 4th grade in a self-contained GT class. This year she has a teacher that has a decent amount of GT experience and education that is completely new to the school and district. This teacher is on her 22nd year of teaching and is extremely organized which is great because she is really making the most of class time.

I've been pretty satisfied about how the school year is going, I like dd's teacher and feel confident that dd is finally learning something at school. Dd is excited about school again and coming home everyday talking about all the things she's learning in reading, writing, science, etc. The past couple of years have been awful and a complete waste of time with a highly unorganized, incompetent teacher.

Recently I learned through dd and the teacher's emails that the class has been working on multiplication facts, and 2 digits times 2 digits, and 3 digits times 2 digits for the past couple of weeks. They will conclude this skill the end of this week and start on division/long division, factors, and remainders next week, which based on the multiplication, will take a couple of weeks too. Keep in mind we're nearly 3 months into the school year. Dd says most of the kids in the class don't seem to know their facts and this is new for them. About 3-5 of them (dd included) know them according to dd. The problem is dd learned this stuff years ago and is well beyond learning these skills. She's working at about an 8th grade level in math. I'm sure there are gaps, but she certainly doesn't need to be working on multiplication and division.

In the past the 4th grade class has always started with Connected Math and for some reason this year the teacher isn't doing it. Dd says they just practice the skills I mentioned on the board, on self-made worksheets, it doesn't sound like they are using any sort of math curriculum. I don't know if the teacher feels most of the class isn't ready for Connected Math (which isn't surprising considering the teacher for the past 2 years was incompetent). I was really hoping dd would start the CM curriculum this year because her weaknesses in math are story problems and written responses.

Dd isn't complaining about math like she has the past few years, but dd is the type of student who picks the easy path of doing things she already knows and shuts down and panics if she doesn't understand something immediately. So of course she's okay with what they are doing in math right now. I am not okay with it because it continues to be a waste of time and it is re-enforcing her to avoid challenging herself in math. She also told me last night that last year she learned that it's important that when you "fall asleep with your eyes open" in class to be sure your eyes are on the teacher or the board or they will realize you're not paying attention. I asked her if she does that this year and she said she only does it during math.

I have a meeting with the teacher this week to discuss how math is going for dd. I'm looking for advice on how to diplomatically address this issue so that the teacher doesn't immediately get defensive or take it as a personal attack... as I've experienced in the past with teachers. In my opinion this teacher has a very confident, strong personality and I suspect that could be a challenge for me.

My ideas were to bring in some examples of what dd is doing at home in math to prove she is far beyond what she is doing in school. Ideally I think the teacher needs to provide differentiation in the classroom, the strongest math students aren't comparable to the weakest in the class. The students who know these skills shouldn't be forced to sit through the others learning them. I certainly don't want to go in there and basically tell her how I think she should run her class.

I have a couple of ideas for solutions but I really just need to hear what has worked for others in the past and what others recommend on how to approach this.

FWIW in past grades when I've addressed math issues the results have been mixed. Sometimes I get nowhere and sometimes I get nicely packaged promises that are never fulfilled. I need an obvious solution that will fix this problem. I'm done being pacified and continuing to allow dd to sit through boring math classes not being challenged.