I have to disagree with some responses to doing the mindless drudgery of math computations that are below a childs' level. ... I think you are doing your kids a disservice by not teaching them coping skills to get through the mind-numbing times.
I think this is an important point, but must be kept in perspective. Yes, people need to learn to do some of the mindless chores of everyday life like dishes and laundry. But the reason we do these chores is that they have a purpose. We need clean dishes and laundry. There is value in the task even though it is boring and tedious. There is no need for a worksheet full of simple addition and subtraction problems when a child is two grade levels advanced and has his/her math facts memorized. There is no purpose. Gifted children understand this. All kids, but gifted kids, especially need to see a purpose for what they do. And realistically a human being can only do so much "because I said so" stuff.
During WWII at one of the concentration camps the Nazis had the prisoners move huge piles of rocks from one location to another and then the next day the prisoners would have to move that same pile of rocks back to the original location. This task was repeated day after day. Eventually the prisoners began to lose their sanity. On a small scale this is what is happening to our gifted students who spend day after day doing tedious, unproductive work. No wonder they rebel against it.
I agree that we need to teach children to respect authority, but we also need to teach children how to appropriately question authority. The very freedom we enjoy in our country came from questioning authority. Much of the turmoil and suffering in the world, especially during WWII, has come from not questioning authority.
In general the education system in the US does not do its job in appropriately educating our gifted children. That authority needs to be questioned. We need to advocate for our children but we also need to teach our children to advocate for themselves.
