Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion How imporant are exclusive gifted schools for PG?

I'm not sure how to answer this. A PG kid will turn into a PG adult, who will still do things like understand things more quickly than most others. I would imagine that if a PG kid finds a particular passion, they will never "level off" in that field. But maybe they'll become less obviously PG to others in other areas? I don't know.

It is my understanding that "leveling off" is referring to the fact that some kids will revert to the mean, even if they picked up on some things earlier than usual. I imagine it originated from the fact that in normally developing kids, maybe all kids, there are spurts in different areas. E.g., some kids may pick up on reading faster. So, perhaps some ND kids do level off at some point around third grade, as the myth goes. But the leveling off concept doesn't seem to apply to GT kids.

My DD is still very much GT, but her early development (very much like the OP's daughter) doesn't fully line up with her current development, assuming you were to go whole-hog and predict IQ from her development at say, age 1. She looked more extreme as a young toddler. I think her IQ results may not fully represent her, but I would still maintain that there is no way she is PG, despite looking kinda PG at that age.

It's not that I think she "leveled off," exactly. But I do think toddler development is not always a clear indicator. Toddlers are weird. I feel like I had a better picture of who she was by about age 4 or 5. Meanwhile, my DS is 3 and looking more gifted by the day despite being much less of a shocker at age 1.

Ok, I see. With DS6 it has been the opposite. We knew he was a smart toddler, but we seem to be grasping just how smart in the last year.

I wonder how much some of these differences are based on how gifted the child is in terms of memory, sensory integration and gross/fine motor control? As in, do some children need to channel more of their energy into learning motor skills? Or are they less gifted memory wise but great thinkers and therefore maybe don't seem so academically gifted as toddlers? Do do they not have the visual processing skills (as toddlers) to learn to read even if they do have the intellectual capacity (that's without even touching on dyslexia an other specific learning delays)? Personality has got to be a major factor too. Each person is so unique and the first 5 years or so of development so intense that there has got to be an awful lot of room for different ways of developing normally AND different forms of advanced development.

Yes, I think you're right about all of that, MumofThree. In DD's case, she has a truly phenomenal memory that was especially shocking in a toddler. It's not that she isn't a deep thinker, but some of her most out-there skills are speed and recall.

One issue with pg/eg kids is that you don't know how they are going to respond in an academic environment and school setting until they are placed in one.

My 5.5 DS was born with special needs (attn and visual processing issues) and was in special needs preschools until last Sep when he started to read and write 3-, 4-, 5-letter words. I knew he was bright but that was it. I then put him in a gifted school in MA since MA doesn't offer any g & t programs and I knew he was quite bored in the special needs preschool and needed more.

Within 2-3 months of being at the gifted school, my ds completed the pre-k/k/1st grade curriculum. I was told that he might be pg/eg and that the gifted school could no longer accommodate him so we pulled my ds and put him in another gifted school - which is an open/unstructured/mixed age one-room type schoolhouse situation.

At the first gifted school, my son really resisted the teacher-driven, traditional - subject based approach to school. He resisted the drill and kill. He is a visual spatial learner and this particular school had a lot of verbal kids so he didn't fit in socially.

At the second gifted school, it is intrinsically-motivated and more flexible. My son's school has 34 kids between pre-k and 8th grade with 3 teachers. It is private and expensive but we were left with few options in MA.

Yesterday, I got the verbal results from a neuropsych test we had on our son. I'm still grappling with what happened, what level my son is operating on, and appropriate educational placement.

My son is not a typical eg/pg kid if there is one, but I think if you read a lot about giftedness you'd find there is quite a range and my son seems to fit within this range. Asynchronous development, intensity, anxiety, attention issues, etc., are not usual for this population.

One warning, the phenomenal speed at which eg/pg kids pick up knowledge or process visual or written information is staggering. It seems like they take great gulps at time. They can be quite intense at times, or at least mine can, but what a journey it is!!!

Hmm, DS10 has few "true peers" at school but now that we are getting to middle school I see the PG kids starting to find each other. It's actually amazing.


what does this mean? why would a kid "level off"? is that when they are so bored and disengaged from lack of an interesteding, challenging school program that they just stop? I can't imagine a PG kid ever stopping.

I've heard parents of non-gifted kids say things like, "well, they all level off by 3rd grade" Huh?

Anywhooo...
Well, we've only done gifted schools for PG DS10. Starting with pre-k. He just was too "out there" to be accommodated in a mainstream school and too asynchronous to fit in with the mainstream kids.

I wish we had a PG school option with a high cutoff but things are going very well for him here. We are in our 2nd year at this new school, it's a 130 cutoff but such a better program then the one we left (which was private, big bux and attracted the hothouse crowd)

You all are amazing - what a wealth of information! I'm so glad I've found this site.

My husband and I have been giving it much thought, and we've taken all the advice given here to heart. We haven't reached any conclusions yet, but that's OK - we still have plenty of time. Even once we make the decision on where to send the kids to school, we may need to change plans later depending on many factors.

I guess what I am hearing is that we can't really know what our kids will need nor can we know exactly how well any school will accommodate them until we are actually THERE and trying to work with the system.

Here are our options - local public schools (underfunded and overcrowded, but they do have a gifted program that starts in 3d grade), local Lutheran school (small school and small class size advantage, although we are Christian we are not sure if we are totally on board with a religious school, doubtful they have any special gifted program), local montesorri (small class sizes, only pk-6, not sure how this would transition to a traditional school),and a private gifted school (50 minute commute, big price tag)

Our pediatrician had mentioned a Montesorri as a possibly good option. There is a pk-6 montesorri near us. I don't know much about this type of school - or even how to spell it (sorry about that). From what little I know, it sounds like kids can accelerate in areas where they are really strong - it sounds very individualized. But it also sounds very different than the type of schooling that I grew up with, and therefore sort of foreign and uncertain to me. I'll have to look into it more, but I am very interested to hear any experience with very gifted kids in Montesorri.

AntsyPants - You mentioned that at one point you were at a school that was private, expensive, and attracted the "hothouse crowd." I'm still learning my gifted terminology, but I think i understand what you mean by that. My question to you - is there anyway you can tell if a private school is just for hothouse-types, maybe parents who want to pay big money to say their kids are in a gifted school? This private school in our area is very expensive. I looked at the kindergarten curriculum and it is well advanced beyond what public schools offer - but it is still stuff that my 3 year old is learning now (like fractions). So I'm really questioning if this is truly a gifted school, or just a school for bright kids with wealthy parents. Any red flags I can look for? The IQ cutoff is 125, which doesn't seem as high as I would expect.

Thanks again!

You have to remember that LOG is an emerging concept. Most schools don't believe that there are subcatagories of 'gifted' so they expect all kids to thrive in the 125 and over category. I think it's because IQ tests aren't created to sort kids over 125 very effectively. Now if you find a school that does all it's Math for each grade at the same time so that it can sort the kids by 'readiness' or ability, and it's normal for kids to wiggle up and down the hall at Math time, and maybe Reading time too, then you know you have a place that doesn't see Giftedness as a unitary adjective.

If they don't do that, they might just be lucky to be flexible - ask, how long since you had a child who needed to be placed in a room with older kids for all or part of the day. How did that go?

I wouldn't even bother asking about enrichment because all the schools will claim that they are doing that already, and it's impossible to tell. One teacher may do a great job and the next year you are paying the big bucks and it's almost a bad joke. Looking on the shelves to see what books are in the room, and observing the classroom is what makes the difference. If the school has a 1st grade classroom with 'Harry Potter' on the shelf, then you know it's going to be ok.

Keep posting - we love that you found us!

Smiles,
Grinity

Just to be totally different , I'm going to mention homeschooling. My son went to 2 years of PS. We tried to get him into a gifted magnet, which is very much a MG school anyway, but they do have the terminology and training. He hit the ceiling of their screening test, but still didn't get in (chose by pure lottery once you qualify). Hindsight, that may have been karma.

We are starting our 4th year of homeschooling, and it has been a wonderful fit for both my kids (My son is 10, my daughter turned 7 this summer). It has given them time to work our some asynchronous development and really dive into topics as deeply as we can. It's a year to year proposition here, but it has been wonderful for us so far. The big piece with that is finding like minded community and resources. My kid's started music lessons as preschoolers and that was a great outlet for them too.

I agree with many of the other thoughts here. I think for a child reading at 2, you're going to have a hard time whatever you choose. There are advantages and disadvantages to any choice. I also don't think you should make any early judgments that your 16 month old is going to have more challenging educational needs than your older.