Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Elementary School So howis it going?

I'd expect much more in-depth exploration of those topics, plus problem solving including some early pre-algebra. My perspective might be skewed a bit by ALEKS and Singapore Math, but the fourth grade coverage in both is significantly more comprehensive and advanced than the way this fourth grade teacher made it sound. I just looked over ixl.com and ALEKS as mapped to NH fourth grade standards, and they are both more advanced than the roadmap outlined by the teacher.

DS7 is completely past the fourth grade curriculum as outlined-- he will honestly get zero benefit from it. That's really what's driving my concern, not a mismatch between my expectations and reality, as I expect a somewhat rough initial fit (and ongoing perhaps due to pace) when we find the right classroom. One extra grade advancement in math is not going to be enough this year despite our hopes, partly because his retention is too good. :| (I don't think that they're even going to cover long division based on what was said, and if so not until later in the year, but he doesn't need review of that anyway.)

He was past the material in this class before the beginning of last year, then received little to no instruction for the first half of the year, then for the second half was doing what he called "baby work" but was really the down-level NH version (or our district's version) of third grade, tuned heavily for drill on basic math facts. I don't think we can sit by while another year is wasted.

I'm guessing that those are covered in depth starting in fifth here. If so, on to grade 6! Advocating for that wouldn't be pretty, since it would require transportation to the middle school.

To be perfectly honest, this is why I don't teach DD any math outside of school. After I taught her subtraction with carrying in about 10 minutes because she asked (I forget how old she was, but not old enough to be covering this), it hit me that I should probably shut up. She's good at math, but not a prodigy. While she has an interest in math patterns, she doesn't ask to learn it. Meanwhile, DS4 is playing with her Flashmaster and mastering all the addition and subtraction tables. I'm wondering if I should take the thing away from him.

She is more challenged by all the blah blah cumbersome blah of how they teach math than anything about actual method or computation, always. She grasps pure math and computation very fast. I'm sure I could teach her long division this afternoon, but they'll complicate and draw it out and make it actually harder. Oh well.

Ultra - but does it bother her that she is not doing more in math. I am in Lucounu's boat with DS and science and am really struggling with what to do. He is much more advanced in reading and math than whats being taught in his gifted school but he doesn't really care. And what the do is still at least interesting to him. The slow pace and simple science they are doing actually seems to pain him, and he is sort of angry and despondent over it. So I feel I need to do something, but really struggling with what beyond "homeschooling" him in this area.

DeHe

Ooh - problem solving - I forgot that (thank you). They do that as well. Not sure about the pre-algebra.


Not my DS8... He's kind of all over the map. He was happily doing fractions and negative number equations in grade one but struggles with word problems. He learned regrouping much earlier than his peers and could do it in his head without showing his work but he kept mixing up the + and - symbols. (sigh. slowwww dowwwwn buddy.)

LOL yes!! (What's WITH that?)

Right--no, it doesn't bother her, so it's okay. I know she could do more, but she's not complaining, although I don't know if she realizes how it could be, you know? Science is a somewhat different story, and I'm not too happy with how reading is being done this year. The good thing about her school is that while the material is not always all that advanced, they are highly enriched in other ways (project-based curriculum).

Sometimes it's better to just leave it alone. If you can't get in-class enrichment at their level, you risk creating too much of a discrepancy between what they can do Vs what's being taught and it causes all kinds of attention issues.

Sometimes you can't leave it alone. DS has brought home unfinished worksheets from class that he was too busy staring out the window to do. Getting him to do them at home was torture. One day he said "It's so boring! Can you make it harder?" "...um, well no, but... if you finish this sheet that your teacher wants then I can give you a different sheet that's harder." Presto: motivated kid, and completed worksheet.

DS7 has also been chafing at the super-simple science lessons that have only really begun this year (third). I've responded to that by getting him science stuff to work on at home. I guess in that instance I'm afterschooling, but there's no other option but to let the school slowly dull his interests.

With math, he shows the ability to do approximately a year's worth of normal skills learning in a month or less (not even studying every day either), learns concepts pretty much instantly or within minutes, and he does ask for it if I let it go for too long (which now it has been, by well over half a year since the last lesson). To let his skills go without use or development because the school isn't teaching him any math is doing him a disservice.

It's this worry about a discrepancy that is too often used as a justification against enrichment or even acceleration. One way in which this surfaced in our situation was when the assistant principal stated that we shouldn't let DS get ahead of his "peers", because then what would the school do when he needed more math than the fifth grade program could supply? (He was at that point already past what I expect the normal fifth grade classroom provides, and of course the real answer is to fix the program to provide what a student needs, or allow acceleration.)

I don't actually think school could dull DS interests in science and reading and math provided there are still books! But what I see instead are potental attitude issues - that it's not even science what is beng done, and disappointment in his science teacher. He and I discussed advocacy and whether he should talk to his primary teacher and he didn't want to, his instincts I think correctly realizing the science teacher might get upset. But more worrisome I think DS is wondering whether the science teacher knows as much as he does! Thinking about doing some advocacy for everyone - sort of along the lines of, they move much faster in reading in math, why not in science. Maybe bringing in some specials,or scientist parents. Something!

DeHe