Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments I Don't Agree with Recommendation for Son

Our 6 year old (1st grade) son was tested for the gifted program last week and we obtained the results in the mail yesterday. We have an IEP meeting scheduled for next week. Apparently, the State of Florida uses the Reynolds Intelligence Assessment Scale, which I had never heard of. Here are his results:

CIX(Composite)-155 (99.99%)
VIX(Verbal)-150 (99.96%)
NIX(Non-Verbal)-144 (99.83%)

These results were followed by this recommendation:
*Regular elementary class supplemented with gifted resource room one full day per week. Other options were rejected because they provided an environment that is too restrictive.

Here are my concerns:
1. My son has already been singled out by peers as "weird." I don't see this changing as long as he's in a general classroom. His friends at after school care are ALL at least 8 years old. He does not connect with kids his age.
2. I had to push to have him tested. If the school couldn't recognize his needs, I have a hard time believing they can provide for them. In kindergarten, the principal actually suggested we put in back in Pre-K since his fine motor skills were behind.
3. I was a little floored by his scores on the RIAS. I thought we'd see that he was slightly above the cut-off point of 130. Doesn't he fall in the highly gifted category? Why the recommendation for a pull out program and not full-time gifted? Perhaps because his particular school only has pull-out? We have school choice in our county, so he can go to other schools. . .

Any insight or personal stories anyone can give would be helpful. I just want him to have the best education possible. He's already bored in school and doesn't like going in the morning. I can't see a pull out program being appropriate for him. I love his quirkly personality and funny jokes, and I don't want to see that squelched. . .

Thanks!

I am not familiar with that particular test, but if 130 is the minimum for GT, I would definitely inquire further as to their recommendation. If you feel he should be in a full-time program, than I would pursue that. Do they have any process to follow after they give a recommendation?

If he can go to a self-contained gifted program I would strongly encourage it. IMO a one day pull-out is like a band-aid. If you google there is a well-written article on the shortfalls of once/week pull-outs.

I would tend to think that the one day a week pull out option is the one offered because that is what your particular school can offer. Since the full time gifted program is not at their school they can't offer that as a recommendation. (They don't have that option in Fl.) I would guess that if you ask them about switching schools to the full time program they may say that it would probably serve his needs better. However, they can't put it in writing because the IEP is supposed to be based on what they can offer at their particular school. Since these are looked at by the state and as such are legal documents and affect funding, if they say he requires full time gifted and they don't provide it they can lose funding for all IEP kids.
We had some similar conversations with our school (also in FL) when we had our meeting for DD and the woman in charge of writing the ieps said the state is very specific about the wording each school can put on their forms - if it is put on the form, it must be followed at the school the iep was written at. I know that FL allows school choice, so I would put in for a zoning exemption and transfer him to the full-time program with the reason being that it is not offered at his zoned school. They may say that you need to have it in writing that he needs full time programming, so then you go back to your school and ask them to write a letter to the county explaining that he would need it. This gives them a way to help you without putting their funding in jeopardy by saying it is being provided.

good luck!

I think you'll ultimately need/want more than the one-day-per-week gifted pullout can provide, so I'd advocate for a full-time gifted program if one exists in your school district. If it doesn't, I'd look into any other options you can find - different district if possible, private, homeschool.

For the upcoming IEP meeting, I'd ask what is specifically meant by "other options rejected because they provided an environment that is too restrictive." Ask what those other options were - if one of them sounds like a good option to you, request it. The IEP decisions are supposed to be made by the IEP team - what you have there is a *recommendation* - not the final decision.

I would also ask for clarification re what is meant by "too restrictive" - I suspect that they are referring to doing their best to having him placed in a regular ed classroom, but you can also view "restrictive" from the point of view re is his placement allowing him to fully show his knowledge or is it restrictive in that he's not able to learn at his ability level? Or possibly he's not going to be learning anything new at all.

I'm not in FL, so I don't know the nitty-gritty details re how this plays out in your area, but my last piece of advice is to go to the meeting, listen, ask questions, take notes. Don't sign anything that you aren't ready to sign and comfortable signing. Remember this is just a first step, not a final step.

Let us know how your meeting goes -

polarbear

Thank you so much for the feedback, everyone. I actually called the ESE/Gifted Administrator for Lee County this morning and asked her if the recommendation is final. She said the recommendation was given because the county does not offer full-time gifted until 2nd grade. Since he is still in first grade, they cannot make a full-time recommendation for this school year. She went on to say that ds score was "very high" and that during the IEP meeting, she suspects that full time gifted (along with some additional acceleration and enrichment) will be the recommendation for 2nd grade. We have school choice here, so we can choose from any of the elementary schools in our zone. Two of them have full time gifted programs.

Thank goodness - just yesterday he begged me to get him a 3rd grade math workbook. He is so irritated that he hasn't been able to move on to 3 digit addition and multiplication yet. I'm a little overwhelmed. . . lol.

It sounds like you have a great plan for next year in place.

Just an FYI, I am also in Lee County and I can tell you from experience that you will have to stay on top of things and make sure they change his placement to full time gifted. Will he be in 2nd next year? If so then you need to have them change his placement to full time gifted now so he can switch to a school with a full time program next year.

Without having that full time placement there before he switches schools you have no guarantee that they will have a full time spot open when he transfers since he would transfer as a part time placement. That would mean he would be put in a regular class with a part time pull out program and then if he qualifies for full time placement he would be moved to the full time class if they have a spot open.

Once he's listed as full time gifted he'll get preference at the full time gifted schools when you fill out the school choice form. In fact you'll only have to rank the schools that offer full time programs and be able to skip the others completely. We went through this with our daughter last year and it was a huge headache.

Also, there are additional criteria that have to be met to qualify for full time placement that most people aren't aware of. He'll have to meet at least 4 of the following items.

133 or higher on the Gifted Characteristic Checklist

90th Percentile or higher or a Level 5 (FCAT or SAT10) on reading or math achievement testing

124 or higher intelligence quotient

90% average in all content areas

Very strong portfolio score

IMO the criteria is unnecessarily restrictive and I had to really fight to get my DD full time placement (her teacher who had no training at all in gifted scored her at a 76 on the gifted characteristics checklist and her portfolio was considered strong instead of very strong) despite her being a Davidson Scholar and clearly very gifted.

Best of luck to you and your son. Feel free to PM me if you have any questions!

What I've learned about such scenarios is, you don't know until you ask. When our eldest was in 2nd grade the school said they didn't have a program for gifted in 2nd grade. We asked about 3rd grade and learned there was a gifted program. No problem in our minds, he worked with the 3rd grade gifted program part of the day and with his regular class the remainder of the time.

We've certainly learned over the years that in order to meet the needs of gifted children, one needs to be flexible and creative as well as willing to run kids around all over the region for opportunities when they present themselves.

Well, let's just say the meeting didn't go well. Now, it's on to the school disrict. The only thing he qualifies for with an IQ of 155 is part-time pull out?