Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Math... Trying to Evaluate Class Fit

Figuring out what's right for our PG little guy is making my head hurt. What I read here and on other gifted sites doesn't really match up with what I hear from school, despite having a supportive administrator. It's enough to drive a parent to drink.

Any suggestions would be appreciated as to how to evaluate and advocate.

Background: DS is 7 and per his assessments, very much an outlier in math ability on the high end (>99.9 on the WIAT-III, I don't have the other results here but all are in same range). He has been accelerated one year for math (to grade 3). They are using a common core-based curriculum and he also gets an enrichment sheet to do for homework. It's not very difficult work, the normal homework (i.e. what everyone gets) is very easy and repetitive. He's only making mistakes when he hurries through it and can almost always find the error if we tell him he has something wrong on a problem.

The teacher seems to think just being in that class is enough enrichment. And... has already mentioned focus and slight behavior problems, along with it being very important to know how he is getting to the answers (had another thread on this, he's playing along well now with writing down how he solved problems). He was getting some pull-out one-on-one enrichment but that person said he has trouble with focus after a few minutes and that he didn't want to do things he didn't understand. (The latter is one of our biggest fears for him... that he will back away instead of digging in, when there is a challenge.)

What I don't feel like I know is what to ask for or what to be looking for on his behalf.

For comparison our DS7 (>99.9 in Math on the WJ-III(ach.)) is half way through grade 6, (and is finding it pretty easy) and will also complete grade 7 this school year. This is possible because we are using a virtual school.

With similar scores (>99.9 means top 0.05%), your DS7 may be capable of the same level, or could have been if he was allowed to accelerate. A single year acceleration is woefully inadequate.


That's certainly not good. It is important to rise to a challenge.


This type of "showing work" at this level is just ritualized busywork. It is a complete waste of time, and has no educational value.

Wow. Thanks for sharing your son's information! I had no idea that was possible.

Completely agree with the concern re: rising to the challenge. We are coaching him through this at home and I think he's slowly coming around. He likes learning, but I think he has the mistaken impression that when it comes to math, not understanding at first glance means it is too hard/he's not capable. I am frustrated that this was just reported to us and that he wasn't coached on it at school.

I agree on the showing the work... but it is so central to the curriculum. How do we advocate against it? Or should we be offering to pay for virtual school while he is in the math hour at school?!

uh, yeah - if your little dude is PG... i dunno - my kid is nowhere near PG and we've had to accelerate her by 3 years in math - and she's not even breaking a sweat - i expect she'll hit the next grade's material by sometime in october.

but... that said, she had the exact same issue in school last year. anything that she didn't do instantaneously in her head felt "too hard" - so basically the only thing got out of school last year was a wicked case of perfectionism. i am working on de-programming her, but essentially she came away thinking that "learning" was equivalent to "showing what she already knows." yikes.

i think the trick is to get them to feel like that uncomfortable, wrong-footed, icky feeling is desirable, because that means they're actually learning something... the trick with your PG kiddo will be finding anything that challenges him AT ALL. all the best - sorry i don't have more advice, but there will be a ton of people here who will have blazed a trail for you!

I know what challenges him... not acting out when he is (oooh, here comes the word) bored. :-) Oh, and "putting up with his younger sibling."

Unfortunately, that's not a good answer for school, it seems.

Seriously, though, where he's struggled is in cases where he gets something "cold," without any explanation (ex. an enrichment worksheet on a topic they've not covered in class and which he's not seen before).

Perfectionism already runs in the family, although I'd not really heard the term much until a few years ago. So I am concerned there.

My kids are somewhere between bright and maybe MG and easily work 2 years above their grade level in math. One year of acceleration is not going to be enough for your kid.

If you want to test the idea get a free trial of Aleks (http://www.aleks.com/webform/bn1-154) and see how far he can go with all the brakes removed for a few weeks. Aleks can generate reports to show the school how he does across the common core curriculum and might help you get more acceleration, but honestly... unless they are extremely flexible it is going to be tough getting him appropriately placed at school.

Cross posted with MoN. Yep. Last year DS9's third grade cohort had 45% of the kids working one year above grade level

This year all the kids are doing 4th grade curriculum, apparently ...

In my reading, being PG is synonymous with needing a minimum of 2-3 grade levels of acceleration. But getting school to understand that is usually extremely difficult...

SiaSL, I see that it says for homeschoolers only... which we aren't.

Anyone can use Aleks, not just homeschoolers. Try this link.

http://www.aleks.com/free_trial