Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy To advocate or not

What does your DS have to say about it? Are you seeing any issues developing in him?

I personally would try advocating for single subject acceleration (or some accommodation, could be taking an online course in the back of the room) if you think he'll be happier taking math at a higher level. (Actually, we did, successfully, advocate.)

This really speaks to me.

One of the things learned to accept is it's more important that he is emotionally well than he meets some imaginary potential. A child/teen can be miserable if they are pushed particularly if they aren't allowed much free/play time. While my son has a lot of potential, and gets very bored in easy classes, he also doesn't do well when the homework load & stress gets too high. It can be hard as a parents to figure out what is a good balance.

Three points I'll add:

1. DS7 is way ahead academically, but behind on his executive function/social skills. So he is working hard and learning in school - albeit not math/reading, etc. He's learning that if he tries hard and practices, he can get better at something. For us, that's the most important thing for him to be learning right now, and I'm OK if he's coasting on the other stuff for a bit. If your child struggles for self control and generalized happiness at school, this MAY be a factor for you. Of course, it MAY reflect boredom and the need to accelerate. Every kid is going to differ here, and at some point you just have to trust your gut.

2. I believe that supporting a kid's desire to accelerate is necessary; pushing a kid for achievement is toxic. But ACK!! it's hard to draw the line sometimes. In younger years, I see a red flag when a parent tries to influence what the child will be passionate about.

Example: DS7 is currently wild about Magic the Gathering, which he picked up last summer at a camp. We follow his interest by playing with him and allowing him to play in tournaments, read strategy blogs, etc. Just basically eat, breathe and sleep Magic. You know how these intense kids do.

One of his friends also loves Magic. But Friend's parents promote him playing chess instead. They play chess with him, enter him in tournaments, etc. They don't forbid Magic, but they don't support it either. Friend is quite good at chess, but never prefers it over Magic. Friend's Mom often recommends that I nudge DS to play chess instead, so the boys would play together (and stop playing Magic). DS likes chess, but prefers Magic, so I don't push chess.

I understand that chess has a certain cache that Magic lacks, and see Friend's parents' reasoning. After all, both boys like chess, and both games are about strategy. But to me - Friend's parents chose chess, not him. To me that looks like pushing, not supporting. If it is, Friend will end up hating chess, or I'll eat a deck of Magic cards!

3. Absent free time, how is a kid supposed to FIND what they are passionate about? And if a kid is perpetually seated at the zone of proximal development, well that takes a lot of energy. I DO NOT presume to know or suggest that anybody here or in real life is pushing. Heck, I can't tell when I'm doing it myself. How could I ever tell what's going on in another family? I'm just saying that sometimes, a little boredom can be good for a brain that needs to learn to think for itself about what it wants to do.

Am I way off your question, HelloBaby? I don't mean to wander. But I guess what I wanted to say is, trust your instincts on accommodation/acceleration. Push the school to give what's needed. But don't be afraid to give your son a little breathing room, too.

In any event, your son is very lucky to have parents concerned enough to be asking these questions!

Sue

I think this can really depends on the teacher. We too live in an area where gifted education starts at 4th grade. Before elementary I looked into various options and ended up deciding to just go with the public elementary for a multitude of reasons. One because their gifted program in 4th grade was supposedly excellent and the best in the area. And two because there are a large number of gifted kids in the local schools and the school had informal "gifted" clusters in the lower grades.

K-3rd grade wasn't perfect but my son seemed content enough at school in early elementary. Second grade was the biggest challenge because that teacher wouldn't allow any of the "challenge" math material until the at grade level math work was done. Problem was my son was slow (embarrassingly I've only figure out after 9th grade why) and would never get to the interesting work. I do wonder if maybe I should have pushed harder but I felt there wasn't a huge rush, it didn't keep him out of the top math track he started in 4th grace. The other teachers he had during that time were informally accommodating (not just to him), and gave him more advanced work when they could fit it into the curriculum. For example for a book report, the teacher would expect a more advanced book & more advanced writing. I could have pushed for more but I figured he was learning other important skills being in a classroom setting.

I wonder if while they are no official accelerations at your school there still are some accommodations? Most schools that I know of are aware that kids pick up reading at different speeds. Are there different reading or math groups within the classroom. Are they subjects they are allowed to work on at their own speed? Open ended projects that help keep them engaged? There other things than acceleration that can keep a gifted child engaged, although that depends on how gifted. A PG child isn't unlikely to find a in-class accommodations very helpful.

Interestingly my father asked these same sort of questions, and he decided that it was better for us to enjoy (and coast through) our lives than to try and grab some arbitrary brass ring. He also worked just enough in order to not work (he placed more value on having free time). He was also highly educated at top schools and was from a high achieving family -and suffered from anxiety- so he was moving in the opposite direction from how he was raised.

I do often have the feeling of having not ever reached my potential- knowing you are gifted often makes you feel you have a responsibility not to "squander your gifts".

If we make the analogy of a beautiful woman- does she have to become a model because she was born with these particular genes? Or someone who excels at athletics- we don't demand that they go into professional sports (well some parents do I guess).

I guess it depends on the child…but you are right, you can't have it all. I am struggling with this myself now as my children complain of being bored at school but do not seem to need acceleration…too much seems familiar to me from my own experience but I don't know what to do about it.

It is perfectly fine to choose life over a job. The problem is that if you drop out of school and start taking drugs in your teens it is not really a choice bit rather a consequence. My aim is to get my kids to adulthood with as many options open as possible.

Agreed. And I would rather my kids have the ability to support themselves so that they would be able to enjoy life instead of constantly worrying about where their next paycheck is coming from….which is hard to do without some kind of degree. I was lucky in that when I did fail out of school in 9th grade (for truancy) my mom made sure I got back into school and back on track.

I don't really know the answer but I will say this.

I was to all outside appearances a happy kid at school. I did enough to get high marks but not too much to attract attention, deliberately got things wrong in class to "blend in", played sports, had friends, etc. I knew it wasn't ideal but I also knew that A) there weren't any other options or programs and B) my mom made it clear that school was just something you had to do and she wasn't going to advocate for anything special. Even with my DS she has not understood why we would seek an IEP and now a congregated gifted program - "he has to get used to doing boring stuff", "he has to work with a variety of kids, that's how the real world works", etc. It took travelling with us for a month and then an article that happened to appear in her local paper to get her to come around. She was a teacher and had no clue about this stuff.

Anyway, all of that personal baggage to say that I would have LOVED to have had a challenge in school but likely no one would have suspected that. In the end it worked out, I plowed all of my extra time and energy into sports which I still love. I found a great career that is challenging and where I am surrounded by gifted people which I also love.

My DS9 is easy in the sense that it was really obvious that school wasn't working for him so we had to change it. DD6 isn't as obvious. She appears to be like I was as a kid so I face the same questions you are. We're testing her in the fall and hopefully that will give us an idea of what we're dealing with and we can go from there.

All of that probably isn't very useful but you definitely aren't alone.

In general, he likes to blend in, which may not be good for him long-term. When he is not challenged, he gradually starts to act out.

It’s hard for me to foresee how my actions or inactions will affect a 6-year-old in the future, especially he does well in school.

I really appreciate it this post! Thank you for sharing it. It is definitely reassuring.