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

Sometime I wonder what if my child is bored at school all day, what kind of long term impact will it have? Underachievement? Under challenged? Not using his/her full potential?

I am first to admit, I am not using my full intellectual potential. I could be so much more than I am now career-wise, but I find a nice work/life balance. Am I underachieving? Probably. Am I under challenged? Definitely. Am I not using my full potential? No, but I made the conscious decision not to.

We live in a school district where gifted education starts at 4th grade. We opt for a private school for the children due to smaller class sizes. I would have to push pretty hard at the current school to get any accelerations/differentiations, if any.

I have no problem to relentlessly advocate since I have the typical Type A personality, but I was wondering how far is too far? How far should you push for accelerations/differentiations if your child is happy socially at school but clearly (to you) not challenged?

Am I doing my child a disservice to advocate since he is happy socially? Or am I doing my child a disservice to not advocate since he is not challenged?

I am sure there is no right or wrong answer, but I am curious to hear from BTDT.

Jaded, distrust of authority, feelings of inferiority (I must be dumb if they keep explaining the same thing over and over that I thought I understood), inadequate study skills for college, inability to meet challenges, increased perfectionism, adolescent depression (with some roots in "if my life is spent going to school and I learn nothing at school, does my life have a purpose?) complete indifference to college... Stuff like that.

Without getting into the kinds of direct actions that might lead from these and the results of those actions.

"Potential" is such an overloaded/pejorative concept, it would be the least of my considerations.

No idea whether it is a 10% risk or 90% risk or what on these, but those are some of the mindset results from being continuously bored and unchallenged.

There is a subtext that appears on this board quite frequently. Usually hidden in discussions about advocacy, college options, or career choices. There's a sense that having a highly intelligent child gives a parent a responsibility to make sure they do meet their potential... That having been given a gift, there's an obligation to use it well.

As I said, it's subtle, but it's there. For example, it's one thing to accelerate because your child is miserable being held back... but what if they aren't miserable? What if they are perfectly happy just coasting along, not having to work very hard? And if your child has a particular skill or talent in an area, do they have to grow up to take advantage of that? Certainly no parent would wish for their child to grow up to be unhappy and unsuccessful, but does that mean they have to use every bit of their intellect, skill, and talent? Or is it OK to take a job that's less stimulating and focus on other things?

If the lack of challenge in school means your child never learns to work hard, is that OK? Can they grow up and get through college and find a job and still never have to work hard? Do we mind if they do? Or is learning to work hard and strive to learn things a critical life skill?

I admit I don't know the answers. DD pushes us and was ill-equipped to be understimulated in regular school. She made our decision to accelerate easy. But at the same time I have to remind myself -- and her -- that it's not a race. What's the prize for graduating early and starting college at 14 (which is her stated goal)? Getting a graduate degree and a job early too? Starting your long working life early? Is that OK? Or maybe she should just relax and take some time to fool around and slow down?

Right now her schooling is making her happy. But I know she'd also love to be a normal kid in a normal class with age mates too. We think we made the right choice, but we'll never know. She can't have it all.

I personally hate poor work ethic - and it seemed like that was a habit my DS was developing when he was underchallenged though he was happy socially. I don't have the energy or time to advocate. So, I changed schools. My DS went on to make new friends, is socially happy and his work ethic has improved dramatically now that he is asked to work on things meaningful to him.
Yes, there is no right answer - but in our case, challenging my child and holding him to higher standards helped. Good luck.

I am hopeless at advocating. I accidentally offend people and find it really stressful. Part of the reason for this according to the counsellor I saw a few years ago is i have learned helplessness - guess why!

That said ds7 is not unhappy at school. Underchallenged in maths and science and overwhelmed in composition but not unhappy. He does say he wants to be like the other kids but he thinks if he wasn't gf, didn't have problems with his bowels and something elseif that nature he would be just like other kids.

If your child is happy and you don't see any negative effects, then I don't think it's as important to advocate. If a child complains of boredom, the work being too easy or silly, if they don't care whether they go to school (or worse not they DEFINITELY don't want to go to school), if they are developing anxiety or perfectionism, if they are becoming sloppy and not performing compared to their abilities (for instance making careless mistakes because they are racing through things), there's more of a need for it. sometimes a kid with a happy, laid-back temperament goes along with whatever happens in school and doesn't even realize things could be different or that the material is super boring, therefore they never complain. I think in those cases it's important to dig a little to find out how poor of a fit the curriculum really is and what will benefit the child. DD never complained about preschool or kindergarten, she was simply thrilled to be with other kids. But when I went in to volunteer and saw her forced to sit through lessons on how to sound out the word "cat" (she was reading well before kindergarten), I could see how inappropriate it was to make her sit through that day after day. Even if she never articulated "I'm bored", I knew she had to be.

DS is actually saying he doesn't want to go back to school. He says it's "babyish" and it's too much boring work and sitting still listening to the boring teacher. He says the only thing worth going in for is physical education. I said "what about being with the other kids" and he said that most of them are annoying. So he is one I NEED advocate for, as he is at high risk of simply refusing to go to school one day, giving up, developing major attitude or behavior issues, etc.

DD spent the second half of third grade finding passive-aggressive ways to get out of doing the work. She "lost" her math workbook a few different times, and I found a stack of blank homework in the front hall closet. As the teacher (a long term sub) became more and more negative with her she became more anxious and actually worse in terms of behavior. She's another one I had to advocate for.

Ditto on that, but most of these don't happen overnight. I am already seeing the poor work ethic in DS.

So should you proactively advocate to avoid these negative effects? Or should you advocate only after seeing the negative effects?

Of course, I prefer to be proactive, but it’s that much harder to convince everyone involved that accommodation is needed when you are not seeing any signs of trouble.

Whenever I think about advocating, I think about the HG adult I knew who rejected school, hung out with the bad kids, experimented in various substances, married badly, went from one abusive relationship to the next, worked terrible jobs due to being in crisis mode and a lack of understanding of her true abilities, and died at a fairly young age due to complications brought on from alcoholism.

And then I think about the other gifted adults I've met who were on that same trajectory, except they ended up in the military for one reason or another, and these straight-D students were tested and found to be high-achieving, they just hadn't seen any valid reason to show it in school, because school was stupid and boring.

For my DD, these are the alternatives to advocating for an appropriate education. I could see that future ahead of her the moment I found out she was pretending not to know things in kindergarten... at her teacher's orders, it turned out.

It is my understanding that state laws for gifted education apply to the public schools only, not to private schools. In choosing a private school, parents choose the school's philosophy and curriculum, foregoing other options.

Over time, in posts on other threads, parents have suggested not pressing when there is not a viable alternative educational placement option or "plan B".

Have you read advocacy resources to provide yourself with some of the best approaches?

OK, one year down and we are still at square one.

DS6, going into 1st grade, can solve some simple pre-algebra questions, but will be learning how to add and subtract in 1st grade.

I started another thread about using Mathnasium as an enrichment. Other than after-school enrichment, I don't have any ideas how to challenge him.

When he was younger, it wasn’t as obviously about his giftedness in math. Now that he is 6 doing 5th grade math, it’s much harder to deny.