Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Grade Advancement, Middle of Year, PLEASE Help!!!

"Based on our family's experiences, I'm in favor of midyear changes in placement-- I think it's actually easier to orchestrate, because you can do the "meet the teacher, check it out, see it'll be fine" business in the course of a normal school day if you want to."

Thank you for your advice and I appreciate you mentioning this point. I was told which teacher he would have if he moved to 3rd grade and she is awesome! My daughter had her and I've gone to church with her in the past...she is all about the students! As far as a teacher he could have if moved, she would have been our top pick. She is also the teacher he took the IQ Test with so he's been in her classroom (for only one day though) before. He knows she loves owls (has mentioned that about every time we see an owl on anything) and he said last night that one of his after school buddies is in her class. So if we do chose to advance him to 3rd grade there is already a connection there!


"You sound a little calmer and more focused TripleB. It's never easy to make these decisions but it often goes better than you imagine, especially as you are taking a considered approach."

Thanks...hearing everyone's advice and the fact that others have gone through this with success makes it all seem a little less overwhelming. I appreciate your words of wisdom.

"If you go that path then do it as soon as possible so it doesn't get caught up with concern over the end of year exam."

We are meeting with the school and county AIG person Friday, will listen to all the options. After that our plan is to discuss the options with our son over the weekend and give them a decision on Monday so they can get started as quick as possible.

"About the math versus reading....we thought DD was verbally advanced not a math kid until grade 5. Turns out she just didn't have an opportunity to demonstrate math reasoning until then and took off."

I think you may be right. In his Math right now they are talking about simple word problems and talking about 10 more, 10 less, 100 more, and 100 less than certain numbers. She told them to leave the place blank for 100 less blank because it went into negatives...he puts an answer anyway...I think that's the most latitude he's got as far as showing what he's capable of in Math.


Again, thanks for all the responses.....they have helped more than you realize!!!

TripleB

We are in a similar situation, wondering about a mid year skip from third into fourth grade, at the end of which tracking decisions would be made.

The current consensus for us is subject acceleration in maths, no full skip. We may decide to do a skip at the end of the year into fifth grade of a gifted program in middle school. We have had some oddly conflicting test results which have confused the issue. Also, in our case, DS8 is anxious and has some executive function issues which make any change hard on him, so the idea is as few changes as possible - thus the transition skip, possibly. The school is leery of supporting a grade skip, and we are not confident ourselves what the right thing to do is, thus do not want to force the issue against the schools advice. It is a discombobulating feeling having to make this choice that so few parents have to make, particularly as most schools like to give you the feeling that it is a completely unheard of event and huge experiment and great risk blah blah blah.

In your case it sounds as if the school is fully in favour of the skip, which is rare and thus a great plus. It is highly unlikely they would advocate for a skip unless they were fully confident he'd cope. You'll probably be surprised just how much of the third grade curriculum he's got down already.

I would definitely set up a trial period, because it's good practice, not because a substantial number of grade skippers prefer going back to their old grade - most kids, once they have realized that the mind numbing boredom is substantially alleviated, refuse. But it removes pressure from everyone in the process, most of all from your son, who can be told that as he isn't learning much in second,he can try out third grade and if he likes it, you will ask the school if he can stay - no strings attached, just check it out.

The disconnect in math that you see may have to do with him understanding advanced concepts even though he may not be the fastest or most focused kids in doing addition or recalling maths facts, all that boring elementary school stuff that doesn't have to do so much with maths as a mathematician knows it.

I have another comment re: subject versus full-grade acceleration. When DS10 was in elementary, he did not like to stand out, which also meant he did not like being pulled out for other classes. For him, a full-grade skip was preferable, as he stood out less. Subject acceleration would be great if you have an entire school set up to do this -- main subjects are taught at the same times, all kids go to their levels. But that is rare. The logistics of subject acceleration are generally trickier.

TripleB, from all you have said, I would say you have nothing to worry about re: the skip. Sounds like he would be moving to an amazing teacher, and if she administered the test and believes he may still be underchallenged, I would believe her. That is the risk with highly gifted kids in regularly paced school programs. But if she thinks he might be underchallenged even with a skip, imagine what he's learning now.

Go ahead and make all your lists of pros and cons. Seem there are fewer cons based on the info you've shared, but obviously I am a stranger on the internet. You know your kid.

My son is also not especially sporty, and he didn't do quite as well as the other (older) kids post-skip, but it is doubtful that he would have done very well with agemates. Now in 6th, he can hold his own.

I always felt my DS was stronger in Language Arts than Math, but he does equally well in both (and when we first started asking for differentiation, we used math as it's easier to show the advanced level there). It's hard to predict at a young age what their strengths and interests will be. Sounds like your kiddo does well across the board, which nicely supports a full-grade skip option.

Your DS is going to be skipping one year no matter when the skip takes place. He is likely to miss less substantive curriculum by doing a skip mid-year. I really would not worry about some end-of-year test, especially if it is meant to be at level. Realistically for most high ability students, they should not have trouble with curriculum a year or even two above. The only thing that I would do differently is to let your DS in on what is happening sooner rather than later. I don't think he should be the last to know as I would consider his opinion as important as yours or the school's.

We haven't discussed it with him yet because we want to find out what different options are available to him regarding the differentiation (ie: are there any other options other than moving him to third grade?). My wife and I are meeting with the principal/teachers/top AIG person for our county/etc. this afternoon to find out what all the options are and how the school would implement each of the options.

Once we find out all of the facts then we are going to talk with our son about it and see what he is most comfortable going with.

Again, thanks to everyone for your input.

I'm still nervous but now it's more of an 'excited nervousness'!

TripleB

Good luck at the meeting! I have a someone different view from Quantum re: how important the kid's opinion is in early elementary -- we considered our son's preferences and concerns, but talked him through to what we thought as parents would be the best decision. All families are different.

Though I would agree that a kid who is vehemently opposed to a skip probably should not be skipped. If they get to the point where they will not participate in school/etc. because they are mad about the skip decision, that is not a good outcome. Our son is pretty easy-going and adaptable, so we knew that he'd be fine. In the end, he was in favor of the skip, but we had to talk him over some nerves.

Apropos-- I was just at the elementary school. DS (recently subject-accelerated) is getting high fives in the hall from the kids in the receiving class, 2 years older.

Looks like it worked. Whew.

Awesome! So good to hear a positive story.

Meeting went incredibly well today!!!

In the meeting were the principal, his current teacher, the AIG person at the school, the AIG representative for the entire county, and a lady who administered a 3rd grade practice Math EOG, a 3rd grade practice Reading EOG, and another Reading Assessment to my son today.

He scored 92% on the 3rd grade practice Reading EOG and 80% on the 3rd grade Math EOG. We had mentioned that we were worried about the gaps there may be because of not having the last half of his 2nd grade year and the first half of his 3rd grade year. She said looking at these scores should put our minds at ease...if he can make that percentage on a end of 3rd grade test while only being at the half way point of 2nd grade he doesn't have many gaps and if he did they would work with him to fill those.

They said they wouldn't recommend only pulling him out because he was so advanced he would have to be pulled out for everything.

They went on to say that even if we put him in 3rd grade he's still going to need differentiation made because of how advanced he is. They are going to go ahead and write an AIG plan for him so that he will receive those services and allow him to be a part of the Science Olympiad Team (even though he's too young to compete in the competitions) and the school's afterschool music program.

We went through everything with my son tonight....you should have seen how large his eyes got (from happiness) when I mentioned moving up to third grade. I think it was even more excitement than when he wakes up and sees what Santa Claus brought. He was so happy he couldn't stop smiling until he went to bed about 90 minutes after we talked to him. He's always loved school but I haven't seen this much excitement in his eyes for a while. I think him moving up to 3rd grade is a definite yes in his eyes...therefore in our eyes as well!

Our 2nd semester starts on January 28th (we have three days off between now and then) so the plan is to have the school AIG teacher pull him out of his second grade class some and take him to his third grade classroom a few times over the next two weeks just so he can get a feel for the classroom and expectations. They didn't feel comfortable with a 6 week trial in the classroom (although after seeing his reaction tonight I don't think there could be a problem) so I think this two week problem will be a great trial for him. His 3rd grade teacher will meet with him and get to know him before January 28th.. And then on January 28th he will become a full fledged third grader!

Thanks to all of you for your help...it has been an unbelievable help...my wife and I are so happy about our son being challenged again!!

TripleB

Wonderful TripleB! Your family are all having what sounds like a very positive school experience. I couldn't be happier for you all. From your son's reaction it sounds as though all will not only be well but were more needed than you had imagined. Three cheers to a school that identifies need and responds appropriately. Best wishes for the new semester.