Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments District Enrichment Policy

Hmm. I think you (and mamaandmore in her post) hit on an important part of the problem there. Some teachers see that a child gets everything right without help on some things, assume that he can get everything right all the time, and kids don't get to be TAUGHT anything.

Val

I couldn't agree more with the posts here. Your first quote about the district's enrichment policy could have been cut and pasted from our school's policy. Our school uses the term "differentiation" in glowing terms, as if it is grandest thing for gifted kids. It is the magic salve which fixes everything. In reality, I have tried for two years to find evidence of differentiation: how often it is applied, how much my son is getting out of it, etc.

The only concrete example that I've observed is that the school uses it to described grouping kids into different levels for reading. There may be three groups of kids in a class (6 per group) who are reading at different levels. (slow=half a grade behind, medium= on grade level, and fast= half a grade above) Great. So my son is placed in the fast reading group with five other kids. But this does nothing for a kid who is reading two to three levels above his current grade level.

I have never seen differentiation stretch more than half a grade in any subject matter, for fear of stepping on the next grade teacher's toes. For most of the moderately gifted kids, this is a welcome and appropriate stretch for them. It does not work for kids that need more than that half a grade bump.

Our school also has pullout classes (half and hour per week for math, and half an hour for high IQ... 129 or above.) The gifted teacher seems to believe that the kids should not do anything that might let them race too far ahead academically for fear of lightly dancing anywhere near the next grade teacher's toes. So they stick to very safe, non-academic topics. (with heavy emphasis on social development and leadership roles.)

Really, in a classroom of 25+ kids, 1 teacher, and no aide (typical class size in our district - and I'm assuming most districts), I'm thinking best case scenario for differentiation is the kid will be pulled aside to do work autonomously with no guidance from even a well-meaning teacher. DS6's K teacher balked at giving him anything different from the rest of the class. DS would have loved to escape the tedium and go to a corner and read, do worksheets, etc. on his own. I think in-class differentiation would probably work best with "acceleration" vs. "enrichment" simply because progress is more easily measured. Maybe you could think of some concrete differentiated activities your DS would benefit from and ask the school/district if he could be provided with those. For example, could he be pulled out for self-paced computer learning? Could he have time set aside to do math worksheets that increase in difficulty (i.e., accelerate) as he gets a certain percentage correct?