Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Skipping and gaps

Thanks. I have to give this a lot of thought.

Val

JBDad, if the teacher insists on only add/sub in 1st grade, how about asking if you can send in Singapore Math challenging word problems (CWP) workbooks. There are some nice multi-step word problems that only involve addition/subtraction but on up into the thousands etc. There is also multi/div in there so if DS should happen to the wrong page, ooops. LOL. You could probably go on up to SM CWP 4A/4B which is addition/sub but adults often require algebra to set up - SM teaches bar diagrams so it wouldn't look like algebra to the teacher.

I think that statement is sooooo funny; but I guess I should be sad about the truth in it.

LOL OHGrandma, I didn't mean to be disparaging to teachers just that with a cursory glance, the problems would look like the usual add/sub problems but they are quite complex. The bar diagrams makes it look deceptively simple. Before I learned bar diagrams, I had to use algebra to solve them. The teacher might not look that closely at the books.

Is it that she doesn't understand the concept--a real gap!--or that she doesn't *like* to use tally marks? It seems to me that she's just choosing another way to solve the problem, and that isn't so much a gap as a matter of preference. Provided she gets the concept and can still solve the problem, I don't see it as a big issue.

I think you're right that this is one of the reasons teachers worry about gaps, but I also think it's rather unnecessary. Is your DD going to be unable to progress in math because she'd rather write numbers than tally marks? I don't think so!

I don't have much experience with the gap question - my son's been subject accelerated for 3 days now and did have vocabulary gaps that freaked him out, but once terms were defined things seemed fine. So far!

But on the testing question, I actually came here intending to post a pro-testing thread b/c of our experience with the school. It's awful, dreadful, that some people are so innumerate as to not understand what the results mean! But if they do, it's soooo nice. We've been playing this 'try to get the school on the same page as us' game for more than a year. It's been so frustrating, and clearly they didn't feel the need for any follow-through, ever. They were defensive and hostile, and we were doing our best to be careful and cautious and never ever ever say the 'g' word.

Then my son had a complete sobbing meltdown in class and they couldn't stop him. This freaked them out, as our repeated "our son is increasingly unhappy and tearful about school" letters did not. We had a meeting get scheduled REALLY quickly then - what a change. We walked in there and the principal started off with what sounded like the "your son is under a lot of pressure from you" talk. And our psychologist, that we tortured ourselves over deciding to hire, whipped out the test results, slapped them on the table in front of all the school people. It was all quiet for a bit, then, some "wow"s were heard. DH and I were just SO loving that. They then recovered pretty quickly and said "well, of course we all expected this." (hah). But the beauty of it was that it completely stopped the hothousing "he's not as smart as he thinks he is" comments, and has got them, however temporarily (though I hope it'll be permanent!) willing to think creatively and flexibly about getting our son to a place where he's learning in school. They changed their stupid grade-level only library checkout policy, his teacher got him a bunch of hard books to keep in the classroom to read, some of which were on math and science, which was brilliant of her. And despite their seeming to think it would be overwhelmingly hard to have him go to a different classroom for some subjects, he's been accelerated in math. So he has a math challenge, books that are both interesting to read and teach him something, and, maybe most important, the feeling that they finally understand that he's smart and that things will get better, in ONE WEEK after more than a year of talking about this problem. They didn't listen to us one bit, but the test scores? That made all the difference. It makes me wish I'd tested him as he started school. I think that's probably not necessary as long as there's no problem and your child is happy...but if there's a problem, oh, how it helped us. (and it helped us personally, too, with the knowing what we're dealing with thing, and the not feeling crazy thing).

it is lovely, kcab...and I know this is going to plateau and we'll need more change. But for now, ds has actually learned some things in school, has come home excited, and feels, I think, vindicated and relieved. He wrote a love poem! he used to write poems but hadn't in more than a year. And this morning he was up and dressed and ready for school before we were even out of bed! And maybe not surprisingly, but I hadn't thought of it - he's been surprisingly kind to his brother. Like encouraging him, praising him. Maybe he just has felt too bad recently to be able to try to make others feel better. I'll have to remember this when it gets rough again...I'm assuming his growing up is going to be a long start-and-stop, better and worse process.

Oh, I meant to say, too, that it doesn't sound to me like anything remotely like not being gifted 'enough', but rather like the sort of stubborn refusal to do the thing that made them feel bad originally thing my son has. I think of it as perfectionism-related. The oh, I didn't know that, now I will go nowhere near it, and besides, who needs to know that stupid thing anyway reaction, which has nothing to do with ability to do whatever it is. We try, a lot, to teach ds that mistakes and not knowing are good, not a sign of complete failure! I guess in that way, the gaps are an opportunity for learning to handle not knowing, which is really important. I do get weary of trying to anticipate what he'll decide about the world from any given experience and head off the counter-productive ones, though...

I agree, montana, and I also don't think it has a thing to do with being "not GT enough." Perfectionism is a much better fit!

I'm glad to persuade you on that one, MON. Normally I'm more interested in the ideas than the persuasion, but on this one, I think it mattered that you saw what I was saying, since I think you're right that you were accepting the school's (wrong) take on it. I like montana's statement on it a lot:


That's good stuff!

It may not always be easy for the child to deal with not knowing something, but I think that makes it all the more important that they get that chance. You know? The harder it is, the more they need it.

Wow - wonderful news montana. I hope the school tries to keep up from now on!

Masterofnone - side note re: tallies. We just read "How to Count Like a Martian" (a book someone at this fabulous site recommended). It explains all types of counting systems, and it explained them simply enough that even I could finally get binary! (i'm a little number-concept challenged.) Just a thought - it's out of print, but i found it through inter-library loan.