Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Skipping and gaps

I have a question: what do people think about the idea of skipping a year or two of a subject versus going through each year in order to avoid "gaps in learning?"

This idea has been on my mind somewhat lately, as my DS8's teacher has made it clear that he will not do 5th grade science until he's mastered 4th grade science, end of story.

I bought a copy of the 5th grade book, and from what I can see, the major difference is that the grade 5 curriculum is somewhat more technical. It shares a lot of the same concepts with the 4th grade book. I don't see the big deal, given that the kid actively listens in on the 5th (and 6th!) grade stuff whenever he can.

I have an impression that many or most teachers are very concerned about gaps in learning, and that allowing them to exist will cause harm. I'm not convinced, at least in the case of gifted kids.

Oh, one more related thing: I'm really beginning to understand the importance of IQ testing: it's so they'll believe you when you make claims about a child's abilities, right?

Thoughts?

Val

I'm not either. If a gap is discovered, how much real time does it take to fill in the gap? For our DS, he just learns so quickly that even if we miss something, it doesn't take him long at all to pick up what was missed. I'm guessing the same is true for you.

JB

DS had a gap the other day. He didn't know the term "spelling pattern" i.e. the pattern of consonants and vowels in a word. This caused him to get half of a worksheet wrong. I'm not sure why the teacher didn't just tell him the definition, because that was all it took for him to "get" the concept and fix the worksheet.

Also, it seemed somewhat irrelevant since he already knew how to spell all those words anyway...

Still, his teacher makes much of such gaps. I suppose it's because it's an inconvenience to her to define terms?

Hmmmmm... that makes sense, kcab. Dratted testing!

Worry about gap seems to me to be the same old lack of understanding about why GT kids are ahead. If we parents had been spending every waking hour hothousing to get them to be ahead, then gaps would be a problem. No time for hothousing to catch them up! Yikes!

But for a GT kid who just gets stuff on his/her own, gaps get filled in immediately.

If teachers could understand that simply defining the term = teaching the concept most of the time, then maybe they'd be less worried about gaps. I think they expect gaps to mean that they have actual teaching work and review to do. Usually, that's just not so.

*sigh*

A little off topic, but in a similar vein, our teacher made a big deal about a particular differentiated math lesson with DS. He was doing "number pairs" (their way of teaching X + Y = Z for sums up to 10) and they made a big deal about DS only wanting to do something simple like 1 + 1 = 2 during this lesson. They couldn't get him to do other more complex number pairs. At first it bothered me a little. Then DW pointed out that to him, it's all the same. Plus 1, +3, +5, etc., it doesn't really matter. Maybe his way of rebelling and saying "Don't you get it... it's just addition..."

But I think the reason that they are hung up on it is that he'll have to take standards tests.

For what it's worth, our teacher has told us directly that DS will not be taught more than addition this year. Perhaps for the same reason (gaps). We have our GIEP in a few weeks, so we'll see.

JB

Ah, I should have clarified. Additions/subtraction math facts (part of the "number pairs"). DS has his multiplication facts down cold already. This is part of what we want to work on with his GIEP. We're a bit put off by the fact the we were told we couldn't go beyond add/subtract. The boy loves math. Let's not kill that.

JB

Wow, thanks for all the quick replies.

I sense a desire for full mastery in DS8's teacher, and there appears to be some discomfort at moving forward in its absence. I also don't understand the big deal about letting him do grade 5 science, yet I got a pushy parent look when I brought it up. DS8 brought his grade 5 book to school to show to the teacher and she told him "not until you finish grade 4."

I just don't get this. I understand, sort of, about having to cover most things in mathematics, because it builds on itself. That said, we skipped a lot of mathematics and went straight to algebra and this was not a big deal. Sure, he still needed to learn how to add unlike fractions and multiply decimals, but he learned it! So, I definitely believe in a non-linear approach to this subject for mathy kids.

As for science, the elementary level books I've looked at don't build cohesively the way that college level courses build on previous knowledge. They just use more complicated ideas about the same basic things, which he's well capable of understanding.

I think I have to ask for a conference; dunno what I'll say yet. Advice welcome.

Argh. Here we are again!

Val

I completely agree with this -- if the gap were that big an issue, it would have been clear that a skip were unnecessary. If the child gets the basics, any gaps should be pretty easily filled. Except cursive (I do have that lingering effect from my second-grade skip -- my handwriting is horrid).


This was our experience, too. It was extraordinarily frustrating. I thought testing was going to help with the school, but it didn't so much ... it more reassured me that I wasn't wrong!

Of course, this isn't the case everywhere and with all teachers, but it was for us.

I think you stated it quite well with the math analogy. Why can't science be the same? Particularly if the difference is the level of detail.

I wish I could give advice on how to approach it... We're still learning the game too

JB