Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Advice for Kindergarten accommodations?

Hi, I am new to this board, and I'm hoping you experienced parents could share some advice with me.

My DD5 was recently tested independently and the results came back in the (barely) HG range. She starts K this fall and will be going half day. I signed her up for half day since this is my last year getting to spend so much day time with her and I figured I could do enrichment at home better than they can at school. This is a Catholic school, which is an improvement over our public (non-charter) schools.

I am wondering how I should approach the school for accommodations for DD. What should I ask them to do in the best and minimum cases? Should I ask them before school starts, or should I let the teacher get to know her first and ask after a couple of weeks of school?

DD is reading at a 3rd grade level and does 1.5 grade math (as near as I can tell). She has been going to preschool so she has decent "doing school" skills, but she is very reserved and sensitive. Do you think she is close enough in skill level that she doesn't really need much accommodation other than choosing her own books for reading?

I spoke with the teacher about reading briefly, but my DD was there so I didn't go into detail. She says they do ability grouping for reading, but I am under the impression that they have just 2 groups: reading and not reading. I didn't ask about math since I hadn't realized yet how little math they actually do in K. (Seriously, they expect kids to come in only counting to 20???)

I'm very worried since I so want her first year at school to be fun and a good experience. I was so bored in school and as a result spent my life underachieving. I want more for her.

Thanks in advance!
Dawn

I did not have any success getting our (public) school to provided differentiated material for my kids. When DS6 was in K (half day), he just did whatever the class was doing, i.e. mostly crafts, coloring, listening to stories, singing. I would pick him up for lunch and then we would do "afterschooling" which was math workbooks (Singapore Math) and reading at his level.

Ultimately, we decided to try a gradeskip for him because the school wouldn't do subject acceleration. His writing was weakest, but is good enough and he is doing well in the higher grade.

DD10 has a much more scattered profile of strengths and weaknesses, so acceleration wouldn't work for her without a lot of accommodations which the school is unwilling to provide. She self-enriches pretty well at home, though, and seems happy at school.

Hi Dawn- We are in the same situation with DS4, he will be starting full day K in the fall. Basically we have decided to make a folder of all the things he is working on at home, worksheets etc. so we can show the teacher once school begins.

We are also making DS write down all the books he reads in a journal this summer, if nothing else it will help improve his handwriting Not sure any of this will help but this is the approach we are taking to start.

Good luck

-Guy

Hi , My DD6 was about at the same level as yours when she started kindergarten last fall. She went to full day kinder though, since we don't have a 1/2 day option.
We talked to the teacher before school started, and brought specific examples of what she was reading (and understanding) as well as what math concepts she already knew. With in 2 weeks of school starting she was going to 1st grade for reading, and by Thanksgiving she was going up for math as well. Neither of these were actually challenging for her, but she was very unhappy in kinder because it was so slow and didn't require her to "use her brain" at all (her words) Once she was going up for those two classes she became much happier and eventually she was moved fulltime into 1st grade.
Her kindergarten teacher really appreciated the heads up, because she had "never had a student like her before..." (boy did I get sick of hearing that phrase) and didn't really know what to do with her. I think the teacher was a bit intimidated because while DD would never complain or act out or even tell her the work was too easy, DD often made suggestions about more things they could do with the work they were being given to make it more interesting. The teacher often asked for our suggestions about what to do with DD because she had no idea what to do. Luckily, the 1st grade teacher "got her" and understood her little quirks and enjoyed having her in class.
So, I guess my advice would be to definitely give the teacher a heads up. Be as specific as possible about her strengths and weaknesses, and her personality. Also ask if there is any option of her doing reading with 1st grade after she gets familiar with how school works. At least then she wouldn't be stuck sitting there listening to kids guess about what sounds which letters make, or how to recognize a G and a g from a random list of letters. (Where we are they only have to count to 32 when they leave!)
Good luck

32!? How'd they come up with that number? Maybe they like it because it's 2^5? Do first graders have to count to 64?

Thanks for all the replies! I'm so glad that I can come here and you all understand! I tried to talk to a good friend about this (her child is bright ND), and she totally didn't get it. But then again, I don't talk with her about what my DD can do, so I really shouldn't have brought it up with her anyway.

Cathy, did you skip your DS out of K or after K? Did he go right to second grade? I've heard good things about the Singapore Math books, I think I will look into them. I'm always worried that we're missing something in her math learning.

Guy, that is a great suggestion. I'm going to start saving my DD's work too. I have already started a reading log for her, including the grade equivalent for the book as per Scholastic's book wizard. I love your suggestion about having your child write the reading log! My DD's writing is probably her weakest area as well. Those fine motor skills don't grow as quickly as the understanding I guess.

Kerry, I'm also going to track her known math concepts as you did...good idea! I don't have any idea if they will allow her to go up a grade for subjects. I'm not sure if my DD would like that anyways since she is fairly shy. It all depends on how bored she is in K I guess. Her PreK didn't challenge her at all since they didn't believe me about what she could do until the very end of the year. She didn't seem to mind though, and viewed it all as playtime. The disbelief is why we had her tested, so we have documentation for the teachers and school. At least your DD's K teacher believed you and was open to suggestion, that is helpful.

I agree, 32 is a really weird number to have them count to. I had to laugh when the K teacher was doing pre-screenings to make sure kids were ready for K. They asked her about shapes, colors and had her throw a ball. I think they also asked her to count to 10. She came out and said "That was silly!", but at least she liked the teacher.

Thanks for all the great suggestions and advice! I'd love to hear more if anyone has more to share!

--Dawn

Hi, Dawn--

Well, it's a little complicated... he was in a private PreK and they decided to move him into their K program when he turned 4 (he has a November birthday). That didn't go too well, because it turned out that the K teacher didn't really want him there He finished out the year in that private K program, though.

The next year, we enrolled him in K again at the public school. He was already reading at a third grade level and doing addition, subtraction, multiplication, counting past 100, etc. After a couple of months of him becoming less and less engaged at school (he would just sit there and daydream) and no sign of him making friends with the other kids, we talked to the school about differentiated instruction. They had a hard time fitting that in. Then we asked about subject acceleration. Too complicated for them to schedule. Finally, we asked about a gradeskip. I pointed out that it would be the easiest way for them to give him more advanced work. They recommended having him do the K class in the morning and then joining the 1st grade class after lunch. He did that for a few weeks, and all seemed well in first grade so we moved him up to first grade midyear.

I have found that schools are more willing to listen to you if they get to know your child for a month or two before you start advocating for different work. It is frustrating to wait, though! We were lucky that there was an opening in first grade. You could ask for your child to try first grade in the afternoon when a space opens up...

I think it must have been someone's age when they made the silly rule.

Cathy, I'm sorry to hear that the private school K teacher was so unwelcoming! It would have been nice if the administrators had checked her attitude about it before moving your DS in there. So much of school depends on each individual teacher, it seems like it is all a crap shoot. (Which drives me crazy since I am a planner!) I am glad that his move to 1st seemed to go more smoothly. Did he adjust pretty quickly to 1st once he was there? How long did you wait before speaking with his public school K teacher about your DS? Did she even notice that he was more advanced on her own? I often wonder about that since my DD's preK teachers didn't notice anything since my DD never volunteered anything due to shyness. If I hadn't talked to them nothing would have changed...

Kerry, I just noticed your location, we are in CO too. We are in the northwestern Denver metro area. I will have to check my district's requirements...maybe our students only have to count to 32 by the end of K as well!

So I am hearing differing opinions regarding when to approach the school about my DD. I can see pros and cons each way. Would anyone else care to weigh in?

Thanks everyone!
Dawn

Since we integrated him into that class gradually over a period of weeks, he adjusted quickly. It was kind of a long day for a just-turned-five year old, though.

I waited a couple of months and then asked her if she could tell me his reading level because I thought he might be reading above grade level.


She noticed that he got every question right on the initial K readiness screening test. She didn't investigate further until I started asking her questions. You may get better results if you frame your requests in a way that makes the teacher feel like you respect their professional opinion. E.g. instead of saying, "My child is bored in K and needs harder work. He is reading at a 3rd grade level," try something like, "I noticed that my child is starting to read Magic Treehouse books at home and I was hoping you could help me find out what his reading level is." I think if you can lead the teacher into "discovering" your child's abilities for herself, she is more likely to find ways to accommodate him.

Cathy and Master Of None, thank you so much for your additional advice.

Master Of None, unfortunately I am not familiar with their terms. I'm trying to track everything she is doing, but she reads so much I can't keep up! I've just been using grade level equivalents from Scholastic's book wizard. I appreciate your advice on how to approach the teacher. I do have a tendency to be either too wishy washy or too unyielding depending on how annoyed I am. I can't believe they recommended a grade skip based on only your DD reading one book, LOL!

On a side note, I received our welcome packet for kindergarten today and they had a sheet on preparing your child for K. It talked about teaching them their letters outside of the sequence of the alphabet song, teaching colors and doing basic counting when climbing stairs! All I could think was Oh. My. God. And my daughter was telling me "I *love* fractions" today at bedtime as she grabbed a book on them for bedtime reading. At this point I have no idea what to expect...

Well, you can see that there can be very little opportunity for your child to show what she knows and is capable of unless you can get them to pay attention and actually test her.

DS' K teacher didn't realize he could read because there was just no chance for him to show her. She had no idea he was doing 2nd grade math at age 4. In K, they were still counting and sorting and identifying shapes. Several kids in his class didn't even speak English...

Yes! I can totally see that a teacher might not even have opportunity to notice. We ran into that to a lesser extent with preschool. Our first parent-teacher conference 2 years ago went along these lines: the teacher said happily "your daughter can count to ten and knows the letters 's', 'm', 't', 'd' and 'a' (or whatever the first 5 letters taught by montessori classes are)". And I responded "Um, she is reading 3 letter words and can count to a hundred". To which I heard "she shouldn't be reading so soon. She needs to go through all the steps first to learn." Ha ha! How am I supposed to stop her, even assuming I would want to? Fortunately we had a more understanding teacher last year, though she was still teaching my DD far behind where she actually was.

I can't believe that there were kids in your DS's class that didn't even speak English! God, how could the teacher even get all the kids doing the right thing at the right time if they don't understand him or her? I'm really still having a hard time wrapping my head around the fact that they are teaching basic numbers, colors and shapes...

I'm trying to stop stressing about this ('trying' being the operative word) and console myself that if K doesn't work out at this school, we can always homeschool. We could even homeschool outside of school and she could still go and socialize...

My in-laws are coming to visit next month, and while they are here my DH and I are going to go visit all the gifted schooling options in our area. We can get a better picture of what is available and once school starts we can see how good a fit it is compared to the available options. Hopefully something will be great!

My DS9 had the same experience. He went into pre-K reading and when I told his teacher, she looked at me like I was speaking Martian to her. So, no help with reading that whole year. Kindergarten was better (the K teacher was more open-minded). But they still had him on low-level SRA cards. There was some rule about having to master the previous level before moving to the next one. Jumping into the middle wasn't allowed for some reason.

Val

We have the same issue with DS5. I have decided to gather up what he has done and doing now and put them aside, and when his teacher is chosen, I will talk to her about his abilities and make sure to keep the communication open. I get the "he needs to get ready for school" response when I even think about mentioning him skipping K, as if he isn't already in a school setting. Anyway, keep the lines of communication open, and start with the teacher. If you need to move up the ladder then do so when you can't get any further with the first rung. I agree with Cathy A, wording the questions differently will help tremendously when discussing where your child is and where she should be.

Good luck! It seems there will be quite a few of us discussing kindergarten this year.