Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Frustrated and need advice

I agree. My ds was humming, squirming, spacing out and yet knew all of the material. I believe it is mostly normal for little boys to be like this and especially in the gifted setting. I will say that these things have been getting better over time. My son is now 8 and it is astounding how he improves every couple of months or so. Now granted, I am schooling my son at home via a cyber charter school since the schools could not meet his needs. Frankly, I am concerned that they never will meet his needs especially in this neck of the woods. OTOH, we do a lot of activities and classes with other teachers and I can definitely see improvements.

IMHO, sure could there be other problems with your ds, but I would give him time especially if he knows the basics of reading, writing, and math He may have the squirmies for quite a few more years especially if school is boring
Hopefully the school can be creative and give him more challenging work to do. IMHO, I would give him lots of time.

We were actually under the impression that things were improving. His teacher hadn't mentioned anything since earlier in the year. Then this past week we've heard things like "at a loss" and "don't know what else to do" and my heart just sank. I'm definitely getting the impression that she can't "handle" him. What happens next? She asked for our suggestions and we actually said (among other things) that maybe a different classroom or school environment would help. For the first time the words "home schooling" came up in conversation with my husband and I. I have to admit this idea terrifies me. Meanwhile we're still not sure that he's actually gifted, just assuming that he is based on the NNAT. I can't wait till his testing in March. I just hope he and his teacher are able to hang in there until then and we can get some answers. Sorry for the long ramble

It is true ADHD is often a quick solution to when children are not challenged at school. I have experienced the same issue when teachers do not feel the child is paying attention, but in reality it is the child is not being challenged, Repetition is good but at a point it can become boring for a child.

Ten years ago I never would have dreamed to be doing school at home Technically we are doing public school at home via a public cyber charter school, but I would not hesitate to homeschool or do a good public cyber charter school such as one that uses K12 curriculum.

We tried a regular public school and a private school and both did not work for ds I did a lot of research and assuaged my fears about socialization which I now truly believe is a non-issue . Many areas have large networks of many different kinds of homeschoolers or cyber schoolers:) Plus there are many resources for homeschoolers. I am very grateful to be able to do school at home at the moment.

I suggest the following site:
http://www.welltrainedmind.com/forums/index.php

Sincerely,
pris

It makes me SO happy to hear your positive experience with K12 as we are strongly (like 99%) sure we are doing that with DS next year. To be honest I'd pull him now and start now if it were fully up to me, but I can understand him wanting to finish K out. He enjoys his classmates and his teacher but is basically only getting handwriting out of school at this point.

I second the suggestion. Just beware, it's addictive.

I would make sure to ask extensive questions about acceleration, work submissions, any mandatory online classes, flexibility, teacher support, etc. In our school we can accelerate in math and language arts, but not the other topics which has not been a problem since you can actually substitute activities or supplement as long as you meet objectives and do work submissions IMO . I find the curricula rigorous and classical like. There are many reviews on the Well Trained Mind Forums.

Sincerely,
pris

classicsmom (or anyone) - have you bought individual K12 courses or are you doing the whole package? I've thought about that for science in particular. We are using Plato, but for next year I would like to do something a bit more comprehensive and hands on.

We never dreamed we'd be homeschooling either. But really, it's been mostly great for all of us.

Thanks for the pointers. I think I covered all that when I spoke with them extensively this fall but will double check that when I plan for next year. He's progressed significantly just since Oct when I spoke with someone from k12 so I do need to make sure he can still be accomodated in math and language arts. I'm not worried about the rest, we'll supplement or add where needed/desired in science/social studies.

We have k12 provided by our state. When I called to ask about it they said they don't accelerate students but they have an honors route. It was a bit confusing because their web site seem to indicate they do accelerate. Do you know if k12 accelerates if you are not going through the state?