Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Percentiles and optimal placement

When considering a grade skip, where is the optimal "place" for a child to be in a class achievement-wise? Where would the child feel challenged but not overwhelmed?

So, for example, say that a child scores at the 99th percentile overall when compared to her age peers. When compared to peers one grade level up, she places at the 98th percentile, two grade levels up, at the 85th percentile (I'm making these numbers up), three grade levels up at the 50th percentile, and so on.

It's pretty obvious that one grade level up is going to be too easy. But is it better to be at the 85th percentile or the 50th?

Let's assume for this discussion that social and developmental concerns are being ignored and that the distribution of achievement in the classes mirrors the national distribution.

Is there some common wisdom about this?

Thanks!

Common wisdom -- I don't know. Personal experience I have. Dd#1 skipped 5th grade. She was easily in the 99th percentile on pretty much everything pre-skip and well above most other kids who tested in the 99th percentile. Post skip, she's still in the 99th percentile in her strong subjects and, while I don't have norm referenced test scores that give percentile, she's still in advanced classes in her weaker subjects.

Since her school places approx. 15% of the kids in the advanced classes for literacy and math and she is an A student in the advanced math class (her weaker of those two subjects) as well as "advanced" on the NCLB tests for that subject, it seems like an appropriate placement. My understanding is that she fits about in the middle of that pack of kids in terms of test scores -- so the 50th percentile of the top 15% let's say. If I am calculating that correctly, I'd estimate that would place her in the top 7.5% of her grade or around the 92.5th percentile for her current grade. She may be a bit lower than that and I'd be comfortable with her being an 88-92nd percentile kid in math post-skip again with that being a weaker subject for her.

If she was in the upper 80s in all subjects post skip (long-term, not just immediately following the skip), I don't know that I personally would view that as desirable. She wants to be a straight-A student and she wants to be at the top of the class in some areas, which she is. She's probably easily in the top 1% in reading and writing. She doesn't necessarily have to work at reading, but the books are more intellectually challenging (like the original Phantom of the Opera in 6th grade, for instance) and she isn't coasting so much.

Science and Social Studies are harder to say in terms of percentiles b/c those aren't tested as much but, again, she's an A to A+ student in those classes & seems to be near the top of the class.

To me, this seems like an appropriate placement so my subjective opinion would be that the child should be at least in the top 10% of the grade post-skip in all or most subjects, but not in the 99th percentile in all or most subjects.

eta: if you are talking about single subject acceleration, I'd be going with the grade placement that put the child at around the 85th percentile with the assumption that s/he would eventually move back into the 90s (percentile wise). I wouldn't go from being in the 99th percentile to the 50th b/c it might make the child feel like a failure and might be too big of a leap. You could always accelerate again in later years or semesters if s/he was rising to the 99th percentile level again with ease.

Well, hey I'm a good guesser then , but you're much more concise!

We found even with a skip over 5th into 6th we still ended up being at the very top of the class in every subject. Even though the work was harder and the homework was harder, she just rose to the occasion. You may find that one skip is not enough. It depends really if the child is happy.

No research to back this up but our goal with the skip was to put DS in a grade where he was 85% or above in his MAP score. We did... then he took the next MAP test and scored 99th% again. So much for that plan!