Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Middle school choices

Dds will be hitting middle school and high school next year. Dd12 will be choicing to a neighborhood high school about 10 minutes north of our house with school hours of 7:30 a.m.-2:50 p.m. and a late start day (9:08 a.m.) on Weds. I will need to drive her until at least her senior year b/c she won't turn 16 until the fall of her senior year.

We have applied for school choice to two middle schools that are right near the high school for dd10. There are reasons why the assigned schools are not the best fit for either kid.

I am having second thoughts in re to dd10, though, b/c both of these middle schools are very high performing. Like the elementary she attends (and almost all of our local schools), there are a lot of high achieving kids and the academic environment is competitive. Like her current school, 20% or more of the kids are in GT classes (one of the schools brags that over 26% of their kids are GT ided on their website).

This creates two issues:

1) If dd doesn't take the GT classes, she feels stupid and there are a lot of below average kids in the average classes since so many non-gifted but high achieving kids are considered gifted and tracked that way.
2) If dd does do the GT classes (as she is now -- subject acceleration for math and GT reading), she is really quite different from the vast majority of the kids in these classes. She doesn't power through material quickly, think convergently, and consistently perform highly. She feels stupid there too although I'd venture to guess that she is a lot brighter than the avg kid in those classes in that she has some pretty high IQ scores including one GAI in the 99.9th.

So, I'm also finding myself considering one of the lower performing alternative schools quite a ways north of us. It is an expedentiary learning model and goes from 6th-12th. The classes are small. GT probably doesn't exist at all or is not a big deal there. It is also a good 30-40 minute commute and it would be tight to get her there from 8-3:10 (especially pick-up) with dd12 being on the other end of town and getting out at close to the same time. They have early release of 1:25 on Weds.

I don't know that I could even keep my p/t job and do this. I wonder if I ought to just look at homeschooling (which I've wanted to do for a while anyway) if I am going to have to quit my job anyway. That would cut about 30% of our annual income and our health insurance but dd10 is really in trouble. She's not doing well emotionally at all and something has to change.

I really wish that I could find a way to make enough money from home to make this all work but my dabbling in writing, etc. isn't paying enough to replace my income even though I'm not making tons of money.

Any thoughts on whether this is worth considering?

You've got a lot to think about there.
I like homeschooling, but perhaps it seems worth it to try the small, far school for middle school. Are there any jobs near the farther school with flexible hours so the commute won't be so bad?

As always, go sit and observe the classrooms in action. You'll learn a lot by observing. All the talk about 'school philosophy' is just talk until you see the inside of a classroom.

((Hugs))
Grinity

The job market where I live is extremely challenging. It is the hardest place I have ever lived to find a job and that's even before the current recession. It is a very educated population so the decent paying jobs are very competitive, a lot of jobs pay near minimum wage, and my having a Masters degree is a draw back for some of the lower paying jobs from what I've been told. I'm not counting on being able to find other work for that reason. I'd do better to commute south for work than north as the market is more diverse.

We are planning on going to open house/school info nights for all three of these schools in January. Would you rule out the higher performing schools?

Hello Cricket2,

I don't know your situation beyond what you have described so I am overstepping a little. I hope you'll overlook it, but I feel like I can see myself in your thought processes and I know that I sometimes chew at a dilemma until I convince myself that the offbeat choice is the right one, when really the obvious choice is the right one, just not what I had hoped for.

I think you are over thinking the schools comparison. Of course there is the question of what school is right for what child, but in general, a better school is a better school. It seems counter-intuitive to me to seek out a lower performing school for a child with a 99.9% GAI, even if her abilities are uneven. And if she's having a tough time emotionally, it seems a like an unnecessary risk to put her in a school farther away with kids she doesn't know. Not to mention that the additional stress on you is going to be felt by her. Maybe only a tiny bit, but she won't be unaffected.

Do you think it is possible to keep the p/t job and home school? If you have to pay for tutoring and childcare, but can keep your job you might still be better off financially than if you quit your job to drive your daughter to work. Also you could have more control over the curriculum and use this control to help your daughter develop the skills/knowledge to re-enter your local system in a couple of years.

Could part of your home school curriculum be a home-based business? I know you've already determined that this would not be financially lucrative, but something is better than nothing and it would be a great experience for your daughter.

I wouldn't rule out the higher performing school if your DD can handle being 'different' in the GT program. I would use the back to school nights to try to set up a time to observe the classrooms in action. You do know the joke about the difference between recruitment and day to day life, right?

What about hiring a tutor to coach younger daughter through the aspects that make the GT program tough?

huggs
Grinity

That's okay; it doesn't feel intrusive. She is not only possibly HG, but also probably 2e. She has anxiety issues and likely ADD. She isn't doing well academically in the GT programming. She's not failing out, but her grades are wildly erratic and she is feeling stupid b/c she isn't doing as well as the majority of the other kids in the classes. She wants to drop out of the GT program b/c she feels stupid. Granted, she also felt stupid in the non-GT class b/c she was grouped with many kids who, in her mind, aren't very bright.

Our GT programs really are high achiever programs. They really don't serve the needs of divergent thinkers. Someone suggested to me on my other thread about ADD on the 2e forum that a school w/ no GT program might be a better idea.

I could keep my p/t job and homeschool, but it would entail dd being home alone about 25 hrs/week and she is a huge extravert who is very unhappy home alone. My dh is a commercial truck driver so he's not home much and he has very little patience anyway. He yells at her whenever he tries to help her with stuff and transfers his own self image issues on to her.

My hours are really strange. I'm an educator at a hospital with rotating hours that include nights, weekends, and different days each week. I often don't know when I'm needed in until a day or so beforehand. For instance, someone from our NICU called me at 8:30 this morning (Sat.) wanting me to come in at 10 a.m. to teach a class. That one, fortunately, didn't have to happen but that type of thing isn't uncommon. It really isn't the type of job that has been easy to juggle even with what I am doing now and would be hard to juggle with trading kids with someone else for instance (which I've explored).

I have been trying the home based business idea (as you can see via my siggie ). I've been doing a very little bit of tutoring and tested one homeschooled kid on the SAT10 last year. I've made a tiny bit from affiliate programs and advertising on my website, but that doesn't even cover the monthly cost of running the site. I'm writing articles online which pays very, very little. I've mostly written the manuscript for a study strategy book for gifted kids, although I haven't been able to find a publisher. I enjoy all of this, but it really is something like an extra $50/month as best at the moment. I may just suck at business/advertising . I am trying, though!

I'm just confused and I feel like I am failing dd10. Dd12, in hindsight, has been a lot easier and she's the one who is really obviously HG. She just needed acceleration.

OK, this is familiar now. I have a DS9 who is similar and we have discussed it. His writing output is atrocious. He gets As and Bs, but I think the teachers actually cut him some slack because they see me as a potential trouble maker. It's not hard for me to deal with because I am pretty sure he has a different option for next year. Also, my son really doesn't care too much about how he is perceived and seems to rather enjoy busy work. So similar situation in some ways, but w/o the difficulties.

If you do decide in the end to keep her where she is, I really like Grinity's idea of hiring a tutor to help with the difficulties at the current school. Maybe you could even get a teacher to do it so you could get the inside track on what's due when and what the expectations are. Ten is a tough age because there is so much variation in what kids are capable of organizationally. Maybe if you can prop her up artificially for a few years and engineer a few successes to build up her confidence, the quality of her mind will eventually speak for itself.

Every Tuesday my son has to use 15 of his spelling words in a story and he gets one night to write it. He is simply not capable of doing this in under several hours and the kids also have piano on Tuesday. So every week he dictates it to me while I type and I give him very liberal "help". I justify it by thinking of all the additional academic type work he does on his own. I figure net-net he's doing way more than the other kids. He's just not doing what his teacher has assigned.

Aside from the tutor not being mom so she likely wouldn't yell at the person and cry , what do you think we could get out of a tutor that I couldn't do myself? Her main issues with the GT programming are that she doesn't see the convergent answers and starts creating all kinds of new ways to approach the problem that are usually not what the teacher wants and that she's really inattentive to details and just checks out mentally and daydreams. Teachers usually don't notice her mental absence b/c she is well behaved and not physically hyperactive.

Jumping in rudely here -

Not much (except maybe the inside scoop at the school), but do you want to do it? You are a good parent and probably interested in her divergent thinking and unique approaches and on some level you validate them. A teacher familiar with the curriculum might be more able to execute a teach to the test approach with her. Obviously not your long-term goal for your daughter intellectual development, but just a short term crutch to give her confidence.

It may be very different at your daughter's school, but I find it very hard to get info on assignments or expectations beyond what my son writes down in messy writing in a tiny space in his agenda. Also, they have no real math or grammar textbooks. So I might get the info that they are working on predicates, but that is it. I usually never see any of the work. So while I am certainly capable of presenting predicates to him (well, after I google it a couple of times) I would not necessarily be able to efficiently prepare him to take his teacher's test.

Are there busing options for either child? Would either be doing after school at school activities that could ease your commute schedule.

I have heard about some kids using an ADHD coach in middle school to help plan assignments and keep track of due dates. We may be headed in that direction in the near future. With a PG/2E kid, the 26% in the gifted program numbers don't appeal to me.

I recently gave up a hospital job with similar hours be make dd8's after school schedule more consistent. I miss having a job and the long school commutes aren't much fun... We compromised on her riding the very long school ride home half of the time. I hope you find something that works.