Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Dazed and Confused

I am so thankful to see an active forum for gifted students. I was beginning to feel like we were going through a rare dilemma with our 11 year old son.

From the beginning, I am a certified teacher with a Master's degree in education which still left me ill-prepared for having to advocate for our gifted son. He attended 1st grade at a public academic magnet school and breezed through - easy, but not bored. Then because he was given a terrible teacher assignment for 2nd grade (tenure teacher the principal was trying to force to quit by putting her in an unfamiliar grade level) so we decided to homeschool just for that year. We decided to continue to homeschool when we found out we were being transferred to another state in the middle of his 3rd grade year. Once we moved, the homeschooling community was so welcoming and accepting, we continued through 5th grade. His giftedness did not give us a cause for concern since I taught our son at his pace and was guided by his interests. But, our son decided he wanted to be like the other kids and go to "real" school.

We brought him to a very reputable child psychologist for testing to provide potential schools with the standardized test scores they need. He was given the WISC-IV and the WIAT. His FSIQ suggested mildly gifted. We enrolled him in a highly-recommended Catholic school and although they did not offer gifted classes, they were known to be accelerated and did offer advanced Math and English.

It was not much into the school year that we realized that our son was very much ahead in Math and Reading - the two subjects that he scored in the 99th % in on the standardized achievement test he took. We were told at registration that we would be notified before school starts if they felt he should be tested for Advanced Math. We weren't notified, so we asked for him to be tested. After the test, the Advanced Math teacher said he clearly was not ready to be in her class. So, despite my own knowledge as a mom and as a seasoned teacher that my son WAS ready, I didn't push it. I thought that an easy year of Math would be just fine to help my son through this year of transition. I was WRONG!

My son is horribly bored in Math, he hates sitting around waiting for the other kids to catch up and he even has tried to "help" the teacher teach the right way. Halfway through the year, my son had convinced me that he was in remedial Math because he was the only one that knew what was going on - I had believed him and emailed another mom to see if my son's Math class was remedial. He has not gotten below a 98% in Math the whole year. We have pushed to get him into Advanced Math, but the Advanced Math teacher won't budge. Since this school year has started, we have found out that our son is moderately gifted given his WISC-IV scores and applying the General Ability Index.

We had a conference with the Advanced Math teacher about trying to get into Advanced Math for next year and she said, "Advanced Math is a privilege" and "if your son is so smart, he will have to prove to me how smart he is." When she talked privately to our son about trying to get in for next year, she told him that, "your mom thinks you are gifted. You will need to prove to me that you are that smart." Maybe we hadn't told our son about his giftedness yet! She gave him a daily practice and review workbook - Daily Math Practice for 6+ grades. She told him if he completes it, he will be caught up with the Advanced Math students. All I can think is, "does she really think we are that stupid?"

We have had conferences with his teachers, the counselor and the principal and it seems they don't believe us when we say our son is gifted. They must think we are just pushy parents. His teachers claim that since he does not have straight A's, he must not be so smart. We are just dazed and confused!

Is this a common problem; schools that truly don't understand or know what gifted is?

His WISC-IV GAI is PR 99% and VR 98%.

Any and all advice is needed!

Thanks!

This is a common problem. Some schools are terrific about it and actually pull the parents along. Many Many schools are more like what you are seeing.

Part of the problems is that WISC-IV is really different in how it handles giftedness than tests from 20 years ago. I think that we are seeing general agreement that 'mildly gifted into optimally gifted' for WISC-IV is starting at 125 nowadays, particularly if Working Memory or Processing Speed are more average, which they can be without saying anything about gifted-yes or gifted-no.

Percentages are hard to work backwards from - Did the tester give numbers for GAI or Verbal? That would be more helpful for my brain. I may as well ask for FSIQ, Performance, WM and PSI - to get a picture.

Anyway - from another recent thread:

Shouldn't like what you did as a homeschooler, yes?

If you've already been to the principle,etc, and already played up the emotional suffering that your son is going through, then I think it's time to outline with your son a few choices for the rest of this year:

1) Continue at his current school as is and your son's 'unit study' will be on finding ways to cope with a variety of folks who have a variety of approaches to life and see what can be accomplished through persistence and negotiation. If you take this approach, then you MUST distance yourself from whatever 'agony' he might feel while going through the process. Think of yourself more as 'making space for him to explore his world.' By 11, self advocacy starts to be a realistic possibility. (Although in some school situations no advocacy works parent or student-led.) After all, if he becomes a parent someday, he will likely face a similar problem with his kids, why not take it on as a learning project?

2) Tell the school that he will be attending for the other subjects, but that he is to go to the library during Math and you will meet him there for his individualized instruction - or some similar 'partial homeschooling' solution.

3) Stop sending him there entirely, put together a portfolio of his work that shows his level, and shop other schools for the rest of the year to see which ones can show you the curricula and let you sit in on classrooms that the other schools would see as 'right' for your child.

Take home lesson - whenever possible, sit in the classroom and observe the upcoming potential teacher, look at homework and quiz samples, look through the textbooks in use, talk to other parents who have had to test the school's ability to be flexible. Expect that if a school folk's mouth is moving that whatever they are saying, sincere or otherwise, is misinformation - only trust what you see actual evidence of. Flexibility and well-meaningness and respect for parents are 3 top qualities in a school.

Keep posting! I want to hear what happens next!
Grinity

His WISC-IV GAI score is 139. His raw score for the PR is 46 and VR is 46.

Well there you go - 139 isn't mildly gifted. It isn't optimally gifted. It's gifted enought that you may see fit troubles even in a full time gifted program. I call it HG, but there are no fixed definitions.

I hope that helps -
Grinity