Yikes, I just realized that Kindy is only a few months off and I'm getting nervous.
My son, who is the opposite of my laid back DD8, is way too prideful, impatient, and advanced for Kindy; yet there we go anyway. Hopefully we get a patient teacher who understands that major differentiation will required.

Anyone else starting Kindy in Aug?

September! Maybe we should set up a thread for that

DeHe

I am thinking kinder is going to be a waste. We had ds tested for early entry to first grade and he isn't quite where they wanted him in reading (he scored 79% spring of kinder on the NEA MAP and needed to be at 90% .. math he scored 91%). So in the fall, he will be in the 99th percentile to start the year. What are they going to do to keep him engaged and not a problem. I am so worried about this.

Most of the people here have early readers... mine is a mathy kid. Any ideas how to help him "like" to read? And let me add... he is a perfectionist and doesn't like change or new things. He is afraid to be challenged and likes things that are easy at this point


edited for my wonderful spelling skills

Kindy is mandatory in FL; skips are not even an option till 1st. My DS is also a math nut, I am hoping they will let him do EPGY during math time. Our county K curric doesn't even start counting past 10 till after Christmas, and double digit addition doesn't start till 2nd grade.

"Any ideas how to help him "like" to read?"
Try to find books that are easy, yet have hard words mixed in. When my son was breaking through into reading, I use to get him phonics readers to help build confidence. The library had a "See it, Say it, Hear it" phonics series that was great. They were easy, yet they had difficult names to sound out on every page.
My son is very prideful so motivationg him is as easy as saying "I bet you can't..." or "I wonder how fast you..."

our school year starts in January - so next January Aiden starts the equivalent of your K - Grade 0. He is in a school for "high potential" learners, but I suspect he will still be bored (as he is now already there)...

Floridama -- I think the skip option totally depends on the school and the principal. I live in Florida (Orlando), and have one friend who skipped from kindy to 1st mid year. I'm sure they would push back at skipping him at the beginning of the year, but if you go in with testing, let the teachers get to know him, and become familiar with the principal and the gifted administrator, perhaps you could work out a mid-year assessment to skip into 1st for the remainder of the year.

Here is the relevant legal information on Florida enrollment from the DOE.

have you tried starfall.com, i know a few kids who were not reading and gifted and this got them over the hump - its good to start with the letters and sounds but you can jump to the read along books - there is a ton there. And the format is oddly not book like so it might take the pressure off.

DeHe

Re: getting into reading. Mine was an early reader, but he didn't "like" reading until recently. We found that he really liked the DK early reader books, which come in different levels and many topics. My DS liked the DK books about Star Wars.

Re: kindergarten. We were advocacy machines. The school knew going in that DS was at levels higher than kindy in math and reading, but the teacher wanted to get to know him first. Although I understand this, it ended up seeming like a waste of time to us. We decided not to argue for too much in reading, as the teacher seemed pretty good at differentiating with that, and we went for math. What finally convinced them that our DS needed more was when he took their MAP test and scored really high. The GT teacher ended up basically tutoring DS in 2nd grade math, compacted curriculum. We advocated/begged/asked a lot for 6 months before our DS got this appropriate math. We also offered to pay for EPGY in the classroom for our DS, which they were willing to entertain, but they came up with the better plan for math.

For us, skipping kindy probably wouldn't have been so good, since our DS didn't want to learn how to write yet. Our goal for kindy was learning to write and learning to "do school", and anything extra was bonus. Our DS then skipped first.

Good luck to all, and get your advocacy hats on now!

Yes, the DK early reader books are what brought my son out as a reader as well, as he really likes nonfiction topics. He finally realized he could read about a topic for himself, and once he started trying, he quickly realized that reading silently was MUCH faster than reading aloud. He moved from finally reading the DK books on to reading Magic Treehouse books within about a month. He particularly likes the Magic Treehouse "Reading Guides" which are nonfiction companion books that go along with the fiction books.

I agree that the DK early readers, and some of the separate Step Into Reading series too, might help, as my son liked some of them.

Another thing you can do is try to determine the source of your son's current dislike. If it's decoding slowness or difficulty, you could probably get him over the hump quite easily with something like these Phonics Made Easy flash cards. You will probably see an improvement in a very short time. On the front of each of these cards is a letter or combination, often expressed in multiple ways in the picture (some of them are quite whimsical). On the back, you will see that letter or combo highlighted in multiple words, and on many cards there are also related or additional words in smaller type down at the bottom to focus on after he's gotten the main ones.

Florida law mandates that before a child is allowed to enroll into grade one they must be 6 years old AND have completed K. Private schools may be able to work around this, but our public Magnet school can't. I have a GT DD8 at the school so thankfully, I am familiar with the territory. The only difference is that my son is twice as determined and motivated to move fast as my DD was/is. He wants to do everything better, bigger, and faster than the older kids, academics included. He also has little tolerance for repetition or "baby stuff" which is going to make school extra difficult for all involved.

He does read... he likes Biscuit books.. we are about through all of them. I have been getting from the library "I'm going to read books". He is very good at sounding out words. That being said... if I buy a book a level up .. he won't even try to read it.. he guesses at words. He did take the MAP test last week and his results were pretty good.. in reading he was in the 79th percentile in reading for end of kinder and math was 91st percentile. I am thinking by fall MAPS, he will be right there at the top of first grade students. For him to have skipped, he needed 90 in both

Hello Floridama,
I am in FL too. My DD6 was officially in Kindergarden this year but for the first semester they pulled her out to do first grade math, reading and writing (still easy for her but much better than K). She ended up in 1st grade fulltime by the 3rd semester but on paper she is still in K (as required by FL law).
In order to make this work, I approached the teachers I knew at the school before she went to K. I spoke to a K teacher and a first grade teacher individually, told them about her abilities and asked if they could try and work something out for her. (They know from experience how gifted my DS8 is so agreed to work with me on DD6). Once I got buy in from the teachers, they actually ended up taking the lead with the principle. (He chastized me severely for reaching out to the teachers directly but I knew this was the only was I could get results. It worked!).
My DS6 also gets frustrated with 'easy' work, so it would have been a real problem if she had not had this option available to her.
Could approaching good teachers in your school work for you? Just a thought
Aly

Most don't offer early entrance, but are willing to look at a mid year "whole grade acceleration". Florida "rules" are very similar to GA. DS7 skipped K right before the first 9 weeks were up (in GA). They tested him and everything.

Sounds sneaky.. I like it! I won't know who DS teachers are till Aug and we are not allowed to make request, so I am going to have to wait and see which cards are dealt. I already planned on working the teacher angle first, although with the new class size laws, I doubt they will be open to letting him sit in as an extra 1st grader as it will put them over the 18 quota. They will switch classes for reading, so atleast the kids who don't know their letter sounds will not be in his reading class; however, most of them will still be a long way off from his reading abiities, and for Math the gap will be even worse. The kid loves EPGY, what can I say.

My DS will be early entry to K at a gifted school. I'm a nervous nelly. He is a fall bday, so hopefully he will fit right in.



I'm seriously having anxiety over it, even though I know it's the right thing to do.

We are. After a lot of visiting schools and some set-backs, we're starting early at a local private school that is suffering financially (low enrollment with the recession-- though the local public just laid of a ton of teachers, so more folks might flee this coming year) but has a history of rigor, acceleration, and prestigious college acceptances. That's of course assuming that they eventually send the contract to us. Every few weeks we get an email saying they should be coming out "next week."

Re: liking to read: The magic treehouse books were like crack to my son. Sometimes we'd take turns reading (him a page, me a page) but definitely something he sought out and read himself in order to find out what happens next. The magic school bus books were a hit too, specifically the easy readers and the old ones from the 1970s. He hasn't really been hooked so much on their chapter books or the comic book or the newer ones that are the same size as the ones from the 1970s but have the tv cast art.

"Any ideas how to help him "like" to read?"

this has worked for us -- keeping an open mind as to what constitutes reading: calvin & hobbes (pretty high level of vocab., awesomely funny), comic books, manga, etc.
Reading to him books over his level reading-wise, but on his level interest-wise (I read harry potter to our ds5/6, about 30 astronomy books to our dd4, and so on).

They are still learning the vocabulary verbally and of course the creative writing or understanding of the solar system are always great things to be exposed to...
I know part of the read-to-me ritual around here is a bonding thing, the kids just love it, as do I.

Oh, almost forgot, results so far: ds10 is reading several grade levels ahead and LOVES reading, dd5 (just turned 5) is truly reading well now after some wondering whether she ever would(lol!) and of course very proud of herself!! (just little books so far)

WE read about 30 books on the solar system. Some he was able to read to us.. some our dd7 read and a few we read to them. We than built a solar system. I think that following his interests more may be better than level 1 and 2 readers. I did look at the DG ( I think those were the non fiction readers) last week. I may have to go back and get some. I am wondering if there are any math reading books on this level as this is truly where his interest is. He told me yesterday, he wants to learn about the united america states over the summer (USA maps). So now I have been challenged to find inexpensive materials.

Add us to the list of families with children on the way to Kindergarten. My DD, who just turned 5 this month, tested at least a third grade level, also in the 99th percentile, reads and writes well, does well in math (fractions, time, money, number sense etc.) but is stronger in language than Math. I have tried to encourage her to like math more the way you may want to encourage reading more, but it seems they like what they like. In general, just reading books would be my strongest recommendation. In some ways I dread this year, but am hoping she will have fun with crafts and singing etc.

Have you tried the sir Cumference books, DS 5 loved them.
Sir Cumference

I found that on the list of books thread there are a couple of good threads on mathy books, with penrose the cat and some others

DeHe

DS had his last day of preK today. He starts K this year and turns 6 in Sept. He is possibly 2e (the school thinks he is autistic I and his doctors and ST, DT & OT think probably pdd-nos or something else) and has been going to developmental preK since Jan which has been wonderful!
I hope K can work well too. He loves school but, of course never learns anything. He is probably about 2nd grade reading level right now and I bet will be at least 3rd by the time he starts K. He is also doing multiplication (which he figured out on his own.) and can add and subtract 'big' numbers. Of course when we had his IEP with the new principal and one of the K teachers I just mentioned he is reading. Don't want to scare them, ha ha.

DS is almost 4 and reads well for his age, but I think he wouldn't read at all if a parent was always available to do it. He gets the most practice on our multitude of daily car trips. There is a real hump with reading from struggling through a basic story, to reading for the enjoyment of the story or to really learn about a favorite subject, he is getting past that now and probably thanks to the car when there is nothing better to do.

Our current car assortment is a couple of the lift-the-flap "See Inside" Usborne books (which actually have short but real text on or under each flap), for example their atlas one, DK books, some picture-type story books. I find DS doesn't like to read long stories in the car as it's a little harder to keep one's place while the car is moving, for the car DS likes books that you can open at any page.

Polly

had a meeting with the principal today.. we have math acceleration for next year! EJ will be in first grade math yipppeeee

Yay, frannieandejsmom! So good to hear that they saw the logic in math acceleration!

What a great topic! My DS just turned 5 and will be starting in August. I fear that his teachers will not realize his potential. Then what do you do? Are we supposed to inform them early in the school year? I feel that my DS tries hard to blend with his peers and keeps his talents a secret. His preschool teacher had no idea that he could read and she told me that he has difficulty with numbers from 1-10...AHHHH!! He can do double digit addition and subtraction! So, do we set up a meeting with the teacher early on or just see if she recognizes his potential?

Jimmysmom-- I would talk to them *now*. It was good that we did, because it turns out they have to rearrange everybody's schedule in order to do single subject acceleration for us for math and reading. Plus they wanted to do testing to see what level he was at in both, which will be easier to do now rather than later. All of that is easier before the school year starts.

We talked back in April. We also had to do testing for reading and math. As it turns out, we may have to move from morning k to afternoon k to get the acceleration we need. They have not completed the schedules for next year yet. It all depends when first grade math occurs. Although, I am thinking by the end of the summer we may need second grade math. Reading doesn't really matter because they are grouped by ability. Although, I noticed with dd the fact they did not allow her to change groups this year hurt her annual growth. Something I will address if need be in the fall.

If identifying gifted children is routine and well-supported at your school, you might have to do nothing; your child might get identified using standard screening tools, the school might decide on their own to do more in-depth assessments, etc. That's less likely to happen if you're not in a good area for GT services, and of course it is less likely if your son is the type that likes to fly under the radar, or would be less likely than normal to stand out in a screening assessment.

In our case, our DS5 has attended K in a school district in NH without any GT program whatsoever. We broached the subject of our smart little boy early in the school year, and seem to have been identified as pushy parents. Which we might be. Our son was assessed under the local procedures for assessing learning disabilities, since the main reason for using assessment tools in place at our school district seems to be for diagnosing disabilities and making sure kids don't slip through the cracks and get "left behind". Though we began discussions at the start of the school year in September, the assessment results did not come back until mid-November, and we only recently got the go-ahead for a grade skip. We would have been further behind if we hadn't spoken up early.

I can't think of many downsides to opening a dialogue with the school early in the school year. I can only think of one biggie: they may peg you as a pushy parent. The extent to which that is a risk depends in part on the extent to which GT services are provided and/or taken seriously at your school. Anything objective you can bring up may help, as may work samples. In any event I think it's generally impossible to avoid any risk during advocacy, and it's better to get the gears turning than to wait and pray.

Would testing be a possibility for you? Numbers are harder to discount than are parental anecdotes about a child's abilities.

Is there anything wrong with being branded pushy? My mom got a lot more of what we wanted after she stopped being nice and put her foot down, after 2 years of me being miserable in public schools (and a fourth grade social studies teacher yelling at me for contradicting her when she said the pilgrims were the first white people in the US). Somehow I automatically got assigned to the best teachers and so on after that without having to request anything, and teachers no longer dared take anything out on me. Later on my mom learned that she'd get more appreciation on her job and better treatment in a hospital setting if people thought of her as pushy rather than as a doormat.

Obviously you shouldn't start hostile, but there's nothing wrong with wanting to talk. You don't have to be pushy about it at all... we've been told that principals and teachers often like it when parents request an informal meeting just to learn about the school and discuss the upcoming year. Though this appreciation of parental involvement is is probably more true in the lower SES neighborhood schools than in the higher SES neighborhood schools. You could also probably use such a meeting to discuss volunteer opportunities and other kinds of issues, approaching it as a how can we help, how can we move forward, here are our special issues, etc. kind of meeting.

But if later, push comes to shove, there's nothing wrong with being firm and polite, and yes, a bit pushy.

It is looking as though we are going to send our DD5 to public half day (actually only 2.5 hr) kindergarten this year. As I mentioned, we have achievement testing done where she hit the ceilings and was operating at least on a third grade level during preschool, yet our school says that there will be "many kids like her" in her class. She is also VERY extroverted, highly excitable, and can appear ADHD like on the surface. They saw test scores, with her language /reading being four standard deviations from the mean, but acted as if that would be common at their public school. I haven't met a child like her in this community. I am not saying they don't exist, I am sure they do, but I also don't picture a class teeming with kids like her. The good thing is she loves everyone and is playful and creative and social. She (this is the only place I can say this and not prepare to be stoned) brings herself down to her playmates level and in pre-k also (another hot phrase coming) dumbed herself down there and I don't want her to do that in K. Maybe I worry too much, who knows. I am just worried they won't see who she really is and she won't show it...I gave them some numbers but they didn't know what to do with them. We do have an IQ test from when she was three but that doesn't hold that much weight. UGH. They don't have any gifted programming until second grade or third when they have told me she will most likely "even out" and be at a typical level. I am not looking for a grade skip, though she could easily whiz through first in no time (her handwriting is even good), because I worry about her socially, but I do want them to give her appropriate levels of work. I just don't know what to do next. I apologize for circling over this so many times, for some reason the whole issue makes my head spin.

We will be in kinder too. I was told to wait for the fall MAP (they test beginning of September) to see where the rest of the kinder kids fall. EJ testing with the spring group to see if he could skip kinder. Unfortunatly he missed the read (even tho he scored better then the average winter first grader it wasn't enough for him in reading). He will get acceleration in math. They will decide after the testing how it will occur. If there are kids like him (his spring map had him above the 90th percentile for incoming first graders) they will try to cluster him and give him first grade math in class, otherwise they will put him into the first grade math room. I hope we can talk about a skip to first grade after winter break if not sooner.

I fully agree. They just aren't getting the picture.

I always dislike that justification for the status quo. Take one batch of skeptical teachers and school admins, season with light reading on "regression to the mean" and possibly apocryphal anecdotes on PG-tested young kids becoming completely normal within years, and voila!

I wish I could offer useful advice. Knowing that someone is wrong doesn't mean you can necessarily get them to do the right thing. Here it sounds like proving their excuses wrong may not give you critical mass to change their in-place GT programming. It's a bad situation, but I hope for the best.

I think that she'll really enjoy 2.5 hours of kindy a day, and she probably will act like her neighbors, but maybe you'll get lucky and an experienced kindy teacher will see through the act.
Maybe consentrate on getting her some really brain-squeezing mentoring/tutoring in the afternoon?
Love and More Love,
Grinity

Since I don't post a lot, here is a background. I have a 5 (almost 6) year old DS who is very self driven. Much smarter than me but, definitely gets it honestly. (Please don't judge me by my grammar I was a horrible student until college, lol.) He is one of those kids that gets fixated on something until he gets it right, ok he totally gets THAT from me. He started with letters when he was a baby and started reading at 2 and well at 3. He lagged behind on his maths but, has a full grasp of negative numbers and figured out multiplication on his own and gets that there is an opposite to it, he just isn't interested in it yet. He was also speech delayed and has been labeled with ASD by the school however we haven't had an official diagnosis since his OT, ST, DT and two peds have said no that isn't what they think is going on. I have a Psychiatrist referral but, haven't taken him yet.
---------------------------------

DS has his K phelps testing today. It was super quick. I could hear him in there but, not 100%. Basically could just hear him giving her the answers and repeating what she wanted repeated etc. All the while I am in the waiting area filling out the paper on whether or not he knows how to count to ten, recognize the letters in his name and can he pick out some capital letters. It may be a very long year. On the plus side I think I have a kid that is happy for now to do easy work as long as he is getting praised for it and very eager to play with the kids (only child).
I volunteered to be a weekly helper so hopefully that will help me stay on top of things. I am SO nervous. He LOVED his developmental preschool so much but, it was so non-academic that it worked great for him. He has kind of done one of his 'stalls' I call them where it seems like his learning is slowing down but, then suddenly he jumps way up seemingly from nowhere. I won't be surprised if he starts K at a 4th grade reading level and possibly doing long division.

I am very grateful our IEP meeting falls in September. I think it will be a good evaluation time.

I have also been told he will even out. If people only knew how silly that sounded to us.

Well school has been in session for two weeks, and so far, so good. We have met with the K teacher and she is a kind, experienced teacher who seems to support my daughter. She says she asks her questions that she knows are beyond the others,has her do certain helping tasks, and they are in the process of testing the kids and once that is done, she will be grouped with kids based on ability. During a meeting yesterday, the teacher even mentioned examples of my DD5 saying and doing things beyond the class (they brought in squares, she talked about cubes as a three dimensional object with six squares on the side etc.) and seemed supporive of it,surprised and taken off guard at times, but not threatened or annoyed. The psychologist who came along with me clearly told her that my DD was not one of those high performing kids who will level off in third grade. She also talked about over-excitabilities. Speaking of over-excitabilities, my DD5 who is notoriously high intensity, impulsive, and can look ADHDish, has been in control and happy in school. Their OT and their guidance counselor came in and both said she was a lovely child that they never would have pegged for having any sensory or behavior issues. I'm proud of her, and I think one reason she is holding it together is that this teacher respects her and her pre-K teacher spoke down to her. I think this new K teacher still shoots too low when she gave examples of "challenges" but she will find out on her own that those are too easy. I know it is only two weeks in, but it is a good start. I feel they are much more supporitve of her here than at her pre-k where they were annoyed by my asking them to differentiate in any way. I know of one boy in the class who seems to be of a similar ability, so they may work together. Her class is huge, 24 kids, and they have almost no time for free play, crafts, or recess, but so far, my DD5 is coming home happy. She is highly social and is making many friends. It probably helps that it is only 2.5 hours. Maybe they are only placating me right now, but for now, things seem fine. For the record, I actually do not want to grade skip her. She is young and nervous in terms of navigating the school and being away from home. In class, she is very outgoing and confident, but I want her to grow more confident this year and hope they can provide things in the classroom with eventual help from the gifted coordinator. They won't have actual gifted programming for several years though.

Getting praised for doing easy work may not be the "plus" that it appears to be at this point. If you haven't yet, be sure to read the perfectionism threads on this forum.

Your description of your child's motivation level, including the "stalls" and leaps, reminds me of my dd. Good for you for getting in that classroom and seeing what's going on. I imagine a lot of how this year will go depends on the teacher that your child gets. It sounds like you're on top of things with both the possible ASD and also the giftedness. Good for you.

Bigbadwool, if you are looking to rule ASD in or out, a psychiatrist probably isn't your best bet. They tend to be very good at selecting and prescribing meds, but not necessarily at diagnosing ASDs.

I'd seek out a developmental pediatrician or neuropsychologist, preferably one who has seen lots and lots of kids on the spectrum, including gifted ones. That is your best bet for teasing out what is autism and what is giftedness and what is something else.

Best,
DeeDee

I'm curious to know how this "assessing for learning disabilities" played out with a grade skip? I have just asked the school to test DD8 for disabilities because of herr refusal to do certain kinds of work and the school counselor suggested it. She helped me write the letter...I figure at least we would know what is NOT the problem but are you saying that this process, at least in your state, revealed that your child was ready to be in the next grade? Because that really gives me hope, that maybe in ruling things out, we would actually get some answers about what IS.

The procedures for evaluating a child for learning disabilities include assessing current levels of intellectual functioning and achievement.

If those results show no areas of disability, and also show that current levels of achievement and intellectual functioning are very high, then you suddenly have the data you need for a gradeskip.

But, based on my experiences with a PG 2-E child, I wouldn't hold my breath about the school system either recognizing what the results mean or being willing to take appropriate action. But the nice thing about having the school evaluate is that they might do a great job and figure out just what your child needs, but if they do a bad job of it and you disagree with the results of their evaluation, they have to provide you with an independent educational evaluation with the qualified evaluator of your choice at public expense, so your child has some safeguards against incompetence or inexperience.