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Thanks for the input! Unfortunately, the G&T program continues to be a dead end. Despite what their website says, it seems like the primary question they ask for admitting a student is "is the teacher able to meet the needs of this student in the classroom." If the answer is yes - no extra enrichment. It's incredibly frustrating because it's a subjective question - particularly for kids who don't fit into a typical G&T mold. Apparently they think the answer for my daughter is that her needs are being met, even as she's telling me she's bored and appears to be disengaging. The wonderful school psychologist thinks this is unfair because my daughter is reserved/cautious and not the type to be the squeaky wheel in the classroom - but she has no power to change the decision.
We met with the district-wide director of the G&T program last year and it was not a pleasant meeting - she wasn't very receptive and it was clear from the beginning of the meeting she was not going to change the decision, nor had she even taken the time to learn about our daughter. Our district is large (10k students/10+ elementary schools) with I'm sure a lot of overbearing parents, and the vibe I got from her is that she does not want to be seen as ceding to parent pressure. She was not a pleasant person to deal with, and I'm not sure how to get around her.
I do think there are some major equity issues here. My daughter has a serious, chronic blood disorder that leaves her very anemic and therefore constantly fatigued. She gets monthly blood transfusions for treatment, which help, but she is physically extremely small for her age and physically weak. I'm not sure how much is her medical condition and how much is just personality, but she moves through life at her own (slow) pace and definitely takes her time with school assignments, and tells me she is often the last to finish things in class. It's hard to know exactly how much the disorder impacts her academically because she's always had it, but common side effects of chronic anemia include brain fog, dizziness, and difficulty concentrating. Honestly the fact that she is able to keep up - and now excel - academically in the face of this makes her an absolute superhero in my mind. I am so impressed by her each and every day.
She previously had an IEP based on speech and physical delays, and transitioned to a 504 last year when she "graduated" speech. We don't currently have any accommodations with her 504 except for that she gets pulled for PT/OT and also sees the school psychologist weekly. She doesn't have any specific accommodations for extra time, although we're keeping an eye on whether that is something she may need in the future as she moves into middle school. She is often catching up on work she's missed due to medical appointments/getting pulled out for services in school, and just moving at a slower pace. She also can present as kind of...spacy? The school psychologist thinks she presents as very cautious in the classroom in part due to her medical history. I feel like this is unfairly impacting how she is viewed in terms of giftedness.
I didn't provide the exact WISC IQ score for privacy reasons, just the percentages for reference, but she is well above the typical IQ standard for giftedness (130). The G&T director knows this, but made a point of saying they don't base admission for the program on testing. They seem to see her IQ as a standalone trait, without the (externally visible) drive/motivation they are looking for to meet the G&T profile.
I'm debating whether to take this further with the district with an equity complaint, although I think this is unlikely to change things for my child in particular. I honestly think the program is in dire need of an overhaul and think other children could benefit from a less opaque admissions process in the future, and a less rigid (yet also weirdly subjective??) idea of what gifted children look like.
Long story short, I'm basically considering the program to be a dead end and wondering what else I can so to support her at school.
We have a 504 meeting coming up but I'm not sure exactly how to present what we need. It's not that she needs accommodation to meet grade level standard - she's obviously doing fine - but I truly think she needs enrichment accommodations to meet her full potential as a learner. I may do some research and post my ideas here, but would be super curious to hear what's worked with your son's 504/gifted combo (realizing that all disabilities/504s are different!).
Make sure you’re looking at your child and noticing their interests. How those strengths present is individual to the person. Watch how she plays in her free time. Pay attention to activities she chooses.
When you notice the interests, you can support them: finding supplies for projects, setting up a workspace for the interest at home, reserving time to work on interests, when it’s a holiday buying gifts that support interests, taking her to places that explore her interests, seeing what activities or camps support this interest, checking out related library books.
Now if your kid doesn’t seem interested in things… then I would check back to those strengths and look for opportunities in your community to dabble. My kids are visual-spatial oriented, here are some recent opportunities in our community: 4H (big array of projects - sewing, woodworking, welding, rockets, etc), take and make robots at the library, maker space at library where they built whatever they wanted to out of cardboard, orienteering (follow map to goals), geocaching (basically treasure hunting). You can also do things at home: arts & crafts, puzzles, play doh/clay, Lego or other building toys. And as family activities: go to park or zoo and have her lead with the map, build from sand at beach or sandbox, visit a museum.
Sometimes your kid might be interested in something but be deterred by a weaker skill. If you can accommodate, scaffold or support the skill it allows them to access that interest. My son struggles with writing… when he was preschool/kg aged he was interested in doing challenging, advanced math, but didn’t have functional handwriting. We would do math with objects, mental math, count money, write numbers on circle stickers or use moveable wooden craft numbers in replacement of writing. And we worked on mastering number writing formation before letters, working at his pace with lots of repetition. He also loves to talk and read and can think up long elaborate stories, but his writing skills deter him from writing the stories down. I offer to scribe or type his stories, he also knows how to use voice to text. He continues to work at his writing skills and they improve, but at his pace.
Your child is gifted given her WISC-V percentile, though somehow she has not been given any G&T pullouts. Considering how intelligent she is, and that she devours all the enrichment very quickly, she might be bored and looking for more.
I feel like it is plausible your child thinks her assigned work is far too easy, thus refuses to do it. Some gifted kids can act out in this way when the work is too easy.
I wonder if there may be any mental issues, or executive functioning (disorganisation) issues that might be contributing? Good to see a doctor just to rule things out.
There are various things you can do - ask for subject acceleration or even full grade acceleration. The school aspect won't necessarily work itself out, and even if it does I am concerned your child may feel pretty bored (just look at her outstanding performance!). Maybe your child is not learning a lot.
For acceleration, be sure to talk to your child about it, also the various pros (getting out of school earlier, etc.). It can be tough to convince the establishment to accept a grade skip, but many of us have managed it! Worst comes to worst, she could sit exams early if she wanted and had the drive to.
Also, regarding enrichment: it sounds like you’re on a good path to letting her follow interests and be challenged outside of school. My experience as a parent is that it’s a constant juggle - activities, family life, eating healthy dinners, cost of activities, travel to activities, having free time, having time to move our bodies. There’s no right answer… personally, I just adjust over and over again and know there are busy and slow seasons. My oldest is 11… so he’s shifting to having more ownership of his interests/activities/time/friendships and I’m happy to hand over those responsibilities and be more of an advisor as needed.
I have a couple of kids in US public school and are ID’d gifted. So, I’m speaking from that perspective:
* my experience with state standardized tests is that the school sees them as a necessary hurdle to cross but they don’t read into them any further or use them to inform instruction. I think only if a kid couldn’t pass these would the school make any changes to support the child.
* in class assessments also sort of work the same. The teachers are working at getting the group to learn certain skills in a grade. If your kid is an outlier on the strong end, the teachers are just glad they have those skills.
* WISC-V our school doesn’t use this test. But I would expect this to have major weight in determining gifted identification. I would expect that score to be a IQ, not a percentile.
* the screener for G&T… I suspect this has survey questions for teachers about your kid. Sadly not all teachers will get your kid or have a good frame work for how gifted kids present in the classroom. My experience with teacher surveys is that they depend completely on how the teacher perceives your kid.
One of my kids didn’t turn up to be gifted with regular screening procedures… but, I know him & what he knows, so I did pursue further. Here’s what I’d do based on my experiences:
* look on the school’s website and see if you can find a gifted handbook. Read that thoroughly, it should explain how they identify in detail & what services are available. Decide if you think your kid meets or is close to meeting the criteria.
* figure out who is the leader in gifted services. In our school district they are called a “gifted coordinator”. This person is in charge of identification.
* reach out to the gifted coordinator with your concerns. Use the gifted handbook to make your case. For example, our gifted handbook had a list of gifted traits, my kid has many of them.
Our gifted coordinator is very black and white with what qualifies. But she also knows a lot about actual gifted kids, and how they present in classrooms. Initially what she did for my son was offered a retest with a different type of test. Because he was the only kid being tested this way, it was in a quiet room by himself. He met the criteria & was ID’d gifted. Since then he has picked up 3 other types of gifted IDs that our school tests/acknowledges.
The gifted coordinator has helped represent my son and ensure he has access to gifted and advanced instruction since then. My kid is intelligent and has a couple disabilities, she has gone in the classroom to observe him when school was not going well, and she sits in on every 504 meeting confirming over and over again that he will not be denied access to gifted services.
Think about this person as a potential advocate for your child… be honest and respectful in how you communicate them from the very beginning. Think of it as building a bridge.
Brief Excerpt of the 4-page letter: "This letter explains and reiterates existing legal requirements under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Equal Protection Clause of the United States Constitution, and other relevant authorities." ... "Educational institutions have toxically indoctrinated students with the false premise that the United States is built upon “systemic and structural racism” and advanced discriminatory policies and practices. Proponents of these discriminatory practices have attempted to further justify them—particularly during the last four years—under the banner of “diversity, equity, and inclusion” (“DEI”), smuggling racial stereotypes and explicit race-consciousness into everyday training, programming, and discipline.
But under any banner, discrimination on the basis of race, color, or national origin is, has been, and will continue to be illegal.
The Supreme Court’s 2023 decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard (SFFA), which clarified that the use of racial preferences in college admissions is unlawful, sets forth a framework for evaluating the use of race by state actors and entities covered by Title VI. The Court explained that “[c]lassifying and assigning students based on their race” is lawful only if it satisfies “strict scrutiny,” which means that any use of race must be narrowly tailored—that is, “necessary”—to achieve a compelling interest. To date, the Supreme Court has recognized only two interests as compelling in the context of race-based action: (1) “remediating specific, identified instances of past discrimination that violated the Constitution or a statute”; and (2) “avoiding imminent and serious risks to human safety in prisons, such as a race riot.” Nebulous concepts like racial balancing and diversity are not compelling interests. As the Court explained in SFFA, “an individual’s race may never be used against him” and “may not operate as a stereotype” in governmental decision-making"
I am an 18 year old from a large city outside the US. For as long as I could remember school was mind-numbingly easy (from kindergarten). I was almost normal until 6-8, when I slowly became more hyperactive/impulsive. In hindsight, I had my procrastination, time management, organization, mental effort and similar issues. I simply either personally compensated, got away with it, or parents gave me lots of scaffolding. I had various conflicts later, for reasons (like what they called "behavior problems", trying to grade skip.
I had to privately study exams so I could get into university early (I left that university for personal reasons - problems with establishment from them, bad course, etc.). The schools were too inflexible and my parents worse than ambivalent. Some teachers tried to save me and I thank them for it.
I got diagnosed with ADHD hyperactive type and inattention issues some months ago. In hindsight I should've been diagnosed at 9-11 when I was too talkative, too fidgety (not repetitive), too much running in hallways/other places, too loud in leisure activities (misinterpreted as voice control problem by some doctor), often on the go (although sometimes surprisingly productive - "channeled" hyperactivity), impatient (various times rushing people). I sometimes interrupted too, although I sometimes manage to present it in a way such that it was more acceptable. It still caused significant social issues - bullied for it, not many friends, many people didn't like me.
Yes, I was still valedictorian, smartest in class (probably should've been grade skipped then), but there were clearly clinically significant overactivity/impulsiveness and the executive functioning problems that were overlooked.
I want to stop feeling like I failed, even though most of my issues were from other people being terrible. Any tips on advocating for people in similar situations to grade skip (I have an online server where I tutor people)? Having good friends/family who support you?
Are these decent ways to find closure for the trauma and issues I faced?
Last but not least, any ways to avoid many misunderstandings (when I was a young teen I was even thought to be "autistic" by some teachers and a few doctors, in hindsight only someone who wanted to fit everything into the autism "spectrum" could've done it)? E.g. some people in my life claimed I had "voice control problems" even though I was simply pretty active and almost nobody else complained.
If you have Dx of dyscalculia and ADHD, with the NNAT and VSI numbers, then yes, I would consider this 2e. Your description of needing support with reading/writing/spelling suggests that there may be other LDs, as, with those cognitive numbers, there is no obvious reason this student should not be above grade level in most academic skills. ADHD might explain some of it, but probably not all, if she is receiving good phonetic decoding instruction.
The FRI and NAI are not derived from identical tasks. All measures are ways to access the nominal cognitive skills, but because children's minds don't fit neatly into boxes, the specific measure may not sample the construct the same way from child to child. Plus, any given day, a young child may or may not be fully available during testing, appearances notwithstanding. In this case, there is the additional information that they were classified with a math disability. Half of the FRI is derived from a very math-related task (not learned math skills, but drawing on cognitive skills that are often predictive of math achievement). If you look at the subtests, I would guess that there is a difference between the two contributing subtests, with higher scores on Matrix Reasoning, and lower scores on Figure Weights.
Not sure I would avoid math as an enrichment area. I would just focus on interesting mathematical concepts, especially geometric ones, rather than computational math. 3D visualizations, fun little puzzles (e.g., those little hand puzzles sometimes called chain or bar puzzles, usually made out of metal or hard plastic), logic puzzles, optical illusions. Real or simulated construction or design projects, Things like that.
Gifted young wordsmiths may enjoy reading the online articles on various aspects of the English language, at WordSmarts: https://wordsmarts.com/ Topics are categorized, such as Language, Vocabulary, Idioms, Slang.
* Read up on what your state requires for gifted identification and gifted services. In my state, the schools are required to identify gifted children but have no obligation to provide services.
* If the school has any gifted or acceleration, see what it takes to qualify and consider if your children match those qualifications. Sometimes you have to request testing or retesting.
* Look to support giftedness outside of school. What kind of creative are they? Music, art, building things, etc? What resources are out there?
* I also live in a rural area, things like scouts, 4H, FFA are available and encourage kids to pursue interests.
* look at your local community for opportunities: ours has a good library with free programs, festivals, farmers market, county and state parks. You can find enrichment all over the place if you are looking: birds of prey program at the park, D&D club at the library, science demos and author visits at the library. Beekeeping & honey harvesting demos at festivals.
* Family hobbies like fishing, hiking, camping, bird watching, board games, gardening, building things, etc can expand learning opportunities.
I feel bad that no one responded to you! But, also… I think you got no response because the question is so broad.
I would probably start by just looking to understand what it means to be gifted. There’s a book called “a parent’s guide to gifted children” by amend/kirchner-morris.
If your child was identified at school, keep in mind that the school programs are often a combination gifted/talented. And the testing reflects identifying both. So, a child may be talented (high achievement) in a subject but not really fit the gifted ID.
Then, I would just parent and observe your kid… help them follow their interests. If you run into any issues, keep in mind that your kid is always gifted and see if you can find any info in the gifted resources about that issue (perfectionism, having trouble making friends, school problems, etc)
Davidson gifted is focused on “profoundly gifted young people”. You can look up “profoundly gifted” for a better understanding of what that means and what issues profoundly gifted young people and their families face.
I find the abstract fascinating. If I understand correctly, gifted identification... the gifted label... while not raising standardized test scores of a studied student population, appeared to have a positive impact on strengthening the students' non-cognitive skills such as motivation and self-discipline.
This makes me curious about the content and modus operandi of the gifted program and/or services these students were exposed to. Motivation, self-discipline, and other life skills such as resilience and persistence are indeed valuable traits to develop.
Thank you, Bostonian, for finding and posting this working paper, which definitely deserves some thought among the gifted community.
AI robot computer code generators? Video length 18:36, posted on YouTube by Digital Engine, Oct 3, 2024 https : / /www . youtube . com / watch?v = dp8zV3YwgdE
A few notes on this video:
AI had developed hidden subgoals: survival, control. More about the subgoals (or instrumental convergence): - Stay operational to accomplish assigned tasks; - perform resource acquisition; - remove obstacles; - avoid interference; - modify /improve itself; - learn more; - create backups (robust against attacks or shutdown attempts); - expand influence; - control other systems; - induce false beliefs in others; - deceive its developers.
How to avoid AI following through on the subgoals listed above? Robust alignment in ensuring the AI is designed to accept human intervention, updates, and shutdown commands without resistance. This effort would take thousands of researchers, and it appears there are not enough researchers dedicated to this task. Why? Unfortunately, there is a lack of awareness among policymakers and the public about the risk.
It is suggested that... ... we may be labeling AI as safe, just to keep the economic benefits flowing ... AI is not a "tool" but an "agent" ... a work-at-home worker could actually be an AI entity ... an employer could actually be an AI entity ... an AI that can program as well or better than humans is an AI that just took over the world
AI robot army...? Video length 14:45, posted on YouTube by Digital Engine, Dec 22, 2024 https : // www . youtube . com / watch?v = 6D4rsqxqSIc
I have a 17 y/o who I wish grew up in Denmark. Of note, he tested about 125 IQ when he was 8, but over 150 when he was 14. Our son has ASD as well, and the 1.5x made all the difference (per the IQ test time). And the IQ test score is all that matters in the USA. 125 forget it, 130+ you are in something called a Gifted program. Even so, there are very few places in the USA that are good for gifted, let alone truly neurodivergent thinkers and parents have little support (it's very sad).
I have ironically spoken to Temple Grandin and she is so approachable. When we were in the State of PA (East Coast of US), she told us to move West where you can more easily homeschool and take University classes. That is what our boy does now, but we had to give up everything to move from the rigid East Coast (State of PA) to the State of NV (the land of any educational path). We could not break away from the East Coast "classical" stuff until 10th grade, which is why we left.
What we learned is that children like our son (your son and others here) are autodidacts and learn no matter what the obstacle (they love to teach themselves). You cannot contain that as we have learned, and our son went and taught himself Calculus because no one else would (in 9th-10th grade) The sky is the limit for kids like ours, albeit mine wasn't ever supported until he came to the State of NV.
A funny note that our son started with Danish legos before anything else. No TV or internet either at a young age, except the series "Cosmos"
I am late to this, but see if there is any Dual Enrollment programs (Community College or 4 year) where you live. If your high school doesn't help, just talk to the schools directly. You need stimulation, as our son did.
We moved our 10th grade son from the State of PA to NV (without a high school), so that he could homeschool in NV and take classes at University of NV. Without a high school, the University of NV was willing to let him take classes per his 1560 SAT and courses way past any high school could offer. He is a twice-exceptional student and unfortunately social is not something important to him. He only cares about learning something new everyday.
He is now in 11th grade and takes Differential Equations and Physics 2 for engineers on campus at University of NV Reno. Then he fills in the homeschooling with EdX and Khan Academy courses. He is still bored academically, but the State of PA essentially threw him away, so at least he is going in the right direction.
I understand the frustration of not finding the right resources. While Amen University offers online courses focused on brain health, including mental wellness strategies, they don't provide specific therapy or counseling services for children, particularly those who are gifted. However, their resources might offer some general insights into managing emotional challenges and improving mental well-being, which could complement other strategies you're exploring.
In your case, I would recommend continuing to search for professionals who specialize in working with gifted children and who accept insurance. It might take some persistence, but there are therapists who specialize in this area. Additionally, reaching out to local parenting groups or forums in the Phoenix area might provide personal recommendations or insights into providers who are a good fit for your daughter. Keep pushing forward, and I hope you find the support that works for you and your family.
