Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment identical twins, one identified and one not

I think you should remember that IQ tests and other cognitive tests are influenced by a child's mood and the ability of the tester. It's possible your one son was simply having a bad day. So I do think you should pursue your options for getting your son into the program-- even if it means retesting next year and getting him in, or trying to get private testing. I was in a similar position.

I have fraternal twin boys finishing up 4th grade. Our district has a highly gifted program and one tested in for 1st grade and the other missed the cutoff by two percentage points. There was no swaying the decision by the officials to let both boys into the program, as the 2-point difference wasn't close enough in their opinion. (I disagree.) I shed a lot of tears but ultimately, we couldn't deny one of the boys the opportunity to accelerate and learn at his own pace. He was an outlier in kindergarten in a way his twin was not and it's inconceivable that we would have denied him the opportunity. We just realized he has qualifying scores for DYS and we're in the process of applying.

My other son has a learning disability (undiagnosed until 2nd grade), is also highly gifted and is so socially gifted that his nickname is "The Mayor." The fact that he wasn't in the HGT program bothered him for quite a while but after his disability was diagnosed, it made a lot more sense to him and to us. After years of back and forth, the district has agreed to accept my son's outside test scores and admit him into the HGT program. But at this point, neither my son nor I think the HGT program will work for him. He's doing fine with the gifted pull-outs in a traditional classroom and when he moves to middle school, we'll put him in the gifted middle school with his brother. Frankly, he does not want to be in the same classroom as his brother, and I can't blame him.

I think you should search out a gifted tester who could also help advocate for you. I think that's what ultimately convinced our district to accept my 2nd twin into the program-- they really could not justify denying him a spot in the program in light of his IQ scores.

Still, it's been 4 years that we've had to deal with the different programs. In case you're in this position next year, some other things we've done to manage it in our family: We encourage separate interests where they can each shine. We don't put value judgements on the program-- instead we value each child's work ethic. We emphasize process rather than the outcome, risk-taking, taking responsibility for learning vs. just doing well on a test.

Of course we never say "you're so smart" to either boy, (or to my dd, who recently qualified for the HGT program with even high scores than her brother). But we encourage and praise them for pursuing passion projects and doing their best.