Originally Posted by Cricket2
Originally Posted by deacongirl
1) So the girls aren't biological siblings, fwiw. Oldest dd12 has DYS scores, and a recent grade skip that I think at 1/2 way through the yr. I can call successful.
Just a side note, but I wonder how often that happens that two adopted kiddos are both HG+ (not distrusting your instinct at all, it is just curious re the nature/nurture/heritability stuff). Perhaps the birth moms chose your family b/c it was a "fit," though and the giftie aspect of things was part of that... musing over...

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2)I think there are prob. a lot of gifted kids, but prob. a lot of bright high achievers with tiger parents who I can see prepping their kids for tests. This particular school cluster seems to be known for insanely competitive crazy parents who all think their kids are gifted--I have not actually met any of these people yet, but I suppose they must be out there. I don't think once/week pull-outs are that great, and I think even a skip prob. wouldn't totally be a solution, but I guess it would put her closer to middle school and more options. I think the school basically thinks there is such a large number of gifted kids that the regular classroom should meet their needs without much effort at differentiation. I have no idea if they would be receptive to subject acceleration or greater differentiation. The assistant principal does have a gifted certification and is very nice and handled the IAS process for dd12, so I think he would be a good ally.
Yeah, we have some of that here too with kids who are prepped a lot and retested until they get into GT. I'd also agree that once/week pull outs are totally insufficient and lack of differentiation within GT programming drives me nuts. Not all gifted kids are functioning at the same place and the needs are so diverse.

Subject acceleration is a good place to start, though, if the school is game. That was probably the best fit we had pre-skip for dd14 and it is working pretty well for dd12 in math right now. I'd rarely expect a skip, a GT pull out, or subject acceleration to actually fully meet the needs of a gifted kid, but at times it is better than the alternative.

Re: adoption--sorry, I wasn't clear--dd12 is the bio child of my husband and I, dd6 was internationally adopted. Dd12 is a lot like me, (minus the oversocialization, I hope) so I could, esp. when she was younger really understand where she was coming from. I think possibly that has something to with underestimating her (boy do I need to be on someone's couch! haha!) Dd6 presents so differently that maybe her giftedness stands out more to me. In the case of dd6 I don't think environment has very much to do with it--she was like this from the day we adopted her once her initial shock wore off. I know that according to research there is a greater incidence of ADHD in kids who were adopted. Impulsivity=more likely to end up with an unplanned pg. so the thinking goes. So I have thought that the gifted traits that look like ADHD could also lead to an unplanned pg. Of course that is even more complicated by poverty in the developing world. Completely anecdotally--I know 2 other kids the same age as mine, one adopted domestically at birth, one adopted from a different country as an infant, who are both clearly HG. So in that small sample there seems to be a correlation, lol!

It is complicated. But, I can just imagine the school and community with a collective eye-roll--"it wasn't enough that her bio kid skipped a grade, now she is asking for special treatment for the adopted kid, too?"

People's eyes popped out of their heads when they heard dd12 was skipping because the perception is that the schools are so challenging. I think that yes, for the high school kids taking 6 AP classes it is tough because of the work load. But after word got out about dd, another girl from her 5th grade class also requested a skip (different middle school) and is doing equally as well. I absolutely know that a kid across the street could benefit from a skip. So maybe there really is a higher concentration of gifted kids. I think to really meet dd's needs she would need a self-contained gifted program or a Montessori that was flexible, (or a different mother who would be good at homeschooling) which isn't going to happen, so we will just do the best we can with the options here.