We have been procrastinating because, we don't know how well the test scores are in predicting his Math needs. Right now he is not rough/demanding with his pre-K teachers, academic wise, so we are not sure he will be acting as a HG kid in math later... Or maybe I am in denial here? OTOH the pre-K is play based and very unstructured, so the kids do whatever they want to do within a theme defined by the teachers.
Okay, I understand better now. Thanks for clarifying. This isn't an easy journey to make, especially because it's hard to understand the school system before you've dealt with it as an adult.
As for denial, I prefer the concept of
underestimation to denial. Denial implies that there's an understanding that's being pushed away, whereas underestimation implies a misunderstanding.
The thing is, I'm not sure that all HG+ kids fit the gifted-kids-pull-you profile, so your child may not necessarily clamor for more math or more whatever. But this doesn't mean that they don't need the harder work. It just makes it harder to identify their needs.
I am going to meet a math teacher/tutor next weekend in order to learn how to teach math; she is not willing to take GT kids (she said it is harder to teach them, is it?) but is willing to jumpstart me. Now I am starting to feel it that most people are not willing to work with HG kids. To say that I am nervous might be an understatement.
It depends. If the teacher understands mathematics and giftedness, teaching HG+ kids is probably easier most of the time, because the pupil gets it so much more quickly. My DD often gets the idea halfway through my explanation and can then do a problem without more help from me. I get what's going on, and see it as a great thing. But someone who doesn't grok giftedness may not like this kind of reaction, fearing that the student is being impatient and doesn't actually get it.
