I haven’t been on here for ages but your posts remind me where things were with my daughter a few years ago. She was always great at maths and I tried hard to get her differentiated work but by year 3 was told that she wasn’t as fast as some of the others and didn’t need differentiation. She still got everything right in class tests but when faced with something new did ok, but wasn’t amazing.
We ended up moving schools (from one private school in Australia to another) for all the children and everything changed. She sat a test to be considered for enrichment (top 10%) and did so well she was placed in a pull out class with 2 other children (out of 100). She lacked confidence initially and felt behind compared with the other 2 children but now, in year 6, has found her stride again and her problem solving is fantastic. She sat 6 external maths competitions last year and got at least distinctions in them all and does different class work and different homework.
The difference I think, is in the school’s definition of which students needed extra work. The first school thought it was the students who were fastest at the basics. Her current school appreciated that she had an inherently good maths brain. Of course, because maths skills build over time, she’s fast now as well.
Having said all that, things only worked for us when we moved schools and got a teacher who actually understood what enrichment should be.
