My DS5 is in Kindergarten and he has a fabulous teacher who has done a great job of differentiating for DS in class, but I think we may have hit a wall. He definitely is exhibiting poor behavior on a daily basis like we saw in the first few weeks of school before his teacher made changes for him.
My bigger concern is his apparent "dumbing down" of his abilities at home, and probably at school. He no longer reads with expression, but instead with this monotone voice. The librarian at their school won't let Kindergarten students check out anything but picture books from an approved section of the library (what a joke! His teacher talked to the librarian and she stands firm on her rules.) This week he brought home a book titled, "Me Hungry". There were two words on each page and we ended up reading it to his two year old brother who ended up memorizing it. My son used to love to read this magazine he subscribes to, but now won't even read the captions. He used to read chapter books at the 2nd/3rd grade level but now refuses.
Also,(and this will be hard to admit to this forum!), we have a Wii gaming system that has been fun for the whole family, but he has become OBSESSED with a game he was given at Christmas time, Super Mario Bros. We limit the time to 30 minutes a day and he is allowed to play more on Saturday mornings. But I'm telling you he is obsessed. When he's not playing it, he is playing make believe games where he is in Mario World. His teacher tells me he has made up a Mario game the kids play at recess, and he talks about it all the time.
I want to take the game away because I feel it is contributing to his dumbing down, but I also think it could be that school is contributing. Is this possible? We have had him tested by a psychologist and he is probably a 3++ on Deborah Ruf's LOG, and I was going to seek a grade skip next year. Now I'm doubting myself. Any thoughts would be helpful.
I'm kind of new to this board but find it invaluable. Thank you!
