I just met with DD6's first grade teacher regarding their fall benchmarking assessments (AIMSweb). These assessments seem to be about catching the underperforming kids, but not the outperforming ones.

During our conversation I was asking her about DD and math. She said that she seems to be average and doesn't want to show her work, so the teacher has a hard idea pinpointing where she's really at. Since I know she was working on multiplication last year, it's hard for me to believe that she's regressed.

Since DD seems to be a reluctant writer, I'm not going to push the math part (at school) until we get her writing. She's reading well above grade level (her teacher agrees there) so they're having a hard time reconciling that with her reluctance to write. It seems to me that she doesn't want to spell words wrong, so she just doesn't write if she doesn't know for sure how to spell something. I just ordered two copies of the "Spelling Dictionary for Beginning Writers," one for home and one for school. We'll see how that goes. Any other suggestions?

At home we started EPGY math as an optional "free-time treat". Last night she was really excited and wanted to spend an hour on the system. I expect that she could be finished with the first grade curriculum in a week or two, depending on how often she has time. I expect that it will take her longer to finish higher grades where she's actually getting new concepts.