Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy How to Find Gifted Tester and Social Emotional Q

I have scheduled an appointment with a local tester who tests kids for independent schools. I am not sure of his experience with gifted testing overall, but I think since he tests kids for entry to independent schools, a large percentage of these kids would be on the gifted end. How would I go about verifying the testers experience with gifted testing?

ALSO BECAUSE OF MY BACKGROUND< I am very concerned with social/emotional issues. DD6 is socially normal, but is sometimes inconsiderate of her peers who may not pick up on things as quickly as she does. For example, while out in the mall, DD6 is eager to read everything. What I have noticed is some of DD6�s friends do not pick up reading the same things and sometimes the parent�s of these kids feel like something is wrong with their kids since I obviously do not spend the same amount of time coaching/reviewing with DD6 since I am a full-time working single mom and most instances they are married working part-time or not at all.

Any suggestions on either end appreeciated.

Regarding testing, I would only consider a person recommended by a parent of a gifted child. Ideally, the recommendation would be from a similarly gifted child, whether you believe your child to be 2e, PG, or what have you. NEVER pick a name from a phone book and then ask them if they know about gifted children. Ask around here or look on hoagie's gifted for a known entity.

I think you have two issues in your second paragraph. One is that your child needs to learn some patience and tolerance. I don't know what your religious persuasion may be, but I like the old adage, "There but for the grace of God, go I".

The other issue is that the other children's parents are feeling awkward about your dd's gifts. My suggestion is that you let them learn to deal with it. I don't mean this in a harsh way, but you should not encourage your dd to dumb down so as to appease them. Just let her go on being herself, as long as she is not being rude or insensitive to others. It isn't your job to make them comfortable.

welcome to the board!

Fist thing is - are you worried about her behavior upsetting the other chldren or the other parents. I believe that you should carefully observe the other children and then coach your daughter is she's upsetting THEM, however, their parents aren't her responsibility. They are yours!

Who want's this job? No one. but once you try, you will find that you can do it.

A place to start is:
(Parent of friend makes pain face)
You: (loving and self-confident smile) I've seen that face before on myself (permission granted to lie here) Isn't it awful how we are always comparing our children to eachother? (Comspiritorial Smile - then be quite and listen, mostly people will want to talk at this point.)
You: ((wait))
Other Mom: My daughter seems so bright but she is obviously far behind in reading to your daughter.
You: My daughter is quite unusual - please don't worry about yours in comparison to her. I believe that it's what we do with what we have that makes all the difference in life.

I suggest that you practice this in the mirror, or in your journal, or even here - listing all the things that the other Mom could say, and then try it a few times. You may even find that you are interpreting their face quite wrong, and that it's you who is remembering how uncomfortable it was to be different than your friends. Or you might just get good at it. If you really think that the other parent is thinking that there is somethink wrong with their child, it's find to open up that area to conversation. "Jane has always been different." Might be all you need to say.

What's with out culture that demands that everyone be bunched up together in the middle of that bell curve? You'd never see that in nature - even single celled creatures, which are all clones of each other, have some individuals that will vary.

Truth is that unless your daughter is quite unusual, she probably did choose friends who are amoung the brighter ones of the choices availible.

As for testers, I guess you could just ask how many children she has seen who have three or more subtest scores over 17 in the last 5 years. You can say that you don't exactly know what this means but that your friend Grinity told you to ask, if that's easier.

Also, chech out the discussion on Emotional Baggage and Parenting a Gifted Kid, if you haven't already.

Good luck dear,
Grinity

Regarding choosing a tester, I don't know if this will help, but this discussion from the GDC website about their service might give you ideas about what to look for/ask about, etc. http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/About_GDC/gdcexprienc.htm . I would definitely look around on the Hoagies site - I'm sure there's info there as well http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/assessing_gifted.htm
http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/psychologists.htm (list of testers)

With regard to the responses from other moms to your daughter's reading, I had a comment.

I had to explain to our son repeatedly from ages 2-5 that none of his friends could read. He just thought that his friends' abilities would be the same as his. He and I had a conversation about how everyone is different and develops differently. It helped that one of his best friends was extremely athletic (learned to swim at 3, to ride without training wheels at 4, etc.), and I used him as an example, since he could do things that our son could not do.

The reading issue first came up when one of his friends (who knew our son could read) asked our son to read a sign out loud (because he couldn't read it himself) and our son thought that his friend was making fun of him for some reason. Our son said, "why don't you just read it yourself? you don't need me to read it out loud!" It was then that I realized that our son really thought that everyone else his age could read well.

With other parents, I usually bring up experiences like the one above, with our son's friend who swam/biked so early. I would say something like, "Our son is an early reader, but I get nervous about his development in other areas. Kids develop at such different paces, that it's so tempting for me to compare, but I know it's usually not helpful to do that. I should just relax and trust that he'll learn to swim when he's ready." When other moms (especially ones who might be feeling insecure) hear me express MY worries about areas where our son is slower-than-normal, they can better relate to me. Our son can bike and swim now, but I can still retell my experience of feeling like he was behind the curve in those areas, and it always sets the other mom at ease.

Tara

ps: Before making an appointment, I asked our tester how much experience she had testing gifted children and what sorts of things she would do differently if a child approached the test ceiling. That might be one way to find out more about your proposed tester's experience and approach with gifted kids.

I so appreciate each of your replies. So I think sometimes my DD�s behavior towards her friends may border on rude. She is sweet though. She will offer to teach, but the problem is that her friends never ask.

I will work on the patience piece with her. I have been trying to do this in general, but I will try harder.

As for the tester, I checked the list. My tester is not on the list, but I will check with her tomorrow. It seems very rude to cancel the appointment, so I will have my fingers crossed that she has tested children who have scored above 17 on the sub-tests.