Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy help please!

Puffin, I feel your pain. We have hit a few more roadblocks that I would like to discuss here, but apparently "many" families from our school consult this site as they all believe that their children are highly gifted + and should be receiving accommodations. (We are in one of THOSE towns.) Yet the gifted coordinator tells me that they have never actually had a PG kid in their school. So now I am understanding a bit, how the teachers see things. We are probably the umpteenth family to declare that our child is gifted and needs accommodations....but we ACTUALLY need the accommodations.

I have spoken a bit with DS regarding the plan to accelerate him. He is just so thrilled at even the prospect, it's well worth it to have shared this with him. It's also good because he is now completely motivated to get through the "boring" things he needs to do in order to really be ready to move to 4th grade in the fall (finish the times tables once and for all). This kid can understand virtually any mathematical concept presented to him (DH is math prof....so there is a lot of fun math talk), but DS is slow with computation.

Thanks for all the feedback!

Eastcoast, that's great news that you brought a spark of hope to your kiddo by sharing the acceleration plans. We found that in addition to providing some hope, our son learned that his parents would try their best to help his school situation. Even if things didn't work out, DS knows we are going to bat for him. (and we were always clear to tell him that we would try but didn't know what the school would agree to).

We went through a similar experience with math. Our DS had been given the 2nd grade curriculum in spring of kindy. He then skipped 1st grade and was given the exact same 2nd grade curriculum he had just finished. We asked for him to be given 2rd grade math, and we were told that they didn't have records that he had done all of it the previous year, and also he wasn't getting everything correct on pretests. (Note: if you can, get all acceleration decisions noted in writing, and a plan to continue the next year.) I looked at something he didn't get correct, and it was all because he didn't remember the terminology. I think it was "perimeter". I said that if it's a matter if reminding him versus teaching him a new concept, that was no reason to hold him back. If he gets a concept in 5 minutes, he shouldn't be punished by having to go through a whole unit. (The pullout teacher argue that if she told him what perimeter meant, that would be giving him the answer. Ugh.)

They also had scheduling difficulties with getting DS in 3rd grades math, and they said he couldn't keep up with the writing. Many meetings later, the school agreed to pretest, and if DS got 95%, he went to a pullout for new math.

Good luck with your advocacy!

Yes, add us to the list of parents who have found that just talking to our DD13 and letting her know that we are working hard to make things better for her helps her emotionally.

I also feel your pain, eastcoast-- we, too, live in one of "those" towns. It's the main reason why we continue to pursue virtual schooling rather than homeschooling our DD (you see, it ISN'T just us saying so... other people see it, too).

It was eye-opening to discuss academics with the local high school counselor (one of perhaps the best 10 high schools in our state). They've had one other kid like my DD. In the counselor's 18 years there, I mean. This from looking at her transcripts, and talking to her for twenty minutes when she was 12.

One other thing to bear in mind, though, is what st pauli girl touches upon-- logistics. It may be one thing for them to recognize and admit that your child is really HG+/PG and needs, well, something off the menu, so to speak. But it can be quite another to actually craft something which is feasible.

Sometimes it does actually help to come in with ideas of your own; it's all in the timing of offering them, basically. I always wait until the counselor reaches the end of his/her rope and looks/sounds helpless or confused. Then I gently offer a few "can we TRY this?" suggestions.