Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy successful advocacy gone wrong -what to do

We've (also) failed to find anything that really works for differentiation in science in the early years. In our case, I'm fully confident that it wasn't for lack of the teacher trying, not least because the year we tried hardest, DS was being taught science by the same teacher who was teaching him maths. She totally got DS and his maths differentiation worked beautifully. I think science is just much harder to differentiate; in DS's case, the things that were useful to him were just too mixed up with the things that weren't to allow them to be separated out for differentiation.

ETA not arguing, of course, that there can't be schools and teachers that don't try hard enough; just that it's a harder task than differentiating maths. DS still doesn't often learn new facts in science lessons, but he does learn skills that he will need and won't learn from books, DVDs etc. It's enough, just.

See that is what drives me nuts - they are accelerated in math - the math moves fast - LA moves fast - everything moves fast but science. I think the science is not accelerated at all. In our case the argument was about his age, size, maturity etc, not his skills. And I can't argue, he's a first grader when it comes to sitting and taking notes.

And we have the same house of science items everywhere - books, videos, models, kits - DS was loving the Great Courses - he burned out on like 12 hours of courses, so now the rest of them we picked up on sale will wait until he gets that urge again! And we love science friday on NPR!

DeHe

Our best solution with Science was to supplement it in the summer with Belin-Blank courses and we were blessed to find an outstanding mentor for our eldest DS who was working on his doctorate in Organic Chem.

Sometimes you just have to find the best situation possible for school and supplement their needs finding opportunity wherever possible.

You can talk to schools until you're blue in the face and eventually get somewhere....maybe, however, there is no doubt that you as a parent will work harder to find opportunity than the school will.

I agree that it's a bummer, but you just don't hear of this subject being successfully accelerated till middle school.

yes, I thought I had tamed the untamable tiger - weird though that the administration is open to a lot but the teacher is holding it back - I think I was hoping the principal would be able to change the status quo

DeHe

I wonder what the ideal science acceleration look like.

Imagine it compressed where he is basically devouring 2-3 years of science a year. There will always be a topic he has already done a deep dive. Likely those are his favorite subjects, what happens when that topic comes up?

Or if it is more like individual tutoring, then there is only so much of a teacher's timeslice he can get.

If it is skipping into higher grade classes, as you say, the core skills (e.g. writing) may not be up to speed with how they do things.

Compacting? Without acceleration means less of the subject he loves.

Maybe the ideal is a grouping with like seven other kids at a similar level of interest and ability. But even in those cases, one kid's gonna be googly on physics, another on biology, etc.

Yes, this is a hard one.

We have not managed to get DS accelerated in science during the elementary years. They just aren't set up for that, or for any kind of real lab work. The braver teachers have used DS as a resource in their teaching, having him explain things to the other kids in greater depth from time to time as a diversion. Right now he's working on a presentation about elementary chemistry principles for the 5th graders.

This year (his grade 5 year) we had a high school chemistry student serve as DS's tutor: they met in the HS science lab under casual supervision by the teachers and had an absolutely fabulous time. It was the highlight of DS's week to know a cool older guy who loves this stuff as much as he does. Since your DS doesn't have the attention/writing skills, maybe this kind of setup would work, since it could be tailored to his level?

At DS's request we are working on a science accel. for middle school. We'll see...

DeeDee

A similar option was suggested for DS which would be awesome - but hasn't happened yet - that I think is mired in scheduling issues!

I think science wouldn't be this tough if they weren't doing so little of it in elem to begin with - which I do not understand at all!

DeHe

The scheduling issues I'm afraid only get worse in HS, especially if your child is trying to fit in Dual credit classes, Driver's Ed, Music, athletics, etc. Not enough time in the day for your child OR you to run them about to it all and attend all the activities they're involved in....but most of the time it's a fun hectic at least.

Except for the times when it's just CRAZY hectic.

Heh.

Problem is, many PG HS kids aren't old enough to get themselves these places...

and there is often an ASSUMPTION that anyone participating is old enough to do so (e.g. driving).