Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy should we accelerate @ school or continue @ home?

oh wow! It really sounds like you hit the jackpot with this teacher yay for a smooth transition!

Great. Now you can start worrying about next year.:-) Only half joking though.

"As for adolescent talk, I've actually heard dumber excuses from a teaching professional, who bewilderingly worried about DD's mental state if her classmates grew breasts before her. In your case, would assure the teacher that my child is not being raised in a bubble, and regularly interacts with members of all age groups."

I had to come back and post on this thread. The 5th grade teacher at our last meeting cited the following concern for DS. (He is in 2nd and going upstairs to the top floor to 5th grade math.) She is concerned that he is "on too many floors" throughout the school day. He attends 2nd grade on the 1st floor, attends 5th grade on the 2nd floor and then goes to the basement floor for lunch. It's too much "bouncing around" the building and they are concerned about some potential mental unbalancing that could happen to DS.

Where's that thread on this website about ridiculous things that administrators/teachers say?

One of the girls in DD's third grade class is very advanced in math and the school refuses to subject accelerate. One of the excuses she was given is that it's not safe for her to walk down the hallway by herself to the other class (and there aren't even any stairs involved!)

Two reasons not to send your kid to that school.

The whole district now is crazy with their safety protocol since the last school shooting. All doors locked (incl. classroom doors). Kids aren't supposed to be outside of the classroom unless they are accompanied by an adult.

When our DS was in 1st grade at a expensive, highly regarded private school, not only were all first graders on different floors, they were in at least two different BUILDINGS each day, sometimes three. Must have been some serious unbalancing happening.

Sounds like your ds is getting plenty of exercise.:)

This is just about the same story I would tell of my son who is now 10.

They were worried about gaps... LOL. he ended up getting the highest MAP scores in the district for 5th grade. He was in third 2 yrs accelerated in math.

The problem for us came in 4th grade. The school was on board with my ds going through AoPS pre algebra. They bailed on that idea shortly into the 4th grade year so we did it at home. The teacher says this is daunting and it totally fell apart. They also said it wasn't accredited by the school district so how can we grade him. This came from the Director of "High Ability". My son spent the whole day in a 4th grade class room, he had jumped from class to class since 1st grade.

He made it very tough on the teacher who was by the way the only teacher in the school with credentials for teaching gifted. He would bring stuff up like Euclid's algorithm, prime factorization during math and try to share stuff he had been working on at home. She would give him a worksheet to shut him up every now and then.

I certainly have worse problems then wondering what about next year.

"He made it very tough on the teacher who was by the way the only teacher in the school with credentials for teaching gifted. He would bring stuff up like Euclid's algorithm, prime factorization during math and try to share stuff he had been working on at home. She would give him a worksheet to shut him up every now and then."

The same is starting to happen with DS. He is questioning the teacher so much now. And they just hand him an iPad to shut him up.

This makes me so sad about public education.

In our meetings the teacher would hang her head at times. She wouldn't even look us in the eye. The school district ended up going overboard IMO and suggested we skip him and put him in middle school Honors Algebra 1. They had to accommodate us but I didn't have a good feeling about it.
I would ask "what is after that". These are the people who kept bringing up his not so stellar OLSAT scores.

There was one teacher at another elementary school in our system that sat in on one of our meetings. Her husband was the Principal at the High School. She was quiet but seemed to be on our side. We told her we were looking for a tutor to help once a week or so. She suggested a Senior boy who was one of the honor students at the high school. It ended up being one of the best experiences we could have hoped for. He made being smart at math very cool. Sometimes they just hang out and do a sudoku puzzle or play a game of checkers.