Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Public school- are these red flags?

I met with the school psychologist at our public school today as part of the kindergarten screening. The only thing I had on the document they had asked us to fill out was dd4.5's natural facility with numbers and need for an environment that would allow her to learn at her rate. Here are some things she said.
1. Most kids that enter our school are advanced.
2. We don't have any gifted programs.
3. She is on the younger side so it is not like I can put her with first grader for math. When I mentioned that she has been in multi age classrooms for two years now and used to being around older kids, she said," yeah, but math doesn't happen at the same time for both grades. So scheduling is not easy.
4. We follow state standards and curriculum so a kid needs to go through all of the curriculum for the grade even if they know some of it.
5. If she learns advanced material now, what will she do in higher grades? ( I thought to myself, "yes lady, knowledge is such a finite thing, my child might run out of things to learn. Seriously?) instead I just said that I cannot control the rate at which she learns.
6. My kid was advanced in math. We did not do anything and now she is a happy xx( a career that does not require math skills)
7. Your kid might be good at math facts but we want them to use math to solve problems. I told her that in fact, my kid was better at using math to solve problems than memorizing math facts. i gave her one example of a problem dd solved in her head and she finally said," wow, that is really advanced! We have had one kid like that 20 years ago. Okay, let me talk to the principal and see what I can do."
So, do you think they will really work with us or will they be so set in their mentality that their goal will be to prove their point. Because one thing she said is that if dd is given second grade math, no one is going to read the problems to her. So she would have to read on her own. Now dd is reading but is by no means a fluent reader. I think that would be a recipe for disaster. Any suggestions? Things I should be prepared for? Questions I should ask? Or should I just say it is not going to work and keep her at her current private school.

Yes, it certainly sounds like an odd one sided conversation at least initially. If you are set on sending your child to this school at least to see how it goes, then (probably) no harm in trying for a few weeks.

We made the mistake of sticking with a situation that was bad for our child in ways we did not even realize, for far too long.

It is interesting and somewhat hopeful to note that due to lack of a gifted program, there might be much less paperwork and red tape in the way of getting your child at least informally assessed. Also interesting that the person you spoke with kind of pegged exactly how often a small elementary school would probably see a PG child. (and that they admit to the possibility of such a child existing!)

Hm.

Parsing the narrative, it sounds like you've gotten in behind 100+ parents and their special petunias. But in the end a break-through, it sounds.

It's like when calling technical support for something, trying to see how quickly I can get escalated to tier 3 support.

I'd stay hopeful.

It's a yellow, "proceed with caution" flag. Zen Scanner has it about right, I think.

See what they do in the face of actual evidence about what your child needs, and go from there.

Chris, the conversation was definitely one sided. I did say a few more irrelevant (to the post) things like "yes, I understand", "that's great!" and "I know". I don't believe my dd is pg but it is a small rural school so it might not be too often that they encounter even hg kids. Dh and I have already decided that if we do send dd to public school, we should be ready to pull her out anytime it gets bad.

Zen scanner, I am hopeful but also apprehensive bcos of her last comment about being able to read her own math problems. I don't want them to use her relative weakness in reading to prove to me that she is not ready for advanced math. Maybe I should emphasize that if the school does offer any acceleration opportunities. Or maybe dd will be a fluent reader by September so this will be a mute point.

DeeDee your point is well taken. As a math person myself, I try to let the data drive my decisions at work but it is harder to do when it is about your child.

Masterofnone, you give me much hope! I would be delighted and pleasantly surprised if even half of what was offered to your dc is offered to mine.

Thanks everyone.

At one of the schools I toured I got out one of the advanced worksheets DS had done (which had multiplication and division I think) and the three people I was meeting with just stared at it. They seemed a bit speechless, because they had also been claiming that DS must just know how to compute but not solve (he's in first grade). But this worksheet was not just computations. One of them asked "Does he actually enjoy doing this sort of thing or do you need to push him?" Despite seeing the work, they wouldn't budge and had basically no reasonable plan for him. That's when I knew it would never work.
It sounds like this psych "sort of" gets it (after the bad start), so there is reason to hope. See what she comes back and tells you.

honestly if it weren't for the last bit I would say it was sirens and red flashing lights. She came up with the complete list of stupid comments.

My first response is ruuuuuuuun!

But you can give it a couple of months and see if they will do anything. If they don't, then definitely leave if you can afford to. Often our meetings would go like yours. Then at the end, when they had to leave they would tell me that they would "do some research", "come up with a plan" or "look into it". That was code for, "we have other things to do and we need to get rid of you".

Agreed-- sounded like a lot of "blah, blah, blah" until she finally got it at the end.

I think after that conversation I would be quite concerned, but I agree that there was reason to maintain a glimmer of hope at the end. Let's look at things 1 at a time.

Based on your subsequent post, it sounds like you might disagree with this assessment. If the statement is contrary to fact, why would she say it? It sounds like she is just trying to ease your concerns without having to actually address anything.

That can be good or bad. Places with a gifted program (which is usually pointless for the children) often use your child's enrollment in said program as a way to argue that they are already doing everything they can be expected to do to accommodate your child.

First she states that age is the reason that they cannot put your DD in first grade math. This implies that if your daughter were older they would be able to. Later she switches the reason. That's dishonest, and for me, that's the most troubling of all the things she said. If you can't rely on administrators being honest with you, how can you possibly advocate effectively for your DD?

This begs the question of how a kid who knows the material is expected to do the work. Are they allowed to do a year's worth of work in a month? Do they really need to do ALL the repetition that might be appropriate for someone actually learning the material?

This may be a practical concern. If the school is K-5, perhaps they don't have anyone to teach pre-algebra to a 5th grader. There are times when accommodation is more or less difficult for the school.

Perhaps their daughter lost interest in math because they didn't do anything. This line of reasoning seems to be pervasive: the idea that talented students don't need accommodation, because they will reach some acceptable level of success without it. It's bunk.

There's your glimmer of hope. It may be possible to convince the school that something should be done. However, actually implementing something effective is another issue.

Taken as a whole, this conversation would really worry me. I would definitely document everything (especially given the dishonest implications you mentioned). Do you know state policy regarding gifted education? It sounds like you're going to have an up-hill battle here.