Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy First parent-teacher conference,feeling frustrated

Great point. Single Subject Acceleration (SSA) is often helpful.

Here's a link to another post mentioning single-subject acceleration.

aj614, you've received a lot of good advice above - I have just a few randomish suggestions, in no particular order:

* You haven't shared the results of his previous testing with the school. I would share - it's an important data point that separates you from other parents. We saw just about every other parent in our childrens' K-1 classrooms insisting that their child was gifted and needed differentiation - which most likely means you aren't the only parent who's requesting something extra for your child. What you have that most other parents aren't going to have is proof (in the previous testing) that your ds is capable of more and you aren't just an over-eager parent.

* Recap what's happened so far with a brief summary email, request end-of-year-testing, and attach a copy of the previous testing with the email request.

* If you can't get the school to provide the end-of-year testing, one way to get proof of math achievement is to have an evaluation at a private math tutoring service. I won't mention names, but one of the national chains that operates here gives every student who's considering signing up a very widely recognized-by-schools achievement test, and they test above grade level for kids who are capable. It will cost money, but not as much money as going for a complete ability vs achievement set of testing. Another testing option might be to check and see who your local homeschool community uses for testing - we found very affordable ability vs achievement testing that way.

* Don't discount what your ds' teacher says about where your child is or how they are coping with the "long day" etc - get the details behind what's been said. Not every gifted child is gifted across all subjects and all situations - and there may be something your ds is struggling with that you aren't seeing. I doubt it, but it did happen to us - so it's something that I just suggest trying to be aware of. I was all too eager to brush off concerns from our ds' teacher in K-2nd grade simply because he was so smart, but ultimately he also had a challenge which was causing him a lot of stress at school.

* Try to spend time in your ds' classroom if you can. It might help to know what the environment is like - are the other students on task or are there a lot of behavior issues in the classroom? What's the teacher like in action, not just in conferencing? When do they eat? Is your ds hungry at the end of the day? Is he really having to learn phonic sounds rather than phonics for spelling? What is he like in the classroom?

* Find out if there is a gifted program coordinator at your district level (above the school level). Contact the supervisor and ask for advice. It's possible there is some type of programming/help out there that isn't advertised, and the gifted supervisor is going to be (hopefully) much more familiar with the testing your ds has had than his school teacher is likely to be.

* Are there any other school options available to you other than the school he's in and homeschool? We were also huge proponents of public school until we had issues, and finally left for a private school. It wasn't even a "gifted" school yet it made *all* the difference in the world for our ds.

* If the school can't offer differentiation, can you offer anything yourself as a parent volunteer? When our children were in early elementary (in a school with no gifted program) there was a parent who volunteered once per week and ran a math pull-out for the higher level math students, and I used to volunteer once per week helping students with writing and spelling.

Hang in there!

polarbear

Again, I so appreciate the advice and ideas! I have volunteered to help in the classroom, but have been waiting over two weeks for the background check to get done so that I can start helping. (Yet another frustration.) Hopefully I will be able to start soon! She wants to use me during reading groups two mornings per week. I am also "room mom" and K PTA rep! Probably shouldn't have been such an eager beaver since I'm now considering pulling him out. But in all seriousness, I am willing to work hard to make it work if we can, and the teacher and I have a good relationship. She does have a challenging class and she is a young, fairly new teacher. The private schools in our town are more than we can afford, even if I went back to work. But there are three charter schools I might visit. I think I was a little stunned after the conference, and now that I've had time to reflect, talk to DS and DH more, etc., I am ready to approach the teacher with the info about his previous testing and ask for more, especially in math. This weekend, he figured out for himself how to multiply fractions, and was excited to discover they "get smaller when you multiply them!" I really feel this is his strongest area of giftedness.

My son went to a first-grade classroom for reading, writing, and math instruction while he was in K. He stayed with K for science, morning activities, lunch, "specials" etc. All in all it was something like a 40/60 split (40% 1st grade). In 1st grade, he was excused from most on-grade classwork in reading and math and given a great deal of independent work, which he was able to handle as he is self-motivated and mature. I don't know if these options will work for you. Just giving examples of what we did.

My state lets schools set the criteria for their gifted programs. It made it a little tricky to transfer schools Similar to you, our old district did just pull outs for kids 3rd and above.

Because our old school was painfully slow at sending records, I ended up providing my copies of previous testing. They took the Stanfords and OLSAT for my 10yo. We homeschooled last year, but they would not take our CAT testing since they only wanted to rely on testing performed by another school or their own. So please bear that in mind if you think about doing your own testing.

Will they let you request testing? Our new district had a parent referral form or teachers could do the requesting. I recommend you be the ones to request, though. I seemed to have better luck transferring in (as much trouble as it was) than parents have when they request the testing.

FWIW, I was told by our son's K teacher that they really didn't do math. That is, their sole focus was on getting everyone to read in Kinder. I'm sure math was touched on peripherally, but there were no 1+1=2 sheets coming home, that's for sure! So their "assessment", unless it was some kind of standardized test, is not one I'd put much stock in. A lot of teachers through the years would do the PALS testing for my kids and they were at grade level, only because they stopped at grade level. They didn't want to waste the time continuing the test to see what the true grade level was.

Our old district, which wasn't keen on grade skips, would let some kids visit a grade ahead's classroom for reading or math, as appropriate. It might be a stepping stone to getting a skip later if they are open to this type of arrangement now.

Hearing about others' experiences is so helpful! I emailed his K teacher and told her about his percentile scores from the testing that was done in our previous district. I offered to give her a copy of the results for his file if that would be helpful. I also told her that after reflecting on our discussion during the conference and talking to DS more about his desires for school, we want to pursue additional accomodations for him in math. I asked if he could be given EOY assessments for K and 1st grade and then we could consider single-subject acceleration to a 1st or 2nd grade classroom for math as deemed appropriate. I was so nervous hitting "send" on this email! It was perfectly friendly and upbeat and only making requests, not demands, but I still worry how it will be received. Anyone else struggle with feeling like you are becoming "that" parent? Anyway, she replied the next day to say that she was going to set up a meeting with the school's AIG specialist to discuss math options for DS. I am hopeful the AIG specialist has dealt with a kid like mine before and will help us get the best fit in math instruction for DS! In the meantime, we are supplementing at home. He comes home excited to do some math practice with me and learn something new. He says he wants to go to 4th grade for math because he "wants it to be hard to do!"

It is super helpful to hear what others have experienced and to figure out the best way to seek solutions to issues. I can't tell you how much I've appreciated this forum for that. And yes, I, too, have to fight that feeling of being 'that' parent. It's like jumping into a cold swimming pool; I'm slowly getting used to dealing with the school folks.