Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Having more than one "special snowflake"?

How do you talk to your school when you have more than one advanced child, particularly when you know that you will end up talking to the same people when you advocate?

So far, I have tried to deal as much as possible with one child request at a time. Sometimes, however, I need to talk to the school about both of them, yet I fear the reaction...so one gets the short shrift. I am afraid that if I bring up the other child it will just sound like I think that my children are all gifted, and weaken my request for helping one of them. Also, if I soon need to make a request for the other child, I fear that I am now asking too much.

I'm contemplating staggering requests...but in a way, that just seems silly.

How do others do this?

I advocate when my kids need advocacy. For my own sake, I wish they'd take turns a little better than they do.

We put my older onto an IEP on the same day we skipped a grade for my younger. These were done in two successive building team meetings, lasting a total of 4 hours. Afterwards, the principal pushed himself back from the table looking overwhelmed and asked, "you don't have any more kids, do you?"

I've not seen resistance to dealing with different kids needs at more or less at the same time when the requests are based on concrete evidence or observations.

We are just starting to face this situation, with a SSA (three classes, two grades above age level) older child and a five year old who is about to need advocacy (they still have him identifying letter sounds with the rest of the class and working on simple word identification; he just read most of a 200 page book).

In our case, although I'm not looking forward to approaching the well-intentioned K teacher, I know that the school already has been pretty good regarding the needs of ODS. They are not going to be shocked to talk about a younger child who has similar needs. In fact, the principal told us when we enrolled him to let her know if he needs more...

So, the school may not be looking at this the way you are looking at it!

Yes. This.

Sometimes it helps that they've recognized the unusual qualities of the elder child, so that when siblings turn out unusual, they already have some frame of reference. You are not starting from zero that way.

ITA. We've not yet needed anything for our youngest, but the school mentioned him when we were discussing the oldest. To them, it was perfectly clear: oldest is very bright, with what they assume are very bright parents, and youngest seems to fit the picture. How logical and reasonable.

If the school on the other hand doesn't agree with your assessment of the child, you may have a very different experience.

I would say that schools are quite accustomed to similar needs for members of the same family. Most educators know that both giftedness and learning disabilities run in families. As long as it is clear that your interest is your children's needs, and not your own, my experience is that school teams will respond to the second child's needs as well as they have to the first child's.

Thanks, everyone. They are both DYS (and both have ability and achievement scores that make them DYS-eligible), but accommodations at our local school have been very hard to come by. We may have very recently found some personnel at the school who finally understand, but the other child continues to be in a "poor fit" situation (and this year she started refusing to go to school, so we are VERY concerned about her). I know that I need to approach the school, but I do fear asking for too much as DS needs help, too. It is good to get everyone's feedback - thank you.

You've received great advice above, about focusing on each child's needs. I'll just add that "special snowflake" is a derogatory term. A special snowflake is not necessarily an intellectually gifted child... and an intellectually gifted child is not necessarily a "special snowflake".

Actually they are, aren't they. As you have previously mentioned that that both of your children have tested as gifted and are DYS, this ought not be a concern: When both of your children are intellectually gifted, it is right that a parent would think that both children are intellectually gifted... this is not "special snowflake syndrome."

Advocacy can be difficult and time-consuming. You mention a dearth of "accommodations"; the term accommodations most often refers to steps taken to assist a child with deficits, such as remediation/accommodation for learning difference/disability or the second "e" for a 2e child. On the gifted side, the terms "challenge" and "advanced curriculum" are more often used. In order for responses to be tailored toward your present circumstances, which type of services are you having difficulty obtaining? Both?

Yes, indigo. And I am sorry if that term is offensive to anyone. It was really meant as self-deprecating humor about our situation and how we might be being perceived by our school.

As far as we know, neither DC appears to be 2e. Perhaps that was poor word choice on my part. I find myself using language with the school that acknowledges that they may be different, but that doesn't offend the sensibilities of school personnel. The DC definitely seem to need advanced curriculum, but in the case of DD - she IS in what the "high performing" school considers advanced curriculum. It just does not seem to be enough.

That's what I hoped and it's good to hear you say that, as the forums are not read exclusively by those interested in helping meet the unusual needs of gifted kids but also by those who may wish to discredit giftedness.

Unfortunately this is very common. This highlights the difference between the principle of "matching the program to the child" and the common practice of "matching children to a program". The book Re-forming Gifted Education and the related Gifted Education Planners may be of assistance to you.

I'll join the others who've encouraged you to keep up the advocacy, stick with facts, offer suggestions, and not be dissuaded by school personnel taking offense.