Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion The ultimate brag thread

I love reading about teenagers and how they're doing! It gives us parents of little ones so much confidence and hope that they'll somehow make their way.

Filling your wine glass on both counts, NotherBen.

Thought you could appreciate this: DS is doing on on-line math course. First unit, all review, DS's long-form written assignment was riddled with basic errors. Next two assignments, 100%. DS looks at marks and notes, "yeah, that first assignment was way too easy."

Well I don't usually have much to brag about (at least I didn't think I did) but two things happened recently that were things I can't really tell my friends with NT kids… 1) we went to an exhibit of pterosaurs, and he knew all the names and was stumping not only the docents but also the employees at the museum who knew something about pterosaurs…they just didn't know what to do with him. He was using all the latin names, and pretty much talking about that subject like a college student 2) he's not a math kid, he's a science kid, but I've told him that he needs to really know his math to do well in science. His grades in math have been pretty good, he tested advanced but wasn't getting 100% on his tests for his grade. His school offered a class for kids who wanted to do advanced math in 5th grade, but it was an hour before school started and DS would rather sleep in than do extra school so he didn't do it. I knew he was a little bit advanced in math because he'd completed his grade (5th) and bits and pieces of 6th, 7th and 8th grade on Khan Academy, but he didn't finish any of the other grades, he just jumped around. So he has to take a math placement test for middle school. You either end up in standard math track, accelerated math track or highly accelerated math track (5 years of math in 3 years). I thought he would end up in regular accelerated. Color me surprised when he qualified for the highly accelerated math track… BTW I explained to him that the highly accelerated track goes pretty fast, and that it was more important to really know the math, so if he felt like they were going too fast it was better for the big picture for him to really know the math than to stay in the HA math track. But we would see how it went, and cross that bridge if we came to it.

Well done. Oh how I wish there was such a thing as different maths tracks here.

very nicely done on the sat scores!

not nearly as frustrating, but similar:
our ds ended his first year of hs with great grades despite many many days of being sick off and on; however, between the two of us not understanding that the schedule for finals was all over the board, he missed his spanish final completely!!

yikes - that made for a few stressful hours before we found someone who could tell us he could make it up.

ps, my husband never did get a h.s. diploma, due to a lingering summer class never 100% completed, but the college that he went to ended up never really worrying about it...so has a b.a. but no h.s.diploma.

Missing the Spanish final reminds me of when I was taking classes in junior college (I got out of high school at 16 and went to community college.) I had to take a typing class. The class only ran half a semester, and in my case the first half was full, so I had to take the second half. When I got my report card I had an F in typing. I had completely forgotten I had the typing class. Luckily they let me retake it.

Chris, don't tell my DS that. I really, really want him to finish the online course. Only partly because we are already out the $$$ for the one we dropped, and we are about to drop $$ for an extension on the required course.

I almost didn't get my MA diploma because of an overdue library book. You bet I returned it and paid the fine!

Off-topic, but...I suspect this forum is enriched for adults who have a post-secondary degree (or two, or more), but did not complete a high school diploma.

...yeah, I think that came up before and there were quite a few, lol. might have to start a 'brag thread for folks with b.a. or higher but no diploma'...;)

we will not be mentioning it again to our ds16 until he is well through with his diploma (fingers crossed), NotherBen!

Here is a big brag that I'm excited to share!

DS5 has a classmate with (I believe) cerebral palsy, who requires support from an educational assistant. The EA and I were chatting at drop-off this week, and she said she is impressed at how sensitive DS is to the boy's inclusion in the class. She said he often reads to the boy, checks in on him to see if he is content, and asks questions about his care. Apparently DS also seeks out this boy and other children on the playground who look lonely and tries to engage with them.

I was so proud to hear this! At first, DS seemed a bit uncertain about making friends with his classmates because he found it difficult to find common ground in play activities, and he found some of their behaviours chaotic and unpredictable. Realistically, he will not have all his friendship needs met with his current class, and I see him longing for a deeper connection with someone his age. I'm trying to find some like-minded friends outside school, and think that he will need his own academic challenges to allow him to be the mentee in class, too. But that doesn't sour the fact that he is being a genuine sweetheart at school.