Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy For everyone

As my father would say when I would ask him "Am I crazy to think this?"...

"Oh, you're crazy, alright! But just because you're crazy doesn't mean you're wrong. Those are two separate issues."

That's my dad for you.

But seriously, I think the Jobs quote is really, really good advice. If "conventional" were so great, then you wouldn't be looking for something else for your kids, right? Especially in your case, 'Neato, if the part-time homeschooling thing isn't working, you can EASILY bring them back to the school. No harm, no foul. Totally reversible! I love "chances" like those that are off-beat but involve very low risk! I mean, why not be unconventional in a case like that? What have you got to lose?

I'm a big fan of that kind of loose risk/benefit analysis. It often makes choices that at first seem scary appear quite easy and painless all of a sudden.

I hope it does the trick for your DD!

I think I like the way your dad thinks!

All due respect, I would't exactly categorize this as a low risk situation, though.

There is the risk:

Of alienating the teachers and the staff.

Of highlighting their intelligence thereby making them a potential target of a disgruntled anti-intellecual teacher who then makes it their mission to "prove" they're not "that" smart.

Of having the other parents make an issue of it and mislabel it as there is something "wrong" with them.

Having other kids judge them and make fun of them. It's easier for a group of children to leave the class then just one child. Kids tend to pick up on that.

The risk that the girls will feel painfully self-conscience about it, when other kids ask why they are leaving. Girls particularly are very succeptable to social mores and not wanting to be "different".

The risk that it doesn't work out well and is then used as an anecdotal warning to other parents dare they strike out on their own instead of following the advice of the all knowing administration.(I've seen this one in action already).

So I don't really consider this low risk and that's why DH and I have spent so much time discussing it and considering the possible complications.

However, we've determined that the risks here are smaller than the potential pitfalls of doing nothing, so, here we go.


Thanks for the well wishes!

Kriston: I definitely like the way your dad thinks! !!!! A wickedly sharp sense of humor always seems to pop any stress bubble that I happen to be dealing with at the time. Laughter is the best medicine.

And 'Neato: I hope everything works out okay for your DDs in school this year. I guess I'm not the only one sitting here on pins and needles as the new school year begins. But your quote was just the right message at the right time for me as well. I may have to print it out and tape it to my computer so that I read it every day. Again, thanks!

Now if I could just figure out what my heart is telling me, I would be all set!

I agree, 'Neato, that's it's certainly not no-risk, but I do think it's a lot lower risk solution than many others you could try. Worst case scenario: you decide it's a dismal failure and return to full-time public school. Even if the teachers and adminstrators were pulling for you to fail (and I don't think they are, at least not the majority of them), then they're happy that you're back. Fail, and they're happy to have you! Not so bad.

As for alienating the teachers, well, that's always a risk with ANYTHING you do for a GT kid. Teachers have a great deal of power over our kids and, frankly, over us. But I think the way you approached it was the best one possible, keeping the risk of alienation to a bare minimum. In fact, I might argue that in some ways it might minimize the risk of alienation, vs. say offering materials for differentiation. That sort of advocacy always seems to me to be ripe for making a teacher feel like we're telling them how to teach. Not a popular move! Doing it yourself, if done right, seems like it could be a safer approach. They don't have to know that you're doing the teaching because you don't think they'll do enough, as they would figure out if you advocated for more and more and more.

As for the highlighting their intelligence: I think that's inevitable, so I wouldn't even put that on the list, frankly. The only way to fly under the radar with kids as smart as yours is not to provide them the services they need...and even then, they'd probably act out in some way to show that things weren't working for them, thereby drawing attention to their behavior, if to not the cause of it. And I'm convinced that if you get an anti-intellectual teacher, it's game-over before you even begin. I don't think you can make ANY decisions with those people in mind.

The parent rumor mill may get your situation all wrong, but that's not a big deal (said Spock... ). Certainly not a big enough deal not to try the solution. Heck, they might get your girls wrong even if you kept them in school full-time!

The social and self-esteem risks for your girls are bigger deals, I think, but no bigger than the social and self-esteem risks of doing nothing.

And being used as a cautionary tale for other parents of GT kids is a valid concern, but not one that you can worry about, I don't think. I mean, of course I'm all for advancing the cause, but your own kids have to come first.

So did I refute every point? See? Relatively low-risk!

Feel any better now, or did I just annoy the fool out of you?

But seriously, it may be scary, but I think things like this feel scarier in the moment than they really are. (And I can say that because I've BTDT, and I was TERRIFIED! ) That's why I added the point about reversibility. If you can reverse it, it's a relatively low-risk decision. That's not to say there are no ramifications. But you're not ruling out other solutions by choosing this solution, so ultimately, the risk of truly screwing up with no way to fix it is pretty low.

Realizing that helped me to be less scared about our choices. Truly, the weight of the world does NOT hang on this decision. You can go back if you have to with no significant penalty. Sure you might be considered the weird family who homeschooled part-time for a while, but that's not the end of the world. Pretty much no one is going to care what you do.

It's the up-side to not being all that important to other people, I think. They're just not that into you...or your choices!

When we moved from a city to a small town, I found that the people here cared a little too much about what other people do. They just love to talk about other people who are different from them in any way. So here I am, older than most of the other mothers around here because they started having kids right after they finished high school--if they even finished high school, married to a guy who rides with the PGR and sometimes wears his leathers and a do-rag into the local stores. I made the mistake of putting a picture of my son wearing his leather vest and talking to some of the other PGR riders (who do look kind of rough, but they are really good people) into the homeschool yearbook. We had gone to visit a VA nursing home and my son and I rode in a chase vehicle, but people like to talk. I also made the mistake of telling another homeschool mom whose daughter is also gifted that I wished my son could go to the public school part time for things like band or the once a week gifted pull-out class. Another homeschool mom heard me talking and I found out that quite a few homeschoolers here think their kids should be kept away from public school, or government school as they call it, because of all those bad influences. I made the mistake of having only one child at home to homeschool because you are supposed to have a lot of kids. I was told by several homeschoolers that they always knew they wanted to homeschool and had more than one child so their kids would have someone to play with. One of the homeschool moms during homeschool PE talked about how "smart" her kids were because they were good at physical activities in front of my son who has motor dyspraxia. I sent an email that I thought was only going to the mom with the gifted daughter about how lonely it was homeschooling because we felt different but I accidentally sent it to the whole homeschooling group and I think my son was right when he said he thought we were being shunned. Some homeschoolers with our group went out of their way to avoid us at the Walmart.

When the principal, a teacher, and the superintendent told me I needed to homeschool my son after kindergarten, I made the mistake of complaining about the school to anyone who would listen. I questioned what I thought was a ridiculous policy of academic redshirting and I wanted to know why they thought coloring in the lines was more important than learning, and why they thought all little boys had to play football and all little girls had to look pretty and be cheerleaders. I talked to a parent of a child in another school district about our school when my son took swimming lessons a few years ago not realizing the swimming teacher was a teacher at the school. It seemed like everyone I talked to in this town was a teacher, a former teacher, or there was a teacher in their family and I was an outsider criticizing their way of doing things. My son's best friends' mother is a special ed teacher and she is the one person who I think really understands my situation, but I think she feels sorry for my son because he is all by himself with me during the school year. She thought part time school would have been best for my son but it is not allowed in our state.

My husband and I had to decide what was most important for my son's future. He needs to go to college because he won't be able to do jobs that require a lot of physical strength and ability. It might be fine for most of the kids in our small town who graduate high school after being on the honor roll for years but for some reason can only manage to get an average composite score of 19 on the ACT.

Oh, Lori. *sigh* I think you just worry too much about what other people think.

So Kriston, you really nailed me to the wall on this one!


That is what I was trying to do.

DH and I tried to go with the lowest risk highest reward combo, and I definately think we have a good plan.

And my friend just told me this morning I'm over-worrying what people will think.

What part of INTJ allows me to pick up everyone's "vibes". Well whatever it is, sounds like Lori's got it too.

It's definately helped me with advocacy efforts. I've been able to head off potential objections by eliminating them before they happen. I'm pretty good at predicting what people's sticking points are by "feeling them out" and gathering info.

But Lori, it's like bothersome background noise, you have to figure out how to tune it out. Or it becomes like a self-fulfilling prophecy........

I've actually engendered some friendships by bold faced walking up to people who clearly seemed annoyed by me and engaging them in conversation. As if it never occured to me that they wouldn't be interested in having a conversation with them. Surprisingly, often they became new friends.

Lori, it is hard living in a small town. I grew up in one. ((Shrug)).
You've got bigger fish to fry, yes?

Yes, I think you're really got a great plan. In my own inimitable, long-winded (!) fashion, that was my point, really. You don't have to worry about all that little stuff, because you have a great plan. Great!

And I'm with you on the intentional ignorance about people who don't seem to like you. If you're friendly to them, it makes it a lot harder on them to be nasty to you. At the minimum, it makes their two-faced nature a lot more plain to others.

Tune it out and it disappears! Yes!

I just had to comment on this! When I was younger I was always very shy and worried somewhat about what other people thought. I also hung back in situations where there were lots of people because I didn't know what to say. As an adult I became friends with the most outgoing extroverted person I have ever met. Every where we went she was friendly to everyone and much to my surprise, everyone responded in a positive, friendly manner! I learned a lot from her. I am now much friendly to everyone and most people want to be friendly back. Lots of other people are shy too but I don't think we always give others the benefit of the doubt. Also, I've also learned as I've gotten older, people are really tied up in themselves, and while they may give you a passing thought, they really aren't that interested in what you are doing.

These are things I so wished I had understood earlier!!! I'm trying to teach my kids to just be friendly to everyone and to try to ascribe the best possible motives behind people's actions that they can. I want people to cut me lots of slack, so I figure I can do the same for them!!

You go, girl!