Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Am I too focused on 'gifted'?

Dazey, Yes, I do agree with yo--mostly. I think you are right that we are talking about different kinds of boredom and that we need better terms. I guess what I feel like I'm hearing a delineation that if the boredom that happens at home (where we are teaching our kids to entertain themselves and explore) it's a "good" kind and if they are bored at school it is the "bad" kind. I just think that that is too coarse a distinction. I don't think that if fair to the school and I worry that it sends the wrong message to the kids--that it is not their responsilbity to address their boredom. The child has a responsibility to address their boredom as well. I think DS does get a lot out of being bored at school. I asked him last night how he gets through repetitive lessons and he came up with a list of about 10 things he does that indicate to me that he his learning useful skills (social, emotional, advocacy, maturational, and intellectual). In no way is he learning to shut down, so I really feel like his school boredom is a good thing.

But I have not taken an approach that he should just suffer and be bored. I have coached him a lot on how to get to the point where boredom is beneficial. And we have both advocated for him a lot and we have several accomdations in place. So you are right, Dazey, I think we are in basically the same ballpark. And if we had done these things and I saw my kid shutting down, I would definitely act.

I have a hard time when I feel like we lose the middle ground in these discussions and I tend to like to bring us back to the middle when I see the discussion drifting too far to the extremes! So now we have to address the vocabulary. How do we distinguish between our healthy boredom and our soul-crushing boredom?

Yes I get into a conversation with someone that only lives on the extremes and it drives me insane lol.

I think addressing *boredom* here on this board is very different than addressing boredom with others. I know of parents with struggling kids who complain that school is boring. I can imagine sitting in on a Quantum mechanics class that's at a very speedy pace, I'd probably get bored after awhile followed by frustration.

I wish my son had had it w/in himself to do what he needed to do to make it through the day. He just didn't. But there was also NO accommodations made for him. And from a couple of sources (one from within the school) that nothing was going to happen for him. I saw no point in fighting and it's just not me anyhow.

As I said, it's highly kid dependent. My kid totally shut down and I saw no benefit in having him deal w/ boredom AS he perceived it.

SHould we ask Mark to split this thread into two threads?

Yes I think estimation is important. Singapore math is heavily into estimation. For a problem like 23x59, it wants the kids to do 20x60 first, then work out the problem. I think it helps to know the ballpark your answer should be in.

As well as estimating how much a pint is or 3L etc. Some things I have no idea about like how much does an elephant way anyhow?

Yes I agree in his situation, putting up with a little boredom is fine. That's why I made my post about little vs a lot. Only you can decide where that line is drawn and it highly depends on the kid. Sorry for going off on my HUGE tangent.

Boredom is a huge sore spot for me. I've read "Gifted kids don't get bored." And I've been told "WHy can't he amuse himself in his head, if he's so smart?" "What's wrong with your child b/c my child knows all that stuff already and he's perfectly happy." or some variation of those. "Well he has many years of boring school work to get through so he might as well get used to it now." and "Well you make things too exciting at home doing chemistry and physics. You need to make home so boring that school looks inviting."

I was left w/ "what is wrong with my child?" Why can't he make it in this environment? People move from miles away for this district blah blah blah.

And I believed a lot of it. I just wish when my son was in K, someone would have told me these things and he wouldn't have had to suffer. But I thought it would be just for that year and bought into he has to learn to deal with it. 1st was better, but as soon as the teacher started winding down in MARCH b/c she had the high kids and they finished the material for the year, he started complaining. He is just like I am I think. He requires lots of data input coming in ... I'm always reading something, or thinking about something or researching something. It's the scientist in me. WHen I was in science, I'd have stacks of journals to read through, assimilate into current knowledge, determine who it affected the project I was working on, put it together in a presentation, present it, answer questions then on to the next thing to research. When I left science to be home w/ my baby, I thought I would go insane from not having intellectual stimulation. I have gotten used to it so much so that the thought of doing that level of mental work frightens me. And sadly, that's what happened to my son in just 3 years.

from gratified3:

This is were I am at right now. I just wonder if I never came up with the label how different things would be. And then my fear of hothousing is there so I really find myself holding her back. She learned everything from play and what you described is my DD in a nut shell. She goes to the playground all the time, weather permitting. She plays with play doh and through that adds and subtracts as she plays. Talks about colors and shapes, etc. while playing with the play doh. Baking has been a big part of her life and she learned important math out of that. This morning she was all about musical instruments and played the piano for a while and pulled out her guitar which freaks me out. I can take the same guitar and it sounds like tar but she uses it a lot like the movie August Rush where he got hold of the guitar and explored it. Hitting it in certain areas to hear the notes and she already understands the keys and how turning them tunes the guitar and will work on it forever. Her dad plays guitar and his dad played guitar so I am sure it runs in the family. But even my DH admits that her approach to it all is weird but very interesting. So again ... she discovers everything through playing so bringing in workbooks for her to do just feels like I am a pushy mom. I think I decided the best thing to do is leave them on the shelf and wait until she is in preschool and see if she makes that connection.

So I question if I didn't know the term gifted and just kept with her cues would she be even more advanced now? I find myself holding her back partly b/c I don't want her to be bored in kindergarten. But even before knowing she was gifted she was equal to a first grader and some second grade curriculum so really how much can I hold her back when she discovers everything on her own? I have also noticed (big sigh) that her cognitive abilities are even more advanced in the last few weeks. We usually get the giggles from visual reference but now she gets the verbal jokes. She just gets a lot more then she used to and now her complex sentences which were already complex by the time she was 18 months are even more complex. If she was at a 6 -7 yr old in verbal before I have no idea what she is at now. So conversations around her gets interesting to say the least.

Good point Dazey. That's another aspect of "boredom" in school that I've thought could be detrimental to my children. I like to think of mental effort as a habit, just like physical exercise. Yes, our kids have a drive to be mentally active but that drive sometimes needs a kick start and needs to be focused on learning in a way they might not necessarily do on their own. It takes more effort on the school's part to give our kids that kick start than the average child. The reductionist in me sees it like this: If the average child in the class is learning new material, say, 50% of the time, they get more mental stimulation than my DS who is learning new material, say, 10% of the time. (Made up numbers). In a public school, doesn't my child have a right to get just as much mental stimulation as the next child? I pay taxes, so I feel my kid has a right to as much new learning as the next kid. In reality, I know that may be too much to expect, but that way of thinking about it helps me justify the fight to get more challenge for DS. What I'm struggling with is: DS will probably never get his fair share of challenge in math in PS - I can push to make it better, though. I feel that at some point, we do have to settle for "good enough". I just don't know what that is yet.

Thinks, I missed your post. DS6 is not unhappy. He says he doesn't learn anything new in math, but he also doesn't spontaneously complain about it. It actually scares me a little when he's so easily content with not learning. That's why we pushed for a skip last year. He wasn't seeing school as a place to learn . This year he is learning in writing and spelling. He still loves to read, so I'm not so concerned that he's reading materials below his ability. He reads voraciously on his own anyhow. My thinking now is: ride out the rest of the year and consider subject acceleration in math for next year. This will be no easy task - apparently this school has never subject accelerated any student. Ever.

G3: last year, my son WAS learning that he was a bad kid. He was. He told me that's what he was learning because of all the recesses he missed and how angry and frustrated he felt about school. And he's SOOOOO not a bad kid! My comment was about our situation and trying to define what I mean when talking about boredom, not something I was putting on you.

But I DO think it is vital to recognize that often kids don't tell us those things even if they feel them. I think it's important to say that even if a child is NOT acting out, is NOT expressing that small feeling (which is SUCH a great way of expressing it!), there may be a serious problem.

Apparently not what's up in your child's case, so probably a tangent that Dazey and I went off on. Sorry! But I can't hear "bored and acting out" and hear someone ask "does that matter?" and not make the point for general consumption that I feel VERY strongly that's a time to at least sit up and take notice. Too many people ignore it. Not you, but too many people. I'm just never going to let that go past, I'm afraid...

I'm totally with Dazey there: boredom for GT kids is huge sore spot for me. I think *much* damage is done by boredom and often goes unrecognized.

I definitely don't think it's a given that even all the parents who find their way here will take action in a damaging situation. I know a surprisingly large number of parents--double digits!--whose biggest regret about their GT kids is that they didn't take action sooner to prevent damage being done by boredom. They didn't trust themselves, and they kick themselves now. So when the topic of boredom and damage comes up, expect me to soapbox!

You have all been warned!

I'm fine with you being on your soapbox and encouraging parents to look for signs of boredom and address them as appropriate. Where I have issues is when you suggest that those of us who do allow our children to be bored for more than 15 minutes a day are somehow subjecting our children to abuse. I think you can be on your soapbox but still use language that is less critical of those of us who made other decisions. I know that you respect me and my parenting and I respect your decisions as well, so this isn't a personal issue at all. But when you get on your soapbox, I think sometimes you get a bit carried away. I would just like to see you moderate your rhetoric a bit. Is that fair?

I really don't think Kriston is trying to push parents into anything. I just think she and her son had such a bad experience with school and it is because of this her views are the way they are. It really comes down to individual children and how they deal with the boredom. Boredom for most of the day might not cause a child to act out but still could cause other issues such as losing the love of learning. We as parents know our children the best. I just see Kriston saying watch for the signs and if you are feeling uncomfortable trust your instincts because there could be damage if the child is left in that situation. But I do agree that we are not going to find the perfect solution for our HG+ kids and they will need to learn how to deal with some boredom. I know when my daughter starts public school I suspect she will be bored but if this causes her to change to the point that she isn't my happy, inquisitive child then I will be working the chain for solutions or pulling her out.