Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Elementary School Kindergarten 2009-2010

Kareninminn,
Sorry that your son's behavior was bad.
Glad that the teacher can see he isn't getting his educational needs met in the current reading program.

I'm hopeful for the following reasons.
1) He has behaved well in Math and is happy there. So they understand the need for subject acceleration.
2) They group across classroom for Kindy reading, so they understand the need for flexible grouping

My guess is that they will offer you a gradeskip or reading subject acceleration. Is it too late to switch to the half day program (you may have to call it partial homeschooling, but who cares?)

Be Sure to sit in on a first grade class and observe what they are doing in there. Even if you son is 'only' MG, he may be a very good candidate for full grade acceleration. MG kids who have unmet learning needs are the best group for single grade acceleration.

Best Wishes,
Grinity

Thanks for the encouragement ladies.

They're talking about pulling him from first grade math because of the focus problems. I am going to tell them I want to keep him there and work on it, I know this will likely always be a problem for him and I think it's better to face it now instead of just sending him back to kindergarten and putting him where he isn't learning. I do think they mean well and want to see him succeed but I think they view things differently.

The school only offers all day kindergarten but we're talking about me bringing him home early. I think the teachers theory is we'll work on the work they do at school, only at home, but I could have misunderstood as the conversation was brief. My plan is to cut some of the worksheets which I think are taxing him and add in some hands on science activities which I know he misses. I expect we will be working this out in the next week or so.

My son is sick today and I think that contributed to his behavior, I fear he's already seen as the bad kid. He is impulisive and lacks focus but I'm seeing I made it worse with the school choice.

I'd fight to keep him in 1st grade math too. How's he doing with the work? Don't they think that being bored in K will cause more problems?

Of course after talking to the principal on Wednesday I haven't heard anything back yet. DSs behavior continues to get worse and he complains that he's bored still.

Another thing that I've noticed that I don't like at all is some regression. When he reads the books that are sent home for homework he sounds out every single word where before he was reading fluently. When he reads other books he does just fine but I guess the teacher is making them sound the words out (dog, sad) and it's causing confusion for him. They're also working on patterns and he's been able to do patterns in his head since he was a baby. Now they have to do some sort of clapping/letter thing (I'm not sure how to explain it) to figure out what comes next in the pattern and that's throwing him off. When I tell him not to do that he does just fine.

In the books they bring home from school there is a teacher part that the teacher reads and a part they are supposed to read. I guess the teacher told them that they were to only read the kid part so when I asked him to read the teacher part to me he got nervous and told me that his teacher said that was for adults to read. I did send her a note and she told him that it was ok if he read it but I just don't like what I'm seeing at school

Oh no Jamie! Sounds very confusing for your poor DS!

Us too! Things definitely hit a few lows this year...and things are going really well now. Hopefully Karen this will be a turning point and things will improve!

This can be quite confusing Jamie. DS5 was reading well before he was 2. He never learned any strange rules to reading...but can read anything now and somehow just always knew the rules to everything. One day he was reading and reading very slow and choppy and I couldn't figure out what he was doing...I just told him to read normally and he did. But he has also talked to me about tapping out words, and the "th brothers" and "bossy R" and all those rules and ways they help kids read. I think it really can be confusing if you already know how to read. If there were difficult words he couldn't sound out then that may help...but that has never been an issue. Thankfully he doesn't bring home those books and they don't have him work on any of that. They say they let him skip all that...hopefully they are, but he still picks up on all the talk about it in the classroom. Hopefully they should be able to sort through it all and figure it out...DS hasn't been talking about it much lately which is good.

That's good that they're not making your son do this stuff!!!

I'm going to call the school back this week and see if they've made any progress with evaluation DS and request a meeting. This has gone one long enough.

Jamie good luck. I think it's hard for readers who are stuck learning to read, I can see where it's confusing.

Well I irked DS6s teacher off. I sent an email trying to explain why I think he's struggling, I clearly asked for her suggestions because I don't think it's her as much as a poor fit, but I think I offended her. We had briefly talked about me picking him up early to do reading at home and I wanted to explain my concerns and look for other ideas.

I told her it's hard for a hands on kid who doesn't enjoy writing to not get the hands on stuff but to get the paperwork. I also mentioned that the structure is hard for him. He's refusing to do projects, he told me today he already is good at that stuff, I just want her to understand and I want to work with her. She told me being bored is no reason to not do projects and while I agree that he has to do things he doesn't want to his refusal is a sign of a problem and I want to deal with that. I'm hoping to meet with her this week. I want to make it a good experience for him and while he says he loves it I have concerns.

Karen: Hang in there. I hope you and the teacher can work something out.

Jamie B: Last year, when pre-K teachers were teaching kids to write names in all uppercase, I told DS that the correct way is to do upper and lower case and even though his teacher was saying this, to listen to me instead. He did. I've used this method a couple of times successfully. Maybe you could do the same? Something like, "The teacher is trying to help the other kids read like you already can. So, just b/c she's teaching them these methods, you don't have to struggle to relearn what you already know. After all, you're such a beautiful reader."

Also, thought you guys would like DS5's new teachers' approach to DS's reading -- maybe you can get some of your teachers to try it? He now has to write down the words he doesn't know the meaning to so those can be the words he works on. We're going away next week and she told me to just put post-it notes in the books she gives me with the words on them so she can work with him on them when we return.

Kareninminn - GD5 has recently started (occasionally)refusing to do work - mostly simple Kindergarten math worksheets in class. Their answer - send her to the assistant principle's office or detention class for "defiance". I think the teacher is under orders from admin. to call if GD refuses to do anything at all. I think GD is finally just at a level of frustration that she almost doesn't care. I do know she needs to do what the teacher tells her to in class & I have been working on explaining to her how much better her days would be if she would listen and follow directions. However, the school could make some attempt to challenge her and I bet the behavior problems would improve dramatically. Hopefully, your DS's school will respond much more positively at some point.

JamieB - Last year in PK GD5 started telling us 4 yr. olds can't read (though she's been reading since age 3). The teachers told them to just look at the books and she took it literally. It took us some time to assure her she should continue to actually read her books. GD has never really sounded out words so I know hearing that in class every day must be confusing. Earlier this year in K the teacher told them (& parents) to write in their journals just putting down sounds they heard - even 1 letter was OK. Since GD hates to write, she took the easy way & put 1 or 2 letters down. THEN the teacher told DD that GD was capable of much more and should be writing whole words! GD is doing much better at this now but - confusing signals from teachers.

Hang in there and let us know how things go.