Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Learning Environments Demand conformity, get mediocrity.

Just received DS6's 2nd semester report today, and feeling a bit sad. His teacher just does not see the same kid I see at home. Where I see a kid who is reading way ahead of his peers, has intuitive math sense and can learn at lightning speed, she sees a kid who is "meeting the standards." He has lost his spark; he just isn't as motivated and excited about learning as he used to be.

Maybe if your focus is on keeping the classroom orderly and conforming to standards instead of teaching the individual child, smart but efficient (lazy :)) kids like my son will do the bare minimum. I'm not sure exactly what's going on in class, but evidently he is not at all showing what he can do, probably because he isn't expected to. If he continues at this pace, he will indeed prove that "everybody catches up to the advanced children by third grade." And I think that would be a shameful waste of his ability.

Denial and doubt moment: Is it possible that a child who was reading and spelling at 2, studying the periodic table and drawing models of radon at 5, and doing multiplication and division in his head at 6 isn't gifted after all? Am I expecting too much?

On the bright side, we just made the decision to move him to a small, private school for 2nd grade, where they'll be able to differentiate the curriculum for different skill levels. The student/teacher ratio is 20 to 1 (public schools in our district are moving to 30 to 1 next year). I hope we'll be able to steer him away from this underachieving rut and get him loving learning again.

I am sending you a pm...

Is this teacher into Bonsai Trees?

She is turning your Redwood into a Dogwood.

Austin...love the comment!! :-) I am glad that you have some other options :-) You guys will have some new adventures next year and hopefully things will look up :-)
- we saw the same thing happening with our son and we don't have a lot of options in our area so we decided to homeschool.

Man! This quote just sums it up.

Are you going to switch him now or in the fall? What are you thinking of doing for him in the mean time?

Love your OP, BinB, so true!

Austin, you made me chuckle. You're right, though.

EastnWest, we're switching him in the fall. He's not unhappy where he is, and he copes with his boredom by being *very* social in class. At first I felt a bit sorry for his teacher. But we have discussed with her why he might be chatting and cracking jokes instead of working, and she hasn't really bought it, so I'm all out of sympathy.

So, we'll get through the next couple of months giving him more stimulating materials at home, and start our new chapter in the fall.

You got it exactly. Schools, driven in part by NCLB, have no incentives to provide for children who can work beyond the low levels required by the Archons of Standardized Testing and Edumacation. The schools actually have disincentives: if a school's average score is too low, the school can be punished (rather severely), yet anything beyond the minimum isn't singled out for a reward. In a situation like that, the approach of the schools is hardly surprising.

Our society has decided to focus on low achievers. Obviously, helping these kids is critically important. Somehow, though, someone decided that getting them to score well on tests that can be graded by a scanner is a good thing.

At the same time, everything and everyone else are being deliberately ignored. Millions of students are capable of much more, but aren't allowed to try. Gifted kids are hurt most of all, but they aren't the only ones.

"A mind is a terrible thing to waste" springs to mind as a counterpoint to NCLB and current edumacation trends.

BTW, I haven't met your son, but from what you wrote, he sounds *with pretty bright* to me.

Sorry to sound so ranty. I just get so frustrated.

Val

BinB - BTDT, don't doubt your son or your observations of him. You know that he is capable of so much more than the school has gotten out of him. So glad to hear you are changing schools. Keep your chin up!

It's as though you are talking about my own DD6! I've watched this child transform from a sparkling, animated, eager to learn child, into a disruptive talker, a class "behavior problem", unable to complete any work, silly and bouncing off the walls! Have you seen the work? No wonder she's bored! Even the average kid is bored off their rocker. Now take the quick-witted, race horse of a learner who's now reading at the fifth grade, studying Greek mythology in their free time, and learns math intuitively beyond where the kindergarten room will allow her? Well...now what? My options appear to be narrowing. As a child of educators myself, I've always been a supporter of public school. Now I find myself researching my homeschooling options for next year part-time. Never did I see my self as a homeschooling parent. But...what am I willing to sacrafice. Do I change my daughter to fit into the school, since the school can't change to fit my daughter?

I really hope the private school works for you. I think our public schools in this country are seriously broken. It's a sad demise for all our children, most especially our brightest ones!