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I just got to work, after the meeting. I've left my notes at home, so I don't recall the specific names of tests, but will post them later.

Attendees:
guidance counselor
reading specialist
vice principal
school psychologist
special education specialist
kindergarten teacher

We discussed our son's current state of development, which took up much of the meeting. The special ed. person seems like she is super-interested in doing a lot with him (I think this may partly be because up to now they have only had IEPs in place for kids at the other end of the spectrum, and she wants to oversee the development of a new gifted part of the special ed. program). The psychologist was reserved but also showed a lot of interest.

Our K teacher expressed some sentiments a little different from the phone call yesterday, stressing how happy he is and that he is in exactly the right place (!). She didn't volunteer what she had yesterday, that it was obvious that a skip to first, without more, would solve nothing because he was far past all of the first grade material (though she admitted it when prompted). She also flatly said he can't spell (this is not true and I don't know where she got this idea, but he can actually spell correctly the first time most words he can recognize). I asked for them to assess that along with his reading.

The special ed. teacher and psychologist both allowed that K might not be the best place for him, but that a careful assessment would have to be done. We said essentially everything you here said to say, including about how he acts when he's bored. It was agreed that whatever planning was done, it would carry past the end of the year and be reassessed as necessary.

All in all I got a different feel from the K teacher, but overall a good feeling from the team. We didn't discuss curriculum, logistics, etc. much at all. When we were talking about assessment, I began to bring up pretesting and curriculum compacting, but didn't press on when it was apparent that we would follow up on such things after testing.

The plan going forward:

* Reading specialist to do a reading assessment

* Psychologist to do testing, most likely of a non-WISC type (I've forgotten the acronym, but she said she hesitates to use older-child tests on someone so young, though she might make an exception in our case). She will probably do multiple tests.

* Special ed. person to work with psychologist, to determine types of tests and how else to assess our son. She also expressed interest in seeing some of his work (for example, photos / video of a board game he invented called "Shooter Ship" that came up briefly).

* Follow-up meeting, to determine what to do and how to do it.

There are no hard deadlines on when this will all be done, but the testing will begin in the coming week.

In the meantime, the wife and I will do a lot more reading and thinking. I've alreadly ordered "Teaching Gifted Kids in the Regular Classroom: Strategies and Techniques Every Teacher Can Use to Meet the Academic Needs of the Gifted and Talented", by Susan Winebrenner, and that will probably be just the beginning.

I want to double-check what the team/teacher come up with for a plan, especially if he stays in K. One thing his K teacher has mentioned is a grouping including lower-functioning kids, with the idea that he would pull the other child up and learn doing it-- this seems oriented at everyone arriving at the same level, which makes me leery.

I'd be leery about the proposed plan too. Cooperative learning is a great tool but used in the way she described can backfire. However, the examples of it backfiring is more in older classrooms. Gifted children feel used and placed into the role of the teacher especially when their own education is not considered can leave with a negative experience. It really depends on your son's personality. Is he the type that enjoys helping others? If he is then he might be okay with it, but I would insist that this does not become his only role within the class.

From the rest of what you wrote I really don't know what your feelings are about the meeting. Did you come away thinking they are taking this seriously and want to help or do you feel that they are going through the motions and you have your doubts? My guess is you are still trying to digest it all.

The fact that they are going to test is a positive but not knowing what kind of test I can't really say how positive. I do wonder about his teacher... she seems to have changed her tone since speaking with her last night. A little to wishywashy in my opinion. Perhaps there was an earlier meeting before this one?

Do keep us posted as they progress. Here is hoping that they get it right.

Sounds like it was a productive meeting.


I had the opportunity to attend a brief session by Mrs. Winebrenner geared toward parents recently. Our school (DS8's 3rd grade teacher in particular), is using Mrs Winebrenner's methods to provide in-class differentiation as there is no formal G/T program at the school. They brought her in as a guest speaker for a recent Teacher Development day. One of the things I recall her saying was that for gifted kids in K, sometimes the best thing is for them to be sent to a higher grade for reading, as the language arts abilities within a K class can be so disparate.

Good luck with your advocacy! Sounds like you're on the right road. I think you're smart to be bringing this above the teacher level. Sometimes I wish I'd done that earlier than I did, but in hindsight, I think it took THIS teacher to bring the admin on board, so maybe it all did work out for the best.

Thanks a lot. You've given me some great ideas and questions to ask about research projects, and management of the process going forward.


He's an empathetic little person and does enjoy helping others, so I guess he might enjoy it. I will have to reserve judgment until I hear more about their plan at the next meeting.



You guessed right. After a little more reflection I feel like the teacher is not our greatest ally, but it's good to know where she stands now. I got a good feeling from the group as a whole, especially since they are all doing this for the first time.


All I know at this point is that one of the tests they are planning to use is the DAS-II.


Thank you. A lot of the credit for pushing so far has to go to my wife-- my function now is to passively-aggressively exploit people's stated positions, and play them off against each other.


Understood, and thanks. I think that this teacher must have little to no experience with gifted education, but at this point has at least done some reading and thinking. Hopefully the team's plan will provide plenty of guidance, while giving her some leeway to be creative-- and of course, hopefully it is the right guidance!

When DS was in K, he too would not have benefited from a single grade skip. Instead the school opted to give him a schedule that resembled that of middle school. He went to 5th grade for math, 3rd grade for LA, 4th grade for science as in our district that is where science really begins. He participated with the K class for art, music, p.e.,library and computer lab. He had separate work in coputers but he was with the K class.

It looks very messy at first glance, but it worked well for him.
Two years later he is in a middle/high charter school as is doing great. When a child is that far ahead you are forced to look way outside the box.

Just out of curiousity, have you asked your son what he wants?

Sounds like it went okay. One area that might still need attention is finding him some mental age peers at school to work with from time to time. The special ed teacher might work here especially as she sounds like she's very interested. I'd load her up with a full portfolio of his achievements not just the video she's asked about. Perhaps she could do a pull out once or twice a week with one or two particularly bright kids in 1st or 2nd. 2nd will probably be a better match but 1st would give your ds some class peers if he does do a skip next year (or later this year).

On the testing front it may be worthwhile talking to them to see if the testing could meet DYS requirements. If it does, and he has qualifying scores, it's a win for both you and the school especially as the school hasn't dealt with this situation previously. If DYS is an option I think he's too young for the WISC and may not have enough headroom on the WPPSI so the SB V might be the best option - the experts will know the answer.

Well, he's off to the first round of testing at the DAS-II.

And apparently he was given a reading and spelling assessment today, and when I picked him up after school he quickly told me about it, and that he'd done great. I was a little nonplused-- how would he know that?-- until he told me that the reading specialist had let him see the marks as he went (0 for wrong answers and 1 for right ones, apparently) and even had nodded and said "good" to each right answer. Weird. Is that a valid technique for increasing confidence? Maybe she just says "good" after every question, to increase confidence? Anyway, the result of that is that he's stoked to take the DAS-II.

Many thanks, again, to all who helped me. I am terrible at tracking replies to my threads... have to get better.

ETA: He says the tests were fun, and he's excited to go back tomorrow. So at least he's not being traumatized.

It looks messy, but it's better than having him sit in the corner with some 5th grade math worksheets, or doing the K math, eh? Yep, I am constantly asking my son what he wants. It's one big reason I'm leaning towards being okay with no skip at this point-- he has some kids in the classroom he likes to play with. I think in the end, if it had to be that way for him to be emotionally happy, I'd be okay with him doing the age-normal stuff all through school and just supplementing at home, but I just would rather that his school time not be intellectually wasted.

Great ideas. I am putting together some portfolio items now.


I had some of these thoughts too, including them being able to learn from DYS if it is available. I held off during the initial meeting on suggesting such things because 1) I don't want to come off as a pushy dad right now (although that wouldn't change his test scores, and I will push nicely if necessary, I want to have as good a relationship as possible, and they've been pretty reasonable so far for a school just ramping up their kindergarten program), 2) they said that if warranted, they would do more testing after the initial round, but that we'd be meeting to discuss things before then.

Anyone who wants to learn more should be encouraged and given help. Uh-huh. Congrats on getting a school that didn't give you the run around. You know he did great. You've done your homework and you know you're not imagining things when you look at your son.