Feeling weird posting here...

[ainh]

I've lurked here in the past...back when DS1 was a toddler and I was trying to figure stuff out.   He never really struck me as exceptional with memory or math or reading, but DH and I are both have PhDs and he was an early bloomer and I was a late bloomer, so I kept an eye here just as a precaution, so to speak ;).  I was more focused on autism or aspergers, to be frank.

Well, in the meantime I kind of fell away from worrying about DS1 and started worrying about other stuff (like DS2).  Anyway, DS1 had a great first year of kindergarten and I was happy that he got a great teacher and he didn't seem to have social or behavior problems.  Well...this week we got back the "gifted" testing.  Only 10 of the 120 kindergarteners placed and low and behold DS1 was one of them?!?!  Somehow it totally took me by surprise (as opposed to most of the other parents who seemed convinced their kids would pass the tests and didn't -- quite an uproar amongst some of them).  He really aced the cognitive and acheivement tests, both in verbal and math.

I'm not saying my DS is some genius or anything...these were just basic tests (Iowa and CoGat or something like that?).  But still...I now know he's testing 99th percentile in most arenas now and I feel like it's changed my perception of him a bit.  And I guess I don't know exactly what it all means, if anything.

If we were staying at this school he'd be in the gifted program (one day of the week they are pulled out for basically the whole day).  But we are moving and I don't think the new school even has a gifted program.  And if they did, would they take his test results and apply them there?

Hmmm..  Not quite sure where I'm going with this.  But I can't talk about it with people here b/c they are all upset (previous years they used tests where 40% of kids were testing in, but they changed tests and now only 10% got in).

[Linda on the move]

Originally Posted by ainh 

Somehow it totally took me by surprise (as opposed to most of the other parents who seemed convinced their kids would pass the tests and didn't -- quite an uproar amongst some of them).  ....

But we are moving and I don't think the new school even has a gifted program.  And if they did, would they take his test results and apply them there?

I can relate. Both my kids are gifted, and neither showed signs of early genius. One had all sorts of delays.

On the move question, it really just depends on the school you move to. Our experience is that schools have been interested in previous testing, but may opt to retest. This is even true for some special needs kids -- a family can move with the military and a new school will retest EVERYTHING. But, testing costs money and a lot of school are tight. If the test seem inline with what they see of your son, they may just accept the scores and go from there.

The scores can also allow admittance to some programs outside of school that are for gifted kids. These vary pretty widely by where you live.

[ainh]

Thanks for responding.  It's nice to know that I'm not the only one has feel a little surprised at higher than expected testing.  Of course, his teacher was like "how could you not know that he was going to do well?"  (she's the one that referred him for the testing) and I was like "he's my first child, he's all I've ever known."
 

[grumpybear]

Another thing to look at also is the gifted program that the school district offers.

The school that my DS goes to doesn't necessarily have a gifted program but the school district offers a gifted program in that school. And frankly, it sucks.

Would I want DS to be pulled out from his regular classes and be part of the so-called gifted program (which, IMO is just in place to sort of appease the parents but is actually just a time waster) and miss project time where they do wonderful art projects?

I never actually thought about this until his teacher brought this up with me. So just another thing to think about. :)

[Geofizz]

Even if the new school doesn't have a gifted program, those tests are generally well- known amongst school administrators. It would serve him well if when you register your son, you present the scores and some information about what books he's reading as a "just to let you know a little bit about him.". Some schools don't have gifted programs on the books, but do unofficial things like clustering the high-achieving kids in the same class.