Anyone with gifted children please help answer my questions?

[meghanwormwood]

Hi I am a college student and I really would love it if people shared about their expierence having a gifted child? I promise not to share names I just want to know what it is like for you to be raising a child who is considered gifted

The questions I really need answered are

What exceptionality does your child have?

How old is the student and what grade level is he/she currently studying? 

What type of school setting does the student attend? 

If anyone could answer these for my paper it would be very helpful!

Thank You,

Meghan Wormwood

[Aufilia]

Originally Posted by meghanwormwood 

Hi I am a college student and I really would love it if people shared about their expierence having a gifted child? I promise not to share names I just want to know what it is like for you to be raising a child who is considered gifted

The questions I really need answered are

What exceptionality does your child have?

How old is the student and what grade level is he/she currently studying? 

What type of school setting does the student attend? 

Hi Meghan,

I'm not sure how your questions get at what it's like to raise a gifted child as I don't think you can tell much about parenting a gifted child based on the information you're asking.  Do you have follow-up questions you'll be asking?  Comparing age to grade level isn't a very meaningful statistic because many school districts refuse to allow grade skipping (although they may allow single-subject acceleration or other accommodations).

My daughter is 6 (turning 7 next month) and in the 1st grade. She attends our neighborhood public school.  She just entered the testing process for gifted programming, which starts in 2nd grade in our district.  She has been diagnosed with ADHD and sensory processing disorder, so she has an IEP and special education services (including a social skills group, occupational therapy and adaptive PE). She had an IQ test that indicated she tests in the 99th percentile for her age.  According to the informal reading inventory I gave her in June (I'm a teaching student and tested her as part of my program) her independent reading level is at least 8th grade.  Our neighborhood school administration has declined to subject-accelerate her in school because of her ADHD symptoms.

[moominmamma]

I too am a little confused by your questions and how you think they'll help you learn about the experience of having a gifted child. But for what it's worth...

I have four gifted kids. The older three all unschooled until the teen years. They entered a small alternative-minded K-12 public school at the high school level. Part-time and a year or so ahead of their age-grade. Eldest is globally highly to profoundly gifted but her chosen field is classical music performance. Ds is highly gifted but with some processing speed issues and is more of a right-brained learner. He's leaning towards digital media fields but is very strong in science, with a passion for biology. Middle dd hasn't been tested but seems fairly evenly gifted.

Youngest is just 9 and remains unschooled. She's likely in the HG or PG group. Her grade level is difficult to quantify in an unschooling environment where she's not receiving any sort of levelled curriculum except in one or two areas (by her request). She is blasting through 8th grade math with no difficulty and is working through some science units intended for 7th through 10th grades. Language arts skills are probably not quite as advanced since her lack of maturity (in comparison to 8th graders) reduces the depth of her analytical and interpretive insights. She's an all-around bright achiever, though, who is amazing at sports, arts, music, whatever she tries, it seems.

My older kids have a lot of emotional intensity and that has certainly presented challenges over the years. Kid number 3 much less so, and my youngest is one of the easiest-going kids I've ever known, blowing the "gifted and intense" stereotype right out of the water.

Miranda

[whatsnextmom]

Originally Posted by meghanwormwood 

What exceptionality does your child have?

How old is the student and what grade level is he/she currently studying? 

What type of school setting does the student attend? 

Child #1- age 15, globally gifted. She was grade accelerated in elementary. She's generally viewed as HG+. She's currently in an early college program where she takes English and Social Studies at the honors high school junior level and everything else at college for duel high school/college credit. The program is part of the public school system, we don't have to pay for her college classes. So, she's working a year ahead for her age in English and Social Studies, about 3+ years ahead in her maths, sciences, languages and other academic courses (which, in her case, include additional English and history courses.)

Child #2- age 12, twice exceptional (both gifted and learning disabled.) He's a 7th grader in a local public middle school with a performing arts and science focus. He's allowed to work a year ahead in science and almost 2 years ahead in math.  He continues Spanish Immersion for history and is in his 5th year of Mandarin. The rest of his classes are honors 7th grade level though quite open-ended and flexible. He struggles in writing.

[Silverring]

We have 2 gifted children with dual exceptionalities, the eldest tested as profoundly gifted and the youngest likely to be PG too.

Both unschooled, neither working at any 'level' but the eldest was working on GCSE sciences at 8.  

I don't know how much you know but I recommend looking at Dabrowski's over-excitabilities and the SENG site.  Also, asynchronous development is a big issue with most children who are at the higher levels of 'giftedness'.

The biggest issue we face is dealing with meeting the needs of 2 children who are outliers at both ends of the bell curve.