Question about school assessment policies

[natlav]

So i met with DS's teacher again today as they in the middle of their 2nd round of assessments for the school year and i wanted to understand how far ahead they test.  AT the first round of assessments in the all she told me she tsted him as high as she was allowed to test and he breezed through it so fast she had to have him slow down to keep up with him (reading assessment).  I asked her how far ahead they test and she said it is distirict policy they can only test up to 1 year ahead.  Do any of you have experience with that?

THey claim they are differentiating material for him but my son says its still too easy.  How can they effectively differentiate if they never test to see what level of material they should give him?

I also asked about math and she said they dont do any look ahead assessments in math - they just test before and after each unit.  Again they claim they are differentiating math for him but if they havent tested to see what material is appropriate i dont see how they can be doing that.  All i have see is he has a "math journal" where he gets extra word problems but they are still basic math facts (he hates the math journal of course).

I'm struggling with what i can do if this is district policy - seems to not make any sense to me taht you wouldnt want to know at what level someone is performing before supposedly differentiating curriculum for them.  Actually leads me to believe they really arent doing anything useful for him.  Any suggestions on how to broach the subject tactfully so i can get them to do something?

Oh i forgot to mention DS is in 1st grade and we have met with the principal and teachers frequently because they have tagged him as a behavior problem for being disruptve, not paying attention or not doing or refusing to do the class work.

Thanks

[Geofizz]

You have encountered fairly typical policies for assessment:  limit to one grade level above for reading, no above-level for math.

For better or worse, the teacher is being held responsible to each child to make one year of growth each year in each subject.  For children learning slowly, their focus will be making sure those children make the year of growth.  As "fast out of the gates" kids often hit plateaus in reading and math development relative to the assessments, there is a fear of evaluating a child at a 4th grade level in the start of 1st grade.  They very well may still evaluate at a 4th grade level at the end of the year.  Of course, a child taught at this level through the year might be making progress in story interpretation, vocabulary, and other skills not well-tested by their reading test.

Here are some strategies I've used with mixed success:

*Ask the teacher what her goals are your your son this year in reading/math.  "What are your goals for my son this year in reading?" "How will he be led to make one year's worth of progress this year?"  "What skills does he need to work on, and how are you doing this?"  "Can you tell me what his reading instruction looks like from day to day?"  This will the open the discussion either to the assessment limitation, or you will discover that the teacher is aware of the issue and has secondary goals that she's working on. 

*Discuss engagement.  Don't use the word bored.  "Is this material engaging for Johnny?"  "Why isn't it engaging?"  "What can be done to make it more engaging?"

*Send in books from home to read during reading.  Some teachers view this as passive aggressive, some see it as relief as their supply of above-level books might be limited.  Fetching books for these kids from another class is sometimes surprisingly hard to make happen.

*For math, you might ask for her to pretest material and to provide extension work when he scores >90% on a given unit.  Extension work is part of the second edition of Everyday Math (I'm guessing that's what you have because of the @#$% journal), but many teachers aren't aware it's there because the first edition didn't.

If the above fails, ask the principal to evaluate your child for a single-subject acceleration (grade skip for that subject) to allow your child to take these subjects with the next grade level up.  If the school day is unchallenging across the board, consider a full grade acceleration.  Often this requires an IQ test and a broad-spectrum achievement test.  Even if the school turns you down on the acceleration, this is a good time to discuss regular (daily) differentiation with a teacher to meet your child's academic needs.

Whatever you do, work to keep the relationship between you, the teacher, and the administration as positive as possible, as you will need their continued support as you go through the grades.  I take feedback on my kid's behavior very seriously, and I work to interpret it from the teacher's point of view.  I don't make excuses for my child's behavior, but I do discuss the ways in which it sounds similar or different to what I see at home.  I'll describe contrasts to what I observe in soccer or violin lessons if relevant.  I take an approach of "wow, the teacher's got a problem, what can we do in putting together information about school and home to figure this out to help the child?"  

I work very hard to avoid burning bridges.  In our case, we burnt a bridge with my daughter's 2nd grade teacher.  The consequence was that it negatively effected the outcome of an acceleration discussion for my son 3 years later.  Because we've managed to keep the rest of the relationships positive, we've now seen multiple subject and whole-grade accelerations for my kids, such that an otherwise rigid school with limited above-level assessment has quite effectively met my kids' wacky needs.

[natlav]

Thanks for the input.  I would say our relationship wiht the school is somewhat strained because of a year and a half of them insisting my son is behaviorally challenged and that his not being challenged is irrelevant.  They finally did test him and he qualifies as "gifted" but the program doesnt start until 4th grade and they have already told me he would not be allowed in it because of his behavior issues.

I have told them i appreciate that they are trying to differentiate (although like i said i think its mostly smoke and mirrors) but that i believed he needed even more advanced material and they refused to do anything until he gets his behavior under control.  Is there any way to build a case for subject level acceleration in the face of this kind of push back?  I dont want him to necessarily skip a grade but at least let him go do literacy and math with the next grade up or higher if necessary to challenge him.  My oldest is in 3rd grade and my 1st grader is definitely at or above his level in literacy - math is trickier to assess as he is better on concepts he has been exposed to but hasnt been exposed to anything other than basic math facts.  He asked the teacher if he could do multiplication and she told him no - you have to wait until 3rd grade for that.

One of my friends has told me i should go to the schoolboard as it is clear this principal is not willing to do anythingn but i dont want to make it even worse for him or for my other kids that are still going to be in that school.

I admit that DS has some behavioral challenges - he's very emotional, stubborn as you know what and has no patience for rote type work.  He HATES the cutting out words and gluing them to sheets cr*p they make them do in 1st grade and refuses to do any of the coloring they add to try to make the work more interesting for the other kids.  I feel bad for the kid because if i had to sit through 6-8 hours a day going over stuff i already know and be expected to pay attention and not fiddle or daydream i'd probably be doing just like he does.  I can honestly say aside from some of the social studies type stuff (like a unit on great artists, or a unit on different countries etc) he has not learned anything at school.  The reading material is still far below his level as they will only let him pick from the level he tested at (ie max 1 year up) and the math is material he knew by kindergarten if not earlier.

Oh and the math we use is called Trail Blazers not Everyday math - i think the math journal is just random problems the teacher finds - and to be honest he can answer them all in his head and hates taht he has to write down the equation to show how he got the answer.

Should i look into gettting a copy of the Iowa Acceleration scale or broach that topic with the school administration? I'm also thinking of setting up a meeting with the curriculum specialist and the gifted and talented coordinator to discuss how they are differentiating his work without knowing to what level they need to differentiate but dont want to be "that mom"

[Geofizz]

The IAS is for full grade acceleration.  Reading through it, you will find that given the behavior problems you're seeing, he likely won't have sufficient points to make a super-strong case for acceleration.  It would be useful to get your hands on a copy, though, to see what kinds of factors it takes into account.  My university library has a copy.

Subject accelerations tend to be on a case-by-case basis, though often times the state board of ed has a published policy.  Are you in the US?  It varies by each state.  I would start by figuring out what the state policies say.  I found ours on the state board of ed website.  It's pretty vague, but it does state that age should not be a factor, but whether or not a child can effectively learn in that environment is a factor.  Again, you might find that the school will see his behavior as a barrier.  If you look at it from the school's perspective, you'll see that they are now looking at placing a young child with behavior problems into a classroom of older children.  As kids get older, expectations for sitting still and staying quiet go up.  Schools also see very few highly gifted kids each year.  Just statistically, expect to have a handful in each school.  Some of those kids will be flying under the radar, content to sit there spinning their pencils or counting holes in ceiling tiles.  The school is then aware of only a tiny few each year whose abilities far outstrip their curriculum.  Add in behavior problems, and each administrator has encountered only a small handful in a career.

Have you gone the route of filling out the checklists to screen for ADHD and other disorders?  For ADHD, the behaviors must be present in more than one part of a child's life.  So if the behaviors are at school and not at home, this doesn't fit the criteria.  Check out Misdiagnosis and Dual Diagnosis of Gifted Children. I disliked most of the book, but the chapter on ADHD was clear in helping us see that in our case, the issue was mostly an inappropriate educational environment. 

Also, check your insurance to see if you can have a full neuropsych exam for your son.  This would also get you the assessments you need for the academic levels, and a psychologist with a PhD will write a report to say that the problem is boredom, not ADHD.  The recommendations in the report could very well be along the lines of accelerations as well as social skills classes or "sensory breaks" (time to bounce and run outside of recess).  Or you may come out with a diagnosis of ADHD that you are then confident in because it was done right and done in a way to account for the gifted piece.  Check lists should only be used for screening, and not diagnosis, particularly if you suspect that the idle brain is a major contributor to the issues.  It is possible that you are dealing with something like both giftedness and ADHD.  In that case, you will need someone experienced who can help you sort out which behaviors are ADHD (or whatever the other diagnosis would be) and inappropriate educational setting.

When there are very real chance that you do have two factors to weigh, getting outside reports really helps.  Schools are more likely to take that word of someone with a "PhD" after  their name (at least as long as it's not mom, as is our case) than the parent.  Schools will want to work on the behavioral issues first and the academic issues once the child has mastered the behaviors.  Folks who run in gifted circles will often just say "accelerate until the problems go away," but that's ignoring that there are real issues at hand.  A measured, balanced approach seems to be the only real way to honor the gifted brain while teaching the child appropriate behavior.

[captain optimism]

Can't she get the school system to pay for a neuropsych evaluation under IDEA, since they've told her both that the child has behavioral issues and that he is gifted? Or is your thought that the school system might not pick the best assessor? You seem very experienced and I'm curious about how you're thinking about this issue. 

In another thread, natlav also said that her pediatrician thought her son was a candidate for Ritalin--the ped. might provide a referral that persuades the health insurance company. 

In the school system where my son is a student, they use the MAPS test, which allows the student to determine the level of assessment. http://www.nwea.org/products-services/computer-based-adaptive-assessments/map I had to complain and make a stink for the school to share the assessment results with me, even though it's illegal to refuse to show parents anything that goes in the child's permanent record. What is the name of the test that your school system is using, natlav? I am wondering how they can put a cap on the student demonstrating proficiencies past his grade. 

Originally Posted by Geofizz 

Also, check your insurance to see if you can have a full neuropsych exam for your son.  This would also get you the assessments you need for the academic levels, and a psychologist with a PhD will write a report to say that the problem is boredom, not ADHD.  The recommendations in the report could very well be along the lines of accelerations as well as social skills classes or "sensory breaks" (time to bounce and run outside of recess).  Or you may come out with a diagnosis of ADHD that you are then confident in because it was done right and done in a way to account for the gifted piece.  Check lists should only be used for screening, and not diagnosis, particularly if you suspect that the idle brain is a major contributor to the issues.  It is possible that you are dealing with something like both giftedness and ADHD.  In that case, you will need someone experienced who can help you sort out which behaviors are ADHD (or whatever the other diagnosis would be) and inappropriate educational setting.

[natlav]

Not sure what testing they use but the teacher indicated they are capped at assessing on year ahead.  So we met with the pedi on a few occaisions, after our first meeting in which he met with us and DS he indicated he felt he did not meet the criteria for adhd - the school psychologists evaluation which included  input from us and the teachers indicated he did not me the criteria for adhd either but was at risk for oppositional behavior disorder.  The pedi essentially told me that his recommendation on medication was solely driven by a statistic in the school psychologists report that said DS was on task 48% of the time on the instances he was observed by the psychologist.

I totally get that they are leary about subject acceleration becasue he is disruptive in class but his most common offenses are not related to shouting out but rather to simply not doing the work. I feel like it would be a real easy test to see if a more challenging curriculum does anything for him to have him go sit in on a 2nd grade literacy block for a week - if he disturbs the class then he leaves.  Seems simple enough to me but i may be underestimating whats involved.

I just scheduled an appointment with a real psychologist (ie one with a phD) for an inital consult early next week - she wants to meet with us before meeting with DS.  She specializes with gifted kids so i'm hoping she can give us some insight on if he truly exhibits adhd behaviors or if its boredom or maybe both.

The school did do some assessment earlier this year at my request (i convened a ppt and asked for testing) - they did a WSIC IV and then the behavioral surveys i mentioned above which found him not to be in need of special education.  He scored in the "superior"range on the WSIC IV and had  a lower processing speed score (98) which dragged down his overall score somewhat (i think his next lowest score was 120 or so). 

We have checked out a school for the gifted nearby but at 20K per year its cost prohibitive.

DS does not say a peep and gets deeply engrossed in things that interest him or challenge him.  We even had a local teacher sit with him this summer and do some "tutoring" (i wanted an opinion of a different teacher than his K teacher which refused to listen to anything i had to say) she indicated that he was a little "squirmy" but as soon as she gave him more suitable material he was able to buckle down and do  it. 

I'm just at my wits end with this whole thing - plus if you complain to your friends that your kids needs arent being met because they are too advanced for the curriculum or heaven forbid you mention gifted you come off as a total tool.

[joensally]

Would you mind posting his scores?  The scores can tell a story.  If he's just had a WISC done, that will help the psychologist.  Bring the report to the meeting.  Did they also do achievement testing?  What does that look like?  If there's a recent WISC and achievement test done, then they should be making decisions based on that rather than capped in-grade testing.

I read the thing about the school psych's report and your son attending 48% of the time in your other thread - I think that speaks volumes about the school psych's level of understanding.  Please also take that to the private psychologist.

My experience tells me that this school isn't going to suddenly "get it," and they have active bias against meaningful differentiation.  I guess you could ask them to do a 4 week challenge where he's given material at his level and see what happens with his behaviour?

My son had a horrible first number of school years.  He's finally in the right school setting, and he's matured, and it's going great.  But I fought a lot.

[captain optimism]

Holy cannoli, I cannot believe a pediatrician would tell you that he does NOT have ADHD and then recommend Ritalin. It is a stimulant. What is the thinking behind this? I would want to hear some very persuasive talk from a pediatrician who said something like this: a discussion of how taking a potentially addictive stimulant that's prescribed for a specific disorder would be good for a six-year-old who doesn't have that disorder. I realize it may be very challenging to find a new school, but I would think hard about finding a new pediatrician. (Unless he was recommending this contingent on obtaining a full diagnosis.)

You need a real evaluation from someone you perceive as well-qualified and impartial. I am glad to hear you've lined up a psychologist who meets that standard. 

I don't like your son's school either!  They sound incredibly rigid. They're right that your son probably can't handle the behavioral expectations of second grade, sure, but why can't they give him second or third grade work in the first grade classroom? (Perhaps in the first grade classroom of a better teacher?) We're talking about one kid reading from a different book or filling in a different worksheet. That's not a classroom management problem. An already disruptive kid on uppers who is bored, now THAT is a classroom management problem. 

[Geofizz]

CO, yes, presumably the school psych should be able to do the assessments that make up a neuropsych exam under IDEA if the psych is a PhD. However, there are a number of pitfalls, many of which the op has encountered: the school psych's don't have the experience witih 2e situations, they work for the district not the parents, and they do not have the authority to make a medical diagnosis.

Yes, the school sounds rigid, but they certainly are not unusual, where the focus for k-1 really seems to be driven by making sure kids can function appropriately in a school setting. I've found that some teachers are really skilled at differentiating, but others are not. If this teacher hasn't taught upper grades, she likely has a poor sense of his actual level and what kind of instruction he needs. Differentiating math in verbal, wordy, psuedo hands-on curricula is a royal pain, and I've watched skilled teachers attempt and fail at this. If there are concepts or skills the child needs to be taught to progress, teachers rarely can find the time. It gets easier the higher up in grades, but this level of differentiation is really tough. DS has an amazing teacher this year, guiding him through most of 3rd and 4th grade math in his 2nd grade classroom, but there are still weeks where DS does the 2nd grade book because she can't manage it.

OP, our school psych did the parent and teacher surveys on my DD (then 9,already radically accelerated in math, in 4th grade) and came up with a very high probability from the teacher that DD had autism, Asperger's, OCD, and ODD. From us as parents, the survey came out with a high probability of a math disability. The school psych was trying to build a case for ADHD.

DD's neuropsych exam came out with massive splits in cognitive performance ("huge brain at a tortise pace"), anxiety, a reading and a writing disability, and face blindness. She scored just below boarderline on ADHD-I so no diagnosis. Her testing supported the radical acceleration and suggested the need for closer testing to see if even more acceleration might be needed. We get DD into a better situation this year with teacher placement and space from bullies, started working on social skills when you've got no f'n clue who's you're talking to, started cognitive behavioral therapy, got an IEP for the reading and writing disabilities. This year has led to making 6+ years of gains in spelling and decoding in the first 4 months of school, friends, an acceleration in science, and writing support. Her therapist initially disagreed with the neuropsych report of no ADHD, and has been treating DD for both anxiety as well as addressing executive function concerns. As of this week, he told me that the ADHD behaviors he was seeing last year are GONE, and that indeed, DD might be weaker on some of those skills, but everything we were seeing had to have been a consequence of the poorly fit educational environment.

We have not discussed any of this with our ped. Again, we've got a bright ped, but the combination of the test scores than literally range from 0.02 percentile to >99.9 percentile is impossible for her to tease out the relevant diagnosis and approach. This is a combination of factors outside her experience or training. We stick with the brain guy who sees wild test results on a daily basis.

OP, bring every report you have from the school with you. If you have a written report of the parent team meeting, bring that. If you have a log of behavioral reports, bring it. Do you have ABCs (antecedent, behavior, consequence) from the school? Bring it. Bring a list of books he reads at home and examples of work done at school.

I'm glad you have this meeting scheduled. Hopefully you can get to the bottom of this before your dear son internalizes the poor behavior as a reflection of his worth.

[Aufilia]

Originally Posted by natlav 

Thanks for the input.  I would say our relationship wiht the school is somewhat strained because of a year and a half of them insisting my son is behaviorally challenged and that his not being challenged is irrelevant.  They finally did test him and he qualifies as "gifted" but the program doesnt start until 4th grade and they have already told me he would not be allowed in it because of his behavior issues.

This is pretty much the summary of DD's entire school experience so far.  She's also in 1st this year.  She has SPD and is officially diagnosed with ADHD (totally not a misdiagnosis) and her IQ tested in the 99th percentile. But the school really only cares that she is impulsive and talkative in class and thus far this year we have had absolutely not differentiation whatsoever that I can tell.  (Last year her Kindergarten teacher, who had a lot of experience teaching higher grades, sent home higher-level reading comprehension materials, which was at least better than nothing!) 

How much do you know about the gifted program?  I would wonder a great deal about a program that only allows in students who fit into someone's conception of an ideal student (ie, ideal behavior).

[natlav]

So i have 2 meetings today - 1`st with the school curriculum specialist, reading specialist and gifted/talented teacher and my son's teacher, then later with a psychologist who deals with gifted kids.  Hope to have some insight from her - she indicated more testing would likely be recommended but we'll see.

As for the school - well i'm going to try AGAIN to have them see that my son's behavior may be exacerbated by the lack of appropriate material for him.  I am going to push to evaluate to determine what level he is at - right now they just have him in the highest level reading group in the class but my sense is that is not high enough for him.  I am going to broach the topic of subject level acceleration and curriculum compacting although i'm expecting they will not agree with either. 

I asked my son the other night if he had learned anything interesting in school this year and he answered - well i didnt learn anything in kindergarten and i havent learned anything in first grade - maybe i'll learn something whn i get to 2nd grade.  Thats just sad to me.

Somebody had asked about the test scores -

VCI 132

PRI 121

WMI 132

PSI 97

The report indicated that he was "distracted" during testing and that he commented "it isnt hard but i could have done it faster"

FSIQ was 126 - if i calculate GAI because of the discrepancy with PSI its 130 i think (no mention of GAI or the large gap between PSI and VCI/PRI in the report)

Hopefully the meeting at the school this aft isnt a total disaster.  They are very resistant to date with any suggestion that they might not be challenging him academically enough - they point to his refusal to do the simple work as indication he is sufficiently challenged.  They definitley favor giving more work (ie more of the same level but in different format) than actually differentiating the work to a higher level. 

[jmpierce2005]

Good Luck!   I hope it went well.  And I understand if it didn't.  It can be so frustrating.

We also have a 6 year old son with behavior challenges who is very bright.  He has an IEP for the behavior issues from when he was little.  Anyway - at this point he mostly gets in trouble for wandering around the room, not doing work, (or not doing the work they want).  He was in trouble for not playing a game with another kiddo where you count pennies.  He was writing in a notebook instead.  Open the notebook and he was doing two digit subtraction problems.

We have not been successful working with the school and are going to start part time homeschooling in a couple of weeks.

We got outside testing and that didn't seem to help much.  The outside testing clearly shows that he qualifies as GT.  But the district does their own identification process.  Quite honestly, we didn't ask for identification, just wanted harder work.

We have been told that the district has adopted a policy that does not allow subject area acceleration.

[natlav]

The meeting went sort of as expected.  They gave me the laundry list of what they are already doing for him (highest reading group, using the "challenge"kit for questions, math journal to differentiate.  The long and short of it they finally admitted that the differentiation they do isnt aimed at stretching knowledge (ie harder material) but rather broadening the understanding (its first grade - how in depth can one reasonably expect to go on 2+3 =5.  The curriculum specialist conceded that everything they have done for him is more likely to frustrate him than help but then stated its "district policy" not to allow harder curriculum - i asked if they could simply test him out of some of the math units and let him work on 2nd grade worksheets and they said that was not permitted.  His teacher admitted even the "challenge kit" that they are using in literacy is too simple for him - they were going to see if there was a more challenging version of the challenge kit.

Overall i was disappointed - they claimed district policy against subject accleration or any testing to determine what level he is at academically.  Independant psychologist we went to see basically said we really need to consider home schooling or finding a different academic setting for him or to expect things to only get worse as years go by.  I called and sent an emial to the elementary curriculum and testing specialist at the district asking what policy was.  She said it was at the discretion of the school - they do allow grade acceleration but i know our principal doesnt think DS quallifies because of the behavior issues.  The district person did agree to talk to the school about doing further academic assessments to determine what level he is at to try to better differentiate though i'm not sure how you do that if they wont allow material from higher grades to be provided.

To be honest i'm completely discouraged - all i wanted is for him to be allowed to work on 2nd grade worksheets in math or literacy if he tests out of a given unit (ie if he has mastered it according to the pre-test).DS is meeting with the independent psychologist today so that she can provide us with some recommendations.

For my part i am going to push hard for a grade level acceleration in hopes that as a compromise they will allow subject level acceleration.  The lady at the district told me she had similar issues with her son and told me to just hang on until he gets to middle school because they have programs there - really - i'm supposed to struggle through 5 more years - ridiculous.  I'm tempted to drop off a copy of A Nation Deceived on the principal's desk!

[moominmamma]

Well, that's pretty frustrating. It sounds like an admission that they have no interest in challenging a child who doesn't fit inside their tidy pocket of normal, or isn't delayed. I would have been tempted to ask to what extent district policy should be allowed to over-rule common sense concerning the best needs of a child. I had a policy against co-sleeping when I became a parent, but my kids' needs came ahead of that and we were all much happier.

My guess is that things will improve a little before middle school, because all the focus on learning to read will pass into "reading to learn" in 3rd or 4th grade, at which point there's more option for self-differentiation and open-endedness. But even two or three years is a heck of a long time.

Miranda

[natlav]

Yeah thats clearly the impression i get from them.  Its - well its good enough for most kids so thats all we're going to do.

DS met with the psychologist(we had wanted an opinion of a professional who was familiar with gifted children because his pedi was suggesting we medicate for adhd) - she said no way that he had add/adhd and said absolutely not to medicate him.  She broached the subject of him maybe going to a different school where he might get to learn more etc but he was adamantly opposed (i figured he would be as his brother and soon his sister will be at the same school as he is now).  He told her that even though he hadnt learned anything yet he was sure that in 2nd grade they'd let him learn something - so sad.  She told me again we need to look at homeschooling or some kind of special program for him.  We have his name in the lottery for magnet schools but they arent gifted schools so the problem may be the same - we're just hoping they are a little more flexible than our current situation.

I agree if we can make it to 3rd grade there is more opportunity to broaden knowledge that there is now we'd still have to get through 2nd grade at a school where the principal has already stated she wont let him in the gifted program in 4th grade because of his behavior issues which she refuses to admit could be exacerbated by the lack of appropriate curriculum.

I had met with the school psychologist about developing a behavior plan - the guy is an idiot.  He came up with this plan which i had to bite my lip not to laugh when he was telling me how he was going to work it with DS.  He clearly thinks all kids are idiots - DS is going to hate it and will likely tell him how stupid it is.  He argued with me that "the kids love it" - whatever, he clearly knows my son better than i do in the 15 minutes he's spent with him over the last 2 years.  I figured it wasnt worth the argument and told him to give it a shot and let me know how it goes.  This is a repeat theme with this school, they have proposed behavior plans in the past that i have told them would not work as that is not what drives DS but they argue with me that they know better and then complain to me when the plan fails. I have given them ideas that they refuse to implement (DS is super competitive so i've told them the use of a timer helps at home with getting mundane tasks done - nope dont want to promote competition and if they time him he will just hurrry and do it - well DUH - he already knows the stuff so whats the big deal).

Anyways - the drama continues.  If anyone has any other ideas i'm open to suggestions.  I've contacted our local gifted association - there used to be a support group in our town but it has dissolved - i am thinking or starting one up again as i'm sure there are other parents who have gone thru what i am now and maybe they can give me pointers on how to deal with this particular school system.  Just not sure i have the time or energy to coordinate that.

[moominmamma]

Well, if you're not willing to over-ride his wishes about schooling, then I would just de-emphasize school altogether and look elsewhere for opportunities for challenge. Not in the realm of traditional academics, which will only further exacerbate the poorness of fit at school, but in other areas. Chess club, martial arts, instrumental music, second language learning, gymnastics, those sorts of possibilities. 

Miranda

[captain optimism]

Originally Posted by natlav 

DS met with the psychologist(we had wanted an opinion of a professional who was familiar with gifted children because his pedi was suggesting we medicate for adhd) - she said no way that he had add/adhd and said absolutely not to medicate him.  She broached the subject of him maybe going to a different school where he might get to learn more etc but he was adamantly opposed 

Wow, that is a relief. I mean, that you got someone who was really in the know who didn't think you needed ADHD meds. It also sounds great to me that she doesn't think he has attention issues. 

I think your son is a kid and that if you can find another, better school for him, one where they don't do everything in their power to make him behave badly, you should get him in there. Your current school sounds like a bad fit. (I wanted to add something sarcastic like, "...for people," but that's not very nice.) 

I think you should shop other schools and see what's likely, and then bring him for a visit.  Level with the kid. You are the mom. He's a smart boy, but he is a little boy who doesn't have as much experience of the world as you do. Obviously, don't go head to head with a first grader about a big change until and unless you see a better school--but do look, don't let his reluctance shape your response. Little kids like routine and are loyal to what they know, so of course he's going to say that he wants to stay at his school. Good for him for finding the good in a bad situation, but don't stick with that. 

[domesticidyll]

Our DS at that age also did not want to leave school for homeschooling. We let him finish the year, and have homeschooled since. (DS's principal said at one point, "Well, they all lose interest in learning around third grade, anyway," which was probably the tipping point for me.)

It's not uncommon for children to ask to stay in an unsatisfactory school situation, but it's not in itself predictive of how satisfied they will feel once the change is underway. I'd be hesitant to make that a deciding factor.  At least, from my own experience, it was hard to leave a familiar but unsatisfactory situation for something unknown... but immensely worthwhile once I did.

Would the school send home the differentiated workbooks and let you add stuff in to make it harder? Better, could you bring in something that is nominally at the curricular standards, but functions at a higher level? If you google your state standards, there is probably something in there that he could claim to be doing more deeply, while actually doing real work. If he's supposed to be doing multiplication, he could do Russian peasant multiplication or lattice multiplication. For work on number sense and place value, he could work with binary numbers or base eight. The limited success I had in a similar situation came from making it as easy as possible for the school and teacher to give him some real work in a way that looked like the work all the other students were doing. (The teacher was very, very skeptical that he would want to do my worksheets, but ended up seeing that he was much happier doing so. I stapled them together with a construction paper cover so they looked like everyone else's.)

I've seen parent supplement with non-academic work, but also with academic work on a subject that won't be covered: in-depth history, Latin, computer programming, formal logic, a modern language. I do think it's really helpful to have a child get to work at level academically in at least one domain as a youngster so there is some experience of what I think of as Actual Learning.

Heather