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Hi, I'm hoping to get some advice on how to best support our daughter in school, and also a bit about what to expect. She's in first grade. We just got her NWEA MAP assessment results, 99th percentile in both reading and math.
At home, she has access to a lot of books, fiction and nonfiction.
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The teacher has to teach to the lowest common denominator of the room.
I confess that I am cynical about teachers. In 8th grade a nun told me "You will get into a good high school but you won't do well."
I ended up winning a National Merit Scholarship but I got straight D's in religion my freshman year that brought my GPA down. The nun was angry with me because I refused to be a patrol boy.
Schools mostly seem to try to produce conformists that seek the approval of authority. But if the system wanted most people to succeed economically why isn't 700 year old double-entry accounting mandatory in our schools.
I think that you should look for things for your daughter to read and talk to her a lot about what she thinks of it. The nuns didn't teach science but the science fiction I stumbled across on my own led me to a lot so I was ready when I got science teachers in high school. But who needs books these days? Get your daughter a tablet.
First quarter first grade is a little young for identification of these GT students. If the child is bored, she needs something more to do. Perhaps, however, "bored" isn't the right word, just the one that in her first grade vocabulary fits the situation. It was my experience that kids call a lot of things "boring".
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Originally Posted by Coney
In my area, there are several universities that offer a Saturday program for young gifted children. You may wish to inquire about some sort of enrichment program at local colleges and museums for young children. Perhaps there is a science museum or children's museum that offers some sort of class. We have literally hundreds of these types of classes at our disposal in my area, but they may be more limited in your locality. Are you close to a larger city? Our local zoos also offer classes for preschool through high school. What about the library? Do they have any type of enrichment? There are also many computer applications, like brainpop. Does she like the computer? Introduce her to coding fundamentals through code.org/hour of code. I like the one where they use Frozen to teach little girls about coding. Most of these teach kindergarten through first grade children how to code through creating games and using sprites.
I just want to caution you that it is common for some young children, especially girls, who are very advanced in elementary school, to start finding school much more challenging in middle and especially high school. Girls tend to mature developmentally earlier than boys. When the subject matter starts to become more abstract, they may find that the disparity in ability starts to narrow between the child and other classmates. Usually, having the teacher give "extra" work results in just busy work for the child. Other children and their parents may resent it, as well and it can have a negative effect on the child socially. Better to have enrichment after school. The only in-school approach that I can think of that might work is if one of the second grades are doing some sort of "project" and your child would be invited to participate-kind of a pull-out situation during the school day.
I haven't read it yet but it is from 1957, the year of Sputnik.
It is not unusual to encounter a bit of racism and sexism from the era but sometimes it is quite progressive. But works from way back when do not have explicit sex and cursing either. Though characters may smoke like chimneys.
I just used my word scanning program on it. It uses science words more than most of today's SF, like The Hunger Games. I didn't know there was a crater on the Moon named after Plato.
What ever happened to acceleration programs (where you do all the work but do it faster and eventually in a couple or 3 years end up in a higher grade if you are ready emotionally)?
What ever happened to acceleration programs (where you do all the work but do it faster and eventually in a couple or 3 years end up in a higher grade if you are ready emotionally)?
This child is in her first quarter of first grade! Let it all sort itself out first.
This child is in her first quarter of first grade! Let it all sort itself out first.
Rather agree. This just might be a very precocious child for her age, with an advanced vocabulary, advanced oral skills, advanced reading skills, and advanced computational skills, graphing, etc. But that is not necessarily gifted where a child truly thinks outside of the box. By the middle of first grade, some of the other children might be ready for chapter books and other types of inquiry-based projects. There might end up being an advanced group that the teacher can prepare projects and activities for the entire small group which includes this student.
I can relate, since I was a high achieving student who was bored in elementary school. As I've posted in other threads, many of my teachers did not like me, since I was ahead of the curriculum, and would ask a lot of questions that they either could not answer or did not want to answer, and I was completely bored with the busywork that the would assign. I also agree with other posters who say that, unfortunately, many teachers tend to cater to the struggling students or at least the average students, more so than the high achieving students. They seem to relate more to them.
Things were better in high school where I had access to honors and AP classes. Unfortunately, even in those classes, many (not all) of the teachers still catered their class to the weaker students and were extremely rude to students like myself.
Unfortunately, I do not have any good advice for the OP. But I do agree with posters who advise against skipping a grade. That can cause severe social problems later on. Nobody wants to be the only high school senior who is too young to drive, or a college freshman who is still a minor, or a the only college senior who is too young to drink.
As other posters have said, some teachers are more accommodating than others of high achieving students. I think that elementary schools should make an effort to assign higher achieving students to teachers that treat such students more favorably. Yes, I understand the argument that "you have to learn to deal with people that you don't like". But such situations are going to occur naturally. There is no need to intentionally create such situations. I've posted in the past about my 2nd grade teacher. She was well known for hating high achieving students and for hating boys. So she was a double whammy for me. The fact that I was assigned to her shows that the school truly did not care about my education.
Perhaps parents of high achieving students need to be more demanding that their kids be assigned to teachers who are more favorable toward such students. The first several years of such parents demanding better teachers will likely result in the administration just saying either "life isn't fair" or that "kids need to learn to deal with people that they don't like". But if enough parents complain, the school may be forced to do something.
I can relate, since I was a high achieving student who was bored in elementary school. As I've posted in other threads, many of my teachers did not like me, since I was ahead of the curriculum, and would ask a lot of questions that they either could not answer or did not want to answer, and I was completely bored with the busywork that the would assign. I also agree with other posters who say that, unfortunately, many teachers tend to cater to the struggling students or at least the average students, more so than the high achieving students. They seem to relate more to them.
Things were better in high school where I had access to honors and AP classes. Unfortunately, even in those classes, many (not all) of the teachers still catered their class to the weaker students and were extremely rude to students like myself.
Unfortunately, I do not have any good advice for the OP. But I do agree with posters who advise against skipping a grade. That can cause severe social problems later on. Nobody wants to be the only high school senior who is too young to drive, or a college freshman who is still a minor, or a the only college senior who is too young to drink.
As other posters have said, some teachers are more accommodating than others of high achieving students. I think that elementary schools should make an effort to assign higher achieving students to teachers that treat such students more favorably. Yes, I understand the argument that "you have to learn to deal with people that you don't like". But such situations are going to occur naturally. There is no need to intentionally create such situations. I've posted in the past about my 2nd grade teacher. She was well known for hating high achieving students and for hating boys. So she was a double whammy for me. The fact that I was assigned to her shows that the school truly did not care about my education.
Perhaps parents of high achieving students need to be more demanding that their kids be assigned to teachers who are more favorable toward such students. The first several years of such parents demanding better teachers will likely result in the administration just saying either "life isn't fair" or that "kids need to learn to deal with people that they don't like". But if enough parents complain, the school may be forced to do something.
Bad example, since my 1st grade teacher was one of the better teachers that I had, and she did try to support both high and low achieving students.
In any case, my comment was intended more toward middle and high school teachers.
To give an example: several times in school (in 7th, 8th, 9th and 12th grade) we learned about which elements were diatomic. In all cases, their list would include "all of Group 17 (or 7A)", and then list elements in that group, but they would not mention astatine, which is at the bottom of that group. I would then ask whether not astatine was diatomic. All 4 of those teachers would get mad at me and refer to it as a stupid question, and that we don't need to know about astatine. The one in 12th grade (in AP Chemistry) claimed that I was "making an astatine of myself". It was obvious that they did not know the answer to my question. But instead of being so rude, even if they didn't want to admit that they didn't know, why couldn't they just say something polite, such as "that is beyond the scope of this class, and there are other things that you need to learn first before it will make any sense". Nowadays, I could have looked these things up on the Internet, and may not have needed to ask so many questions in class about things that I was curious about.
My son was in the 99th percentile and I understand your concern.
My son loved school and did great until 4th grade when he had a horrible teacher. It was her first year teaching and she was a very negative person. That was a rough year and the beginning of him not being excited about school anymore. If I had to to it over again I would have fought hard to get him out of her class.
Good luck.
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