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You might consider the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning, formerly Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. It's a boarding school in Westchester, NY.
Depending on your child's abilities, he could get a scholarship. Fact is, I think most, if not all, students who attend, qualify!
You might consider the Xavier Institute for Higher Learning, formerly Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters. It's a boarding school in Westchester, NY.
Depending on your child's abilities, he could get a scholarship. Fact is, I think most, if not all, students who attend, qualify!
Sorry, I was referring to inclusion and IG in the elementary setting. My kids are young, and my own experience with IG growing up was in elementary school. After that point, it was honors and AP classes...which do not really address some of the unique educational challenges that come with giftedness.
While AP classes are certainly a good option, I think that there are 3 main problems with them, which perhaps cakeums is referring to:
1. Since they are a class where basically everything comes down to 1 exam, it encourages teachers to "teach to the test", which is perhaps the worst possible scenario for a "gifted" student who is genuinely curious about a particular topic. In the extremely rare case that a teacher refuses to "teach to the test", it puts students at a major disadvantage when taking the AP exam (although all of my teachers "taught to the test", whether they would admit it or not).
2. While the teachers who are assigned to AP classes are (from my experience) usually very competent in their subject matter, and usually good teachers in general, they may not necessarily be the best teachers for "gifted" students. I found that even in AP classes, their loyalty would be toward the weaker students, and would be extremely rude to high achieving students like myself. They would often use lines like "we have students struggling, so I don't have time to answer your stupid questions" (I even had at least 1 teacher use profanity when refusing to answer a question I asked). AP classes should be a challenge, not a struggle. If a student is truly struggling, that student probably does not belong in that AP class. But, unfortunately, those are the students that the teachers connect with the best and feel the most loyalty toward. I also feel that my school district wanted to run up the number of students taking AP classes, even if it meant sacrificing the average AP exam score. Perhaps school districts need to hire a few teachers exclusively for AP classes, and use different hiring practices than they use for other teachers.
3. AP classes tend to attract 2 groups: the "gifted" students who understand much of the material naturally, and are genuinely interested in learning even beyond the curriculum; the "overachievers" who probably don't belong in AP classes, but they either work really hard, or are the teacher's pet, or are really good at marketing themselves, but have no interest in learning anything beyond what they are rewarded for. These 2 groups usually don't mesh well together, and the teaching techniques that work for one don't work for the other.
While AP classes are certainly a good option, I think that there are 3 main problems with them, which perhaps cakeums is referring to:
1. Since they are a class where basically everything comes down to 1 exam, it encourages teachers to "teach to the test", which is perhaps the worst possible scenario for a "gifted" student who is genuinely curious about a particular topic. In the extremely rare case that a teacher refuses to "teach to the test", it puts students at a major disadvantage when taking the AP exam (although all of my teachers "taught to the test", whether they would admit it or not).
2. While the teachers who are assigned to AP classes are (from my experience) usually very competent in their subject matter, and usually good teachers in general, they may not necessarily be the best teachers for "gifted" students. I found that even in AP classes, their loyalty would be toward the weaker students, and would be extremely rude to high achieving students like myself. They would often use lines like "we have students struggling, so I don't have time to answer your stupid questions" (I even had at least 1 teacher use profanity when refusing to answer a question I asked). AP classes should be a challenge, not a struggle. If a student is truly struggling, that student probably does not belong in that AP class. But, unfortunately, those are the students that the teachers connect with the best and feel the most loyalty toward. I also feel that my school district wanted to run up the number of students taking AP classes, even if it meant sacrificing the average AP exam score. Perhaps school districts need to hire a few teachers exclusively for AP classes, and use different hiring practices than they use for other teachers.
3. AP classes tend to attract 2 groups: the "gifted" students who understand much of the material naturally, and are genuinely interested in learning even beyond the curriculum; the "overachievers" who probably don't belong in AP classes, but they either work really hard, or are the teacher's pet, or are really good at marketing themselves, but have no interest in learning anything beyond what they are rewarded for. These 2 groups usually don't mesh well together, and the teaching techniques that work for one don't work for the other.
My expectation is that the AP teacher will teach the subject matter (which in turn will be addressed in the test). The test is the sole determiner of AP credit. I guess one could shorthand this to teaching to the test. (Of course particularly interested and self motivated students are not bound by this instruction and frequently research and learn beyond the classroom instruction.)
My experience tells me many public parents push their 'less bright' kids into AP courses. Although public schools may have guidelines for admission to the course, parents can usually override. My experience also tells me that schools can (and do) game some ratings by pumping up the numbers and gaining 'AP participation rate' increases. The presence of these two and sometimes overlapping groups in AP courses inevitably and understandably causes the teacher to adjust instruction to a lower 'center mass', dilutes the experience (and frequently the AP score) for the 'brighter' kids, and is a sign of the times (wherein every child is considered a genius by their parents).
Of course there are some courses and schools where this is not the case. For example, Calculus BC, AP Virgil, Studio Art Drawing, tend to draw only the talented kids.
My experience also tells me that the whole notion of 'giftedness' needing special handling is essentially a crock. There are some kids who are objectively very bright or objectively very talented in certain directions. No biggee.
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Like everything offered in a school it is not for everyone nor is it the end all to a problem. AP Courses can be a great option for those who are performing above the average level but realize that colleges may only accept so many courses in transfer, how you score testing out of them will determine if a school accepts them. My daughters both did AP courses but only applied 2 of them in transfer because that's what the schools accepted. Duel enrollment is a popular option here when the scheduling allows and may be more constructive in the long run.
My expectation is that the AP teacher will teach the subject matter (which in turn will be addressed in the test). The test is the sole determiner of AP credit. I guess one could shorthand this to teaching to the test. (Of course particularly interested and self motivated students are not bound by this instruction and frequently research and learn beyond the classroom instruction.)
I often wonder if my experience in school would have been different if I was born a few years later. The Internet did not really exist when I was in elementary and middle school, and I was in high school during the AOL dialup era. I wonder if I had been in school when the Internet was more easily available, if I would have been willing to research things online rather than asking questions in class and getting in trouble for doing so.
One thing which I will be adamant about is, if a teacher cannot answer a student's question for whatever reason (lack of time, needing to learn other things first, not knowing the answer, etc), I feel it is wrong for a teacher to be rude to the student, especially in an AP class.
For example, when I was in AP Chemistry in 12th grade, our teacher said that all Group 17 elements were diatomic; he would then list all of the diatomic elements, including the ones in Group 17, but not mention astatine, which was at the bottom of group 17. I then asked whether or not astatine was diatomic. He then got mad at me, accused me of "making an astatine of myself", and said that he doesn't have time to answer my stupid questions (even though he would spend much of the class time answering questions that other students asked). Obviously, he did not know the answer. But instead of being so rude to me, why couldn't he just give a polite answer like "That is beyond the scope of this class, and there are other things that you have to learn first before that will make any sense".
Like I said, nowadays, I could have just gone on Wikipedia and looked up astatine. Which is why I wonder whether or not my school experience would have been different if I was born a few years later.
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My experience tells me many public parents push their 'less bright' kids into AP courses. Although public schools may have guidelines for admission to the course, parents can usually override. My experience also tells me that schools can (and do) game some ratings by pumping up the numbers and gaining 'AP participation rate' increases.
Good point. Is it the school's trying to run up the percentage of students taking AP classes (even if it means sacrificing the average AP exam score), or is it the parents pushing for their kid to be in AP classes even if the kid clearly doesn't belong.
I think another issue is both guidance counselors and parents pushing for their kids to be well-rounded, thinking that it's what colleges are looking for (whether rightfully or wrongfully). So, the future liberal arts major is pressured into taking AP Calculus, and the future STEM major is pressured into taking AP English. In both cases, the student will have minimal interest in the class, other than in getting a good enough score on the exam, and they hold the entire class back since the teacher gears the class toward those students.
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The presence of these two and sometimes overlapping groups in AP courses inevitably and understandably causes the teacher to adjust instruction to a lower 'center mass', dilutes the experience (and frequently the AP score) for the 'brighter' kids, and is a sign of the times (wherein every child is considered a genius by their parents).
That was the point I was making: the 2 groups of students taking AP classes don't mesh well together, and require very different teaching techniques. What I feel is wrong is how the teachers gear the classes toward the students who don't really belong in the AP classes.
Which brings up another question: I always felt that the issue was that, even in the AP classes, the teachers would connect more with the weaker students, and feel more of a connection to them. But another possibility is, are the teacher maybe pressured into favoring the weaker students, in order to encourage them to take AP classes, again, in order to run up the number of students taking AP classes. They can then, unfortunately, afford treat the real high achieving students like garbage, knowing that they will take the AP classes anyway.
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Of course there are some courses and schools where this is not the case. For example, Calculus BC, AP Virgil, Studio Art Drawing, tend to draw only the talented kids.
Interesting that you mention Calculus BC. For those who don't know, there are 2 levels of AP Calculus. AB is the easier one. BC harder one, and covers all of the AB topics, plus additional topics.
In my high school, there was only one AP Calculus class. The vast majority of students in that class took the AB exam. My teacher was an unusual hybrid of teaching to the test vs teaching for learning sake.
I will mention that he was generally an excellent teacher, so this paragraph is not a complaint, just commentary. His class covered all of the AB topics, and some, but not all, of the BC topics. He made it very clear that even if you were planning to take the AB exam (as most were), you were still responsible for learning the BC-only topics that he taught. And if you were not willing to learn those topics that were not on the AB exam, then you should drop his class.
The remaining BC-only topics he taught before school once a week. But he made it very clear that during class time, we are not to discuss or ask any questions about those topics. He used the usual line about there being students who are struggling, and how he does not have time to answer questions on BC-only topics when there are students struggling just to learn the AB topics. Like I said, he was a very strange hybrid. He threatened to kick us out of class if we ever asked questions about the BC-only topics that he didn't cover in the main class, although he never actually enforced that rule; he would just yell at such students, including myself.
I didn't take AP Virgil or Studio Art, so I know nothing about those classes.
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My experience also tells me that the whole notion of 'giftedness' needing special handling is essentially a crock. There are some kids who are objectively very bright or objectively very talented in certain directions. No biggee.
It may depend on the student, and how you are defining "gifted". The term might be overused.
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