Comments on: Summer: It Takes a Village

By: Gifted Etiquette: Prudie, Take Two « The “More” Child

Gifted Etiquette: Prudie, Take Two « The “More” Child — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 06:14:04 +0000

[...] can ensue when one’s child is far, far ahead in reaching certain milestones (See a recent comment to this blog for an [...]

By: SwitchedOnMom

SwitchedOnMom — Fri, 26 Sep 2008 09:27:24 +0000

Hi “e”

5 and doing square roots? Oh my.

I’m sorry to hear of your frustrations. As you say, the position you describe can be rather isolating in this area (in addition to being exhausting and frustrating!). No one wants to hear about your “problem”–granted in the big picture it’s a good problem to have, but still, when you’re living it, it’s hard. So what to do? To start, please check out my recent comment to Cheryl on the post “Normal is Relative” regarding getting some online support. And if you haven’t already, spend a lot of time reading on Hoagies, especially the section on highly, exceptionally, profoundly gifted.

It sounds like you need some further assessment. Again, I highly recommend Johns Hopkins CTY’s Diagnostic and Counseling Center. They specialize in gifted and they’re near by. Should your son’s scores merit it, they may recommend application to the Davidson Institute’s Young Scholars program. That will give you access to still more support, and most importantly, peer connections for your son.

Regarding school. Ack. This area is so school and school achievement focused, so it’s very hard to think of stepping out of “the norm.” My theory is that a lot of people who come to the DC area were school achievers themselves, so as a parent it’s really hard to go against that. But you should keep that option open. As you’re probably learning, MCPS is not very receptive to acceleration or thinking outside the box for accelerated learners. They have their programs….and that’s that. That said however, I have a friend in the system who has had amazing success in navigating some radical acceleration for her child. She lives in an outer part of the county (maybe not as intense?) carefully interviewed the elementary principal before she bought her house. It was her good fortune that he was help her get what her son needs.

But back to homeschooling. Check out Lisa Rivera’s Creative Homeschooling: A Resource Guide for Smart Families. That may warm you up to the idea, or at least give you lots of ideas for engaging and challenging your boy.

Finally, you’re right to worry about the impact on your daughter. Be sure she finds places to shine.

Good luck!

By: e in cc

e in cc — Thu, 25 Sep 2008 05:54:10 +0000

this is all overwhelming and exhausting! my son turns 5 in october and of course there was no way we could enroll him in mcps even though he already has internalized the curriculum. we decided to try a year in a dc private school and try to leverage it into first grade in mcps, and guess what? his needs still are not being met and we work on math problems (his favorite is working with square roots), reading, etc. when he comes home in the afternoons. i feel like there’s no gifted and talented progrms out there until third grade. so are these kids supposed to just coast until then??? in trying to find a “home” for him at a school, i’m also having to reconsider my bias against schooling him at home. furthermore, i feel isolated because no one wants to hear how frustrated i am searching for a program to challenge my son. i know that to my neighbors i’m being percieved as an overbearing “type a” mom because everyone in this area is trying to fast-track their kid to harvard, but i’d rather they treat me as a freak than my son (and some who have seen his gift for numbers have made a huge scene, thrown quizes at him to stumble him, and make my younger daughter feel inferior since she’s not as good as math at age 3!)

on this journey, is it best to start with an educational consultant and testing beyond the wpsii?

thanks for this site, i can’t wait to lurk some more…