<p>I think that you have addressed something really important, since middle school is the time when the kids really try to establish some boundaries between school and home/parents. I can see it in my 7th grader.</p>
<p>Interesting thread. All 3 of my boys were/are math geeks and found various solutions to their math needs. But I wish I had had all of this info when they were young!</p>
<p>Thanks to this thread, I plan to get two books from the library for our family’s enjoyment–Mathematics of Origami and the new Kaplan book, Out of the Labyrinth.</p>
<p>Corranged–I can sympathize, re the 3rd grade teacher who made you correct all your errors. One S tried Kumon b/c he ultimately wanted to do higher math than was offered in his (private K-8) school. He spent all his time correcting stupid math errors on things he understood well, (basic algebra) and we finally gave up on it as a waste of money.</p>
<p>Kelowna,
what might be helpful is to involve the district’s curriculum director, the superintendent, the gifted teacher, and the principal. wouldn’t hurt to contact your state’s department of education and find out what the policies are for gifted education in your state. you’ll have to advocate that the needs of your gifted child be met in the regular classroom OR that they will provide the opportunity for him to take higher grade classes at the middle school or the high school. read all you can about gifted education and subject acceleration, grade advancement, differentiation of instruction, dual and concurrent enrollment, etc. see the Duke Tip website …they have a newsletter there with some helpful information as well:</p>
<p><a href=“http://www.tip.duke.edu/resources/parents_students/acceleration.html[/url]”>http://www.tip.duke.edu/resources/parents_students/acceleration.html</a></p>
<p>what is of great concern is that with state assessments, there is the teaching to the “average” and that the needs of the higher ability student are sometimes not met in the regular classroom.</p>
<p>DS2 was able to link up with a local CC prof in biology – the guy taught at the local GT Saturday morning programs, and DS2 (who had taken a couple of his classes) wrote him a note about doing some independent work when he was in 6th grade. The prof was quite happy to give DS2 some advice, and DS2 wound up doing quite well with his project at the local and national level.</p>
<p>A good friend of mine teaches at a CC in her area and says she continues to do it after all these years because she loves to teach. (And she’s won several awards in the process!) She’s under no pressure to publish, and so she deveotes her full energies to helping students. I think it’s a great way for young students to get some specialized attention from folks who know what they’re doing.</p>
<p>By my CC name you can imagine the gist of my opinion to the OPs key question: How did you handle your child’s extreme curiosity/ability in math?</p>
<p>Basically my wife and I did what we reasonably could to meet our sons math quest which did involve driving tens of thousands of miles.</p>
<p>Our son was lucky that his middle school does AMC8, AMC10 and MathCounts, though only the MathCounts team members practice somewhat. Our son almost aced the AMC8 in 6th, but he rejected MathCounts then in favor of a social club! When he qualified for the USAMO unofficially (long story) in 7th, we started researching for what that meant and concluded we had to do something extra. That led to a 5-year journey of hits and misses. Most of the misses happened during the 1st year, during which we struggled and mostly failed to find the right resources to assist his math growth. Then AoPS came to his rescue and alls well ever since. Hes heading to college in one and a half month, and we are almost done with our math support roles. Its been fun for him, but perhaps even more fun for us.</p>
<p>Here are the major points we learned during the fun ride:</p>
<ol>
<li> Every math kid is different Some are mature enough to be in class with much older kids, some are not; some like math competitions, some dont; some like to read lots of math books, some dont; some enjoy the company of other math kids (e.g. math circles), some rather venture mostly on their own; some likes to go to math related camps every summer, some dont; some spend all their available time in math, some have more interests beyond math, etc. So no one set of strategies work for all families. </li>
<li> Let the kid does what he/she likes, not what the parents like E.g. sitting in an advanced math class in a top university may not interest the kid at all.</li>
<li> Assess the kids math knowledge accurately Skip core math classes or problem solving subject classes only if the kid has mastered those classes/subjects.</li>
<li> Dont promise as parents what cannot be delivered It will soon become apparent that it is not good for the psychology of the parents or the kid.</li>
<li> Keep researching for resources and events that may help to maintain/enhance the kids math interest Internet makes this task easy and fun.</li>
<li> A right math mentor goes a long, long way That unfortunately is something to hope for but cannot be guaranteed. We were extremely lucky.</li>
</ol>
<p>I cant go into details since the post is already too long. Hopefully I have said enough to be helpful.</p>
<p>Another suggestion for the geek factor–though it may not be available before HS. In addition to math leagues and other math competitions, Scholars Bowl or Quiz Bowl teams can be really fun and a great way to feel reinforced and rewarded for being scary-smart. They’re always looking for super math students on these teams and it also connects your student with kids who are geeky in other subjects. For my son, these team practices with a smart, funny coach, provided him with a home base in HS where he always felt welcome, safe and appreciated.</p>
<p>I sure wish I’d found you guys, oh, say, 7 years ago! Lots of great
information. Are mathkids really so rare that the schools don’t know about
this stuff? Why do you have to ask and ask and ask again?</p>
<p>(Can you tell that I’m feeling tired and frustrated with schools today?)</p>
<p>Our elementary school put their hands over their ears and said “La-la-la” about all requests for more math. I had teachers that were more helpful luckily. The principal basically was sure my son would be emotionally damaged by getting more math - her kids (engineers) did fine without enrichment. Middle school had MathCounts, but it was like pulling teeth to get acceleration. It’s always parent initiated and a deep dark secret that it’s not that hard to do. I don’t know why they don’t look for the math kids - I’d guess there were at least a dozen who ought to be double accelerated and aren’t every year.</p>
<p>The sad reality is that good teachers/administrators don’t have much available time (who cares about the bad ones anyway). Only a rare percentage of those good folks are able or willing to spend some of that time on the gifted kids, or on any kids!</p>
<p>Teachers/administrators beyond those rare ones do best for the families of gifted kids by NOT getting in the way. For that to happen small battles may even be necessary at times. Meanwhile, the families of the gifted kids will need to provision for their own extra educational needs. Such provision does not always involve a lot of cost, but it will likely always involve a lot of time.</p>
<p>I guess I have to disagree. I pay my taxes, my kids go to public
schools, and the BEST they can do is not get in the way? I’ve heard
the Los Alto public schools in California have all their elementary
school math classes taught at the same time every day. Then there is
no scheduling difficulty going to whatever level is appropriate. So easy.
No extra cost. Probably easier for teachers to teach. All it takes is
realizing that kids deserve instruction at the level at which they are
ready to learn.</p>
<p>Why can’t all schools hand out an info sheet with much of the
information on this thread to any parent who has a kid who scores
above a certain percentile threshold the first time they do standardized
testing in 2nd or 3rd grade. Very low cost, almost no time involved.</p>
<p>I read only the first two pages (sorry!) because I have a meeting to get to for setting up this summer’s Mathcamp, but that’s why I’m posting. It’s too late for this year, but he’s a bit young, anyway. You might check out both CTY Summer Programs in math and the website for Canada/USA Mathcamp, which meets for five weeks each summer and has a lot more freedom. Someone mentioned a book by John Conway earlier. He’ll be here for a week later in the session. Lots of other interesting people will, too.</p>
<p>That doesn’t solve the school-year problem, of course. Others mentioned EPGY math. CTY Distance Ed uses that, and my own son did Calculus that way when he ran out of math at his HS. It was excellent. He did it through CTY when he started but later we bought our own software through a Texas company and it was also fine. I can find you the name later if you what it. It depends on whether you want a tutor and possible school credit.</p>
<p>Best.</p>
<p>Reading this thread, I’m thinking it’s great there are resources for talented mathkids, but it shouldn’t be this hard. Our schools seem to be failing in supporting the best and brightest in this area.</p>
<p>Math seems to be different from English skills. It’s easier to feed a love of language–just get out there and read everything you can find, from original sources to literary criticism. And talented writers can and do exercise that on their own. Math is more like music–you need the guidance of good teachers, and a more or less systematic progession of knowledge.</p>
<p>But Math, unlike Music, is not just decorative. It’s essential to our progress as a nation.</p>
<p>I agree with Mommusic (except that I think that music is essential, as I’m sure she does :)).</p>
<p>Teachers don’t always realize when they are enriching a student in English or social studies; but because of its sequential nature, they notice when a student is out of step in math, but don’t always do much if anything to correct it.</p>
<p>When S2 was in 3rd grade in a combined 3/4 class, I asked if a group of 4th graders advanced in math could be formed and if so, could S join (a 1/2 teacher had allowed S to join an advanced group). The teacher said no way, she did not believe in tracking. That same teacher, however, had not hesitated to give extra readings to S1 several years earlier when he expressed an interest in a topic. In fact, she lent him her own teaching materials so he could use them in a paper he was writing on that topic. She did not see giving S1 more and more challenging materials in social studies and English as “tracking” but she saw providing S2 with a more formal opportunity for doing more challenging math work as such. She, however, did not object when S2 joined a group of 4th graders who were reading more challenging books of fiction than the rest of the 4th graders.</p>
<p>I don’t know what my son would have done without the dedication of a 5th grade teacher, who pulled out the mathematically gifted kids for separate math lessons, a middle school math teacher who ran the MathCounts program and was equally dedicated, and the chair of the math department at our local university, who ran the high school math club/team. My son took Algebra I in 7th grade, Geometry in 8th grade, tested out of Algebra II and took Trig/Pre-calc in 9th grade, Calculus in 10th grade, and then to the University for math classes in 11th and 12th grade. There were actually quite a few high school kids who did that. (He also went to the university when he ran out of high school science classes.) His advanced standing in math was actually one of the factors that led him to choose a larger university rather than a smaller LAC for college–when he looked into the course offerings he realized he would run out of math classes after about 2 years. </p>
<p>He also participated in all the math competitions previously mentioned (AMC, ARML, MathCounts-they went to nationals, USAMO, and some internet math competitions. I was one of several parents who spent lots of Saturdays driving to all parts of the state and neighboring states for numerous math competitions. When he went to high school he continued to help coach the middle school math counts team, and hopes to continue doing that while he’s a college student, if it fits into his schedule.</p>
<p>I know he’s listening to podcasts of some courses on the internet now, but I don’t know what subject matter!</p>
<p>marite–I need music as much as I need air to breathe. In an earlier time I would have been known as the person who was always singing as she milked the cows or worked the spinning wheel. 
But I understand some things are a luxury to society. </p>
<p>OTOH, a society that spends all its time just surviving doesn’t “need” multivariable calculus either. ;)</p>
<p>See my FAQ. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.artofproblemsolving.com/Forum/viewtopic.php?t=6606#33140[/url]”>http://www.artofproblemsolving.com/Forum/viewtopic.php?t=6606#33140</a></p>
<p>Thank you for posting the link to your FAQ, tokenadult. I remember seeing a reference to it some time ago, and I recently spent some time trying to find it again, without luck. So I’m happy to find it here!</p>
<p>I’ve found some great information on this thread - thanks, everyone.</p>
<p>I have one kiddo who’s a math/cs guy, and another who’s a history/English/bio guy. I was involved in a parent committeee looking at establishing a humanities high school program a few years ago, and one of our tasks was to look at “benchmarks” so the school system would know the program was successful (i.e., the corrolaries to Intel/Siemens/Olympiads). </p>
<p>One can argue about whether those are effective benchmarks for exceptional education, but in my research, we found relatively little in the way of national awards/recognition for the humanities side of things. There were not many high school humanities program, either, to look at for models. At the high school level, the activities were much more along the lines of Quiz Bowl, debate, archaeology/Shakespeare/language clubs, National History Day in some areas, Scholastic Writing/Arts Awards, Destination Imagination/Odyssey of the Mind, etc. </p>
<p>There is a LOT more sponsors out there who are willing to throw their money at math/science than at humanities. I think it’s a shame – the balance is SO important.</p>
<p>It’s funny you should characterize Odyssey of the Mind as a humanities type
program. I have a science background, and coached an Odyssey of the Mind
team for several years. I saw that it helped develop some of the most
important intellectual habits for science: 1) the ability to restate and
reformulate constraints on a problem; 2) the ability to generate multiple
ideas through brainstorming; 3) the ability to work on a solution, but not
get so emotionally attached to it that you can’t listen to criticisms or
even abondon it for a better solution.</p>
<p>That said, that’s not why we got DS2 involved in the program. We signed
him up because he was so shy in front of people he could barely stand to
do required classroom presentations at school. After two years of the
Odyssey he was able to not only perform in front of an audience, but
was able to ad lib and crack jokes, too. I could have cried tears of joy,
watching him.</p>
<p>I haven’t mentioned one consequence of being too advanced for one’s grade level: being shushed by teachers. S would be passed over every time he raised his hand to answer a question. At parent-teacher conference, the teacher explained that she knew he knew the answers; she wanted to find out whether his classmates knew it as well. Perfectly reasonable explanation. But it resulted in S never raising his hand again in any class unless specifically called on, even when classes ground to a halt because no one (but S) could answer the teacher’s question. In college, he has had to learn to speak up again.</p>