Encouraging "gifted" students to branch out rather than just go up

Parents Forum
101

@SculptorDad - I 100% agree with your second post! That was the point I was tying to make as well! There are many different right ways to raise a math genius (or a genius in every field), and single-mindedly concentrating on what will enhance their math potential is only one of them.

And this is to your earlier post:

No, but social development comes in stages, not all at once. Much like how in math you learn basic arithmetic before you learn algebra (even if you do it much earlier than everyone else), you learn certain social interaction skills and with your same-age peers as you grow up together. You can learn them from hanging out mostly with adults, too, but there are things learned through play and interaction with age peers that are valuable for development.

I highly doubt that the vast majority of prodigies in any area are “teenagers trapped in six-year-olds’ bodies.” That’s not really how social development works, and being really advanced in one academic area doesn’t necessarily go along with being really advanced in social development as well. I’m sure there are some, but I am also willing to be that they are few in number.

And I agree that the best way may not be (and probably isn’t) to keep them back academically just to ensure they are around people their own age - I wasn’t arguing for that - I was only countering the idea that a child’s social development wasn’t important or something that could be completely cast by the wayside in favor of the academic development.

Hmmm, I doubt that. Lack of social skills aren’t entirely genetic (or genetic at all, depending on who you ask). There are some parts of social behavior that are genetically heritable that may increase or decrease one’s sociability, but social interaction is also learned over time. Again, I don’t think that means being forced to stay behind if one is a prodigy in the classroom - there are different ways to learn how to interact socially.

102

@juillet,

It seems the major difference we have is that you think there is a high risk of academically precocious children only pushed lopsided without proper development in social interaction side. And you may be are right.

I am from a homeschool community and most I know chose it exactly for proper social development, or at least that as a just important concern as academics. Some starts homeschool for academics and then quickly realize the importance of social interaction and shift focus. It’s just that I have never seen a family that raised any concern for that matter, while I hear a stereotype about math genius with bad social skills due to sub-optimal raising.

Contrary to the stereotype, parents of prodigiously gifted children, especially those who chose to homeschool, are usually smart and wise, and seldom neglect importance of the social interaction including age peers.

But some of the kids are just born in certain way that simply don’t like or are not good at social interaction despite the needs have been adequately addressed during their childhood.

in other words, the seemingly inadequate end result you see may be the most positive outcome possible, after social interaction has been learned as much as it could be for an individual with certain character and interests.

103

Being confined educationally to same age peers in a classroom is a modern social construct (late 1800s in the scheme of human history means that social skills were mastered in a different environment than a school age segregated classroom.)

Definitely not a premise that I accept as being superior.

104

Springbird, I read your post very carefully especially the part that you were a Principal in a high performing school district. While not a proponent of moving kids forward ( skipping a grade), I think most principals and teachers miss a huge point when they think of “gifted kids”. I could infer from your tone that you seemed to think you knew best what was best for the child based on your field. As a parent, I can tell you there are indeed gifted and highly gifted children who sit in classes for years waiting to be challenged. These parents spend lots of time and money on extracurricular activities to keep the kids interested intellectually. For the most part, the teachers don’t want to find more activities and work for kids who are highly motivated and just get it the first time out. My own kids have spent years waiting for the curriculum to get more difficult, It hasn’t.I was raised in a lower middle income area but the teachers I had got it. They recognized and supported me intellectually. They didn’t try to put all kids on the same level ( I read about 50-70 books per year in middle school and the other kids read at normal rates). They didn’t tell me that grades don’t matter and that common core is fine for everyone and a whole laundry list of things they learned in graduate school for educators. No, they didn’t and for that I am thankful. In some states there are laws for gifted students so they get access to the things they need like a child with special needs has access to things they need. Unfortunately in the state I live in there are none. And we live in a prosperous school district so many parents are misinformed as to how their kids compare statistically to others.
Gifted children should not be made to shift their schedule so they have to attend the high school across town so they can learn algebra in 6th grade. They should not be made to sit and teach their peers ( this happens all the time to my kids). Let the teachers teach. The internet provides a plethora of opportunities so kids should not be subject to the whims of educators who don’t believe that anyone could possibly be naturally bright. That the light has to be the same in all minds. Tell that to a kid who tests highly gifted. I think you will see a wry smile. My kids are upset too. There are and always will be some minds that learn differently ( mathematically, musically, artistically, etc.) Failing to see differences is a disservice to the child who is different. If you had a child who tested off the charts and came home every day to tell you how they repeated things for years in a row you would be saddened. Why do kids have to wait to high school to get differentiation in classes or to be able to advance quickly based on aptitude and hard work.
Giftedness can be tested. Not to meet the needs of any child intellectually or physically is a waste to our society.
So the next time you speak as a principal, take off your educator hat for a moment and think about what it is like to be the parent of that kid, you know the one, the kid who every teacher tells you they have no more material to teach to them. Think for a minute about creative ways you can help that child stay engaged. Think of how you can work with the parents to keep them interested rather than stating “this is how it’s going to be” You might inspire a mind that creates something amazing, some invention, cure or solution. Something bigger, that just would not have been, had that kid been forced to repeat things over. Because some people can learn that fast. And they will if you will only teach them.

105

Life was so much better in elementary school for my girted kid than it was for me. I was ignored in K-8. I wasn’t made to teach other kids I was just ignored. I sat in the back of the room and read. I rode my bike to the library 3 times a week and loaded my backpack with books. Then I started riding to the library in the next town over because I had read all the ones in mine. I read 30 books a week.

My kid had a dedicated GATE classroom with a teacher who was trained in GATE. Who had presented at conferences for GATE teachers. She was never told to slow down. She never had a teacher who believed she was not naturally bright. Her elementary school had 4, 5 and 6th grade GATE kids in 6 math groups ranging from on grade level to Algebra, by ability, not age. They had chess, math team, Sci Oly, robotics, creative writing, debates, mock trials, and more.

I wish that kind of program was in every school district.

106

I think the OP was saying there are kids who are very bright and may be several grades ahead in one (or more) area(s) could start studying another area too or improve on social skills, or music in a group, to something physical like running or hiking. I have seen gifted kids break down in tears when asked to do something they haven’t mastered, even if they haven’t even tried it yet. They want to be perfect at everything from the beginning, and no one is good at everything immediately.

I was a nanny to a boy who was very gifted in many areas (NMF, went to Yale and Georgetown law.). I remember his mother asking me to play Uno with him and she said “And we’re working on him being a good loser.” Well, he was really good at it and it was hard to beat him even if I was an adult and he was 5. So we taught him to be a good winner too. I’m sure he was bored at times at school too even though it was a school that served G&T, but he and his gifted friends started writing plays and acting them out, got involved in fantasy football (he won a citywide contest and several thousand dollars when he was a teen), and found things to do to relieve the boredom.

107

And did he get to play fantasy football during the English class where he was waiting for his classmates to catch up the parts of speech? It isn’t the time outside of school that these kids have trouble filling – it is the time in the classroom when they are waiting for everyone else a lot of the time that is a problem. It is constant for a really bright kid.

108

Playing UNO… My son met another gifted kid through a school group (blocking and I was the coach!). They would then get together for “play” including games of UNO. I once asked the other mother why her son enjoyed being with my younger in age/one grade behind son instead of a same age/grade boy. It was because they both could think quickly… My son had different friends at different ages/stages. College was where he finally was able to be with intellectual peers (there are differences among those ID’d as gifted kids), thank goodness it came sooner than later for him.

re post #106. YES! So much wasted time in school. OP- you need to address this issue in your school. How much bad behavior is boredom related?

109

as @intparent mentioned, the bigger problem is what they have to do for too many hours everyday at school. Because after that, and sleeping and eating, there are not enough time and energy in a day to do what they need to become developmentally healthy.

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Sculptor Dad: That’s it exactly. While some have mentioned Gates programs ( which I would kill to have in our school) most of these kids languish in school and have to do the intellectual work after school. There isn’t enough time in the day.
Also folks, the myth of the “genius kid” being social unbalanced is just that, a myth. More likely you have a parent who wants the kids to be outstanding in school and pushes and pushes. This is the kid who cannot lose, who is obnoxious and who ties his/her self worth to grades. The gifted kid just wants more detail in everything.

111

But @intparent, @SculptorDad, you don’t get it.

OP didn’t need to be moved to a different classroom, so no child needs to be moved to a different classroom. An anecdote of one, plus OP is an educator, no, not just a lowly schoolteacher, a principal! In a high achieving school district! So OP must be right, they’re an expert.

And gifted children in the math classrooms in their school for sure aren’t bored. After all, they are reading different kinds of books, they are delving into interesting topics, they are introduced math beyond the curriculum, to probability, different base systems, to coding! That’s fun and exciting learning. I am so glad, OP, that the teachers in your classrooms can do all that AND teach the other 24 kids grade level math at the same time. I’m sure you are not expecting the parents in your high achieving school districts to do all this after dinner and homework at home, because after all they are not experts like you, they have no idea what their children need, so better not trust them with their kids learning at all, right?

And I am so happy to hear that the children in your school, when they are a little bored in math class after all this, get to interact and engage with their age peers in order to develop social skills. Math class in your school must be so lively! In my experience, trying to interact and engage with their age peers in the classroom during math class is what gifted kids do in order to find any kind of mental stimulation in order to escape the mind numbing stultification, but in other schools they tend to get in trouble for it, seeing as it kinda tends to distract those other kids from learning grade level math at the same time.

Also in my experience, the only kind of social learning happening in class while a gifted kid is watching grade level kids working hard at mastering grade level academics the gifted kid mastered 3 years ago is either thinking “there is something wrong with me” or “there is something wrong with everybody else”. I suppose the first could count as the kind of humbling gifted children need, the second…well, I hope it never happens in your school. After all, every child has room to grow in something, right? Well, As being academically gifted kind of entails being ahead in academics by years, I suppose you are talking about music, arts and crafts, PE, right, you suggest they could learn an instrument or practice calligraphy. I’m so glad your teachers have time to help them with all that, too! I’m sure this isn’t something else you expect the parents to organise after dinner and homework. Remember, the kid after all is spending mornings and afternoons in school. Being “a little bored in class”. Every day. All day. Of every year. For 13 years. Never hurt anyone to be a little bored, right.

Anecdote of one, my gifted kid really has room to grow in PE, had a hard time mastering the forward roll, or kicking a ball. Believe me, there was plenty of humbling going on in PE class. (“Mom, if I acted like that towards kids who struggle in math, they’d be down on me like a ton of bricks!”) So glad to hear that in your school, there is humbling going on for everyone who needs it, and my kid could have practiced the forward roll and soccer in math class.

Sarcasm off. Rant over. After all, I have no idea. I’m not a school principal.

112

Tigerle: Laughing so hard. That was great. Recently, my kid taught the class the next two math lessons during free period so they could move on. She identified who needed help where to understand it. Teacher was not impressed. Said it had to be studied in depth and analyzed. The teachers seem to be very antagonized by advanced skills. Mainly math teachers. (Last year we were told the same thing, she works hard so the class can move along). The other teachers seem happy that someone understands the subject fully. OMG, it is a constant struggle to balance the needs of admin/teachers who don’t offer anything to my kids and my kids needs to learn.
I love the calligraphy, music statement. Most of these kids have tried all that already in addition to building things, designing things and solving problems.
To your point, I have taught my kids not to think “there is something wrong with me” I have taught them to be humble but realize that not everyone is the same in everything. Skills need to be put to use with hard work. If you got it, use it. Keep working on that forward roll.

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@Tigerle, I think you’ve hit the nail on the head with your opening comment. Most teachers and administrators (like most people) aren’t highly gifted themselves. They just have no concept what it is like day in and day out to be in an environment where everyone else seems slow as molasses in the subject areas you have mostly mastered. Or doing 30 homework problems in the same concept you grasped and remembered after doing 3 problems – and doing it every day for years.

Our schools are not about subject mastery and moving on to learn more. They should be. And they should be designed to support the asynchronous kid. The one with speed and interest in math and history, but struggles a bit in foreign languages, and is at grade level in English. Or the one reading and analyzing literature at a 12th grade level in 5th grade, but is only a grade ahead in math. That is where innovative educators should be putting their time. Design the school of the future, using technology, that gives kids the benefits of self paced learning while still coming together in a school environment for social and community connections. Stop fighting to keep the herd together by age. Start rethinking what it means to fully educate everyone.

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In all fairness to administrators, it must be difficult to sort out which kids really need acceleration, and which are being aggressively pushed by parents. There’s no magic number at which every kid becomes ready to learn algebra; if you send an ordinarily bright kid to a summer program or teach them at home a year or two before they’re “due” to reach the class, then yes, they’re going to be bored, and yes, they’re “advanced,” but I don’t know that the school is obligated to upend the curriculum for that kid. Surely, there must be some gifted children with a passion for history who are bored out of their minds going over the causes of the Revolutionary War for the umpteenth time, but they generally still have to take seventh grade history, and will be expected to behave appropriately for the forty-minute class no matter how boring they find it.

Of course, there’s a different, smaller category of profoundly gifted students, for whom the OP’s advice is indeed woefully inadequate, especially in a subject like math in which there really is no purpose to sitting through a class if you know all the content. But I don’t envy the schools having to sort out the difference. I guess for some classes, you could give kids who want to accelerate the final and let them skip the class if they get above a certain score, although even that would invariably create some issues.

115

As the OP suggests gifted kids branch out, might I suggest that OP does as well? Perhaps learn more about international educational practices and standards? The American standard of secondary education has lots of room for improvement, and learning that in much of Europe and Asia, calculus is a normal high school class taught beginning at age 15, might put parent’s acceleration requests in perspective. Perhaps what they are asking isn’t really so odd for the rest of the world.

116

While there is social and developmental value in learning to behave appropriately during a boring event, I don’t think that lesson needs to be hammered home all day every day from K-12 for very gifted students. My son is gifted but not profoundly so and not in all areas, and even he has spent more than his fair share of time “practicing” being quiet and non-disruptive while rest of the class learns the lesson he mastered in the first ten minutes of class. Sure he’s well-prepared for the most boring mandatory business meeting he might encounter as a professional, but if I added up all the time he’s spent forced to sit quietly and wait, I bet he would have loved to use that time to learn something active or noisy such as archery or the cello instead of sitting quietly and reading.

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My opinion and experience is that many schools do everything they can to prevent bright children from learning until they reach high school, at which point they are encouraged to take challenging courses. My children attended what is supposedly a good school, but middle school was an absolute joke. The switch from middle school to high school was like going from crawling to running a hundred-yard dash.

For many people, gifted education isn’t a possibility. My mother was valedictorian of a class of nine; not much way to split those kids off into gifted or advanced classes! For my children, their first few years were spent attending schools with only about 20-25 students per grade. When there are only one or two class sections, it’s hard to have an “advanced” section.

In everything our children do we should encourage them to do as much as possible as quickly as reasonably possible. This can best be accomplished by grouping children first by age, then by achievement, then by ability, then by behavior and social maturity, with adjustments made according to how much a child deviates from each of these norms.

When a young kid shows athletic promise, our system doesn’t try to cripple him. These kids are invariably put on traveling teams and encouraged to develop their talent (as they should be). All children should indeed “branch out,” but there is no need to force an entering kindergartener functioning at say the 2.5 to 3.0 grade level to share a classroom with a bunch of illiterate and innumerate students. These are students who learn very quickly, so they will have plenty of time to “branch out” if the teaching establishment doesn’t cripple them.

Sometimes achievement grouping isn’t possible, as I mentioned. But when it is possible and educators refuse to use it they are guilty of child abuse and ought to be put in jail.

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About “being pushed by parents” I have a funny story. Before my son started middle school he had a placement test for math, and the results indicated he should go to honors prealgebra. Now I was sure he was ready for algebra, so I went and talked to the math teacher who graded the test. He was likely thinking I was being pushy, but went ahead and let me look at my son’s test. Turned out the teacher made a mistake in grading one of the problems on the test. So in the end my son went to study algebra with this same teacher (who was in fact a wonderful teacher), got an easy A and during parent-teacher conferences the teacher said we obviously made the right decision. Many hours of boredom averted.

By the way, we didn’t really teach him much at home. I think he learned fractions during once-a-week pullout lessons their school had for TAG kids, taught by a parent. I think schools can utilize parents and community resources more to help gifted kids during the school day.

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@apprenticeprof, one would think that testing and assessing a child’s level of mastery in one subject and readiness for learning the next level is part of an educators skill set. I fail to see where magic numbers come in. If a child tests at the 98th percentile in pre algebra, the child is probably ready for algebra. Move child into appropriate group, teach child algebra. If the child, for some reason, only pretended to be ready and is actually hanging on by the skin of their teeth, you’d think the teacher might notice. Move child into group below, teach them algebra more slowly.

I also fail to see where the relevance is when and where the child learned Pre algebra. If you want to discourage parents making their only ordinarily bright children study next years content over the summer (which one absolutely should, but for the children’s sakes, who need to run and climb and swim and sing and play and paint, but not for an uninspired educator’s sakes) you can make it clear to those parents that the end of year assessment will count for next years placement, period.

By the way, I am assuming those parents exist, or one should not read about them, though frankly, I have only ever met that argument as an educator’s copout. Anecdote of one: “He’s only scoring in the 98th percentile on next years content because you are tutoring him every afternoon!” Um, no, I just gave birth to a severely disabled baby and basically spend my time in hospital, I wish I had the time to check he’s doing his homework. “Okay, so he’s taught himself next years content perfectly on his own then. He’s just motivated, not gifted, he can’t be, because I know he is only ordinarily bright, MY ability testing says so!” True story, school psychologist.

And I sincerely fail to see what the point is of sitting through a class of which you know all the content in ANY subject. A gifted child with a passion for history will LOVE going over and discussing the reasons for the civil war in class, and will learn something new from the discussion as long as real discussion is happening. If no one in that kids classroom is able to hold a discussion that engages the gifted kids mind on an issue that the kid cares about, again, that child is in the wrong classroom.

I hope you are aware, as roycroftsmom suggested, that the age a child is considered “due” to learn something by age is a completely arbitrary cultural construct? I live in a country where parents are actively discouraged from teaching their children to read, or even learn letters beyond the ones making up their name so they can sign their artwork, before the child is 6 or 7 and in first grade. Teaching letters in preschool and reading in kindergarten would be considered totally unconscionable pushing. Educators in the US would wring their hands!

120

I dig up an interesting and relevant chat with a friend 7~8 years ago;

The friend was considering a private schooling with grade skipped to 3rd, and the school said a kids has to be proficient in pre-algebra to be 3rd grade. Without revealing anything, I will just say that the kid may do some major contribution for the good of mankind, and I will be very proud of myself for being any small help with the following chat.

me: some 3rd graders do such problem although not formally called as “pre algebra”

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me: I think EPGY had such problems in 3rd grade or 4th grade.

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me: Yes, they don’t need fractions and decimals for concept of algebra.

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me: EPGY had multiple variables like 3~4
in pretty low grade
either 3rd or 4th

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me: You see, some school children get quite competitive
There were not many.
Anyway, it’s not big deal, I think.
For some children, concept of algebra and even calculus is much easier than long-division
There is a good book for calculus for 4th graders, “Calculus without tears”

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me: You can learn concept of algebra with “Hands on equation” …
You don’t need higher “arithmetic” including division, fraction, etc ect.
for math other than “arithmetic”

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me: Sure you need some math/arithmetic but it doesn’t have to be now, I think.

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me: Your kid’s grade level cannot be defined by their arbitrary standard. That’s all. Because we are not following those.