posted on January 28, 2001 09:39:07 PM new
I don't know if this will be helpful but I also have a very gifted Gemini daughter.
She's in her second year of college now and we had a talk not so long ago about some of the decisions that were made along the way.
She's always been a natural leader and comfortable in her own skin but I was afraid of the "lessons" she might get from other kids if we let her move ahead too quickly. So, we kept her in her grade level early on but with some classes at above grade level or specifically for gifted students. We also provided lots of different stimuli for her. That included everything from learning every musical instrument known to man (it seemed like it) to taking Kumon Math classes (highly recommended) to having college students work with her one on one in areas she was particularly interested in. We were also very fortunate that her teachers were always accomodating in finding ways to hold her interest. By the time she was 14 she had developed a web-site development company and was actually doing large scale projects for a hotel chain and a Nashville Music Company.
My head swims when I watch my daughter. The kid is a huge sponge soaking everything up and in constant motion... exhausting to watch.
By the time she got to high school she soon reached the point that to hold her back would have been like cutting off her air. We decided it was time to just let her take whatever pace she was comfortable with. She graduated on her 17th birthday and is well into her second year of college - and very happy about that.
If your daughter's like mine - you'll at least have the satisfaction of knowing that even if you make mistakes along the way - that kid will always manage to land on her feet. Good luck.
Here's a link to info on Kumon in case you're interested -
posted on January 28, 2001 10:18:36 PM new
Very - All that I can offer is a load of personal experience.
The crux of this is that there are 2 pits filled with dragons and you must help the child negotiate between them.
On one side is advancement - which fills some of the intelectual needs and desires but has the very grave potential of social misfortune and isolation (And having 2 real friends in a class of 30 who treat you as a leper - is little consolation)
The other side has the very real danger of boredom and regarding school as a hateful chore because of no challenges. She could still be an outcast - the "brain"
Of the two - my own experience is that the second is far worse and less correctable. I did not get through High School by much - most thought me quite the dullard. UNLESS, I was interested in the subject and was challenged by it.
College was fun - I'm an auditory learner and lecture courses were pretty easy - I used to drive my roomate nuts - she took pad after pad of notes - I took almost none and got mostly better grades. Now, on the side of Math, sadistics (Erm. I meant Statistics)Etc. I am a dunce - always will be - and she blew me out of the water.
Grad School was GREAT - Wow! what a great period for me. Loved all of it.
The point I was getting to (In a roundabout way) is that if the child is held back - the social isolation will still be a challenge - because she is so far beyond her peers. AND the lack of challenge has the potential of causing more distress.
The intelectual things will and can sort themselves out. The advice from me is to go with the advancement - and try to encourage participation and activities that stimulate the intelectual AND social aspects of her life. The performing arts are a good outlet outside of school and age differences in a community theater are needed - and accepted. Frequently, kids like her can have the simple intelectual problem of memorizing lines and moves and contact with others - lead to better social skills and the ability to be at peace with others.
Why do I say theater? Well, in my own personal case - a High School Theater Teacher thought we needed and were worthy of a challenge - So we did Shakespeare - Lots of it - Othello - Midsummer Nights Dream - Romeo and Juliet - and it was my participation with the group and in the work there that may have kept me in High School.
Anyway, that is my tale and suggestion. Nutspec
"dead?"
"Aye, To Me! She is Abused! Stolen from me with potions bought of montebanks!"
Very interesting and rather scary at the same time.
I am somewhere between Lotsa and xardan's "What's the hurry"?
I would also be encouraged by your remarks about her being able to take other classes elsewhere in the 5th grade.
I do want to mention Britney Spears though because I had to chuckle when I read that name.
My granddaughter is 4 and the Britney Spears tape was top on her Christmas list and yes she knows all the words to everyone of her songs. Before that it was the Dixie Chicks and Shania Twain and knows all the words to their hits.
I doubt this is any help but I wanted you to know that Britney Spears is not just popular with the older children and from what I understand so do the other girls in her Church Day school.
posted on January 29, 2001 12:21:04 AM new
I started college as a sophmore at 15. I'd never been a social butterfly in school, but I wasn't a complete loner either, always had a group of friends and one or two "best friends," from kindgerarten through high school, but I never felt as comfortable socially as I did when I got to college. If I had it all to do over again, I'd have entered college even earlier.
posted on January 29, 2001 03:09:44 AM newVM
I can't really offer you any advice, but I just wanted to add a couple of things.
As a mother part of me says 'WAY TO GO',Wow how proud you must be of this remarkable little person. Your heart must swell with love and pride.
Now the other part of the Mother in me says, leave this baby alone, let her grow at her own pace, but leave her with the kids' her own age.
Okay I agree that mothers' aren't always sane when it comes to our babies welfare, we mothers' only ever want what is best. The trouble is that what's best for them isn't always best for us.
Now I can't believe that I am actually saying this (because my kids' always tell me I can never step away from there troubles), but I think you have to let her take this as it comes, let her decide what she wants, but if she decides that she is moving up this level please make sure that she still has her friends of the same age over to play.
If your little one stays with her own age group for now , she will continue to learn and maybe the teacher can give her some extra work or she may be able to help her friends learn about the Solar System. It is always possible for her to advance and skip grades in a couple of years when she has lost her baby teeth.
Which ever way this goes, I think she will do just fine. You sound like a wonderful mother and I think that no matter what you finally decide to do she will be fine - because she has her mother's guidance.
posted on January 29, 2001 04:35:05 AM new
Hi VM,
I had an almost identical situation with my daughter. We opted to keep her with her age group "class" with the understanding from the faculty that she would have access to advanced studies if the need arose, which it has many times. She is technically now in the 8th grade, but taking many 9th grade classes. Once she hits high school it won't be such an issue. It helped my daughter's social self esteem to stay with her friends. She has still had issues, kids are mean, and we've had many a tearful night because she was made fun of for being "the brain". I think it would have been worse had I accelerated her to fast. I'm hoping soon to see a return of the pride in her accomplishments instead of the embarrassment that tends to rear it's head due to peer pressure. Follow your gut, you know your child better than anyone and will make the best decision for her as an individual.
Good luck.
kerrydaway here and there......
kerrydaway1 at that other place
posted on January 29, 2001 05:16:23 AM new
In my experience, other kids only look at you as "the brain," (and "different", if you don't skip grades.
Once a kid skips grades, and he's with other kids of similar intellectual development, he's no longer "the brain," as much. And,
when a kid skips grades, they're not immediately noticeably younger than others in the class. There's a wide range of looks, social maturity, height, weight, etc. in kids of the same age. Your kid will find people to hang out with.
As to the reaction of other kids when they find your kid is younger? I was always 2 or 3 years younger than everyone else in my class. You'd meet people, start hanging out with them. Sometimes (and not always), the subject of age would come up. Invariably, the reaction was a closer look and a sort of wondering comment - "You're younger than my younger sister!"
And that never stopped anyone from hanging out with me, or lead to anyone suggesting that I hang out with their younger sister instead.
posted on January 29, 2001 06:14:20 AM new
Wow! Great posts! Thanks everyone.
donny thanks for posting.
What you are describing is what I have observed. She has always been well accepted and forgiven her age, as well as her various eccentricities which are pronounced at times. There seems to be some intangible reason that she is respected and forgiven her shortcomings when the child right next to her seems to be run down on a daily basis. I have seen her act out in a myriad of ways that should or could have spelled social death for her and had no repercussions at all.
It is also interesting that you felt most comfortable when most advanced. I did not have an opportunity like that when I was a kid, but I expect I would have felt the same way. Perhaps we innately know what is best for ourselves and she is working hard because she wants to advance. It does seem this way.
roadsmith she does not study any kind of music. Very frankly she displays neither interest or aptitude. She wants information and has a pronounced interest in languages. She asked me recently how I learned what I knew. I think she thought there might be a source - like a pill you could take and so if she discover what it was - angling for it could commence! She does have ability to draw and paint, but her focus is overwhelmingly academic.
nutspec I like the idea of the theatre for her but she has not shown any thrust in that direction. She never dresses up and plays pretend for example.
It goes like this.
When I got her the Spanish dictionary a couple months back, the first thing she did it turn it over and note that they made German and Italian and so told me that she needed them also..
What occurs to me is that she could grow older, 10 YO or whatever and then take the richness of knowledge she has amassed and channel it in a creative way like that - but at this point I feel if I were taking her to "rehearsal" I would be driving her away from her preferred activities. She is busy trying to read every book in the land and definitely does not appreciate interference.
shar8 - very good to know that Britney is not isolated to the older children. This is reassuring to me. I think my thing is that I have seen older children pretending to be her with air microphones on the playground or whatever and I ache at the idea of my daughter doing same to try to fit in when she lacks the HORMONES for starters.
I am out of time right now..
Thanks all for the terrific responses.
What I would be concerned about is the
possibility that she may skip too many
grades and be ready for college at 12.
I believe that I would encourage outside
activities such as music, art and sports.
Provide the books at home. And then possibly
let her decide. She knows where she will
be happy. And if it doesn't work out,
it can be changed.
I worried about one of my children when she
was four! The teacher gave the class an
option...either to join the reading class or
play in the doll corner. She chose the doll
corner! I can't tell you how much I worried
about this. But, she went on to learn how to
read and has a Phd from Yale.
So, I learned that there is really no need
to hurry. Most intelligent children
will not be easily bored. They will seek out
an interest in what may be a boring activity
for "normal" children.
Helen
sp
[ edited by HJW on Jan 29, 2001 07:45 AM ]
[ edited by HJW on Jan 29, 2001 07:48 AM ]
posted on January 29, 2001 08:05:50 AM new
Perhaps I am confused as to posters. I thought this was the same school that was run by ignorant people, that lost the child on numerous occasions, who fed the child sub-standard lunch in an office?
Combine those attributes with the idea that they are now wanting to skip two grades and place a child who has just started to learn math into a "gifted" third grade class where I should expect those kids will be doing long division, algrebra and geometry at least on on 4th or 5th grade level, I would worry.
posted on January 29, 2001 08:16:05 AM new
This is really an interesting discussion.
I was bored out of my mind in school until I went to college~Teachers never believed that I finished my work, reading and tests ahead of everyone else~I was accused of cheating.
Kids made fun of me in school for reading serious non fiction on my own in study hall~
Socially, I had friends, but I had to work at being interested in the things they were when I really just wanted to talk about politics.
At the time, gifted programs didn't exist~
College saved my life~I wish I could have gone when I was 12!
posted on January 29, 2001 09:28:58 AM new
Interesting discussion...
Like bunnicula, I was reading at two, and bored throughout grade school, even with the addition of the Mentally Gifted Minor program in which we learned cake decorating and went whale watching during the time we were meant to be learning math.
At that time, they had a dictum against skipping grades. My Mom was skipped and miserable during middle and high school as a result, she tells me.
With those bits of history behind me, I'm a strong advocate of giving kids power over there own lives in matters such as these...particularly brilliant kids like yours.
Specifically, she can be given the pros and cons, and allowed to make a choice and see how it works. And if it doesn't work, she can learn how to correct the situation. In this sense, it doesn't really matter which of the options she chooses, as both of them can be corrected. Might changing later be painful or unsettling? Yes. But painful and unsettling events are part of what we use to gain character and strength of purpose.
The lesson that approach teaches is, IMO, more useful than the academic ones you get in school, whatever grade you're in. It's about managing your own world, and knowing that you have the power to fix the things that don't work.
It is also an extremely difficult set of lessons for parents to teach, LOL, particularly when they are little. And each child is unique, some of them need more guidance than others (yours, however, already seems very self-possessed from your anecdotes). We want so much to protect them, but in the long run, the job of a parent is not to protect as much as it is to create self-sufficiency.
Noting, this approach is ridiculous taken to extremes, in case anyone is preparing to combat it that way! Of course, you don't let your little ones venture into harm's way when the danger is clear and apparent...
posted on January 29, 2001 10:18:57 AM new
Hi VeryModern!
As another who had the basic 3R skills before entering school, and who had to suffer the boredom of sitting and waiting while the others were studying, and had to make my way through a school system where the concept of allowing children to learn at their own pace, whether accelerated or decelerated, was unheard of, I can attest that dcj's system sounds like the best one. You can be assured that your daughter will make it very plain to you when she has reached or exceeded her own 'comfort level'.
And, after all, she is the one who will have to live with the effects the rest of her life.
posted on January 29, 2001 10:34:23 AM new
Greetings, you two!
I think the key thing is that you sort of change your role for some decisions from being the decision-maker to being the provider of resources and help. Not all decisions, but ones of this nature, wherein you yourself aren't clear on the right thing to do.
I think as parents, we intuitively know when it's time to take a more forceful role...we can tell when the little ones are really struggling and miserable.
Parenting is such a tightrope wire! Aside from the obvious stuff, there's a great paucity of clearcut rights and wrongs.
In the end, I try to love my kids and support them and believe in them. Knowing I've made mistakes, knowing they are probably strong enough to overcome them.
posted on January 29, 2001 11:04:00 AM new
Well thanks some more!
Everyone's input is very stimulating and in a helpful way. Things are moving now, events have just turned rather quickly and so perhaps with the step I have just taken, things will become clearer for me.
What I did is quit the car pool.
As I said, both of the other children are unhappy and both situations are getting worse not better and it has become a marked detriment to my daughter and myself as well.
One of the children will be 9 next week and is in 3rd grade. He does not want to go to this school and never has but has been forced by his father. The agreement between them was that he would go 1/2 the year and if he did not like it he could quit. The father is now reneging on the deal and the kid is horribly miserable and I don't blame him.
I feel as if I am doing this kid a favor, because the father has never driven even one day and I feel he will let him go to the regular school (with his friends!) if he is made to be responsible for getting him there.
The other child is also miserable (not fat) and hates school. His problems are pervasive and complex stemming (I feel) from the parents ambivalence about their sons (profound) giftedness. He is an oddity in their family and so has intense pressure not to make cousins which live WITH him and close by not feel inferior. He is an intellectual in a family of wrestler type boy cousins and the mantra in the family is "school sucks". He chants same to fit in and this ties him in a zillion knots because it is utterly against every cell in his body. Sad story and I have talked until I am blue to his mother but she can't see the way out. Pleasing her family, keeping them comfortable is too ingrained a habit even at the expense of her son.
Anyway - the result is that where it started out okay, at this point my daughter rides to school in a hotbed of negativity, essentially putting her in the same situation as kid #2 - she has to say "oh drag.. school" to fit in which is truly a lie against her very being. It occurs to me how much better it would be for her to ride with children who are wishing to soar in the way she is, or alternately just with me, (I am high on school, always have been) and so thanks everyone, something has come of this already.
The conference is Feb. 8 and I will wait to have all the information. I am thinking now that it if she is offered "3rd grade" I will tell her what I tell her for one reason or the nearly every day - that "It's your lucky day!"
"..because you have worked so hard, you can go to 2nd grade with your friends or 3rd grade with your friends..."
After that I will answer her questions.
I did see one thing clearly though.
If she is going to step up, she needs to lose the negativity that has formed around her recently.
I feel better than yesterday..
Thanks again all!
posted on January 29, 2001 12:03:51 PM new
Posting again because I made a leap .. how did the car pool enter into this anyway - and so I will explain.
My daughter threw a bit of a fit before school today (the other mother is driving) and this just started over the last few weeks. She also has begun to beg me to drive both ways, and this has also come about recently.
I asked her why she did not want to go school and she told me because "I don't get to study the solar system for even 1 little minute."
Now appreciate that this is a 5YO tears streaming. She is crying for *something* and I want to know what.
What is she trying to say?
Since "solar system" is what the 2nd graders are doing, is this her way of telling me where she wants to be?
Something else?
I wonder.
I do know that the other kids whine to high heaven all the way to school and I know she does not feel this way - so I am trying to clean up her environment so that I can read her signals clearly and correctly.
What is occurring to me now is that she wants to advance and she wants to be spared the other kids (and the other mother's) problems.
????
I will he highly interested in what the teacher has to say.
There is an answer though and I intend to find it.
posted on January 29, 2001 01:38:01 PM new
Hard to say...but I usually find that my daughter is especially attuned to me. Hence, she picks up my tension about decisions and events and translates it into something in her own life.
Kids push against boundaries, it's their job to do so. They push farther than they want to go. Some parenting book or another I once read talked about expanding what it called "the empathic envelope", but only very slowly.
Maybe she's feeling your indecision, and feeling indecisive herself as a result?
I think removing the negativity where you can makes a lot of sense. But in synch with my last comment, it may help her to simply make a decision.
Were she mine, I'd take her out for something fun, just the two of us. And with great calm, I'd help her to decide, stressing that it is all good, which ever way she goes. Probably, I'd want to ask questions and listen more than guide...but my daughter will tell you that I rarely follow this advice without cheating, heh.
You're right to wonder. These early tugs on the tapestry strings have implications way down the line. That's why I think you can't go wrong if you let her tug them as she will, in a way that's safe and has the possibility to be sewn back into pattern if needed.
Hang in there, E. I can tell you're a fabulous dream mother, and I'd bet a lot you won't go far wrong.
posted on January 29, 2001 02:15:15 PM new
Thanks dcj - I cannot really talk to her yet because I don't have all the facts. I am ASSumming what is occurring here, and will not know the whole story until next week.
I talked to her about it some though, because this scenario seems probable and if she had a strong reaction one way or the other, it would have been some serious info for me.
As it is, everything is unclear, and so I am cleaning up thinking it will help clarify
She has been upset recently going to school and I need to know precisely why.
In the past, she has always made it abundantly clear to me what she wants and I expect she will do so again.
Very frankly, she is driven. She creates her agenda and she sees me as a person with power and ability to make it go her way. She is correct on that front, and I do not mind being her advocate / acting as her instrument to achieve her goals, particularly because they are always high-minded and hurtful to no one.
OTOH - my son just plain loves me.
See.
One sweet. One spicy
Together, I got it made.
posted on January 29, 2001 02:25:53 PM new
Interesting...
Of my two, one (my sweet Jen) is so connected to me I sometimes can't tell where I end and she begins.
My MightyMite, on the other hand, adopts the pose that I am a form of enemy (although he secretly loves me as witnessed by the fact that he forgets himself at vulnerable moments and I find his fingers twined with mine).
Christopher is so much like me, Jen is so much a part of me, they're both more precious than anything else in my life.
Educationally, I don't worry too much. They're both too bright for school, I supplement it with what we do at home, and I can individualize it the way I want. Hence I play lots of games with Christopher the competitive, and research projects with Jen, and they all do puzzles and other mindstretchers with me.
I view school as a necessary evil, I suppose, and value the social interaction more than the dim light it shines for the brilliant mind. And we all have brilliant minds, in one way or another, don't you think?
posted on January 29, 2001 02:53:12 PM newAnd we all have brilliant minds, in one way or another, don't you think?
Oh I dunno. I am not sure about that.
Are you counting folks who are brilliant at denial or something like that?
I think that their are legions of people living 1/4 of their potential.
posted on January 29, 2001 02:59:05 PM new
Somebody once told me that we are all dyslexic in some way or another. I know mine, it's directional dyslexia. North is up, tra la la...
If that is true, than it seems to me that we are equally gifted, each of us, with the capacity for brilliance.
Denial is a whole different animal. Living up to potential is too, in my view.
posted on January 29, 2001 03:07:38 PM new
Well we are "gifted" differently.
A child with a good home is gifted as far as I am concerned.
"Gifted" intelligence is a curse in direct proportion.
This one has a brilliant intellect, but this other is happy, well loved, and kind.
posted on January 29, 2001 03:14:22 PM new
I follow, but in my economy, there's a false mutual exclusivity there...
*This* one has the capacity for brilliance (granted, something of a Damocles sword) plus the additional boon of a good home and with that, happiness, kindness, so forth...is that impossible?
posted on January 29, 2001 03:25:02 PM new
Oh, of course it is possible. I am out of my element here dcj. I really don't think about these questions.
I am reacting to the premise that says everyone is brilliant or "equally gifted"." Although that sounds good, it does not jibe with my life experience. I have met some pure fools for sure. I am guessing that you mean that everyone is brilliant at *something*, but I am not sure.
If you are suggesting that everyone's mind has the capacity to think as well as everyone else's, well, I feel sure that is not correct.
posted on January 29, 2001 03:30:24 PM new
Growl, AW is not working well for me today, keep getting error messages...
Sorry, dear one, didn't really mean to engage you in a debate, although I'm fond of debate.
I think I need to differentiate between actual brilliance and capacity for brilliance. I do believe that we each have an innate gift, a capacity for brilliance in some field or another. I agree with you that this is not often realized. And I've encountered enough sorrysacksinks myself to eschew pure idealism here, heh.
But!
What if we (and this is a generic we, encompassing teachers and parents and the world of adults) treated each child as though he was potentially the next Einstein? What would that unlimited belief do for the child?
, if you don't skip grades.