(no subject)

[felicula]

I should be joyous and enthusiastic for Aidan, but I'm bawling as if I am trying to re-enter the Our Lady of Victory Infant Home

Today we spoke with Aidan's Kindergarten teacher. She is concerned that if we don't take action, he will not be challenged in his school environment. I'm immensely proud of him. Today mechanchaos spent some time online researching possibilities. Luckily, one of my favorite professors at MCC was involved with the education department at the University of Rochester. Not only has he promised me names and contact information, he insists that we us his name as a reference. Another foot in the door for U of R support is the fact that Aidan participated in the Science Start program pioneered by their Warner School of Education. Today Aidan's teacher is sending him up to the fourth grade teacher for developmental testing to assess his current abilities. She even gave us her home phone number, something she hasn't done in her 30 years of teaching, and she made certain we had the direct extension to the classroom, in case we need to get in touch with her.

Our homework is to find out how we can help him. The U of R studies are what she recommended as a jumping-off point. I am confidant that between my academic schmoozing and mechanchaos' internet research we'll be able to come up with some ideas. We may have to enter the fray with the City School District to get an IEP and see if there are programs already in place. We're at the bottom of Mt. Everest in the task of advocating for Aidan.

That's not the issue.

I included the above article because it gave me pause... then it set me to tears. So many of the problems they say are encountered by "gifted students" were problems I faced as a child. I don't think I was extraordinarily gifted per se, but I know I was rarely on the same level as my peers. I learned early on that things weren't challenging in school, then I surfed the BS wave until I got college burnout in 1998. There were many aspects of those times that I loved, and many things that I learned, but the what-ifs are building up when I read about specialized programs like the one listed in the Tennessean article...

It's as if I've just opened the door to a bright, lovely mansion to find myself descending the steps into my parents' darkened basement. In order to do the right thing for Aidan, I need to make peace with the cruel mirror of my own past. I want to give him what I did not receive. I don't want him to suffer the same disillusionment I had. The circle has come around.

Comments

[alierak.livejournal.com]

I already wonder how I'm going to deal with my own demons to make sure my son thrives in school, and he's not even a month old. I was bored in regular classrooms, but felt forced and stigmatized by the gifted program so I deliberately underachieved. I ended up suicidal and unmotivated before the work really got challenging or interesting anyway, and it took me a decade (and a private high school) to get back on my feet. In my depression I often wondered why being gifted had to hurt so much, and I still don't have an answer, sorry. I want to believe that I can be down-to-earth, encouraging, and insightful when I explain all this to my son, but I'm afraid the nickel summary will inevitably be "school sucks the life out of you", even if he isn't years ahead of the program.

It was learning how to teach that I think finally brought me around. I sometimes wish for a school system without age segregation, where advanced students are treated not as anomalies but as blessings, able to provide more lessons for less advanced students, from the point of view of someone who's just been there. But I worry that someone like me would be too afraid to take on that much responsibility or social prominence, afraid of failure or embarrassment.

Of course Aidan's gifted. Congratulations (to the extent allowed by the nature vs. nurture debate), and good luck to all of you.

[blackfelicula.livejournal.com]

A very profound thank you to you for sharing your experiences. I appreciate it more deeply than I can verbally express. One of the things that gets to me is the number of friends, people I know and care about, who have been through the negatives of this sort of thing. It is likely that a significant proportion of students could benefit from adaptive programs like that in the above link whether they are gifted or not.

mechanchaos and I both feel clue-by-foured by circumstances to take action on Aidan's behalf. In many ways I don't know where to begin, aside from the U of R contacts, the ScienceStart! Program, persuing an IEP, and scouring local and internet resources for educational programs that seem to balance the social and intellectual aspects of this.

We are blessed to have a city school kindergarten teacher who is taking the initiative not only to let us know and keep in contact, but who is gathering resources from teachers of several grades to provide him with a variety of work and opportunities. Aidan also gets to show classmates how to explore the classroom computer's sesame street games.

Perhaps we can keep in touch about this (and other) kidlet issues. I admit I'm not always the best at keeping in touch. Your perspective as someone who has experienced a gifted program could help me understand and recognize some of the pitfalls. The research and experiences that mechanchaos and I encounter may be helpful to you, kareila, and William down the line.

Again, thank you.

[kareila]

FYI, dustkitten recently created a kidtalk community which could be a good place to go for advice as well.

[blackfelicula.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I'll have to check it out. :)

[hbbtrbbtbcnbt.livejournal.com]

I will tell you to be prepared...going through CSE in Rochester is difficult and slow, and there's a good chance you will have to fight for everything. A friend of mine, Lisa, is a parent advocate, and she's come with me to every CSE meeting. This is her work...not just professionally, but she's had to do this with both of her children. If you would like, I can get her information to you...she might be helpful as to how and where to begin through RCS.

*lots and lots of snuggles and hugs for all*

[blackfelicula.livejournal.com]

We need to get together :) ***huggggggs***

I would appreciate her information. Today I found out that the contact my professor had was the same woman who is in charge of the ScienceStart! project. It turns our her specialty is normal development, but she gave me the name and phone number of a more appropriate contact, with the permission to use her name as a reference. I left a message with the other contact today. Apparently she's involved in assessment and will likely have information on programs and resources. ***crossing my fingers that she'll get back to me soonish***

[hbbtrbbtbcnbt.livejournal.com]

Matt was in the same position. He qualified for an accelerated math ( and science, I think ) program in school, and he didn't do it, because he didn't 'want to be a geek.' He coasted through school, did alright, but was bored with it. He went out of his way to be average, and wasn't happy with much of anything. I think it honestly jarred him, when he started college at the age of 30, that he scored a 98 out of a possible 100 on the entrance exam, having never taken the SAT and having been out of school since 1989.

It's gotten better, I think, in the last few years, but there's still a loooonnnng way to go in how to best work with children in any situation. Schools really are mostly designed to be cookie cutters in teaching style, and there are bright children who are deemed problematic either because it's too easy or because they just learn differently. At Finney ( the private school the kids went to last year ), the classes were small enough that the teachers were able to do alot of 1-1, and I know for Dakota, that made a huge difference. It's harder to do that in a public school setting, though. They're in the Victor public school system this year, and they do offer a multi-age classroom, which I may consider for Dakota next year. I don't know if this extends into the upper elementary grades....will check that out. ( the structure is 1-3 in one building, 4-6 in the next, then jr high, then sr high )

[phoenixsong]

Meant to chime in yesterday, before things went to hell with my parents.

I know I was in a TAG program for a while in elementary school, and lite has a great story about failing all his Earth Science labs in HS, then getting an 80-something (maybe even higher) on the Regents. His mom wanted to make him repeat the class over the summer; the teacher told her "NO! put him in a more challenging science class already!" We won't talk about all the creative toys I asked for for Christmas/birthday and then basically wasn't allowed to use them until "nice weather" because they were deemed "outside toys" or too messy for anywhere besides the basement.

Not that we're not counting on our kids being freaks at least a little ahead of "average" or anything. s:) Definitely interested in whatever you come across and sharing various views.

(Isn't it neat and scary all at once to have something like that validated by a less biased source? *hugtight*)

[blackfelicula.livejournal.com]

I was in accelerated reading and math in my ES in Baltimore, then again in 6-8 grade at CtK ES. Thing is, I know I wasn't challenged enough in school. They went over and over things. I got bored and stopped listening. Too much time to think, tuning out... But then I hit college with the attitude that A's ought to come easy. I feel like I wouldn't be doing right by him not to find out what he needs to learn best.

It is neat and scary and a whole lot of other emotions. It is also stunning to read the list of "your child might be gifted if" and being able to say yes to each item. Then talking to my psychology professor about it, her confirmation adds weight to the matter as well.

The most difficult part for me is the part influenced by adoption. One of my major motivators is the question "Who am I?" Yesterday, reading what I did, I learned a big something that I hadn't known about myself: that I would have positively benefitted from more adaptive, less age-restrictive education. It hit me like a battering ram to the chest, leaving me shaking: emotionally and physiologically drained. In some ways I felt resentful that my parents did not vigorously advocate on my behalf. Maybe my experiences are supposed to add fuel to the fire in my advocacy for Aidan.

This is real. I can't argue with developmental testing that puts his reading level at third grade, his vocabulary beyond that, and a teacher who is confident that Aidan could learn anything she put in front of him. We are blessed to have her resourcefulness, enthusiasm, and willingness to tap into the resources of her colleagues to keep Aidan challenged. I just hope we can advocate successfully to assure the continuation of the challengs. I don't want him to fall into the trap of equating "school is pointless and redundant" with "learning is pointless and redundant."

[blackfelicula.livejournal.com]

Rereading my comment to ecwoodburn, I realized that I had unconsciously downplayed the connection with my "Who am I?" obsession. It is difficult for me to articulate since it involves such deep-seated, primal emotions that are more closely linked with me physiologically than most of my feelings. Being adopted, I am working with many fewer pieces than most in terms of assembling the puzzle of who I am. Sometimes I encounter entire sections of assembled puzzle that fit closer to the center of what has shaped me.

When my parents first gave me the non-identifying information from OLV I had an uncontrollable physiological reaction of trembling along with and overwhelming sense of (I think it was) grief. Since then I have confronted the same kinds of uncontrollable physiological-emotional responses when I regisered with the NYS Adoption Information Registry, when I finally remembered the emotional abuses I suffered at the hands of older CtK students, when I wrap my head around the fact that Aidan is my only blood relative, and a small number of other occasions.

Last night, it was triggered by the above article and my accompanying realization. Admitting to myself that I was a talented student who wasn't challenged enough fills in another big section of the center of me. There are too many mixed emotions to accurately describe without a litany of my personal history erupting from inside.

But now I am exhausted by them. They tore through me like a hurricane. I can be understatement girl and silly girl and punny girl, but in the face of the sudden filling of one vaccuum in my soul, I cried and shook and went weak-kneed. Damnitol. People think I'm too intense when I'm expressing my "mild" emotions. If they only knew how deep the proverbial rabbit hole goes...

Weird - now that I'm allowing myself to take math again, I'm starting to see comparative emotional intensities in graph form.

[phoenixsong]

*huglove* Retrospect is a crazy, crazy thing.

[blackfelicula.livejournal.com]

***hugs back tightly and agrees***