Christmas Gifts

Christmas came this year and we just had to share the gifts that our 2 boys gave us. Our oldest made a 2009 calendar filled with a poem he wrote for every month. I read these poems and was surprised. At first I thought he had just compiled different poems he found in a book or something, but it came to be that he actually wrote them himself. One example for the month of March:

What's as beautiful as butterfly wings?
Lapis laxuli that's sparkly blue,
A topaz that shines so goldenly true,
An opal that shines like rainbow fire
And and emerald that people admire.

I've never even heard of a lapis lazuli.

And then our 1st grader wrote a whole 5 page story entitled "My Funny Family".

I won't quote the whole thing, but I thought it was pretty impressive a kid who was in preschool last year, was now writing 5 page stories with things like:

"My mom is extremely fun on vacations." and,
"My dad is exhilarating."

Pretty big words, and he spelled them all right too.

I was so proud and loved both their presents.

vc

Too Much Homework, Too Much Busywork?

Our oldest seems to be overloaded by tons and tons of homework. Since school started this year he is home doing tons of homework every day. It seems to me that his teacher thinks, "Oh, gifted students--they need to have tons and tons of work all day and night to keep them busy!" And during the day is no different. It seems like the day is full of busy work all day doing workbook page one right after another.

I used to think that it was just our son that had the worst of it because of his Asperger's maybe he wasn't getting things completed in school and so seemed to have more work, but I started asking some other parents and heard comments from other kids in his class. One boy we carpool says to my younger son often, "You're going to HATE 3rd grade because you have to work SOOOO much ALL day long and it's TONS and TONS of work!"

Why is it that some of these teachers feel that tons of work or homework is best for the gifted child? It's like they are trying to cram tons of work into the shortest amount of time. Our #1 isn't having the chance to explore, research or go in depth with any particular subject like he used to. Before, he would learn a little on a science subject, or history, and if it interested him, he would go to the library and check out all these books on it to learn more. Now, we're lucky if he's done working just to eat dinner at night. It's like they are shoving vocab and facts in the students' faces and making them memorize, but it's not really learning the way a gifted child learns.

I watch sadly as the other kids in the neighborhood come home from school and are riding bikes and playing around the neighborhood. They come over to play, and we have to tell them no because our kids have homework up the wazoo.

He's only 8 years old for goodness sake! Why can't he just be a kid?! Yeah, maybe before he was reading and doing workbooks all day anyway, but he actually ENJOYED it. It was what he wanted to be doing and learning. Now he has begun to hate school because it is all forced on him and TONS.

We've discussed things with the teacher and she says students shouldn't be working more than 45 minutes on homework and if so just don't let them finish, but then I'm sending him back to school unprepared and having more work to do in school. There is no winning solution. We just continue to work him to death and hope we can be rid of this class soon and in time before our oldest decides he hates school all together.

My husband and I are completely frustrated now and he keeps suggesting private school which I know we can't afford. I know there are good teachers out there, but it seems like a lot of them are just out to get all the tests passed off, sign this and that off, and it doesn't matter how they are learning in between.

Now, I'm not in the classroom, and I don't know everything that is going on, but something just doesn't seem right. All these gifted kids that used to have a love for learning that are now thinking of school like a trip to the dentist. It just isn't right.

Should we just put the boys back in regular school and forget this gifted program that we had so much hope for? Should we do the online schooling thing where they can go at their own pace? Why does public education have to be so frustrating? It is interesting that I have heard several parents have pulled their kids from this gifted program when they get to this 3rd grade teacher's class. Obviously, something is wrong here.

Obsessions

OK, so you've read in our last post how the boys just want to read read read or play the piano all night long. Well, they have this other obsession lately of doing brain puzzlers or working on a comprehensive notebook all day long.

We can't get our oldest to stop reading through this brain puzzler book figuring out all the problems for a moment to do anything else.

Our 2nd son is so obsessed with working on this 2nd grade reading/math/grammar comprehension book, that I can't get him to do anything.

You'd think gee, you've been at school all day long and then you want to come home and do more school type workbook solving problems, answering questions, grammar type things?! Don't you want a break? Gee, I sure would, but then again, I guess I am not like these 2 little sponges.

I suppose I could look at my husband who looks at a computer all day at work, but yet comes home and continues to be on the computer for the rest of the day. I think---don't you need a break? But nope. Obsession.

At least they are good obsessions that the boys have. I should be thankful that it isn't video games or fighting, or whatever else there could be that isn't the greatest.

How to Ground a Gifted Child

Ok, so I'm not actually looking to ground the kids, but I thought I'd just share something funny about the kids. Yes, they get in trouble for fighting and normal stuff, but one of the biggest problems we have is when they won't listen or go to bed not because they want to watch tv or play video games, but because they want to practice the piano, or read!

I have a specially hard time trying to make my kids go to bed when they are begging me to just let them practice a few more piano songs, or if they are wanting to read read read. It's like gee....why not let them stay up all night and better themselves---but I have to remember to be good and steadfast in getting them to listen even when it seems like these things are so good.

They get to bed and yet I'll still find them awake reading or one of them trying to play more piano songs in the dark. It is just so funny. It's not just bedtime, but I often need them to help out with cleaning or dinner, and they are too busy reading, or my 2nd son is so into playing the piano, that they won't obey.

What am I going to say to them? "Hey--if you don't listen I'm going to ground you from reading!" Or, "I'm going to take away the piano!" It's like I don't want to ban them from doing such awesome things, but it's funny--I'm not grounding them from the tv, or taking away their toys or video games---it's books and piano!

Such funny kids! I love how passionate they are with their music or their reading and researching. It is just so inspiring to me, and I guess I'll just have to continue being guilty of letting them get away with reading, studying, or practicing the piano a little too much.

Parent Teacher Conferences

Parent/Teacher Conferences were this week, and we have been waiting anxiously for them to see how in the world our kids have been doing. For our oldest, we were hoping to not see low grades, and for our 1st grader, we were hoping to see he is actually making it going from preschool to 1st/2nd grade.

We first met with our 3rd grader and were so surprised to see that his grades have NOT taken a terrible toll. The teacher who before had marked so many points off for him not showing all his work, or for not "labeling" his answers (i.e: word problems he got all correct, but he did not write the answer as 18 "students", or 5 "ducks"--he just wrote 18 and 5) I guess had decided to regrade the papers and allow the non-perfection. I'm not sure, but she said something about how she changed a lot of the class grades.

Oh, and as far as the timed math tests, she postponed the whole class to give them another month to pass off because no one was getting them done!

So, all this stress and worry for nothing! Well, yes, he still needs to work very hard and try to get these things done, but I guess he doesn't have to be perfect. She did say that he was the fastest reader in class at 199 words per minute. Yeah, he always surprised me as the super reader. She says he's on a 7th grade reading level. Good job for #1!

Then, off to #2's conference. This is the one we were worried about. How had this big experiment of skipping Kindergarten and going into 1st/2nd grade worked out?

We were happy to see that he had 100% scores on every single test/paper/project everything except for one 90 something %. Basically his report card was just about perfect! She said she had placed him in 2nd grade math, and he was at a 3rd grade reading level, and he was scoring most of his spelling/language arts and other stuff in the 3rd grade level.

It was OK! Our little preschooler to 1st grader has succeeded. A little part of me inside shouted "Ha! Take that all you that doubted him and thought this was a terrible idea!"

I did ask specifically about his development emotionally and socially being in the classroom with kids up to 2 years older than him, and she said he was doing fine. She said particularly all the girls loved him, 1st and 2nd graders and that they all hung around him. Hey, he can be a cute ladies man! She said he was really really quiet and hardly spoke up in class, but part of his personality is that timidness, and he hasn't done a lot of things to know what's to happen since he missed Kindergarten, but it's OK. He will be OK. This was a successful "experiment" as the district coordinators called it. It's interesting too, because the teacher advised against us skipping him, yet we did, and he's doing alright.

Incredibly Smart, but Sloppy and Slow

We are having a tough time right now with our oldest. He is so so smart. We know he has such this massive amount of knowledge and ability, yet everything comes out so jumbled and messy. Yes, as before we suppose a lot of it has to do with his Asperger's that he is so unorganized, and his handwriting is so incredibly sloppy, but these little things are starting to take effect in school and with what grades he's getting.

Yes, it's important to be neat and all that, but right now it seems as if he's getting so much more sloppy with his handwriting and everything. I know his teacher counts a lot toward neatness and organization if he remembers things or whatever, and it's started to count against him.

Another thing is a big part of school this year is that things are timed. It's like you can be smart but you must also be fast. (Maybe that's why his handwriting is becoming so much more sloppy because he's being rushed.) In math it is mandatory that they must pass off these minute and 30 second timed math problem sheets. I know it is important to get to know your multiplication tables down pat, but must you insist that they pass them off in a timed test and if not then fail? OK, so I don't know how much they are going to take off points wise, but it seems like this is a big part.

It's not just this, but a lot of things are all about time, and with our oldest who has Asperger's, his connection from brain to mouth or brain to hand is not as fast as the other kids and so he is lagging behind a lot.

Oh, and one more thing--you must show ALL your work for math problems, even if you do them in your head--if you get the right answer but didn't mark a little 1 next to the tens when working out your problem, then you will get points marked off.

This is incredibly frustrating to us to see such a smart kid go down hill in school because of these little nit-picky things. Yes, I agree it is important to get kids in the habit of doing all these things a little more quickly or to show your work if you're not understanding it, or to see later where you made a mistake, but he's not making mistakes, he's just getting docked points for things the teacher wants.

My husband and I feel very frustrated and saddened at times to see such a smart kid still not be able to show his full potential, and then on top of it, it's like he's being graded not for what he knows, but how he produces it.

When he was being diagnosed with this type of high functioning autism they were telling us how stunned they were that his intelligence and academic abilities were scoring so far off the charts that they couldn't even justify telling us how they compared to others. They mapped his IQ as "in the genius range". I promise I'm not bragging. This is what they said and what we have on paper as record from countless doctors and tests. But yet here we are with our #1 being so smart, and yet as we've said before---he'll never be able to show it.

I suppose that's how the world works though. You must be fast, you must do it "this way" or "that way", and this is the way to be successful in life. Is the world going to wait for a genius who might take an extra minute to answer a question or write a report?

My husband continues to ask for other options in schooling for our kids. He says they are just going to hate school and it's not going to be enough for them. It's not challenging enough he says, but just picky and busy with projects but not really new things to learn. I continue to wait it out. I hope things will be different once the kids enter junior high and can choose a little more what classes they will take. Husband says they won't last that long. Only time will tell.

Weird Interests of Weird Kids

Well, our first grader finally turned 6 years old, and we celebrated his birthday. Of course, it wasn't sports equipment, toys, or games that he really wanted. No......he was dying for an atlas, piano music, and science books.

There is some sort of obsession that he has with maps. I don't know what it is really. He will take the phone books with us whenever we go out and will just study the maps as I drive.

He spends hours at a time just going over maps and atlases. And then he's analyzing the phone book maps telling me that this phone book messed up because it's labeled Interstate 15 as Interstate 89 and that's wrong, and I'm thinking this boy doesn't drive, and I don't go around talking about street names or what freeway I'm driving on, so how does he even know these things?

I suppose along with his "I want to be a piano player when I grow up", that maybe he'll do something with Geography or some sort of map thing as a career.

Super Memory

My oldest son has this super memory, and it's not even memorized on purpose. It's like he just memorizes things word for word from the 1st time and even only time he hears something or reads something.

I used to find it very interesting when he would bring home these speech homework sheets and he was supposed to read the story and then tell me back the story in his own words. He couldn't do it--that is, he couldn't summarize. He would have only read these little stories once, and then not even glancing at the paper, he would word for word recite line by line the 2,3,4 paragraph little stories. It just blew my mind.

I remember him (well, and still now) reading these super science fiction or fantasy novels with hundreds of pages and then having someone ask him about what he's reading with me waving my hands NO NO behind him. Why? Because he will tell you in detail chapter after chapter and chapter and it might take an hour of your time when all you were looking for was an "it's about dragons" answer.

I write this post, because just yesterday as we were sitting at the dinner table going around asking about what we learned at church, as we do on Sundays, he once again astonished me.

He had read some scriptures and he was quoting me word for word this super long scripture. I asked him if that's what he did in class--memorize the verses, but he said no, they just read through it once!

How can he do that? It's almost as if his brain is like some kind of a computer database that can just recall exactly any information that it is given. It's amazing. It really is.

The Gifted Child with Asperger's

So, our #1 was diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome a couple years ago. For those of you who are not sure what it is, just say it's like smartness, but with quirks. Actually, the reason we went to have him all checked out in the first place was by direction of his teacher and the school.

#1 was so so smart, but when he went to talk or write it was just terrible. He knew all the answers, but he couldn't get them out. He couldn't write fast or clearly at all, and when he spoke it came out in repeated phrases almost like a stutter, but in sentence chunks not just syllables. His motor skills were awkward, he walked on his toes, tripped alot, seemed oblivious to our talking to him sometimes.....

This was a long drawn out process to figure things out, but in the end we discovered that #1 might be genius as they test, but he can't process the information fast enough. It's like you can ask him a question and he'll raise his hand to answer, but when you call on him it takes his brain an extra minute to process it to make it come out in words. Or, if you want him to write the answer it takes extra time to process to come out by handwriting and even then it is almost unreadable.

SO---what does this mean? It means you've got a super smart boy who can't express himself and may appear stubborn, lazy, or even dumb at times.

We met with his new teacher early this year and gave her this great guideline we found on the web for teachers at
http://www.udel.edu/bkirby/asperger/teachers_guide.html

Anyway, all is great to have a smart kid, but how will he live up to his full potential when he can't write fast enough or neat enough, or he can't respond quickly enough, or keep up in class? It's not because he's not smart. It's this whole processing delay and a lot of other things (many social misunderstandings, not able to cue in on things, etc)....but what do you do? What can you do?

Everyday is a new battle to see what will work or not for him. It's just so tough to see how smart your kid is, but wonder if the world will ever be able to see it too.

For more insight on our struggles with Asperger's Syndrome, we've created another blog at www.ourlifewithaspergers.blogspot.com

He's So Small!

Oh! Look at him!

Today is the first day of school as we took our 8 year old to 3rd grade and our 5 year old to 1st grade. Our 3rd grader ran off to hopefully get where he was supposed to, while we walked our 1st grader to his line since he has never gone to school before.

But just look at him!
Look at all the other children towering above him! He looks so small there with all those other kids 1, 2, and 3 years older than he!

He was really excited though. I hope he does OK in his first day. I guess I didn't think about how small he would be, just how much younger.

Too Immature?

So, we're going to pick out backpacks today at the store for the boys, and my oldest goes for a cool Speed Racer one, and then my 5 year old picks out a Go! Diego! backpack. Now, there's nothing wrong with Diego, and for those of you who are unfamiliar, it is like Dora the Explorer's buddy. The problem is that Dora is really made for like ages 2-5 I suppose, and yes, my son is 5, but here goes the issue:

He's 5, going into a classroom of 6-8 year olds. Now I'm sure in Kindergarten he wouldn't have any problems, but if you go into a classroom of older kids who all have Batman or Speed Racer, or whatever else cool big kid cartoon hero backpack there is and then they see a kid with a preschool type "baby" backpack, aren't they gonna make fun of him?

Maybe they wouldn't, and maybe I worry for nothing, but really, I look at my oldest, and these are the age kids #2 is going in with, and well, Diego just isn't cool.

In the end I didn't have to worry anyway, because he opted for a Pokemon backpack, and I know that is OK as far as "cool" for that age range, but I guess this is only the beginning of my worries.

#2 is really immature. Well, he's not immature, he's just a 5 year old, but when it comes to intellectually, he is far above that of a 5 year old. So what do we do?

We gave the go ahead to go to 1st/2nd grade, but what is it going to do in the long run? We will wait and see what comes this next year.....

Deep thoughts......

So, most 8 year olds when making a Father's Day card might draw a cute picture and write an "I love you dad" on them to give to their dad, but then I guess our 8 year old is just a little more intense in his thinking.

I had all 4 of the kids making their own Father's Day cards last night.



---Our 7 month old was eating the paper and crayons,

--Our 3 year old was coloring stars and moons on a little yellow card.

----Our 5 year old had a card written "Daddy, You are good at playing games on the computer. You are good at playing Pokemon Sapphire. I know. I like you Daddy." (I thought he did a pretty good job with no promptings from me.)

--But then our 8 year old was working on something, adding stickers, and writing, and he wouldn't let me see. It wasn't until after he left it on the table for his dad, that I went to see what he wrote. It said:

"A caterpillar grows in 2 weeks and lives for a year at most. 1 day of a caterpillar's life is a day when we celebrate our dads. Today is the day and I love you."

Hmmm..........we both thought it was pretty deep.

Last Day of School and Worries of Next Year

Today was the last day of school and our oldest son received some of the top awards given out today. I feel like it's not really a big deal for him though. I thought it was pretty impressive that our son gets the Principal's Award for Top Academics in not just one subject, but ALL subjects, but it's like it isn't anything special. I've began to notice a trend with him and the awards he's gotten. It's like oh, no big deal, it's just the "smart kid" getting another certificate. I wonder though if it might cause him to want to "under-excel" later so that he gets more attention for NOT achieving.

Like one thing that they started changing this past year which I have mixed feelings on:

They have this reading program where you read books and take tests to get points. The more books you read and more tests you take, the more points you get and then at the end of the month the points get tallied up and you get prizes and awards. Our oldest has always been gung-ho about this and while the rest of his class is getting 25-75 points a month, he is getting 100+.

Last year he got the "highest points award" many times and each time he gets this it is special and he gets prizes and it's fun for him.

This year they changed the rules so that once you get it one month you are never allowed it again and don't get the prizes or certificate or whatever.

I realize they want to make it more fair for the other kids to get the certificate or prizes when they aren't coming close to his points, but at the same time I have mixed emotions. My husband's thoughts were like "Well, gee, it's like if you work hard and practice at a sport and run in a race then you can win once, but all the other times you might win but it won't count and you won't get the gold medal because you can only have it once."

I suppose it is good to let the other kids feel like they can get a good award, but when I go to these assemblies and I know that my son worked so hard to get 165 points and then watch the other kid who got 72 points get the picture taken, awards, and extra prizes for being the "high point earner" when I know they really weren't, it makes me feel he got a little cheated.

It's dumb, I know. I shouldn't care. I just wonder if later he might not care so much to excel because people aren't impressed by his efforts anymore.



Well, I know he's a good kid, and I suppose all that matters is that We as parents let him know we are proud of him.

Soo......as school has ended and thoughts go to next year, yeah, I worry. I still worry everyday how my second son will manage in 1st/2nd grade as a 5 year old among 6-8 year olds.

The last week of school I looked at him, I looked at his preschool classmates, and then I looked at the kids he'd being going to school with next year. I decided that he doesn't fit anywhere. He doesn't fit with the other preschool kids who were sucking on their hands, eating their shirts, and talking about poop, but then he didn't fit with these 6 and 7 year olds who seem just so mature and at ease with life. So where put him??

Then, I also worry about our oldest and how his Asperger's Syndrome is going to affect him in a much higher paced 3rd/4th grade class. Will his new teacher be understanding with a gifted yet slow at self managing person?

Worry worry worry.........you never know if you're making the right choices for your kids.....we just wait and see what will happen..........

Piano playing........

So, earlier we showed you the sheet music of the song our second son wanted to play. Remember, it was the one that had all the sharps and flats that I can't figure out, but he sure can. It is very entertaining to me to watch him play and see the weird expressions on his face as he does it.

So here is our 5 year old playing what he calls the "new version" of the March from the Nutcracker.

The Odd Child Out

Maybe not for all gifted kids, but for ours, it seems like they are always the odd one out. Most boys would rather be out playing sports or more boyish things, but our 2 boys would rather be inside reading or doing something pertaining to music.

You've read about our piano player. When he's not playing the piano, he wants to sing Karaoke, and he tells me he's interested in taking gymnastics.

Our oldest gave up on sports a long time ago. He would rather read read read, play on the computer, or his latest:

DANCE!

It doesn't matter that he's the only boy in the entire dance studio, he could care less! He wanted to dance, and so we let him. He is very open about his likes and dislikes, and he doesn't care what people think. He openly tells people he could care less about sports.

Maybe that's something we all need to learn from these smart kids---that it doesn't matter what other people think, or that you don't have to do the norm.

Day after day I try to get my oldest to match his clothes, or make him change his plaid shirt from his camo pants. He asks me why?? I don't have a decent answer for him. "They don't match! " I say.

"So?" He says. "Why does it matter?" Well, I guess it really doesn't matter. It's just what the world thinks is right or wrong, but really, why does it matter??

Maybe that's part of the brilliant mind--you don't conform to what others think or do. You can make your own decisions and your own discoveries.

The Piano

Yes, about 6 months ago my oldest was taking piano lessons, and not caring too much about it, but my younger son was intensely watching. One day he came up to me and said he wanted to play too. I didn't think it was worth it to try to find a piano teacher for a 4 year old, so I just got out a beginner book and showed him how to play middle C, D, and E on the right hand. Little did I know he would become so obsessed with it and passionate about the piano that in a couple months he would have read through the piano books himself, teaching himself how to play and how to read music. This is what he is playing right now:

And this is only the first 2 pages of the song. Maybe I am just totally lousy, but I can't even figure out the notes on half of this song to play. There are like 2 sharps playing on both hands at one time and it's too hard for me. (Of course I only took piano lessons for 2 1/2 years a long time ago.)


This is what he does though. I just go on the internet to see if I can print off any free sheet music, and then he plays it. He wanted to play "The Entertainer", so I printed that one off and he is doing that one.


It blows my mind how he can read the music and all the notes. It's almost like it's another language he has learned. I don't even know if he knows all the names of notes, but he knows exactly where to move and put his hands.


The question is--do I find him a piano teacher? I looked into it for a while and it was so expensive! First off, most all piano teachers wouldn't even begin to accept a 5 year old as a student, and second, if they did, they wanted over $20 for a half hour. That's $40 an hour!! That's crazy!! One gal wanted $300 for 3 months and that was for 3 lessons, one group lesson a month. I can't afford that!


So, for now, I just get whatever songs he wants, and assign him to play them during the week. I don't know if there is much else I can do. I can't even play the songs for him or teach him much. All I can do is tap a rhythm if he seems to be playing off. I love to watch him play though. His little hands still can't reach most of the chords, so he has to improvise in what he plays.

Recommended by the Pediatrician!

Well, today we received a call from our Pediatrician. A year ago we took our second son in for his well child checkup and the doctor was first to observe how smart he was. He told us then that we should go directly to our Principal and ask what can we do for this child? So, it all started by recommendation of our doctor, and now after all this testing and discussing, I left a message with him, and today he called me back.

I told him how everyone was so worried about him socially and emotionally and what would happen down the road......and he said really there is only a 6 weeks difference! There is always the youngest in the class and the oldest in the class. And there will be kids a month older than Caleb in his grade. That is NOT that big of a deal!

He has personal experience with his own son whose birthday also falls in October who they skipped Kindergarten. He is now a junior in highschool. I asked about dating, and drivers education. (By skipping him now, that will make him 16 as a senior turning 17 in October.) He said his son hasn't had any problems, he still took drivers ed with some of the younger kids in his own class, and he got his drivers license on his birthday.

He asked about specific social and developmental abilities. He said our son will be FINE! I really value our Pediatrician. He is very wise and an excellent doctor. Whenever we go to ANY specialist or other doctors, they all say they know him and half the time he is who trained them to do their job! Anyone looking for a good Pediatrician? Dr. David Hurley in Murray, Utah.

Great Quotes across the Internet

While trying to figure out what to do with our second son (to skip Kindergarten or not), I spent a lot of time searching the internet for the experiences of others. While a lot were pretty negative toward skipping, I found one quote that seemed to make a lot of sense for the other way:

One parent said,

" I think that's a mistake." (to just leave the child in Kindergarten when they're advanced) They may fly through kindergarten but could have problems later on. When I was researching this for our son I learned that kids who start late when they were ready to start on time can end up having a really hard time in middle school and highschool. If elementary school is easy for them (because they're intellectually ahead of the other kids in their classes) they don't learn good work and study habits. They're able to just coast along and get great grades. Then they hit middle school and the work is hard (for everyone) and because they haven't ever had to really work at school they can have real problems adjusting."

So, what do you think about that? It makes a whole lot of sense to me! If we don't have to try hard in school, if everything always comes easy, then how are we going to learn later to work hard? It could mess up your whole life. You could become a loafer, a lazy, expect everything to come easy to you type of person.

The Beginning

HOW THIS BLOG GOT STARTED

Starting with our first child, I wouldn't say he was smart starting off, but when your Kindergartener is already reading chapter books, adding and subtracting double digit numbers, and configuring the earth's atmosphere and explaining scientific things to YOU, you realize something just might be different!



Then along comes child number 2. By now you have been around long enough to realize yeah, your first child was a lot more advanced than the other kids his age, but number 2 isn't going to be the same way. He doesn't seem to be picking up on much, until one day, out of the blue you are driving home from somewhere, and he is reading every single street sign and he's only 3. And then you teach him how to play middle c, d, and e on the piano, and the next month he is already in book level 3 teaching himself.

And then you start to think--gee, what happened here? How'd they get so smart? I didn't do anything!

And then you realize, what are you going to do now? How are you going to handle these kids who are so much more advanced than their peers?

So, after years of trying to figure out what is right and what is wrong, and dealing with teachers, doctors, principals, and the opinions of some friends and family, we decided to start sharing our story, what's worked, what hasn't, and all the fears and frustrations, as well as joy that has come with it.


Where are we Now?

So, our oldest is 8 years old right now. He is finishing up 2nd grade in a full time magnet program for the gifted. Next year he will continue on into a split 3rd and 4th grade classroom. He has done well in the program, although the first year he had struggles with his motor skills catching up with his thinking skills. His problem was yeah, he might have been super smart, but he couldn't talk or write well or fast enough to get all his ideas out. But was this a reason to remove him from the program, or not let him move forward academically? No, but it was a struggle to get him to work equally with the other kids. We had great teachers and doctors that have helped us the last year. (His Asperger's has a bit to do with his struggles, but it was great how we could allow him to finally be producing better verbally and physically all that is in his head.)Our 5 year old just shocked me over the last year and a half. Like I said again, we didn't see number 2 doing anything toward letters, numbers, or learning that raised any flags of super smartness, until just like overnight he was BAM! Super amazing genius boy! Well, now he's different than #1. #1 is so so smart in facts and science and knowing, memorizing everything, but #2 just popped in all of sudden reading, writing, and then playing the piano that shocked us the most. He missed the Kindergarten deadline by a month so had to be in preschool again this year, but I couldn't see putting him in Kindergarten next year when he's reading Magic TreeHouse books, writing his own mini stories, telling time, adding, subtracting, and doing work out of his brother's 2nd grade comprehension workbook.I figured there was nothing much to do, but decided maybe we could test him "just to see" if he really was that smart that we needed to do anything. We tested him as if he were in Kindergarten to see if he could get into the advanced 1st/2nd grade gifted program his older brother is in, and we were shocked to see he placed 3rd out of all the kids a year older than him! And these are kids trying to get into the program that have already been in Kindergarten.

So, here we are again, but this time it is a bigger struggle--the teachers, principals, and district coordinator are VERY concerned about skipping a child as far as emotionally and maturity wise. Are we bad parents if we do this? If he is like the 3rd smartest in the school district out of kids a year older than he, than why not let him go to school and actually learn stuff NEW, not be forced into Kindergarten and be bored? We don't feel like we're pushing him. All he has talked about for the last year is how excited he is about going to his older brother's school and learning all the cool stuff, not just learning the ABC's and colors like in Preschool.

They say you can have problems with motor skills. What if he can't handle all the writing? Well, #2 is already writing better than #1. #1 struggled a bit, but is super great now, and if number #2 is writing as well as 2nd grader #1, then I don't worry much.

What about the age? He's so young? What about being smaller? What about making friends? What about this and that? All the questions are rolled over and over, but in the end, it's not the school, or the year of school, or the kids ages that are going to make a child who he or she is. It's the child is going to become who THEY are. They'll still make the friends who relate to THEM no matter how old or big or small. I don't think that's going to change a kid.

So, anyway, I feel like we are BAD parents, but we gave the go ahead. You go #2! I know you can do it and you'll love all the academics! You get so excited by all of it!