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.