On Wed, 6 Dec 2006 23:08:01 EST, Louise
wrote:

The original poster mentioned that when a teacher does provide some
extra assignment for her son, it is always of the form "write about
..." and he really does not enjoy writing. Of course, more creative
and more active options for enrichment are easy for the rest of us to
dream up (Build a model of ..., make a video of .... draw a map of
the setting of ... ) but they aren't much help as long as the teacher
isn't interested in having that kind of activity going on in her
classroom.

The tests that they use to qualify different students as gifted in the
district I work in results in a lot of gifted students who hate to
write, and often hate to read as well. But the guidelines for
enrichment activities for gifted kids are along the lines of writing
extra pages or extra reports. It drives me nuts as a counselor to
deal with the aftermath. We have kids being "punished" for being
gifted and parents who believe their kids are not working hard because
they are not getting straight A's (usually their lower grades are in
Language Arts and things like Social Studies which consist primarily
of reading and writing reports or taking written tests). I get really
tired of explaining that gifted does not mean good at every kind of
school task.

Having seen how hard the teachers in my schools work to try to keep
things interesting for a whole lot of students at different levels and
how much pressure there is to keep test scores up, I don't blame them
for not dreaming up all kinds of other activities for kids who aren't
good at or are bored with pencil and paper activities. Those that
used to are being pressured not to because standardized tests are
paper and pencil activities and it is all important that the kids be
able to sit for hours taking written tests and doing well on them.
Sometimes the teachers don't want to but often they just can't. That
is why I encourage parents to talk to the teacher about what the
student can do when bored. I've been surprised at some of the great
ideas that have come from student/teacher/parent collaboration. It
has to be something that works with the individual classroom as well
as the individual student, but there are usually lots of options. If
you ask the teacher what the student can do that would not be
disruptive instead of arguing with her about why you don't think what
your kid was doing should be considered disruptive, you get further.

For example, there is a huge difference in the message it sends when
Johnny pulls out a book and reads while the teacher is reading or
talking about something else out loud and the students seeing the
teacher tell Johnny he can go ahead and read his book since he has
already passed the test on whatever it is that she is teaching to the
class. My third grade daughter has an arrangement like that and the
teacher loves it. Other kids who like to read or do things other than
listen to the same concept be explained again are asking if they can
do what they like to do if they get a good grade on a pre-test. They
are more self-motivated and she can pinpoint what group teaching she
ends up doing to the specific needs of those who are still having
problems. But if my daughter had just pulled out her book, I would
have told her that is inappropriate because it sends the message to
her classmates that she can blow off the teacher when she is trying to
teach the class something.

On the other hand, that reminds me of something. A bright kid who
reads well but does not enjoy writing -- that could be another clue to
look into LD testing, either through the school or privately.

Fits a lot of ADHD kids I work with. If it's ADHD, it's easy to
solve. Whatever the outcome, it's better to find out and start
addressing it specifically now than later.

--
Paula
"Anyway, other people are weird, but sometimes they have candy,
so it's best to try to get along with them." Joe Bay