How do you challenge and provide enrichment for your G&T kids?

[ourbabygirl]

DD and DS would technically qualify for our Gifted and Talented program, but our school district is very small, and only has one person working with all of the G & T kids in the district (4 schools). I'm a little disappointed in what's available to the kids, and am hoping to do some enrichment with them on my own.
DS (K) scored really high in math, but because the older grade's math is at the same time as his literacy, the coordinator and principal didn't want him to miss literacy, and they're having him work on some math on the iPad during his classmates' math time.
DD (2nd) is in a 3rd grade math class, but unfortunately, her teacher spends each class overloading them with worksheets and assessments. (Seriously, I think the kids take home 5 worksheets each day, along with one to do as homework, and they have some sort of test or quiz at least once a week.). My friend's son is in the same class, and she's a former 2nd grade teacher in a great district, and she's disappointed enough in things to be looking at sending her kids to another district. Our district gets very good ratings due to high test scores, but I feel like there are a lot of better, more exploratory and experiential things the kids could be doing that they're not, because maybe the teachers are teaching more to the test, and doing what my friend calls "Sit and get" (info. from the teacher). And DD has been in a twice a week literacy pull-out group, but it seems like she's not getting anything out of it, and starting today, she's going to stay in her regular class instead. DH and I think this program is not run very well.

So I'm looking into other nearby districts, as well (would rather not pay for private, if possible, but it's not totally out of the question). In the meantime, what can I be doing to better challenge my kids and help them have enrichment, rather than just more busy work? They read a lot, and I read to them at bedtime, and we take outings to museums and things on weekends and vacation days, but I'm not sure what else I should be doing with them.

Also, if your kids qualify for a gifted and talented program in your district, do you have them stay in with their regular classmates, or go to a separate school designated for the G & T kids? A nearby district that we're looking at does that, and I have one friend who decided to have her son stay in with his classmates, but another friend whose daughter goes to the separate school. I'm not sure if there's a best answer.

Thanks for your help! :)

[mmsmom]

DS is in the AGP (Academically Gifted Program) at our elementary school. They test kids for qualification in 2nd grade and he started the program in 3rd grade. You can ask for your child to be tested sooner but I didn't feel the need. . There are 4 kids in the program out of about 90 in 4th grade. The program at our school challenges students beyond academics. They are challenged creatively with a major focus on problem solving. Each kid has their own goals but they work on the same projects which are chosen by the teacher. There are no academics in the program. They go for one period for what equates to every other day and it is during a period where review is done and other pull outs happen so no new work is missed. I also did AGP as a kid and it was a similar program- non academic with a focus on problem solving and being challenged to learn about topics that are not covered in the classroom.

I also wanted to add that while I think AGP is a great program for DS I do not think it is going to impact his life or education in a dramatic way. I do not think DD is going to qualify and I think her chance for success in life is the same as DS's.

Also, I don't know of any district in our area that has an official program until 3rd grade. Our AGP teacher covers 2 schools and she spends part of her time going into K-2nd grade classes to do enrichment programs about once every 2 weeks.

[georgiegirl]

Our school doesn't formally identify kids until the end of third grade for services starting in 4th grade. Before that, there are pull out groups for math and reading that kids are somewhat randomly selected for (by teacher recommendation...no specific testing.) DS (2nd grade) was pulled out for math for part of K and then again for second half of 2nd. I'm not sure how challenged he is. DD was pulled out in math starting in 2nd grade because I really pushed it. She was pulled out every other day for math extension. In 4th grade, she was accelerated into 5th grade math, and now in 5th grade, DD and one other girl are taking prealgebra. She's also formally identified and gets pulled out every other day with two other identified kids (only 3 identified kids in her grade of about 75 kids) to do general extension stuff. She's also pulled out for an advanced book club twice a week. So she sees the special teacher pretty much twice a day.


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[Tenasparkl]

Our school doesn't formally identify kids until the end of third grade for services starting in 4th grade. Before that, there are pull out groups for math and reading that kids are somewhat randomly selected for (by teacher recommendation...no specific testing)

This is similar to our situation. DD was just GATE identified in third grade and will start in the program for fourth grade. Our school does group kids from the four different classes within the grade for reading, spelling groups (only in first & second grade) etc. I'm very curious to see what next year will bring. They've changed the GATE program in our district recently, so I'm hopeful that it will be challenging and interesting for DD

[♥ms.pacman♥]

my DS [1st grade] has been in G&T program since Kinder. We are lucky that the school district here tests & offers GT services from Kinder on, and the programs are funded/run pretty well (people often joke we're in tiger-parent central, lol). In Kinder the GT program was a 30min/1x week pull-out, in 1st grade it's now 2x a week for 1 hour at a time. My DS enjoys it. He especially likes the brain teasers and games they introduce /play in that class. He recently begged and begged for a Rubik's cube which we just got him, and while he was getting frustrated with it, i think he is fascinated by it.

DS is also in Russian School of Math (RSM) which is 2hrs a week Math enrichment class. They have various lvels from Kinder on up and he was placed in the advanced 2nd grade math, so much faster paced than what he is doing in school. he recently participated in Math Kangaroo annual competition which was hosted by RSM. they provide a lot of info/announcements over local math competitions etc which is good bc normally i woudlnt' hear about them otherwise.

other than that, i don't do much else as i work full-time, kids are in aftercare after school and thus don't have time to do additional stuff on my own. DS was really never into reading , so we didn't force it, but then recently stumbled across "Diary of Wimpy Kid" and is reading those books like crazy. for the summer, our district GT program has a special summer school (4 weeks, 1/2 day) and i plan to enroll him in that. I also plan to do the math enrichment camp as well.


i know several families outside my district who do have done Destination Imagination (DI) activity and that looks like something very interesting, though we've never done it.

[California]

My older two qualify (youngest hasn't gotten results yet,) and their schools haven't really offered much. They are fluent in a second language, which gives them a good challenge. That doesn't help you though. For enrichment I plan outings and vacations around a theme. Some of the past themes have been aviation, our state history, marine biology, astronomy- look at what's available in your area or of high interest to your kids. Pick several activities that relate to a single theme and do those in a row. I also provide books. Provide journals if they are writers and encourage sketching too. I search for local field trips for ideas, visitor guides and event listings. Once you have a theme it's easy (in my experience) to start filling in weekend activities. And it's a richer experience for the kids when they can start making connections and start comparing places.

[MaiseyDog]

DS is in the AGP (Academically Gifted Program) at our elementary school. They test kids for qualification in 2nd grade and he started the program in 3rd grade. You can ask for your child to be tested sooner but I didn't feel the need. . There are 4 kids in the program out of about 90 in 4th grade. The program at our school challenges students beyond academics. They are challenged creatively with a major focus on problem solving. Each kid has their own goals but they work on the same projects which are chosen by the teacher. There are no academics in the program. They go for one period for what equates to every other day and it is during a period where review is done and other pull outs happen so no new work is missed. I also did AGP as a kid and it was a similar program- non academic with a focus on problem solving and being challenged to learn about topics that are not covered in the classroom.

I also wanted to add that while I think AGP is a great program for DS I do not think it is going to impact his life or education in a dramatic way. I do not think DD is going to qualify and I think her chance for success in life is the same as DS's.

Also, I don't know of any district in our area that has an official program until 3rd grade. Our AGP teacher covers 2 schools and she spends part of her time going into K-2nd grade classes to do enrichment programs about once every 2 weeks.

This is very similar to our set up. We are fortunate to live in a state that funds gifted programs at all schools, but that means that the state gets to dictate the curriculum. No academic topics can be covered in the Gifted programs - meaning they can't do advanced work in the basic subjects of math, science, language arts, and reading. They focus on creativity and problem solving primarily. The classes are small (dd1's classes have had 8-10 kids) and they get pulled out 6 hours per week. Some years it's been most of one day a week other years they have gone 2 afternoons a week. DD1 has enjoyed it and I do think she has learned some great things as her teacher has found creative ways to get around the "no academics" rule like by doing a block on presentation skills and each child had a chance to research a topic and teach it to the class.

I don't think being in the gifted program will make our break anyones future. DD2 did not score high enough to get into the program when they did the screening in 2nd grade and I don't think her opportunities will be any less. It has been a good environment for DD1 because she is more socially awkward and just seems to operate on a different scale. She needed the smaller environment and all the kids in her gifted class all seem to be kind similar in behavior. DD2 is a social butterfly and doesn't have any problems making friends. She has thrived in the classroom and so I haven't pushed to have her retested.

[ellies mom]

Our district has gifted clusters within the classrooms starting in third grade. The clusters typically work to a higher, more complex level than the other groups rather than just getting more busy work. DD1 was not in the program but DD2 is in a gifted cluster for literacy. She reads more complex books and they analyze the books more than the other reading groups but other than that her day is just like it was last year.

In the home, we just give her lots of opportunity to write stories and read to her level and so on.


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[schrocat]

My Kindergartner just qualified for Highly Capable Program in his school. Only 3 kids in Kindergarten in the whole school qualified for Math enrichment and 4 kids qualified for reading enrichment because the criteria for getting in is extremely high. They have half an hour of enrichment and work is left in their class for them to do. He needs to qualify again for the gifted class where they only have gifted kids that starts in second grade.

He gets plenty of enrichment at home hanging out with my husband and watching him do stuff. He learns two other languages at home. He also spends time learning how to play the piano and works on swimming in preparation for swim team (he overtakes kids in his class who are older and taller than him).

At home I just let him read whatever he wants and he gets to make what he wants. Plus he gets time to be a kid.

[ahisma]

DS1 (4th grade) falls into the "highly gifted" category. We only know that because he had testing done to evaluate for ASD (none, but he's incredibly quirky - which is pretty typical of HG kids). He does have a grade level acceleration in math, but we didn't push for that until he started expressing frustration with doing the same math for a few years in a row. It's a moot point, he's still working years ahead of his class. He thinks it's neat though, and isn't frustrated, so it did accomplish something.

Other than that, there are no services available through his school. Some years are better than others - this year his teacher is amazing at differentiation and gets him. There's a limit to what they can do though, there are 25 kids in the class and there's one teacher. Clearly they can't customize a curriculum for my kid. And, like you, there is not GT program available.

Our core focus has been keeping him involved in things that don't come easily to him. After his testing, the psychologist told us that the most important thing we could do was to make sure that he knows how to fail and experiences failure. His soccer team has lost pretty much every game for two years straight, he auditions for plays and doesn't get the roles he wants, etc. We also have him involved in an instrument and choir. He's signed himself up for school clubs (started in 3rd grade) and now has every lunch hour booked - 2 math teams, chess club, Harry Potter club, writing club, etc.

[acmom]

Plus he gets time to be a kid.


This. I worry that we all try so hard to make sure we are pushing our kids and providing everything we can to help them achieve, that we forget this part. And kids learn SO much just from time to "be a kid". :)

[schrocat]

This. I worry that we all try so hard to make sure we are pushing our kids and providing everything we can to help them achieve, that we forget this part. And kids learn SO much just from time to "be a kid". :)

So true. Down time is so important for these kids.

My little kindergartner is fiercely competitive and pushes himself so hard in all his activities. I just have books and stuff ready for him at home if he needs it. He loves to read Make magazine and Popular Mechanics. It's there for him. If he wants to read Corduroy for fun, it's there for him. If he wants to read Harry Potter, it's there for him. The stuff they do in the Highly Capable enrichment is hard. It's not about doing math at a higher grade level or reading at a higher grade level. It's about thinking creatively and critically.

[HannaAddict]

Our city is just like lake wobegon, everybody is gifted and talented by the huge surge in number of kids in the program and it suffers because of the huge classes (and why we didn't opt for that route). We are able to do an independent highly capable school with small classes and differentiated learning, even among the self selected hc population. If you can find a school that gets rid of worksheets and works on problem solving and project based curriculum, I would. The best thing is no worksheets to speak of and inquiry based lessons and great teachers and specialists (math, science, language) with the support and small classes. If you are stuck, reading is huge and encouraging reading for pleasure and what they are interested in is better for later learning than any workbooks. If you can afford it, a once a week or every other week tutor( if they are great) to enrich in math or writing, or their passion, can really be energizing for a highly capable kid. They can expand and work on more theoretical things. And agree with non-screen based down time. That is a priority and hard to do sometimes. Good luck.


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[rin]

Our school district has a dedicated gifted school for kids who test in based on standardized tests + a general cognitive test. Our oldest (currently in 1st grade) is eligible to attend this school, but we have at this point decided to keep her in her general education program largely because we're hoping to give her social continuity with her classmates/teachers/etc. Our youngest hasn't started school yet, and I don't have a great sense for whether she'll be eligible for the dedicated school, but we plan to start her at the same school as her older sister.

Our oldest does attend a language immersion school so she spends half her day in Spanish/half in English, which I think provides her with a good challenge and has helped a lot. We're currently facing some issues with math at school (she's bored to tears by the math they're doing in class, but does not have strong social/emotional skills and so is not a great candidate for moving up to a higher grade for math). We're trying to work with her teachers to find a better solution for math. Her school does not really have any special options for gifted kids, since the general idea is that kids who need an accelerated program should just go to the dedicated school. For right now, we do a lot of math games at home and work math problems into general conversation (both DH and I are fairly math-y people so we have fun coming up with word problems and discussing ways that math ties into different areas of life, reading books about math, etc). Our kids (both DD1 and DD2, who will be heading into kindergarten next year) love doing math problems for fun. As our kids get older I'm sure we'll need to expand our approach though, depending on their interests.

Our oldest is only in first grade, so I can't say how things will go in the long run, but we're hoping to make things work for her at least in elementary school in the regular classroom with lots of home support and working with her teachers to allow her to do modified work (i.e. use a higher math book while staying with her same-age classmates). Our biggest concern right now is not so much giving her opportunities to learn material at least at the elementary level (since she does a lot at home and in her free time) but rather preventing behavioral issues that come up from the boredom in class.

[JBaxter]

From 2nd grade on our upper achieving kids are in a separate class. 4& 5 they can choose either the "eagles" or a STEM class.

[acmom]

It's not about doing math at a higher grade level or reading at a higher grade level. It's about thinking creatively and critically.

I think I had this exact conversation with so many parents (with the full support of our gifted and talented teachers) when I was teaching. We used to talk about stretching and broadening thinking horizontally more, not always vertically.

One of my pet peeves is thinking that if a student reads very well (at a high level) that they should only read and can only benefit from reading at that level! As adults, we don't do this....we don't only read at our exact reading level. We read a variety of levels/types of texts and use them in a variety of ways. Thinking about texts critically, discussing them, using and implementing what we learn, is more important to me as a teacher/parent, than the level of text.


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[lizzywednesday]

My mother signed me up for a Saturday enrichment program offered at the local community college one year when I was in grammar school because we didn't have a dedicated G&T program until I was older (and slacking off!)

I think that learning how to fail - and come back from failure - is really important as a PP mentioned that they are doing for their DC. I never learned to stretch myself, never developed study habits, never learned to fail and then I hit high school and was completely overwhelmed because I'd coasted through my schooling prior to that point.

[ahisma]

Our city is just like lake wobegon, everybody is gifted and talented by the huge surge in number of kids in the program and it suffers because of the huge classes (and why we didn't opt for that route). We are able to do an independent highly capable school with small classes and differentiated learning, even among the self selected hc population. If you can find a school that gets rid of worksheets and works on problem solving and project based curriculum, I would. The best thing is no worksheets to speak of and inquiry based lessons and great teachers and specialists (math, science, language) with the support and small classes.

This really resonates with me. Our school has no GT program, but if it did, the bulk of the school would be in it;) Our school has gone the opposite route - little to no homework, very limited worksheets, lots of hands on learning. Lots of flexibility - I just talked to DS2's teacher about the fact that we've never turned in a reading log, she explained that it only existed because parents asked for it and she had no question that DS2 was reading at home and was not remotely concerned that we weren't turning in logs.

For us, differentiation doesn't always mean a different curriculum, but the teachers pushing the kids to dig deeper. For example, DS1 is obsessed with deflategate (the Tom Brady football thing). After he finishes his work in class, he's used his time to build a website advocating for his position. Sounds like a waste of time, right? Not at all - his teacher pushes back on every single stance that he takes - DS has learned about coding, about circumstantial evidence, and had done some casual experiments with football pressure, learning about control groups, etc. Lots of challenging his assumptions and critical thinking. At the end of the day, he's learning far more than he'd ever learn on a worksheet, but is very much still being a football obsessed 10 year old kid.

[Tenasparkl]

For us, differentiation doesn't always mean a different curriculum, but the teachers pushing the kids to dig deeper. For example, DS1 is obsessed with deflategate (the Tom Brady football thing). After he finishes his work in class, he's used his time to build a website advocating for his position. Sounds like a waste of time, right? Not at all - his teacher pushes back on every single stance that he takes - DS has learned about coding, about circumstantial evidence, and had done some casual experiments with football pressure, learning about control groups, etc. Lots of challenging his assumptions and critical thinking. At the end of the day, he's learning far more than he'd ever learn on a worksheet, but is very much still being a football obsessed 10 year old kid.

This is great!

[squimp]

I agree that it is contextual. We don't have a GT pull out, but about 50% of the kids at our elementary school met TAG criteria. In addition, so much is teacher dependent, you want to identify the teachers who try to meet kids where they are. Ahisma's example is so great.

I really recommend doing things outside of school that your kid enjoys. We also do a few things out of school, for my kiddo it was spelling bees and Battle of the Books, which allowed her to try, succeed, fail and learn. Also music and sports are great ways for kids to push themselves and work hard.

[elektra]

My son goes to the separate GATE school. It is the district magnet school for GATE, with 1-2 all GATE classes per grade. So they have non-GATE classes too. So that is all I really do for him regarding the G&T qualification. No extra reading, tutors, nothing academic.
I suppose our "enrichment" then consists of doing other outside activities not directly related to G&T at all. He does sports and art.

My DD goes to the same school but is in the non-GATE track.

[jgenie]

My Kindergartner just qualified for Highly Capable Program in his school. Only 3 kids in Kindergarten in the whole school qualified for Math enrichment and 4 kids qualified for reading enrichment because the criteria for getting in is extremely high. They have half an hour of enrichment and work is left in their class for them to do. He needs to qualify again for the gifted class where they only have gifted kids that starts in second grade.

He gets plenty of enrichment at home hanging out with my husband and watching him do stuff. He learns two other languages at home. He also spends time learning how to play the piano and works on swimming in preparation for swim team (he overtakes kids in his class who are older and taller than him).

At home I just let him read whatever he wants and he gets to make what he wants. Plus he gets time to be a kid.

Would you mind sharing What you are using for language learning at home? TIA

[schrocat]

Would you mind sharing What you are using for language learning at home? TIA

Sure. We read storybooks in the target language and we make our own books and practice writing. He also goes to chinese school once a week and we listen to music and watch TV in chinese. I also speak to him in both French and Chinese so he picks up some phrases. We're mostly concentrating on chinese though because it's a harder language to learn. He will start French or Spanish classes after school next year.