They're Gifted Therefore They'll Survive and Other Myths

As we're wrapping up the first trimester of school and looking toward the second trimester, my hopes are that with a 504 in place and an IEP assessment scheduled, we will see more differentiation and appropriate curriculum for Logue.

Logue was diagnosed as profoundly gifted at age 8. Recently he has been diagnosed as having Asperger traits, Selective Mustism and Social Phobia. It's taken us approx. eight years and five psychologists to come to the right diagnoses. From the stories I've heard, our journey to getting special accommodations was not that bad. It's taken a year and a half and I'm only semi-psychotic about 20 days out of the month. It's pretty common when you claim your child is gifted that the reaction will be along the lines of, "Oh well, he'll do just fine - we teach to all levels in our classrooms." And if you're not very versed in the vocation of advocating through the 504, IEP systems, differentiated and compacting curriculum and what you need to do and who you need to do it to in order to get what you need for your child....it can be the highway to hell the long and winding road.

During the last school meeting, I was challenged by questions from a couple of the teachers. "Can he manage feeling different if his class is doing an assignment and he is not?" Or, "This is a unique way of being in school, can he handle the confusing complexity he is likely to feel when his peers are doing something in class that he isn't?" These examples are by no means verbatim as they were presented to me in even more of a rhetorical fashion (yeah, yo no comprende either).

Now, I say they "challenged" me with these questions not because they came at me with their gavels and demanded I answer with five supporting fact-based statements to back up my theories. I mean it challenged me because I believed them at first. I believed that because they were bringing up these potential problems, they were bound to be legitimate problems. I bought into the myths. I had to take a step back, take a deep breath and reread How To Raise Your I.Q. By Eating Gifted Children, (I had to throw that one in here). When I get centered in my thinking I remember that I KNOW my son. I can debunk these myths about differentiated curriculum, at least for my kid. Er, at least until the next meeting where the questions will challenge me in a new way.

In case I get off-center again, please copy, paste and post on my kid:

What is most important to Logue is NOT that he feel like a "normal" student.
It's not important that he feel that he is "like" everyone else.
He doesn't care if he's doing the same things as other students.
He has known for a very long time that he is different than what he sees in most of his peers.
A unique way of being in school sounds like a relief to him.

What IS important: That Logue feels UNDERSTOOD.
That his needs are met emotionally and intellectually.
That his teachers identify with him in some way and validate who he is.
That he feels he can identify with his teachers.

I suspect this will elicit feelings of relief for Logue.

Reminder:
Social Phobia is the fear of being judged.
Teachers are really the ULTIMATE JUDGES from a student's perspective.
Elevate him in a way that enables him to take back some of that power.
Word. I mean, Ohm.

Photo: New NAGC Poster courtesy of Tamara Fisher and her blog Unwrapping the Gifted

1st High School Trimester Redux - Part 1

Since Logue entered high school this Fall, my anxiety level started increasing exponentially. The voices inside my head keep saying "Now his grades actually count." At first I had to restrain myself from grabbing his backpack and doing his homework for him. Call me crazy, but I've seen the 3rd grade science projects in which the quantum physics applied clearly did not come from the 8 year old.

I want Logue to have all the resources possible for the kind of education he deserves, that any child deserves. Unfortunately, grades sometimes determine the opportunities and homework sometimes stifles the excitement for learning.

A few nights ago, Logue had to sketch a copy of a Calvin and Hobbes illustration as accurately as possible. He tried for 2 hours to conjure up something he thought would be acceptable to turn in to his new high school art teacher. But in his mind he fell short because accurate meant perfect and to him it wasn't perfect. Then came the frustration, the anxiety and the defeatist attitude and BOOM! It hit me - like wearing 5" heels reminds me that I have bunions:

Flash back to 5th grade math class. One day Logue didn't finish a homework assignment. His teacher, brilliant man, decided he'd show Logue a thing or two by putting him out in the hall. That night, Logue didn't know how to do the new homework because uh, he was in the hall feeling stupid and missed the lesson. This went on EVERY DAY for months before I found out. The teacher sure showed Logue. Wait, showed him what? That homework and school can be profoundly castrating?

After the Art assignment melt down and my flashback b*tch slap, I let Logue have some time to just relax and not think about homework. Then I did the unthinkable: I told him that the grade was not worth losing self esteem. If he tried, he tried - even if that means a "D" as in "Dang, so close." If the teacher has some suggestions for improvement, so be it. His grade is not a reflection of WHO he is. I want him to WANT to learn. And anyway, I would be punching out any teacher who doesn't realize how wonderful and brilliant he is. He let out a huge sigh and gave me a hug. *Joy* I still get hugs from my 14 yr old son. Twenty years from now, we're going to remember the hugs, not the grades. (Well, and maybe the image of me socking his teachers with my 5'3" mini self.)

I've always had mixed feelings about homework and grades, probably because I got nothing but A's out of fear and now I'm a pretty screwed up, gigantic, anxiety ball. What are these stressful homework situations teaching our kids?

Cut back to present day, 1st Trimester, Freshman year: For Logue's final exam in English he had to answer the question, "What does it mean to be Educated?"

While I may not be educated enough to answer that question in any coherent fashion, I do know what it DOESN'T mean:

*It isn't that you've memorized the Periodic Table and all the Presidents of America.

*It isn't how many hours your butt was stuck in a desk.

*It isn't your test scores.

*It isn't your pedigree of degrees from Pre-School to PhD.

What kid can even make it into Stanford or Harvard these days? One with a 6.8 GPA? And what does that half million dollar education get them today? A large diploma with an gigantic student loan bill?

We've all stuck our nose in our kid's homework where it didn't belong in an effort to either circumvent an emotional breakdown, boost their chances of getting to be an Ivy Leaguer or (even better) prevent our "perfect parent" reputation from being tarnished by a bad grade in 3rd grade geography. Whether its helping with just that one little paragraph or building the damn model bridge ourselves, sometimes we just to want it to get done already!

Apparently some parents' (not me of course) OVER involvement in homework has become an epidemic according to Alfie Kohn. In "Stop doing the homework, overzealous parents warned," Kohn states this phenomenon has some schools requiring students to complete their work at school to ensure parents are not undermining the learning process. I say yay to that concept. I already did my times tables.

Homework at our home can cause tension, stress and anxiety. I'm not going to let 5 hours of video gaming take the place of what could be more productive, non-comatose time BUT, I will be the first to email a teacher when memorizing states and capitals becomes a 2 hour long process with only Oregon and Washington accomplished while members of my family are losing their voices and handfuls of hair. I have questioned teachers on the validity of an assignment. It does mean crossing that line. You know, the one that puts you on THAT list at the school. So, I'm the Bad Mom - the out of the box, non conventional, trouble maker who questions the curriculum making all the teachers avert their gazes when I walk down the hall.

I can't tell you how many times I've heard, "So, what's going on at home that is affecting your child's ability to do their homework?"

You mean besides the fact that I tell my kid the homework is stupid?

I'm not at the point yet where I have taken on battling the school's homework policy, but there are many parents who have done just that: like here.

Luckily, I have THE BAD MOMS CLUB - to at the very least share my badness, non Super Mom ways and have moms like me to justify my unconventional means of surviving .

note: no teachers were hurt in the making of this blog post.

Life With Logue - Parenting a Gifted Child

When Logue was born, exactly 13 years, 7 months 19 days ago, I knew right away he was an old soul. He didn't like a lot of noise, activity or fuss. He would sit in his bouncy chair and laugh and giggle at a Native American mask a friend's father made for us. He hated sleeping alone as if he knew about solitude already. We started to call him our "Little Bhudda" he seemed so "Zen" (except when we had to put him on the washing machine to calm him down in the middle of the night). At 18 months his daddy asked him how his nasty cut on his eyebrow that he had gotten on the playground was and Logue answered, "It just IS Daddy."

When I took him to mommy and me class he was content to play on his own. If another child neared his area, he just moved on to something else. When circle time came, he was not about to participate. I know now what he was thinking: "Why join in with the others when I can have the Duplos all to myself and reinvent the pyramid?" "Besides, who wants to sing the ABC song when you can design a Lego airplane from scratch and really Mama, the wheels on the bus? We all know they go 'round and 'round." Logue resisted play time up in the gym as well. Other kids were not interesting to him, especially if they were ramming each other with various wheeled, kid powered vehicles. To Logue vehicles (Hot Wheels) were to be lined up in neat little rows, color coordinated and by make and model.

Preschool came and man did Logue put up a fight. Being young, first time parents, we didn't want to cause him more agony than he already appeared to be in every time preschool days came around. You'd think that the resounding "Logue!" shouted from every student in the classroom when he walked in would be a welcoming treat for a 3 yr old. Not Logue. We caved often when those crocodile tears came pouring down, "I don't want to go to school, it's too hard!" Poor teacher Nancy, the sweetest lady ever who adored Logue. She had her work cut out for her. But again, I knew what he was thinking: "What's the point in going to this place where you have to stand in line, run around in a gym and...What is all this nonsense about coloring inside the lines, for God sakes people, think outside the box!" A conformer he was not. Polite, gracious and kind he was (thank God for small favors) which I why I think they let him stay.

Around age four I started noticing Logue reading signs along the road in the car. At first I thought he was just talking, singing - the usual toddler stuff. It started to dawn on me that he might be reading. So, I tested him. "Do you know that sign says stop because you recognize the red octagon?" "No, mama, it says S-T-O-P, stop, just like that sign over there says Cleaners." "Oh, my bad." Soon it was cereal boxes, milk cartons and very quickly our house was bursting at the seams with books. That's when the worrying started. How do we parent this child? Are we supposed to send him to some think tank or boarding school for special smart 4 yr olds? Reading about gifted children and other parents with smart children brought me back down to earth...THEIR children were reading when they were 2 yrs old. Whew!

...to be continued.

One of the True Joys

Logues's school has a phenomenal dance program (thank you Sara, for all your hard work, dedication and for inspiring these kids to move). In fact, during middle school, all the students have to take dance and tap. The philosophy is that it taps into different creative AND critical thinking parts of the brain. I love that! Being a former dancer myself, the hairs on my neck stood up when I watched my first born perform in his first dance piece. I admit, I was nervous. Would he trip over his own feet? Does he know how to keep time to the music? Would he decide he was too scared and sit out?

This is a child who wouldn't do team sports, or sports at all for that matter. So, no packing up all the rain gear into the suburban, standing in the freezing cold to watch the weekend soccer tournament. And I admit I'm not feeling the deprivation one bit. Nope, no soccer mom here and no Suburban either. BTW, I like my Prius in all it's 48 MPG fabulousness, snub snub. But, every mom wants to see their child in the spotlight of some sort...whether it's a science fair, spelling bee, piano recital or Karate promotion. Something where you can say, "See there, that's MY kid." But Logue just never wanted to venture into that spotlight much. We had to bribe him with Legos to perform in his first grade play as a bug in "A Bug's Life." What is it about us parents needing to dress up our children and put them on display? I think that'll be another post.

The wait seemed like the checkout line at Costco on a Saturday. I was breaking into a sweat with anxiety, (oh wait, that's my normal everyday occurrence) when finally, after some deep breathing, I calmed down, looked up, and there he was, in all his glory, dancing his heart out!
Look out, another stage mom has been born.

Logue is a Writing Genius

I love the fact that Logue's end of the year self reflection essay at school was full of snarcastical (combination: snarky, sarcastic, fantastical) quips that even I nor Jay knew he had in him. We are so proud of our son snubbing his school...

OK we're not normally this jaded BUT when your kid's school suspends your 7th grade kid for a bogus plagiarism charge for a WEEK, doesn't talk to the kid first about the "crime", doesn't talk to the parents at all, threatens expulsion to an otherwise extremely compliant, rule-following, A and B student and questions the kid's entire body of work because the kid copied and pasted some facts (not opinion or fiction) and left it in a different font and font color so the passage sticks out like a sore thumb as if to say "here, look! Over here is where I plagiarized! Make sure you don't miss it!" --breathe, mom, breathe--
IT IS ASININE! -- to say the least.
But whenever I get that anger bubbling up, working it's way to my fingers that want to type a really nasty email to the school (like the "You Suck" short and sweet version of an earlier post), I read Logue's essay and all is right with the world.

Correspondence

The adult version of me and the 10 year old version (who's still stuck in me) are at war. It's not so much a multiple personality thing...which might be better since then I could score a ticket to a little vaca in arts and crafts and green jello heaven.
Not so much... It seems to happen when the chips are down and there is so much floating up there in the vast configuration that is my brain and BOOM! I digress. My somewhat witty, articulate thoughts burrow deeper into my cerebral cortex and all that's left are the ingrained thoughts of my much, much younger self. And it's funny, those childish thoughts, emotions and urges just seem to take over. I can't be held responsible for things like calling the neighbor, "grumpy-pants-meanie-old-man" or telling Jay (husband) he's not my BFF anymore.

Of course this started happening after many years of being passionate about my Highly Gifted, teenage son, Logue's education and running into many administrative road blocks. I have read a trazillion books, consulted for countless hours with child psychologists and education specialists and done enough research to have earned myself a degree in child psychology. I have written enough letters, emails, dissertations and education plans to put together a Master's Thesis on how to educate children.

Sidebar: Children should be treated as individuals in school-- not cows in a herd.

So, maybe it's the exhaustion of beating my head against the wall that's pushing the intelligent, grown up me aside when I try to complete an arduous task such as writing a thoughtfully composed letter to Logue's school.

I've started...It goes something like this:


Dear Logue's School Administration, (Names have been withheld from me to protect their wellbeing privacy)
First and foremost, I would like to impress how many wonderful aspects of the school Logue has experienced. The school has many passionate educators who have conquered the arduous task of disseminating a quite challenging curriculum.
However, I am writing to present my dismay with the arbitrary use or misuse of policies and procedures. I expect a school where the philosophy is: "...based on the research of noted educators, especially Howard Gardner, whose work on multiple intelligences revealed the importance of arts-infused curriculum for the benefit of all students," to be apprised of the multiple needs of those types of students.
A private school that touts accepting "bright and highly creative students" with one of the most exorbitant tuition rates in our area is not above criticism. It is a school's responsibility to take the emotional welfare and individual educational experience...

That's about where my brain said SCREW IT and the ten-year-old-me wrote this one:

Dear Logue's School Administration,
You suck.
Most Sincerely,
Claire

At least I didn't swear.

(No Anna, I didn't REALLY send it)