In seeking help for your gifted child, what are "the best" negative comments you've ever heard from school administrators, teachers, or even well-meaning family members and friends?

(You know, the ones that make you want to roll your eyes and leave you momentarily speechless while you ponder the absurdity of the logic....)

Here are some of mine, all from veteran teachers:

"If we advance her now, what will she do later?

"We don't let fifth graders use the sixth grade book, because, well, then what would they do in sixth grade?"

"We find the advanced kids usually level off by third or fourth grade as the others catch up."

"We can't let her do accelerated reading with the older kids because language arts is reading AND writing, and her handwriting doesn't look the same as the older kids."

"Don't worry about challenging her now. She'll have plenty of time to learn things. What does it matter if she learns math now or later? She'll get to learn it eventually."

"Oh, don't worry, we do so much in my classroom that no child could ever possibly be bored!"

From a K/1st PRINCIPAL no less...

"We don't want to start him early if the other boys are going to get their muscles ahead of him."

Another favorite, from a PSYCHOLOGIST...

(presumably because his IQ was so high)...

"You'll want to get him involved with an instrument and a sport, so he'll be cool in high school."

She actually suggested tennis! (No offense to the many cool tennis players there are, but the thought of my "too-smart-to-be-cool" son playing tennis after math club and honors calculus, was just too much.

Oh Dottie, LOL on the muscles comment! So ridiculous...

My DS10 asked his teacher early on in the school year if he could do all the problems in the math set rather than just odds or evens. She replied,
” That wouldn’t be fair to the other kids”.

gosh these already all so sound familiar...here are some of mine


"Well he's verbally precocious, but I wouldn't say he's gifted."

"I don't like to use the term gifted. Let's just say he's definitely bright."

"We don't do concurrent education. It would put young children in older classrooms."

"Now that you have found out he's gifted, don't change how you do things. We don't want to see you become one of those pushy parents whose kids burn out fast."

along with the "vulture" contribution I here by contribute the term "collective ignorance".

Collective Ignorance....you got that right, another goodie!

This one totally blows my mind..."Now that you have found out he's gifted, don't change how you do things."

Let's substitute "Now that you found out he's allergic to dairy, don't change how you feed him."

Or "Now that you found out it's going to be -20, don't change how you dress him."

Don't people hear how ridiculous they sound???

Now that you know....don't....

I just don't get it!

from our school psychologist at our initial Gifted IEP meeting:

A full scale IQ of 154 on a WISC-III is pretty average for our district.
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from our then Gifted Ed Supervisor:

The state's gifted ed regulations are a bunch of gobbedly-goop that nobody really understands....

-and-

It sounds like you expect your child's Gifted IEP to be individualized.

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From our then Director of Pupil Services at the Mediation hearing held to get the additional testing needed to create an appropriate plan:

"We'll come up with three names of school psychologists and you come up with the names of three school psychologists and we'll put the names in a hat and your son can pull the name out of the hat and we'll use that school psychologist to do the additional testing."

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That experience ended up taking me down a path of understanding the state regs about the education of gifted in public education in PA.

Had they simply offered a half-baked plan that I could kinda/sorta go along with, I'd have time for two or three hobbies.

Regarding my son already reading, 8 months before kindergarten would start:
"We start learning to read in January of the school year. I guess we could have him start earlier in the year."

Regarding skipping to first grade:
"You say your son is currently reading at about a first grade level. Now,if he was reading at the third or fourth grade level right now we would consider a skip to first. But not with the level he is at right now." (This was 6 months before he would have started kindergarten.)

From the superintendent when discussing a grade skip: "What size clothes does he wear?"

At least we overcame those and got the grade skip. But now:

From the current first grade teacher: "We'll be moving him ahead in the extra readers, but he needs to stay with the hard cover book in sequence." Me: "Why is that? He can manage the 4th or 5th level right now." Teacher: "Because it is the first grade curriculum." Duh.

When I asked about giving DS some challenge spelling words:
"He needs to be getting 100 on his spelling tests." Me: "But he has. He spells them all correctly. He knows them all on Monday." Teacher: "But he needs to remember the rules. No capitals unless it is a proper noun. And I don't allow reversals."

'If I had a son like that, I would force him to be normal. He'd thank me later.' No comment....

'Do you have a problem with it when he acts his age?' No, I just have a problem with it when he gets depressed and gives up all his favorite activities....

'He needs to learn he doesn't know everything.' He knows that - which is exactly why he would prefer to be LEARNING something this year instead of underlining the subject in a sentence.

'At least he doesn't have special needs....' I know.... 'special needs' has a special meaning for educators - but if my kid doesn't have special needs, I don't know who does....

'He can't move on to 5th grade math unless he gets 100 on the 4th grade final.' Why not? Any normal kid who gets a 98 on the fourth grade final would move on to 5th grade.....

I think I have shared this one before....

"Mom, Snoopy is off the charts -they can't really measure his IQ.

Well, your dad was off the charts too sweetheart.

No, he was really smart, but he was definitely on the charts.

Well, you were off the charts too.

No, I was most definitely on the charts - at the far end, but definitely on the charts.

Well your grandfather was off the charts until he starting seeing little green men and was diagnosed with schizophrenia....."

I guess with all I hear and read.... that one still takes the cake.

Mary

Oh the clothes one is priceless!

And Todd, the "average" 154 begs the question "then why are we still doing (name the grade level activity you hate the most)?"

Our school tends to quote "150" a lot, as something we see "all the time". I don't understand why those (alleged) parents aren't displeased with the status quo.

I can't complain too much, as I met with a principal yesterday who is actually considering my request for a grade skip! It just might happen. She didn't even bat an eye at the fact that DS is already young for his grade. (And I didn't even bring the banana bread!)

And just for Todd in PA, I was told by our gifted teacher that the "mediation/due process" block on our NORA was only for special education kids.