My gifted daughter is getting very average grades

[pianistclare]

I have stayed away from the two threads about this subject for the whole time. Because threads where parents are talking about their kids academic or mental performance rarely are logical or end well.

OP

1. An IQ that high is on the extreme end of the spectrum. And in medicine or any science really, when you have a result that is extreme, you retest from a different source.
2. Many parents who have been told at such a young age that their children are phenomenal and then the child does not perform experience a damaging effect with relationships with their children. I think you should step back and decide if this is affecting how you relate with your child.
3. 2nd grade is hardly a time to focus on Cs or any grade really. Many schools do not assign letter grades at this time.
4. With a 6th grade comprehension of reading and logic the child would, even if bored, be able to get the work done to get the positive attention and just be done with it.
5. I would encourage you to rethink your focus on numbers and scales of achievement for a second grader.
6. No matter how you say you package it for your kid, they know. If we can see your anguish and confusion and fretting on a computer screen, your child can feel it thick in the air of the home.

Yes.
There’s plenty of time for that PhD. She’s a child. Leave her to it, assuming she is not defying authority.

 

[insideitall]

My daughter hears and understands what the teacher says, but she is a little bored and therefore is not engaged…she goes to do the work and it seems like she wasn’t listening…

Then I need to explain to my daughter’s teacher that DD’s mind is extremely active and due to this, she has a hard time putting specific things into long term memory.

She’s not ADHD, but she’s definitely a dreamer and a thinker.

your daughter does not need you to make excuses for her, she needs you to do what’s best for her. if she hears and understands the directions, but is too bored to follow them, she is choosing to disobey. she is old enough to understand this. why would you justify this behavior to her teacher? this tells your your daughter that since she’s so smart, you don’t think she needs to follow the rules. it tells your daughter’s teacher that you care more about how “special” your daughter is than how well she can learn to succeed in the classroom. and lastly, it undermines the authority a teacher should have in the classroom.

could you approach this from an incentive angle? maybe ask the teacher if your daughter could be allowed to have free reading or writing time after she completes her assignments. there are plenty of writing contests - here’s one from pbs (pbskids.org/writerscontest/) but you get the idea, and she might find it fun. your daughter needs to understand that she needs to do the work that’s requested of her, and that there are more appropriate times for her to “be herself” and let her mind wander.

if she continues to be bored, is she advanced enough in her other subjects to be able to skip a grade? is there a gifted program you could get her in, or some sort of after-school activity that lets her use her creativity, like odyssey of the mind?

 

[gardenswithkids]

thanks.

we got her tested b/c we thought she had a learning disability.

If you suspected she had a learning disability, it shouldn’t entirely surprise you that she’s getting C’s in some subjects. Looking over that other thread, besides being gifted, the person who did some testing identified some areas of weakness. Your daughter’s “weaknesses” may have still fallen within the realm of “normal” or “average” for her age, and therefore not earn any specific learning disability label.

It’s very likely that the testing being done in a second grade classroom on which her grades are based hits right where your daughter’s abilities were the weakest. They aren’t asking 2nd graders to work at sixth grade reading levels or beyond, but they are probably asking questions sequential reasoning questions and questions about phonics where your daughter’s abilities may be more in line with others her age. You say the psychologist suggested that your daughter learned to read through rote memorization, so it may be harder for her to get good grades on phonic based questions in reading.

Grades aren’t based on iq and they don’t show everything your daughter is capable of doing. Grades reflect how she tests on the specific tasks from the teacher. The pyscho-educational testing done with the psychologist looked at different things beyond what your daughter’s teacher is grading.

 

[Sophie_Lawrence]

I have a background in secondary education.

I’m also a mom of a child who has gone through testing to see if there was a learning disability. He tested within the bell curve of normal. My personal belief is that he does have a higher IQ than he tested. This child was able to speak in full sentences at 18 months. He recognized letters and numbers at about that time, and was able to distinguish his video tapes, just by the wording on the actual tape, no pictures. Some of the wording was so similar, but he was able to tell them apart. That was in between the ages of 18 months and 2 yrs.

My son has always been average in school, we have been frustrated, and thankfully reassured by his teachers and principal that he is normal. He gets average grades because at times he aces his assignments and tests and at others he seems totally confused. He tends to be anxious, since infancy, and his anxiety gets in the way of success at times.

This same child is a computer wiz. He taught himself computer coding and has been doing so since about 11 years of age. He took a year of trumpet class and frustrated me incredibly because he wouldn’t practice, yet showed up at the recital and played as well as all the other kids.

I share all this is that it isn’t abnormal for a “gifted child” to not get perfect scores at school. I have a friend whose son is in college now. He spent his grammar school and high school careers as low average, yet would test very high on all standardized tests as 99th percentile. My friend was frustrated. He would do assignments and then forget to hand them in, he would do tests and forget to answer entire sections. Part of it was he was anxious, and would rush through.

He went to college and was warned that if he failed, he’d need to go to find a job, he could not come back to live at home, he need to go out and get a job, His first semester at college he pulled an 3.9 average and he maintained it through out college.

When your daughter was tested, did the psychologist provide feedback for her school on any accommodations that should be made for her? That should have happened.

Also, having a high IQ doesn’t preclude having a learning disability. Often children with high IQ’s can compensate for having a learning disability precisely because they do have high intelligence.

I would go back to the psychologist that provided the assessment and ask what accommodations your daughter needs to succeed in school.

From your other thread, you paid a significant amount of money. I’d be somewhat concerned as well. I hope it isn’t “Your daughter is gifted! My bill is in the mail”

Something similar happened to my son, he was tested as below average for his grade through a private agency. To bring him up to speed, they suggested tutoring sessions through the same agency, 3 hours a week at 100 dollars an hour. We went to our principal with the results, and she warned us that she would not trust these results, it looked like they were trying to sell a product. His testing through the school district was significantly closer to the mark.

 

[Serap]

Hey guys,

Thanks everyone!!

We met with the psychologist again and he is suggesting that my daughter’s reading be tested again one on one in a quiet room with no distractions.

He also highly recommends that she go in the gifted program at school. He says she is the ideal candidate for it.

He doesn’t get her "C’ grade in English either. He says it’s inaccurate.

I am also teaching her that without following instructions and hard work, she will not reach her potential. I told her that even Olympian athletes, still need to train in order to use their gifts.

 

[Bruised_Reed]

Serap, a friend shared with me a post from this blog crushingtallpoppies.com/. I read a few of the the posts and thought of this thread.

 

[Serap]

Serap, a friend shared with me a post from this blog crushingtallpoppies.com/. I read a few of the the posts and thought of this thread.

cute thanks

 

[Hoosier_Daddy]

Hey guys,

Thanks everyone!!

We met with the psychologist again and he is suggesting that my daughter’s reading be tested again one on one in a quiet room with no distractions.

He also highly recommends that she go in the gifted program at school. He says she is the ideal candidate for it.

He doesn’t get her "C’ grade in English either. He says it’s inaccurate.

I am also teaching her that without following instructions and hard work, she will not reach her potential. I told her that even Olympian athletes, still need to train in order to use their gifts.

What did her teacher say when you talked with her?

 

[Xantippe]

Are there also some attention issues in play?

I know it does happen that children may test better than their grades suggest partly because the testing environment is more engaging and less distracting than the normal classroom.

 

[DivineMercy2000]

Greetings Sirap,

Grades at school are important, and I can understand your concerns, however, they do not mean everything.
There are so many possibilities about what could have caused this.
It could simply be that she has found one particular thing very hard or that she was unwell on the day of a test. The textbooks may not be good or there could be other more complex things going on in her life or a learning problem.
I do not understand why as a 7 year old, you are getting so very worked up about this when she is already clearly very smart! It was maybe just a little slip which she will recover from quickly.
Worry not and always love her for who she is.

Perhaps her talents are focused elsewhere?

 

[Serap]

Are there also some attention issues in play?

I know it does happen that children may test better than their grades suggest partly because the testing environment is more engaging and less distracting than the normal classroom.

Definitely. My DD gets distracted very easily b/c her mind is always “on”.

I often have to help her concentrate at home doing homework. I put her in a quiet room with lots of light and few distractions.

She also gets overwhelmed very easily. I then help her break things down in to manageable chunks.

 

[Serap]

Greetings Sirap,

Grades at school are important, and I can understand your concerns, however, they do not mean everything.
There are so many possibilities about what could have caused this.
It could simply be that she has found one particular thing very hard or that she was unwell on the day of a test. The textbooks may not be good or there could be other more complex things going on in her life or a learning problem.
I do not understand why as a 7 year old, you are getting so very worked up about this when she is already clearly very smart! It was maybe just a little slip which she will recover from quickly.
Worry not and always love her for who she is.

Perhaps her talents are focused elsewhere?

Thanks. I worry b/c I don’t want her current grades to start a trend. I always scored avg too even though my IQ tested at 126. I made it into university as an adult, after taking some aptitude tests in English and Math.

Then in university, once I truly learned how to study, I began getting A’s and B’s.

I also did terribly with multiple choice and much better if I could write my own ideas and explanations.

 

[SMHW]

Definitely. My DD gets distracted very easily b/c her mind is always “on”.

I often have to help her concentrate at home doing homework. I put her in a quiet room with lots of light and few distractions.

She also gets overwhelmed very easily. I then help her break things down in to manageable chunks.

That’s the thing about grades. They really are not measuring intelligence. They measure **results **in a given environment.

As such, you see how your child does in the environment of the typical classroom, not how your child could do if life presented her with her ideal environment.

 

[Bruised_Reed]

Hi Serap,
I thought of another resource, a book by Cynthia Tobias, “The Way They Learn.” It discusses learning styles, learning modalities, and even the kind of environment a student will work best in, which is different for everyone.

There is a caveat and that is that the founder of the theory of learning styles she uses has criticized her use of it, as he thinks it’s wrong to ascribe a learning style to children. I respect that and would apply the recommendations thoughtfully. Basically, he doesn’t want a child to be pigeon-holed by parents and teachers without consideration that their “diagnosis” of a student’s developing learning style might be wrong.

With that said, I think the book is interesting and would be helpful in considering how your daughter perceives and orders information, knowing her modality and how to work with that.

One more and then I’m done () 7 Kinds of Smart by Thomas Armstrong.

Wait, one more: Right-Brained Children in a Left-Brained World: Unlocking the Potential of Your ADD Child. This one is the most fringe of resources I suggest it might have some nuggets of wisdom. In his advocacy of the right-brained he gets ranty about public schools and kinda comes across as biased against left-brained.

(ETA: Right-brained Concrete-Random, visual, global learner in the house! )