When your kid is mildly gifted but you are not

[SunshineMom]

I feel like an idiot most days:( My biggest struggle right now is just keeping up with all my dd9's interests and scheduling time enough for her to complete all her homework, practices, etc. all the while keeping our homeschool studies progressing. She is all over the place within subjects/skills and finding a curriculum and sticking to it has been hard. I don't seem to have enough trust, knowledge, or creativity to extend subjects in the way I feel she would thrive in. I often try to pack more in when really we need to go deeper. A couple of examples might prove helpful. She is currently enrolled in Athena's Upper Literature class, learning violin, piano, and Science Olympiad (thankfully only two events). Meanwhile at home I am trying to focus on skills areas. I recently made the decision that she is ready for AoPS prealgebra even though she is not a star math student but we just need a new approach to math. She finished 5A/parts of 5B Singapore, some of LOF but hates it. I figure we will just catch gaps (she has them!) within AoPS and invest the time. She has just started in AoPS prealgebra. She says she love math but I am not sure why for she doesn't request it....she likes AoPS however wordy, but those early concepts are intuitive. I have changed my mind so many times about science studies this year. She wanted to do Science Olympiad. I didn't know how much time Science Oly would take but now I see we can also get to biology this year. Here is my plan for biology; read through How Life Works book, Cell Biology-Ellen Mchenry's, and Plato Science-Life Science (she began this last yr but couldn't finish due to me not her). Literature, I didn't know what else to do and Athena's gives me an option but I can see she needs more stretching. We need to invest more time in literary analysis but I am slow to get to that too this year. Writing, urg....I have WWE4....this is an easy exercise for her. I have been debating whether to get her WWS just because I can see outlining would help her with science and history reads that she does independently. She keeps a journal of her reads, summaries really but outlining might be more helpful. Thoughts? She wants to participate (she is not one to write alot on her own, she's interested in the challenge) in the NMoNW which will eat up a lot her time but only for a month. I guess I need some guidance here.....her interests are seemingly trumping what I have decided she needs to learn (skill wise) and she is choosing options that take herself in nontraditional learning i.e. out of curriculum based learning and I am often running to gain enough background knowledge to enrich her. I am trying, reading ahead and what not but I often feel empty handed. Can anyone relate? Thanks for taking the time to read this.

[tyydae]

Based on what you wrote, doesn't sound like you are having too much fun these days. You might want to remind yourself of the reasons you made the choice to homeschool/afterschool and start there. It also sounds like you have waaay too many irons in the fire. Might want to think about scaling back a bit...if only until you've had a chance to re-evaluate some things. Good luck!

[mathwonk]

you have so much to give your child. it does not matter if the child learn more quickly than you do, your head start in knowledge and wisdom i more than enough to qualify you as her teacher for many years. give her what you have, and learn together. discuss current events, talk to her, share experiences and impressions. you don't have to design and follow a curriculum.

 

i would say pretty confidently that the kids at epsilon camp i taught last summer are waay smarter than me. i enjoyed that, and they seemed to enjoy what i gave them. bright kids like having a teacher who enjoys and appreciates their gifts.

 

the same thing is true of many of the students i have had in my college and grad school courses. the point is not to be smarter than they are but to catch them at that moment in their rise where you can help them. bear bryant was not as good a quarterback as joe namath either but he helped him.

Edited October 12, 2012 by mathwonk

[quark]

Agreeing with pp's. And :grouphug:! I feel like this almost every single day but have learned from the frustration to prioritize and to stop trying to do everything. Doesn't help that we don't actually follow TWTM as much as many posters here do and I always feel like we're not doing enough in the history and writing departments. :tongue_smilie:

 

Just pick 2 or 3 key areas and focus on those. Then add other things back in if you have time or leave them out till another year. I also suggest reading the relaxed homeschooling thread and its various spin offs :001_smile:. Lots of food for thought there.

[jennynd]

Take a deeeeeep breath..... Will u ?

My mom was Chinese literature major and My Dad was English major. My sister is a electric engineer and I am a mechanical engineer. If thing meant to go that way, you can't stop it, whether u like it or not :001_smile:

 

Provide her the resource and lots of support. She will be fine

[serendipitous journey]

:grouphug:

 

The ppers have such good points; esp. jennynd's idea to relax!

 

At the moment, it seems like she is doing fine in everything: you shouldn't be adding. And you should be kind to yourself.

 

Offhand I'd say, for example, don't start WWS b/c she might benefit from it; let her finish WWE4 first, it will simplify things and she will be fine. Don't worry about literary analysis right now: that's not going anywhere, either. :) If you work through what's on her plate and flag areas of concern for your next planning period, then maybe you can settle things down a bit?

 

-- also: she's old enough to enrich herself pretty much, esp. if y'all have a halfway-decent library. And Netflix. IMHO. Not that you can't add a lot; but if she's interested, she can gain an incredible amount of knowledge the old-fashioned way; and there are tons of hands-on experiment books a child that age could tackle.

 

:grouphug: I relate to this problem. Your goal cannot be to optimize the child's education or you will go nuts.

"Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away." -- Antoine de Saint-Exupery. I like that quote. If you don't, say the word and I'll edit it off your thread -- you don't need any more annoyances!!!

Edited October 12, 2012 by serendipitous journey

[8filltheheart]

My dd is strongly gifted and I'm definetely not :), so I don't think I can keep her pace, she also has to accept the way I am.

I think 9 yo is a nice age to start a child making more responsible for their own learning. I keep the overview and the endresponsibility, but if she wants to learn 20 languages, she has to do it, not me.

If she would work with AoPS it would be her job to learn that, I can't help her that way.

For several subject we do what I think what is best for the moment, or what fits me, especially if I am the one who has to teach ;)

 

A gifted child might get you crazy, but don't let that happen, take care of yourself.

:grouphug:

 

:iagree:

 

I have never had my kids tested, but I have several kids that are way beyond me intellectually. It does not mean that I can't educate them; it simply means that I need to find ways to meet their needs.

 

I love using annotated books for lit for my language loving dd. It has opened up an endless realm of possibilities for areas of research, spin-off lit, lit ana, etc. I don't have to know the answers before we start. I learn them as we go along w/ resources.

 

If my dd wants to learn 3 languages (which is what she is doing now and wants to add more in the future :tongue_smilie:), again, finding resources that she can use for self-teaching or finding online classes or tutors is what I have to do b/c I am not going to learn them all w/her.

 

AoPS is meant to be self-teaching. Their online classes are for getting help. ;)

 

I respect my kids' interests and discuss w/them what they want to study. I spend hrs collecting resources. I dictate what they do and their output. I talk to them and a lot of the time it means I am googling answers to questions I don't know the answer to.

 

For me it has meant taking the lead in planning, organizing, researching materials. At your dd's age, though, I am very much involved in everything. Once they are older, I don't even try to keep up. I pick and choose what I want to spend more time on and we focus on that together and they are more independent w/the between materials. For example, dd just finished Song of Roland. I have teaching materials from when her older sister did it in high school. Those materials were all I used. She is currently reading Oliver Twist and that I am reading as well and b/c of that, my level of discussion, suggestions for research, etc are more thoughtful/involved. I can't do it w/everything she reads b/c I simply don't have the time.

 

It is a balance that has worked w/my kids.

[Storm Bay]

Do you need to teach your dd every subject? My eldest is the kind of dc who was able to self-teach herself many things and so could go as quickly as she wanted to (or, during puberty as slowly as I'd let her in certain subjects--not because she was no longer gifted).

 

You can't do everything, so perhaps she could do much of the Biology on her own. My eldest did science on her own at age 9, primarily with trade books. She excels in science in high school, so it didn't hurt her, even though we didn't do as many labs then as we should have due to family dynamics & my other dc--like you, I only have so many hours in a day. I couldn't keep up everything at a hectic pace with three dc & I was a gifted dc. We didn't even touch literary analysis when my dc were 9, and both my dd's do well with it now. My dd's did a LOT of reading, and analyzing it at 9 killed their enthusiasm for reading. What she's doing now sounds great for 9, even if she's gifted, & she enjoys it.

[8filltheheart]

Do you need to teach your dd every subject? My eldest is the kind of dc who was able to self-teach herself many things and so could go as quickly as she wanted to (or, during puberty as slowly as I'd let her in certain subjects--not because she was no longer gifted).

 

You can't do everything, so perhaps she could do much of the Biology on her own. My eldest did science on her own at age 9, primarily with trade books. She excels in science in high school, so it didn't hurt her, even though we didn't do as many labs then as we should have due to family dynamics & my other dc--like you, I only have so many hours in a day. I couldn't keep up everything at a hectic pace with three dc & I was a gifted dc. We didn't even touch literary analysis when my dc were 9, and both my dd's do well with it now. My dd's did a LOT of reading, and analyzing it at 9 killed their enthusiasm for reading. What she's doing now sounds great for 9, even if she's gifted, & she enjoys it.

 

Reading Karin's post made me realize that I did not clarify in mine that those are things I am doing w/older kids. I meant for to be encouragement for coping as they get older, not for suggestions to follow at 9.

[SunshineMom]

Thanks everyone, your words do give me some comfort:) I guess I don't need to be an "All Knowing Teacher" and it is perfectly normal to need to do research before teaching a particular topic/subject. I think what is so isolating about homeschooling is that one does have to research, to learn too, and others not homeschooling, don't understand that. A public school teacher teaches one grade and they're experts within that years subjects, whereas each year we cover something new, so there really is no teacher "down time". The time it takes to be ready to teach a subject is often not talked about here, there is an assumption made that most parents are "ready". I certainly am not and for this reason homeschooling is humbling especially when one's child learns quicker. I need a firm schedule with planned flexibility to pursue interests within subjects, often though I don’t know what those are ahead of time. Yes, I agree my dd9 is at a good age to be doing more independent learning, we have begun to make more transitions towards that. I have found that she is more capable of independent work and it's just a matter of supporting her in acquiring time management skills.

 

8-We enjoyed Alice in Wonderland, yes there were many trails to follow. My dd9 loved learning about the historic references to objects, phrases, vocabulary, and the author's original intentions. We plan at some point to read the annotated Peter Pan together. Thank you for sharing what goes on in your home. It helps to normalize the read ahead, plan out, seek outside resources, in a progressive independence seeking fun loving manner. I am sure you have heard this before but writing a book about your homeschool would be helpful to so many of us.

Yes, I know I need to take a chill...thanks for that:) I know this was written with the best of intentions. Yes, if my goal is to try to maximize learning it will make me crazyI Looking for loose ends, gaps, is what I have been doing. I don’t want to leave anything out but the truth is kids fill in their own gaps (within reason) with their own readings, experiences, etc. and we have time. I do like your quote regarding perfectionism-a good reminder.

[Embassy]

The time it takes to be ready to teach a subject is often not talked about here, there is an assumption made that most parents are "ready".

 

I'll admit that I'm not ready. There is no way I can be fully educated on every topic. I prioritize and put my effort into what is most important. Some subjects I let my child learn on his own. Other subjects we learn together. Cliff notes can be helpful for discussions when I haven't been able to read a book. I wish I had time for it all, but I don't. I do my best and even with my inabilities I know my kids are getting a great education.

[Beth in SW WA]

She is currently enrolled in Athena's Upper Literature class, learning violin, piano, and Science Olympiad (thankfully only two events).

 

Can anyone relate?

 

Yes. Online classes and local tutors are a fantastic solution.