How do you know if your child is truly above grade level in subjective things?

[Dmmetler]

I'm trying to figure out what I could possibly put in a portfolio for DD-and in something like Math, or even science if it involves calculations, it's pretty easy. The books are labeled, the topics are labeled, and the skills are divided by grade level.

 

But what about doing research or writing type things? Particularly for computer-done writing, where spelling and grammar could potentially be corrected by the software (I have that turned off on DD's computer-but I know local schools don't?) How do you know what's above grade level vs expected writing. I know it's quite common to do little research projects even in K-1st grade around here, and creative writing is pushed from the time the kids can pick up a pencil.

 

And what about things like constructing Greek myths out of legos, or turning her bedroom into a herpetarium, complete with written records and research notes on her plastic and stuffed subjects? In many cases, I think her play shows more than her formal school work, but just "play" seems...well...young.

 

 

 

I wish there was a cheap route to an IQ test-or that when the schools had done hers for K entry they'd actually done a WPPSI. This portfolio stuff is giving me a headache!

[sunriseiz]

I'm not any help, but I totally agree. I am so glad we don't have to do a portfolio, though I know it may be an issue if we want to apply to some programs.... I have DDs "books" she's written for nanowrimo the past 3 years and the diarama she made for history club, but anything else would be hard to document/quantify.

[Five More Minutes]

I haven't done this for a portfolio, but I prepare quarterly reports here as a means of helping me reflect on learning and as a "just in case there are any questions" document.

 

One tool I use to assess grade level is our province's curriculum standards. Because some of the subjective areas (like writing) are difficult to pinpoint even there, start where I *think* she's at in that area, and review the expectations there.

 

I then use phraseology right from the standards document in my report or to explain examples of her work. "She correctly uses quotation marks for passages of dialogue (Gr. 5 standard) in her free writing."

[quark]

I would take a video of her explaining her little projects and also photos of all the labeled projects. I know it's hard to think of what is truly above grade level but sometimes, what looks normal to you *is* above grade level. Try not to overthink it. Other than that, I want to give my sympathies and also encourage you that it will be okay and to just send a few things that show her intensity and passion for the subjects she loves.

[OSUBuckeye]

Do a google search on "Five Levels of Gifted". There's a book and even an assessment test. I don't know how accurate it all is, and I've only read the online portions of the theory without reading the whole book, but I was impressed at how it described me. Your daughter seems to have a lot of level 5 traits, and I was level 4 mostly.

 

Public school testing showed that I had high school level reading comprehension in third grade, and by fifth grade I could have scored the average SAT for graduating seniors (I took it in 6th grade and got a 1200). I graduated early, and still ended up by all measurements being the best student in math in my city (pop. 200,000) among my grade, the grade above me, and grade below me. When I was 17 I was taking senior-level college classes, and a professor mistook me for being in graduate school. Yet I was one of the youngest 85 students on a campus of 50,000! The weirdest phase growing up wasn't taking challenging classes with older students, it was transitioning into the workforce when you're highly credentialed and yet too young to go to happy hour. ;-)

 

Your daughter is hitting milestones faster than I was, so I suspect you might see her in the Level 5 categories of gifted. Which means that every day she is more and more functioning at an adult level, and she'll have to navigate the waters of "biding her time" until she gets treated like one while using that time to become an expert (yes, expert!) in the topics that interest her. By the time she's ten, I hope you'll start treating her intellectually like an adult. Yes, she'll play with legos, cry after a stressful day, etc., but don't discount her ability to think through things as an adult. When decisions need to be made, include her fully on the decision-making process like you would to an eighteen year old child. There's something stunting about being deeply rational and being excluded from decision making that you'll want her avoid feeling during the touchy teen years.

 

Bookstores sell a Mensa Tests For Kids IQ book. Don't buy it! They have different measuring systems for both tests so they aren't consistent. When I was 11, I topped out on both and found a mistake in the book. Your money is better spent elsewhere.

[Arcadia]

Particularly for computer-done writing, where spelling and grammar could potentially be corrected by the software (I have that turned off on DD's computer-but I know local schools don't?) How do you know what's above grade level vs expected writing

 

For 2nd and 3rd grade, my older's writing was graded by his teacher based on the content, grammar and spelling. First they check for content first to see if he meets standards. Than to see if the writing is grammatically correct (commas, periods and what have you). Last they check for spelling because creative spelling is only allowed for hard words. So the writing would have three separate grades. Hope that helps.

 

And what about things like constructing Greek myths out of legos, or turning her bedroom into a herpetarium, complete with written records and research notes on her plastic and stuffed subjects?

 

Constructing Greek myths out of legos is counted as my boys history portfolio (work samples) by their school. Herpetarium is counted under Science in the module science project, we just need to show the completed science fair report to their teacher. Their Science is spiral from K-5 so I don't worry about grade level so much. History is not tested for K-5 so I didn't bother checking state standards and just let them absorb what they can.

[EKS]

My kids attended a public "homeschool school" for several years. For part of that time, I also consulted with a teacher in this school about their progress. One of the main things I wanted to find out was where their writing was compared with that of their peers. The teacher I consulted with had been in the business for 30 years and had taught grades K-10. I never once got a straight answer from her about this.

 

The same thing happened when my older son was (briefly) enrolled in a public homeschool school for high school. I had to show the teacher his writing assignments and I never once got any feedback about whether I was on target with what we were doing or if it was honors level or what.

 

I've come to the conclusion that there *is* an answer to these questions, but that most teachers either don't know or don't want to be pinned down.

 

Also, there is the issue of what exactly "on grade level" means. Does being "on level" mean doing average work as compared to what an average kid in the US can do? A kid in the local school district? A kid in the selective private school in the next town? Or does it mean doing excellent work as compared to one of these groups?

 

I have finally settled on the idea that working above grade level means getting an A (whatever that means) in the above level subject without accommodations or modifications for age. I did get something approaching an answer when I asked the homeschool school teacher about my son's writing in these terms, something like: "Would you give this paper an A if it had been written by a 6th grader?" The answer I got was that it wasn't long enough even though it met the requirements of the assignment (which came from a 6th grade program used by public schools).

[Arcadia]

The same thing happened when my older son was (briefly) enrolled in a public homeschool school for high school. I had to show the teacher his writing assignments and I never once got any feedback about whether I was on target with what we were doing or if it was honors level or what.

 

I've come to the conclusion that there *is* an answer to these questions, but that most teachers either don't know or don't want to be pinned down.

For California, the public school teachers has examples of what is on grade level for K-8 with regardless to state standards, not sure about high school. My kids teachers did go over their writing assignments and guide them on improving their writing using their writing assignments. I guess it really depends on the teacher as to how much feedback and guidance you get.

[Lang Syne Boardie]

Hm. Well the way I approach the requirements is to spend as little time as possible on them because it takes away from time I could be spending on far more useful things. And I get the impression those I deal with about it don't care nearly as much about my own kids as I do.

 

You could simply get creative in your wording. Schools do. Sandboxes are called "sensory tables".

 

You could use this eduspeak jargon generator:

 

http://wiki.bssd.org...ex.php/Eduspeak

 

 

:smilielol5:

[Lang Syne Boardie]

I haven't done this for a portfolio, but I prepare quarterly reports here as a means of helping me reflect on learning and as a "just in case there are any questions" document.

 

One tool I use to assess grade level is our province's curriculum standards. Because some of the subjective areas (like writing) are difficult to pinpoint even there, start where I *think* she's at in that area, and review the expectations there.

 

I then use phraseology right from the standards document in my report or to explain examples of her work. "She correctly uses quotation marks for passages of dialogue (Gr. 5 standard) in her free writing."

 

 

When I needed to consider a portfolio for my tutored student, I decided on this approach, as well. The evaluator didn't need to know everything I cared about or everything the student had learned and done; the evaluator just needed to see that all the boxes had been checked. So why not simply list those boxes in the terminology they recognize and check 'em off?

 

One*mom kept two portfolios for her child. One to please the state, and one for her own records and use. The first included all the requirements and nothing more. The second was a true record of everything she and her child had valued as authentic learning experiences throughout the year. I thought that was brilliant.

[MinivanMom]

When I needed to consider a portfolio for my tutored student, I decided on this approach, as well. The evaluator didn't need to know everything I cared about or everything the student had learned and done; the evaluator just needed to see that all the boxes had been checked. So why not simply list those boxes in the terminology they recognize and check 'em off?

 

One*mom kept two portfolios for her child. One to please the state, and one for her own records and use. The first included all the requirements and nothing more. The second was a true record of everything she and her child had valued as authentic learning experiences throughout the year. I thought that was brilliant.

 

 

This is what I do.

 

I think it's hard to know what grade level is in those subjective areas, because it depends on the cohort you are comparing a child to. A child at a rural elementary school might seem to be above-grade-level in their science reasoning or with their science fair project, but if you transported that child to a suburban elementary school in a highly-educated area with lots of science or technology-type jobs then they probably would be just one of the bright kids. Even talent searches are looking for innate intelligence or high-achievement in core areas, so that doesn't necessarily help you with subjective things like writing, science, or art. I guess there really isn't a way to know unless your child is involved in national-level academic competitions in their area of talent

 

Are we talking about portfolio samples to meet state monitoring requirements or are we talking about applying to something like DYS? Those are two different situations. If your gut is telling you this is an area of talent, then it probably is. If it looks like your daughter is producing much more advanced work than her peers (both homeschooled and those in b&m schools), then she probably is. Choose the work sample that shows her talents in the best possible light. That's all you can really do anyway. I would guess that they are probably used to out-of-the-box portfolio samples versus simply reams of advanced math problems. I love the idea of taking a video of her explaining one of her projects. Hearing a gifted child talk about their academic passions communicates so much more than a piece of paper ever could.

[quark]

Are we talking about portfolio samples to meet state monitoring requirements or are we talking about applying to something like DYS? Those are two different situations. If your gut is telling you this is an area of talent, then it probably is. If it looks like your daughter is producing much more advanced work than her peers (both homeschooled and those in b&m schools), then she probably is. Choose the work sample that shows her talents in the best possible light. That's all you can really do anyway. I would guess that they are probably used to out-of-the-box portfolio samples versus simply reams of advanced math problems. I love the idea of taking a video of her explaining one of her projects. Hearing a gifted child talk about their academic passions communicates so much more than a piece of paper ever could.

 

This! I assumed OP was referring to DYS, that's why I wrote what I did. If it was for a school, I would use WendyK's example of educationalese-based stuff.

 

I've been keeping two portfolios too. Both are basically, running lists in Excel spreadsheets of what he has done organized by date/ year and subject areas where the areas are obvious, but the one for our own purposes includes binders full of test/ contest results, and tote boxes filled with history project samples, math notebooks, videos of presentations made, photos of anything that seems noteworthy and also just for my own reminiscence, and in our garage, prototypes of rocket launchers for his physics project, simple machines, and other odds and ends.

 

For DYS, with a reluctant writer, I didn't have pages of written work so I submitted a presentation video where he was engaging an adult, during the Q&A session, in a discussion that was psychology/ biology based and it was clear that he was passionate about his opinion. In some areas, I submitted doodles...yes, just doodles! Not even labelled clearly by my kiddo. I attached a write-up describing the samples I had sent, what they were about, why, how much time kiddo put into them, what sparked the interest, what books he read/ documentaries he watched and so on.

[Greenmama2]

In my area one can search "curriculum outcomes" and find PDF and video work samples of "above requirements", "met requirements" and "below requirements. Maybe yours has similar?

[Dmmetler]

It's for DYS. I've gone through the last year or so and found some poetry samples, her "snake proposal" that she did to get us to let her get a snake, including her estimated budget, several chapters of her ever-growing novel (really, more a collection of short stories with similar characters), a couple of things she's written on mythology, especially where she's been writing as mythological characters, a research report she did for "fun" on a hypothetical snake species (complete with diagrams of the snake's anatomy and maps of where it's habitat is), various math samples, and the like. I have much, much less from this year than from 2011 and 2012 because so much of it's on the computer. Definitely a difference between handwriting when she's working at it and for "fun"-and I think her "fun" handwriting has gone down in quality this year since she's been doing most of her "fun"

writing on the computer. Still searching, but starting to feel a little better about finding stuff to send.

 

 

I'll also try getting her on video talking about some of her projects. I'm not sure how that will work-this is a kid who hides when regular cameras come out.

[Dmmetler]

It's for DYS. I've gone through the last year or so and found some poetry samples, her "snake proposal" that she did to get us to let her get a snake, including her estimated budget, several chapters of her ever-growing novel (really, more a collection of short stories with similar characters), a couple of things she's written on mythology, especially where she's been writing as mythological characters, a research report she did for "fun" on a hypothetical snake species (complete with diagrams of the snake's anatomy and maps of where it's habitat is), various math samples, and the like. I have much, much less from this year than from 2011 and 2012 because so much of it's on the computer. Definitely a difference between handwriting when she's working at it and for "fun"-and I think her "fun" handwriting has gone down in quality this year since she's been doing most of her "fun"

writing on the computer. Still searching, but starting to feel a little better about finding stuff to send.

 

 

I'll also try getting her on video talking about some of her projects. I'm not sure how that will work-this is a kid who hides when regular cameras come out.

[EKS]

For California, the public school teachers has examples of what is on grade level for K-8 with regardless to state standards, not sure about high school. My kids teachers did go over their writing assignments and guide them on improving their writing using their writing assignments. I guess it really depends on the teacher as to how much feedback and guidance you get.

 

 

I'm sure they do here (WA) as well. Maybe we just had bad luck with teachers.

[Arcadia]

I'll also try getting her on video talking about some of her projects. I'm not sure how that will work-this is a kid who hides when regular cameras come out.

 

 

My "shy" 8 year old did some video presentations using his iPad front camera. He position his iPad in a suitable position and just tape himself doing the presentation. Before the iPad he did it with the webcam.

[Kathy G]

We did videos for DYS. Some of DS showing his programming on the computer and other projects and one of him just talking about his passions. When I called they suggested something along this line. I thought this was the easiest way to go.

[Crimson Wife]

One thing to look for in portfolio pieces is evidence of "out of the box" thinking. Something that displays creativity rather than just academic achievement. The EXPLORE will show academic achievement, so what you want your portfolio pieces to showcase is the qualitatively different way of thinking that sets apart the truly gifted from the merely bright.