For those parents really invested in the AAP process beginning in kindergarten or first grade...

[Anonymous]

Do you think you groomed your child for their eventual AAP admission?

-Prepping
-Creating work samples with them at home with the intent to submit them OR saving work samples for years
-Looking for potential people to write letters of recommendation well before the deadlines

Do you also think that you can help ensure your child is admitted by doing any of these things?

I have two in AAP already...but I've wondered if parents are in the know, do you think it is easier to get admission that way?

[Anonymous]

The intent of the program is for the school to find kids who need extra challenge, not for parents to try to create this type of kid out of whatever kid they've got. If that were possible, or recommended, wouldn't every parent who wanted to be able to achieve that? Wouldn't that make for more AAP kids than gen ed kids, especially in the NoVA area?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you think you groomed your child for their eventual AAP admission?

-Prepping
-Creating work samples with them at home with the intent to submit them OR saving work samples for years
-Looking for potential people to write letters of recommendation well before the deadlines

Do you also think that you can help ensure your child is admitted by doing any of these things?

I have two in AAP already...but I've wondered if parents are in the know, do you think it is easier to get admission that way?

Short answer is No. A key component of the admission process is the child's teacher recommendation (Forget what it's called). No amount of prep can work around this.

- Test Prep. will only help familiarize the kid with the test. I don't think it improves results.

- Work samples - Begin gathering work samples as early as you can. Keep an eye out for good samples of the child's work at school or home. preserve it with some notes so you can write about it. It could be a story, ability to solve problems in pre-K, creating their own game with stuff lying around the house, etc. Whatever you think shows extra ability. Provide these to the teacher or include in your packet. Don't expect the teacher to do this on your behalf. Though most teachers are very conscientious, they have a lot of kids to think about.

- Recommendation letters - This is important. Identify people who interact with your child on a consistent basis. Your parents, His pre-K teacher, his coach in Robotics, Odyssey of the mind team, etc (yes, you have to have the kid be involved in one of these).

All of the above falls under "Prepping" in my opinion. It's up to you to decide if you want to increase the level of certainty that your child will get into AAP.

AAP as it is now is not really for the smartest kids but for the most hard working. So all kids deserve a chance to be in it and it's up to the parents to make it happen..

[Anonymous]

NP here with an incoming AAP student just saying my kid is not in robotics or odyssey of the mind.

Not that the committee would know either way - they didn't ask for a list of ECs nor did I provide one... I suppose now that you mention it, i could see it being not a bad idea to provide though.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you think you groomed your child for their eventual AAP admission?

-Prepping
-Creating work samples with them at home with the intent to submit them OR saving work samples for years
-Looking for potential people to write letters of recommendation well before the deadlines

Do you also think that you can help ensure your child is admitted by doing any of these things?

I have two in AAP already...but I've wondered if parents are in the know, do you think it is easier to get admission that way?

Short answer is No. A key component of the admission process is the child's teacher recommendation (Forget what it's called). No amount of prep can work around this.

- Test Prep. will only help familiarize the kid with the test. I don't think it improves results.

- Work samples - Begin gathering work samples as early as you can. Keep an eye out for good samples of the child's work at school or home. preserve it with some notes so you can write about it. It could be a story, ability to solve problems in pre-K, creating their own game with stuff lying around the house, etc. Whatever you think shows extra ability. Provide these to the teacher or include in your packet. Don't expect the teacher to do this on your behalf. Though most teachers are very conscientious, they have a lot of kids to think about.

- Recommendation letters - This is important. Identify people who interact with your child on a consistent basis. Your parents, His pre-K teacher, his coach in Robotics, Odyssey of the mind team, etc (yes, you have to have the kid be involved in one of these).

All of the above falls under "Prepping" in my opinion. It's up to you to decide if you want to increase the level of certainty that your child will get into AAP.

AAP as it is now is not really for the smartest kids but for the most hard working. So all kids deserve a chance to be in it and it's up to the parents to make it happen..

I have 3 in the program. Agree with test prep comments above. Will help with familiarity but I wouldn't spend a lot of time on prep stuff.

Work samples--yes, be on the look out for these early. We had our kids do work samples over the winter break when they had time.

Recommendation letters--have heard these are not that important. Nevertheless, each of my kids had a recommendation from a coach.

I do not believe that your kid needs to be in robotics or odyssey of the mind.

[Anonymous]

Two in AAP (One earlier, one incoming). No prep for either. It would be more convenient to stay at base school (which is a great school with strong programs in walking distance), but we've opted for AAP since they needed the challenge. So maybe we're not "really invested" by the standards you mentioned. We didn't submit letters of recommendation. The work samples I used were just things each had written/drawn in the previous few weeks that I thought captured their sense of humor/writing skills.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Do you think you groomed your child for their eventual AAP admission?

-Prepping
-Creating work samples with them at home with the intent to submit them OR saving work samples for years
-Looking for potential people to write letters of recommendation well before the deadlines

Do you also think that you can help ensure your child is admitted by doing any of these things?

I have two in AAP already...but I've wondered if parents are in the know, do you think it is easier to get admission that way?

Short answer is No. A key component of the admission process is the child's teacher recommendation (Forget what it's called). No amount of prep can work around this.

- Test Prep. will only help familiarize the kid with the test. I don't think it improves results.

- Work samples - Begin gathering work samples as early as you can. Keep an eye out for good samples of the child's work at school or home. preserve it with some notes so you can write about it. It could be a story, ability to solve problems in pre-K, creating their own game with stuff lying around the house, etc. Whatever you think shows extra ability. Provide these to the teacher or include in your packet. Don't expect the teacher to do this on your behalf. Though most teachers are very conscientious, they have a lot of kids to think about.

- Recommendation letters - This is important. Identify people who interact with your child on a consistent basis. Your parents, His pre-K teacher, his coach in Robotics, Odyssey of the mind team, etc (yes, you have to have the kid be involved in one of these).

All of the above falls under "Prepping" in my opinion. It's up to you to decide if you want to increase the level of certainty that your child will get into AAP.

AAP as it is now is not really for the smartest kids but for the most hard working. So all kids deserve a chance to be in it and it's up to the parents to make it happen..

This poster is very confused.

Letters of recommendation and work samples from prek are ridiculous!! If you can't find something more recent, forget it.

Your kid does NOT need to be in robotics or odyssey of the mind. My two athletic kids were in sports when they were in second grade.

Aap is NOT about the most hard working kids. Sure, some hard working kids are admitted, but lots and lots of slackers are, too. Go walk outside an aap classroom and look at some of the poor work samples. Doesn't mean the kid isn't really bright, but may be 2e or just lazy.

[Anonymous]

I have heard about AAP before DS started kindergarten. DS struggled with reading and I had no intentions of pushing him into AAP. He was in pool and got into AAP. The only thing I did was buy a cogat book on amazon. We went over one practice exam prior to his cogat. When the time came, I wanted to submit some work samples but I didn't really have anything that showed gifted behavior. I considered submitting some art but decided not to.

[Anonymous]

It must chap the asses of the "invested" parents that some of us just send the kids to school and let them do activities they enjoy and still get admitted to AAP without breaking a sweat.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It must chap the asses of the "invested" parents that some of us just send the kids to school and let them do activities they enjoy and still get admitted to AAP without breaking a sweat.

Why, if their kids also got into AAP? I think most "invested" parents are concerned about getting the best education for their kids, and aren't focused on whether or not you're breaking a sweat. Many come from cultures where breaking a sweat is viewed as a good thing. As far as the OP's question about whether prepping works, I think it must. There is no way test prep centers could survive if people kept paying money for AAP prep with no positive results. Word would eventually get out. You can't increase a kids IQ with prep, but you likely can significantly improve test scores. Also, if your child gets high test scores on both the NNAT and CogAT, a low GBRS could exclude a kid first round, but many still get in on appeal. I think each family decides what works for them. Would I say push a kid who is average into AAP, no. Do I think prepping your above average but not gifted kid could skew the results toward eligibility for AAP, absolutely.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It must chap the asses of the "invested" parents that some of us just send the kids to school and let them do activities they enjoy and still get admitted to AAP without breaking a sweat.

Highly likely most people posting on this forum aren't laid back about aap!

[Anonymous]

Frequently, those parents don't realize that prepping for AAP is just the beginning of a twenty year process of prepping or propping up their children for education. Hopefully, they burn out early in a way that benefits their children.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The intent of the program is for the school to find kids who need extra challenge, not for parents to try to create this type of kid out of whatever kid they've got. If that were possible, or recommended, wouldn't every parent who wanted to be able to achieve that? Wouldn't that make for more AAP kids than gen ed kids, especially in the NoVA area?

I know multiple families with three kids in AAP. I know one family with four. I know intelligence has a genetic component, but the number of such cases defies statistical probability. So, my feeling is it is possible to artificially create kids who meet the ENTRY standards by prepping, even if not recommended.

[Anonymous]

I'm the OP of the thread. I didn't prep my kids. Both were admitted first rounds, in pool, very high GBRS (one had a 16 and one had a 15). Regardless, there are kids who are admitted after prepping OR after being rejected and then are admitted after an appeal or even after 1, 2 or 3 years of trying to get in OR who score much higher on a retake the following year and are then admitted, etc. None of us can tell who those kids are in the classroom setting. It isn't like they stand out as drowning in information that is so far above them in any way.

As said above, I don't think any of us can claim that even when our kids were in the pool and admitted first round that we took the process lightly. If you are responding to this forum, you are invested in the process, the program, etc. No other explanation why you'd be posting responses on this board!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you think you groomed your child for their eventual AAP admission?

-Prepping
-Creating work samples with them at home with the intent to submit them OR saving work samples for years
-Looking for potential people to write letters of recommendation well before the deadlines

Do you also think that you can help ensure your child is admitted by doing any of these things?

I have two in AAP already...but I've wondered if parents are in the know, do you think it is easier to get admission that way?

OP, congratulations, you have already gone through this process twice. Do you think items you listed were the key to getting admitted? If your first child did not get in, would you have done something different for the 2nd child?