School for child who is selectively highly motivated

[Anonymous]

OP here - thanks to all of the helpful posters. How do people homeschool if both parents need to work?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here - thanks to all of the helpful posters. How do people homeschool if both parents need to work?

Hire a nanny andbdonthebwchoolwork on weekends and evenings.

[Anonymous]

...and do the schoolwork with parents in evenings and weekends.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here - thanks to all of the helpful posters. How do people homeschool if both parents need to work?

I know some co-ops organize themselves so parents work together to each take a day of homeschooling basically. But that won't work well for a child who might be easily bored and in need of enrichment.

I think basically someone has to leave work for a few years. There are more options once a child is in 2nd grade.

[Anonymous]

OP, if your child does turn out to be highly gifted, there's a good community here:

http://giftedissues.davidsongifted.org/BB/

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't think a school exists for such a special, special snowflake. Sorry, OP.

Have you never had the experience where another parent judged you because they didn't get the particular challenges you face in parenting your kid with their quirks and tendencies? Did you not think "this is not me, this is just what I am dealing with"?

I hope your child was a tantrumming mess and embarrassed you in public every time you went out to a restaurant when they were little. The smiling parent with the angelic child with good manners at the next table was me. I don't understand why your child was so out of control.

And I am OP. Thanks for being an ass and proving how DCUM is not a good place to go for advice.

OP-- That poster has not had any real, comprehensive experience with children. Only an ignoramus would post such a reply. But by the grace of God goes she...

[Anonymous]

OP-- That poster has not had any real, comprehensive experience with children. Only an ignoramus would post such a reply. But by the grace of God goes she...

OP needs to read her first statement again. That could describe any child--and it could also describe most people on earth. Aren't we all "selectively highly motivated"?

One must learn to live in the real world and sometimes one must adjust to the world--rather than expecting the world to adjust to you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

OP needs to read her first statement again. That could describe any child--and it could also describe most people on earth. Aren't we all "selectively highly motivated"?

No, actually, some kids are basically "teacher pleasers". If they know what is expected of them, they are happy enough to just do that. Sure they also have other interests, but "Getting the Gold Star" is pretty important to them. And they aren't bored by doing rote work, even if someone else has chosen the task.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

OP needs to read her first statement again. That could describe any child--and it could also describe most people on earth. Aren't we all "selectively highly motivated"?

No, actually, some kids are basically "teacher pleasers". If they know what is expected of them, they are happy enough to just do that. Sure they also have other interests, but "Getting the Gold Star" is pretty important to them. And they aren't bored by doing rote work, even if someone else has chosen the task.

This. Plus even more students are just hard working and as a result they do well in pretty much every subject, all the time. And there are a lot of these kinds of kids in this area.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

OP needs to read her first statement again. That could describe any child--and it could also describe most people on earth. Aren't we all "selectively highly motivated"?

No, actually, some kids are basically "teacher pleasers". If they know what is expected of them, they are happy enough to just do that. Sure they also have other interests, but "Getting the Gold Star" is pretty important to them. And they aren't bored by doing rote work, even if someone else has chosen the task.

This. Plus even more students are just hard working and as a result they do well in pretty much every subject, all the time. And there are a lot of these kinds of kids in this area.

I have a child like this. She's plenty bright, but she's not at all what I would consider highly gifted. She's smart, a hard worker and organized. She's GREAT. But she doesn't have any particular passion, anything that she find intrinsically motivating (yet), unlike her sibling who is NOT a hard worker, NOT a teacher pleaser, could care less about getting the gold stars if it isn't of interest... but has a deep passion for certain subjects and activities.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DS is only in K but we can already see that school is going to pose challengers for him.

He is:
-- highly motivated and works hard at things that particularly interest him.
-- not at all interested in things that' are not interesting him.
-- not motivated to be interested just because other parents or kids are trying to involve him in something.
-- doesn't focus well when asked to do something that he didn't pick himself.
-- a perfectionist and doesn't want to try things until he knows he can succeed.

We are struggling to decide what type of school environment (Montessori? Waldorf? Small classes?) will work for him. He is smart but will likely have attentions issues at his current pace of adaptation. He needs to learn to be more flexible and do what is asked of him. But if we stick him in a traditional public school, I really wonder if they will have the patience to deal with him. It could be totally miserable for all.

Has anyone had success with a particular educational approach with this type of child?

I think this describes half or more of the boys in my DS's 1st grade class, including my son. We are lucky he has a great teacher who lets him do a bulk of his assignments in ways that relate to his favorite things (what sports the Mayans played, a sports player for Black history month, filling his book box with sports-themed books, etc) and the school does nice things like reading pull out groups and is good at understanding that some 1st graders are writing and reading like 3rd-5th graders and some are like 1st graders - and that shakes out as kids age often. But there are still times when he zones out during writing time or phones in the least amount of effort on something - which has no relation to how bright he is or isn't. He does not have ADHD, he does not have autism, he does not executive function issues. He's just young & would rather be playing...

K is really young - and they do learn to adapt to expectations and requirements of the outside world more starting in 1st - and you can help bridge his interest divides by relating what he's learning at school with fun things at home.

Waldorf would probably be a good match if you want to find a particular environment like you're describing. But I don't think he sounds out of the range what you'll find is normal in 1st grade.

[Anonymous]

OP, I have two kids with these tendencies. They are both high IQ and ADHD. The first is also very intense, highly sensitive, and naturally very intellectually curious. He was actually pretty happy in Montessori--where his hyper focus had many positive outlets--but it led to a very uneven educational development. His strengths became even stronger and and his weaknesses even weaker. We switched him to public and he did pretty well--well, he did well academically, got in advanced groups, etc, but was extremely unhappy, became highly stressed, and even depressed. I have ended up homeschooling him. He is now in 6th, very happy and social, totally fine in weaker academic areas (with a little bit of dedicated attention), and very advanced in his preferred areas just because he has so much time to read and explore interests. Homeschooling is amazing for a self-starter!

My second is a total people-pleaser (just like I was in retrospect). He likes school, is in gifted classes in his areas of interest and produces mediocre work in others. He comes out as "average," which is not the case--in fact he is incredibly bright and quite impaired attention-wise--but that's what this kind of kid looks like in school. (Actually, like another PP, I did very well because I was more of a people pleaser until I had to write my dissertation...) I think staying in school has been positive for my younger son: he has learned very important skills. Discipline, self-control, organization. He has to accept that tedium is a part of the day and that he has to control the urge to walk around and talk all the time. He has had to adapt to his environment. He is learning--maybe not as much as he could, maybe not to his potential, but he is learning. And he is happy.

We have made two very different choices with our two boys and so far, I think they have both been the right ones. In my view, these situations are very child dependent and become much more obvious as the children get older. I saw soooo many wiggly k-ers, grow up and out of it. That was clearly not the case with mine. Even when they can control their hyperactivity and their impulses, regulating their attention gets harder and harder.

[Anonymous]

Really? This kid sound pretty typical for a kindergartener?? OP, lots of schools will ultimately be fine for this kid. No one special style is going to be the be-all-end-all. FWIW, my kid was exactly like this and he goes to private with small class sizes and that environment does suit him well, and the fact that they keep the learning kind of "hidden" within hands-on learning projects (so they do a lot of store activities to learn about money values rather than just worksheets about coins or whatever) in the early years also suits him well. So if you can find small class sizes, go for it. I don't think you need to homeschool....

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP, I have two kids with these tendencies. They are both high IQ and ADHD. The first is also very intense, highly sensitive, and naturally very intellectually curious. He was actually pretty happy in Montessori--where his hyper focus had many positive outlets--but it led to a very uneven educational development. His strengths became even stronger and and his weaknesses even weaker. We switched him to public and he did pretty well--well, he did well academically, got in advanced groups, etc, but was extremely unhappy, became highly stressed, and even depressed. I have ended up homeschooling him. He is now in 6th, very happy and social, totally fine in weaker academic areas (with a little bit of dedicated attention), and very advanced in his preferred areas just because he has so much time to read and explore interests. Homeschooling is amazing for a self-starter!

My second is a total people-pleaser (just like I was in retrospect). He likes school, is in gifted classes in his areas of interest and produces mediocre work in others. He comes out as "average," which is not the case--in fact he is incredibly bright and quite impaired attention-wise--but that's what this kind of kid looks like in school. (Actually, like another PP, I did very well because I was more of a people pleaser until I had to write my dissertation...) I think staying in school has been positive for my younger son: he has learned very important skills. Discipline, self-control, organization. He has to accept that tedium is a part of the day and that he has to control the urge to walk around and talk all the time. He has had to adapt to his environment. He is learning--maybe not as much as he could, maybe not to his potential, but he is learning. And he is happy.

We have made two very different choices with our two boys and so far, I think they have both been the right ones. In my view, these situations are very child dependent and become much more obvious as the children get older. I saw soooo many wiggly k-ers, grow up and out of it. That was clearly not the case with mine. Even when they can control their hyperactivity and their impulses, regulating their attention gets harder and harder.

This post is incredibly interesting. Your first child sounds exactly like my son - hyper focused, intense, sensitive, very curious. My son has been in Montessori for the primary cycle and we are now trying to decide whether to leave him in Montessori (where we think he would be happy) or move him to our local public school which is strong academically but a very traditional style with classrooms of 20-22 each. He loves Montessori and I suspect that he would continue to love school if we leave him in Montessori. But he doesn't seem to be learning things other than the particular thing that he is focused on at that moment. So, his education does seem to be a bit uneven. In terms of the public school option, it's not encouraging that your child was unhappy, highly stressed, and even depressed. If you could do it over again or didn't have the option to homeschool (doesn't seem feasible for us), what would you do? Stick with Montessori? Try a private school with small classes?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Really? This kid sound pretty typical for a kindergartener?? OP, lots of schools will ultimately be fine for this kid. No one special style is going to be the be-all-end-all. FWIW, my kid was exactly like this and he goes to private with small class sizes and that environment does suit him well, and the fact that they keep the learning kind of "hidden" within hands-on learning projects (so they do a lot of store activities to learn about money values rather than just worksheets about coins or whatever) in the early years also suits him well. So if you can find small class sizes, go for it. I don't think you need to homeschool....

OP here. I agree that this is pretty typical for a kindergartener. However, for my child, these behaviors are more extreme. I know this to be the case because my child's kindergarten teacher, who is very experienced, has told me that he is off the charts in terms of being independent minded, stubborn, and hyper focused. She also thinks that he could be gifted.

Other kids pay attention when the teacher gives them one on one attention. My child keeps doing what he is doing. Other children are excited to show the teacher that they can learn what the teacher wants to teach. My child has his own agenda for what he wants to learn. Other children follow the norms of the classroom (put away your things, etc) while my child doesnt' want to stop doing what he is doing to put away his things. Other children finish with one activity after 20 minutes. My child wants to work for three hours straight on one activity (of his choosing).

Yes, I know he sounds like a brat. I do think he is a bit of a brat. But he was born that way!

And DH is the same way. I am a 'people pleaseer' on the other hand. Example: At a recent parenting workshop, the trainers started off with a fun quiz with silly buzzer buttons to pique people's interest in the topics they were planning to discuss. Since it was a quiz, I grabbed a buzzer and started answering the questions (excited to show what I know). DH said "why are we doing a quiz?" and did not engage.