Anonymous wrote:
DP. Other posters have said that "differentiation" doesn't work, that advanced math and advanced language arts aren't.

Not Eastern European, but Northern European. Not sending my kid to aap. American way of schooling is crap anyway. She gets her challenges after school. The fact that there is no language in primary school means any advanced programming or “gifted” program is a joke. If you aren’t bilingual you are starting three steps behind most of the world.

Did I speak slow enough for you monolinguals?

Anonymous wrote:The minuscule number of 140 IQs can get mad and leave for private. Keep the others together and differentiate.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
That ^. My kids' base school is very diverse, both racially and by SES. About 20% qualify for AAP, and they're almost entirely white or Asian high SES kids. In many cases, they're kids from incredibly enriched households with parents who decided that they belonged in AAP from the time they were born. They are then are prepped into getting a 120s cogat, and somehow get in. How is this not elitist and an example of "white flight"?

This is why the program expands each year. Fairfax is trying to capture more disadvantaged gifted kids. They haven't been noticeably successful. Do you have recommendations for Fairfax?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
AAP and GT centers are disproportionately filled with kids who come from higher ranked schools in rich neighborhoods. Until each neighborhood school sends the same number of kids to the center instead of 40 kids from each great falls school per grade and one kid from herndon per grade, these centers will stay elitist and not full of the kids who could actually benefit from gifted education.

That ^. My kids' base school is very diverse, both racially and by SES. About 20% qualify for AAP, and they're almost entirely white or Asian high SES kids. In many cases, they're kids from incredibly enriched households with parents who decided that they belonged in AAP from the time they were born. They are then are prepped into getting a 120s cogat, and somehow get in. How is this not elitist and an example of "white flight"?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Wrong!

Just because some kids need an additional level of differentiation, does not mean that the ones already getting it don't need it! Instead of hating AAP we can work to improve it. I'm all for an additional layer of differentiation, where the highly gifted kids can benefit fully, or at least a lot more. But, to take differentiation away from kids that need it is not right. You have to draw the line at some point, and if the process is holistic then why are we relying so much on these test scores and ignoring the rest of the process? The system is not full proof, and can be improved, but there is no magic biller when it comes to this.

You really like creating straw men. NO ONE HAS BEEN ARGUING FOR TAKING DIFFERENTIATION AWAY FROM KIDS. 120s Larla should still be receiving advanced math and advanced language arts instruction. Many of us are arguing that she doesn't need to be labeled as different and then guaranteed self-contained separate classrooms for 6 years.

Anonymous wrote:
AAP and GT centers are disproportionately filled with kids who come from higher ranked schools in rich neighborhoods. Until each neighborhood school sends the same number of kids to the center instead of 40 kids from each great falls school per grade and one kid from herndon per grade, these centers will stay elitist and not full of the kids who could actually benefit from gifted education.

Anonymous wrote:Wrong!

Just because some kids need an additional level of differentiation, does not mean that the ones already getting it don't need it! Instead of hating AAP we can work to improve it. I'm all for an additional layer of differentiation, where the highly gifted kids can benefit fully, or at least a lot more. But, to take differentiation away from kids that need it is not right. You have to draw the line at some point, and if the process is holistic then why are we relying so much on these test scores and ignoring the rest of the process? The system is not full proof, and can be improved, but there is no magic biller when it comes to this.

Anonymous wrote:140 what?

140iq? 140 per in test section? 140nnat? 140cogat? 140cogat component?

any of the above? All of the above?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
well, that's lucky for your younger child, but it is not always the case. I know of profoundly gifted children who struggled with frustration because they were not understood, and did not have enough skills to explain themselves, due to their young age. I know also of other gifted children who were too preoccupied with following the rules and the status quo, so they did nothing advanced in front of others. There are kids who demonstrate their giftedness in so many ways, it's hard to tell just by looking at them. That's why there are so many screening tools combined to determine who needs these services.

there are also certain kinds of kids that like certain games and activities that you will label as 'hot housing', but it is not like that, because the kids love them. my younger one loves brain puzzles so much, everytime DC discovers a new one we have to have it, so now we have soooo many of them. You can interpret that any way you like, but who cares. IF those brain puzzles are what's responsible for DC's advancement vs. natural ability, who cares, DC is still advanced at this point, and needs those services in order to keep engaged.

1. Just how many profoundly gifted kids do you know? Profoundly gifted kids have an IQ of 180 plus and are at a rarity of 1:1,000,000 http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/underserved.htm Or are you just bastardizing the term "profoundly gifted" and applying it to the 99.9th percentile (which is "highly gifted")?

2. You seem to have the viewpoint that if the AAP panel finds a child eligible, then that child must be gifted. That's a lot of faith to place in people who've never met or interacted with the child and are basing their assessment on 5 minutes of glancing through the file. In FCPS, a lot of kids are found eligible with 120s test scores and good but not amazing levels of achievement. They really have no metric at all showing giftedness. One of my kids (in AAP) fits this profile. She's bright and hardworking, but not gifted. The only reason she "needs AAP" is that all of the other bright, hardworking, non-gifted kids are in it.

3. Insisting that 20% of the student population "needs" to be segregated from the rest to have their social and educational needs met smacks of exactly the type of elitism that this thread is about.

1. I know a few, and they are very different from me in their learning abilities. Some that are still kids, and some that have turned into adults. And even if they are not 'profoundly gifted' but 'exceptionally gifted' by your definition, they still need at least some differentiation.

2. I do not have the viewpoint that the AAP committee is always right, but its the best we got. When you can come up with a better approach, and still meet the needs of advanced students, then I'm sure people will hear.

3. The top 20% are very different from the bottom 20%, and keeping them together is not doing anyone any favors. If you follow the Eastern European style, everyone got the gifted education, at a gifted pace, but not all would succeed. Only a handful of students could keep up in all classes, and have straight As, most of the students will have B average, then you'd have the bottom 20% who had no idea what was going on, because the teacher would not slow down for the kids that didn't get it, but would go at the pace of the kids that got it. Now in the US you have a system that separates kids, so they can cater to everyone. I'd be fine if my kid had to go through the most rigorous curriculum, and have a chance at everything. But I am not fine with my kids' education being watered down so the ones that are not selected for the AAP program can feel better, because they are not being labeled as smart. Who cares! People need to toughen up and see the truth for what it is. It is always good to know the truth sooner rather than later. And if Larla got in and Carla didn't then Carla can learn to work harder to give herself the same outcome. That's life.

(Eastern European Curriculum:

Algebra by 5th grade,
Geometry by 6th grade,
Physics 6-12, trig and calc based,
Chemistry 8-12th grade(including organic chemistry),
Biology 5-12 all the way to genetics and anatomy,
Trig, Precalculus, Calculus 1 and 2,
Probability Theory,
Knowledge of Machines,
Electronics,
Intro to Computer Science,
History,
Technical Design,
Intro to Micro and Macro Econ,
Intro to Sociology,
Intro to Philosophy,
Foreign Language,
National and World Lit,
and the list goes on)

Anonymous wrote:I was a FFX GT kid back when it was GT and even then it was mostly bullshit. They put centers in poorer schools with low test scores to bring the average test scores up, which means you’re busing in a bunch of rich kids with tutors and parents who do their science fairs projects for them into schools where kids are more likely to be receiving free lunch and not have as much academic support at home. In those rare occasions where the two groups interact—-recess, band/orchestra, there were serious class-and-race-based incidents. Rich parents take over the PTA and push for pricy field trips that only the rich kids can afford, they allocate funds for the GT classes to have special experiences and assemblies that lead to more resentment between the two groups, and the rich GT students treat even the poor GT kids like crap (“Wait, you live in an apartment? I thought only poor people did that?”).

AAP and GT centers are disproportionately filled with kids who come from higher ranked schools in rich neighborhoods. Until each neighborhood school sends the same number of kids to the center instead of 40 kids from each great falls school per grade and one kid from herndon per grade, these centers will stay elitist and not full of the kids who could actually benefit from gifted education.