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How to test for gifted children and also survive dinner time
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K12 Company Gifted Solutions
Parents may be wondering how to find out if their children are gifted. Here are some ideas to find testing:
1. Contact the State's Gifted Organization
The people in these organizations are very knowledgeable and may have information about qualified testers in their state.
2. Contact the School Administration Office of the Nearest Large City
If parents are lucky enough to live in or very close to a large city, school systems in large cities usually have a psychologist who does the testing for their gifted program. These psychologists have private practices and often specialize to some degree in gifted children.
Since Kansas City straddles two states, here are the gifted association links for each state:
Missouri: The Gifted Association of Missouri http://www.mogam.org
Kansas: The Kansas Association for Gifted, Talented and Creative http://www.kgtc.org
Parents can also tap into public schools that partner with the gifted program from the K12 company. http://www.k12.com/ They also offer testing.
“In many states, the inspired K¹² curriculum is available to families at no cost through virtual public schools and distance-learning programs. These are not tutoring programs — they're full-time, tuition-free, public schools using K¹²'s award-winning curriculum.
K¹² has partnered with these schools in the belief that all kinds of kids — from gifted children, to those needing a more flexible pace than what is possible in a traditional school — can achieve mastery of the key concepts and skills they need to succeed. It is this mastery that allows children to reach their personal potential.
Parents in these home-based public schools benefit from the leading research in education and cognitive science.”
Purposeful Dinnertimes:
Now that some ideas about gifted testing and curriculums have been given, let’s talk about dinnertime with gifted children.
With kids, dinner times can be crazy! Some rules to help dinnertime be a good family experience- with stimulating conversation and connection- are:
1. No eating in the living room. Kids should have to eat in the dining area for everything. This also helps keep the living room cleaner.
2. Turn off the TV. No TV should be allowed on during the meal. Another time to turn off the TV is for an hour of homework and reading time each evening.
3. Have dinner at a reasonable hour, not late in the evening, if possible, to avoid having to rush everyone to bed.
4. Find some simple, quick recipes that include a protein, complex carbohydrate, and vegetable, and that most of your family likes (you can never please everyone, so don't try).
5. Sometimes have breakfast for dinner - eggs, toast, something fast and easy.
6. Ask questions. A favorite is, "(Child's name), tell me something good that happened to you today." Ask this question of each person, in turn. Try to get them to focus on the positive each day.
7. Remember that you're the parent. Sometimes you just have to demand what you want, regardless of the grumbling. It always gets better with time.
8. Serve healthy drinks at dinner, juice, milk, ice water. This helps them stay focused and not hyper.
9. Have a regular snack time in the afternoon, say after school by 4:30 p.m., and no snacks after that. They need to want to eat a healthy dinner.
These simple rules help keep family dinner time less stressful and more connective for each family member, especially mom and dad!
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