What About the Boy?

You don't raise heroes, you raise sons. And if you treat them like sons, they'll turn out to be heroes, even if it's just in your own eyes.

~Walter M. Schirra, Sr.

Through my writings here at The Autism Experience, and over at The GFCF Experience, you have gotten to know members of my family fairly well. You know Helena, of course, through our experiences with autism. You know Olivia through her imaginative artwork. And you know Julia through the antics of a (now) 3-year old.

But what about the boy? I seem to write very little about Nicholas, my 8-year old son. But I want to make up for lost time here, because he is very special, and he deserves a moment in the sun.

Plus, he illustrates a glaring need in our public school system.

All of my children are special, but Nicholas is truly gifted. At four years old he was already reading. By the end of Kindergarten he was working on multiplication and division. By the end of first grade he was into chapter books and had pretty much devoured all the Magic Tree House books he could find.

The problem was, the school could not, or would not, keep up with him. He loved going to school (he still does) but he wasn't really learning anything he didn't already know. The school acknowledged that he was gifted, and as he entered second grade, he was given a teacher whom we were told would be progressive and allow Nicholas to work to his ability.

What we got was a disaster. Nicholas would come home, and all we would hear is how he beat his teacher playing Hangman. He was still getting spelling lists with simple words instead of the more advanced words that we were promised. Same thing with math. We I talked to the teacher at conferences, he would throw up his hands and say that the Superintendent is mandating common a curriculum in all classrooms, and that there wasn't a lot of wiggle room in that!

The IDEA guarantees Helena and all children the right to a free and appropriate public education, although those of us who have been through the IEP process year after year know how difficult it can be to achieve that. Still, IDEA is a Federal Law designed to protect the education rights of special needs children.

The No Child Left Behind Act (sic!) focuses mainly on bringing disadvantaged students, and those is "low-scoring" schools, up to academic proficiency. This often means more focus is given to test score performance and bringing the "underachieving" students up to academic standards.

But what about the gifted students? What about the boy?

Fortunately, in third grade, as Nicholas transitioned from Elementary school (K-2) to Intermediate School (3-5) things seem to be improving. For the first time this year, they offered a gifted program to children in third grade, and Nicholas was one of five children selected to participate. They really do not have a structured program for the third graders (since this is the first year), but the gifted program director is enthusiastic and great to work with. Nicholas also has a wonderful regular teacher who has many of the higher functioning third graders in her classroom, and there is a lot more flexibility in the curriculum. I can only hope this is a sign of how things will be in the future.

What is really scary is that had we remained in Georgia instead of moving to Montana, Nicholas would only be in second grade right now, since he would have significantly missed the cutoff date for being in third grade, since they start school there at the end of July as opposed to September here (he missed the cutoff date here by 10 days, but they allowed him to test into Kindergarten when he was 4).

At home, Nicholas is a typical 8-year old in a lot of ways, notably in how he always gets into disagreements (to put it mildly) with Olivia. He loves sports, especially baseball and soccer. He is really into computers right now, and is actually designing his own virtual worlds! His love of computers has really had a great influence on Helena. Helena likes to go on to the computer and play, but usually it's the same old games. Nicholas has introduced her to a lot of new and fun things to do, and he willingly stays by and teaches her and encourages her (at least until Helena shoos him away so she can do it herself!). He is also great with Julia. He loves to play with her! He continues to be a voracious reader - we will check 10 juvenile books out of the library and he devours them in a day or two. His favorite author - Matt Christopher, whose books I enjoyed when I was a kid!

I know it is really hard on him to have 3 sisters and no brother, but he handles it well.

What about the boy? The boy, he is my son, and I am honored to be his Father.