The following article has been excerpted from Encouraging Your Child’s Math Talent. Parents of kids who show precocious advanced math ability will love Encouraging Your Child's Math Talent, a comprehensive, helpful guide to supporting a child's mathematical talent.

When your child seems to be advanced in a particular subject area, it is sometimes hard to know if he is demonstrating average progress and ability, or if he is advanced. Many parents are confused about the difference, because schools frequently introduce mathematical topics in earlier grades than parents expect. Additionally, it is sometimes difficult for parents to know just how much their child is ahead of his classmates.

The following sections will help you to understand how students become recognized by their school as being advanced or gifted in mathematics. Although the focus of this book is mathematically advanced students, it is sometimes very difficult to distinguish between a child who is mathematically advanced and a child who is gifted or talented. The level of mathematical talent or ability that your child has becomes important when you are trying to determine the amount of acceleration or enrichment that she might need. Correctly determining your child’s level of ability and potential in mathematics is important and deserves attention. Failing to provide educational experiences that match your child’s ability can effectively stunt her academic growth. Forcing your child into classes and experiences that are too advanced for him can provide a negative reaction in your child and cause him to rebel.

The label gifted is a legal term that in many states allows a child to receive special services in the school system in order to meet his or her educational needs. The services that are reserved for children who are identified as gifted vary throughout the country, and you may find that your child will need to qualify in order to receive those services. However, in many schools, children who have advanced abilities but are not labeled as gifted can receive the benefits of the programs developed for gifted children.

A number of recognized tools are accepted throughout the educational community for use in assessing a student’s mathematical ability. Unfortunately, you will usually need to go through the educational system or hire a professional psychologist who is experienced in administering and interpreting achievement and ability tests. A comprehensive educational assessment of your child’s ability and achievement level will include a variety of tests, observations, and input from a variety of sources. Some of the input will be derived from precise educational testing, while the rest will come from observing your child and his educational progress.

This chapter will consider the following topics:

• Impact of mathematical advancement on the family
• Common vocabulary regarding the mathematically talented, advanced, or gifted
• Characteristics of a mathematically advanced child
• Assessment of achievement and ability
  • Achievement and above-level testing
  • Talent searches
  • Additional assessments
• Issues affecting mathematically talented children
  • A child’s interest in mathematics
  • Playing with mathematical ideas
  • Unusual problem-solving strategies
  • Girls and math

Parents are not always happy to discover that their child is advanced in a subject area. But, who would not want their child to be able to attain skills easily and demonstrate mastery of valuable material at an early age? In some cases, parents recognize that it may be difficult to provide an appropriate program of study for a child who is mathematically talented. Suddenly, there develops a perceived burden of extra responsibility because you might feel that you must find ways to nurture this wonderful gift.

Instead of thinking ahead toward saving money for college, you may fear that a private elementary or secondary school will now be a necessary expense. You may believe that your school system will not provide an appropriate education for your child, and that perhaps you will need to homeschool your child. You may worry that your child will grow up to be weird and not fit in socially. Or, you may be concerned that your own math ability is weak, and therefore you will not be able to keep up with your child. You may feel threatened by the ability demonstrated by your child, and wish to deflect his interest into less academic ventures. These concerns are understandable, because many parents don’t know other children or adults who are gifted and may have heard some of the unfounded myths that circulate about gifted individuals. Fortunately, you will find that most of these concerns are unfounded. Table 1 presents some common misconceptions about math and may help relieve your concerns.

View Detail

Perhaps not surprisingly, children who are academically talented may have some misgivings of their own. In an effort to fit in, your child may camouflage his ability and even neglect his schoolwork so that his grades will not stand out. Girls often feel the need to “act dumb,” particularly in the areas of math and science. Middle school brings challenges in the social arena when peer pressure may dictate that children attempt to shine athletically rather than academically. You and your child’s school need to work together closely to support and encourage academic excellence and strong educational experiences.

In fact, it may be difficult for you to provide the best educational experience for your child. The primary reason for this is that you, with the help of the school and other experts, must first determine what the optimum educational experience might look like based upon your child’s ability. Then you will need to work together with schools, and perhaps outside experts, to create that experience. There may be times when the school, for whatever reason, will not provide adequately for your child and you will feel the need to supplement your child’s education with enrichment experiences, tutoring, mentors, summer camps, and so on.

In order to understand some of the terms educators use in describing children, think about your own classmates from your school years. Some students were below average, the largest group fell into the average range, and some were above average. Within the group of students who were above average in their ability were some students who would be called advanced and a few others who had even higher abilities and were termed gifted. In this book, we want to help parents of children who are above average in mathematical ability, so we refer to those children as being mathematically advanced. Because a child may be mathematically advanced and also gifted, we have included a bit of information to help you decide if your child may also be gifted.

Although the term gifted is used in legislation and in a great deal of educational literature, it is viewed unfavorably by some. Many people are comfortable describing a gifted athlete, but are not happy with saying that someone is gifted in mathematics. School programs for gifted children are often known by an acronym, and children sometimes try not to let everyone know that they belong to the program because they fear that they don’t want to brag about their ability. While fear of ridicule is not a problem for children who participate in a special choir or sports team, it may be an issue for a child who participates in a gifted academic program.

You may have heard the notion that all children are gifted. While this is a lovely sentiment, it must be acknowledged that not all children learn at the same pace, nor are all children prepared to study subjects in depth before the subject matter is normally introduced in a school’s curriculum. Parents and educators must take a pragmatic view and recognize a child’s ability, and make provisions in her education to ensure her educational needs are being met. Every child deserves to learn every day. It is not fair or equitable to ask a child to wait patiently for his classmates to catch up while he marks time in boredom or is asked to tutor his peers.

Whether your child is mathematically advanced or mathematically advanced and also gifted should be determined by a comprehensive educational assessment, which we will discuss later in this chapter. However, you should be aware that whatever the level of talent your child has, avoiding the use of descriptive terms or minimizing the child’s talent is not the way to support your child’s mathematical ability. It is important for you to recognize your child’s strengths and help nurture them. You may sometimes need to act as your child’s advocate and you should not feel the need to apologize or make excuses for the modifications to the educational program that may be necessary for your child to be able to make progress each school day.

Interestingly, your child may be academically advanced in many subjects or just in mathematics. A child who is mathematically advanced may or may not be a superb reader. It is even possible for a child to be advanced in mathematics and not be very interested in learning mathematical content. A child who has high ability in several areas may find that her interest alternates between the areas. This may be due to the influence of an excellent teacher, the particular content being presented, or it may simply be a function of maturation.

It may be very easy for you to recognize that your child is mathematically advanced because you may have seen, through his interactions with his agemates, that he is so obviously beyond his agemates in mathematical interest and achievement. Or, you may be able to use other factors to pinpoint your child’s math talent. For example, the first-grade child who is interested in converting decimals to fractions is clearly working beyond his age and grade expectations. You may find that your child remembers numbers easily and loves to play games related to numbers. It can be very exciting to watch a child who is talented in mathematics learn things so easily that it seems to be effortless. Table 2 provides a list of some of the characteristics of mathematically advanced children.

View Detail

Sometimes, however, your child may report that math is boring and that he is not interested in doing his math schoolwork. This is not necessarily an indication that math is not an area of strength, rather it may be a signal that the math program at school is moving too slowly or your child has already mastered the material being presented. In fact, some children who are talented in math don’t achieve good grades in the subject because they solve problems in unusual ways and sometimes cannot (or don’t wish to) explain their method of problem solving to the teacher.

Usually, the mathematically advanced child falls somewhere in between these extremes. You may be surprised at the interest your child shows in math games, riddles, and activities. She may be able to make interesting comparisons between numbers or have a strong interest in geometry or measurement. She may get good grades in math and enjoy doing extra challenge problems provided by the teacher. Perhaps she just seems to be able to know the answer without having to work out the problem.

Many parents believe that if their child can do math problems quickly that means that he is mathematically advanced. This is not necessarily the case, because many children can very rapidly perform mathematical computations. However, there is far more to mathematical understanding than getting the answer first. A child with advanced math ability will be able to apply mathematics in appropriate and novel situations, recognize integrated concepts among mathematical topics, be able to explain mathematical principles, and so on.

You may wonder why it is important to identify and label a child as mathematically advanced or gifted in mathematics. The simplest reason is that the identification and label provide a foundation through which to communicate with teachers, school administrators, and others regarding appropriate educational programs and opportunities. In addition, special programs in schools are often closed to children who are not identified as gifted.

If you or your child’s teacher thinks that your child may be academically advanced, a comprehensive educational assessment, including both formal and informal assessments, should be developed and utilized to assist with the identification of your child’s ability and to make appropriate educational plans. A great deal of information must be gathered, as the report should include information from parents, teachers, a school psychologist, and school records, as well as any evaluations that have been done outside of the school. The assessment should include:

• present levels of achievement,
• results of psychological testing (IQ and other tests),
• the rate of acquisition of new material (how fast does he learn new concepts?),
• the rate of retention of the content that has already been mastered (how well can he remember new things he has just learned?),
• an indication of particular strengths and weaknesses,
• recommendations for acceleration and enrichment, and
• modifications that are recommended for the regular education program.

While thorough assessment and subsequent academic planning sounds like a complicated endeavor, a careful assessment is essential for several reasons. From the school’s perspective, it is important that children whose ability necessitates modification of the regular curriculum be identified and served. Because of the additional costs that may be involved, many schools are careful not to identify as mathematically gifted those children who are highly achieving but whose needs can be met in the regular program of study. On the other hand, you must be careful to ensure that your child’s ability is accurately assessed so that his academic needs will be met.

In many schools, only those children who are labeled as advanced in mathematics will have access to acceleration and enrichment options and individually designed study programs. However, there also may be a few disadvantages that may accompany the label. In some schools, there may be a social stigma connected with being labeled as gifted or talented in mathematics. In addition, some teachers may feel intimidated and actually be unable to provide adequately for these children in their classes. Teachers may hold unreasonable expectations for children who are academically advanced and may even attempt to turn them into teacher’s assistants by requiring them to tutor their peers.

If your child is already in school, you will probably find that her school will begin its identification efforts with a look at her achievement. Grades in mathematics and science are one measure of achievement, yet it is certainly possible for a mathematically talented child to have average grades in math and/or science. As previously noted, there may be several reasons for this, ranging from low-level content, slow pace of instruction, social factors causing your child to want to hide his ability, your child’s neglect of homework assignments, poor teaching techniques, or simply lack of interest in the subject.

Teachers’ recommendations and anecdotal records provide further information regarding a child’s ability. One problem with this is that elementary school teachers generally receive little or no training in the identification of advanced children or the specialized techniques they should use when teaching them. Certainly the opinions of more highly trained faculty and administrators in respect to mathematically talented students should be sought and should carry more weight. However, research demonstrates that in general, teachers do not accurately identify the advanced children in their classes. Some studies have shown that teachers tend to identify as gifted those children who have learning styles similar to their own. In addition, teachers often believe that the children who answer questions in class are the brightest students.

It is not always easy to convince a school to test a child to determine his educational needs. While some schools do an excellent job at this assessment and subsequent curricular modification, other schools will balk at both the expense of testing and the expense of necessary resources for mathematically advanced children. Nevertheless, parents can argue that their child deserves testing, particularly if an adequate amount of evidence makes a case for mathematical giftedness, and schools should provide reasonable testing.

Standardized achievement tests, such as the Iowa Test of Basic Skills, the California Achievement Test, and the Stanford Achievement Test are usually administered to groups of children on a yearly basis by schools in order to measure students’ progress. Standardized tests are organized by subject area and divided by grade level. A third-grade child, for example, would typically be given a test near the end of the academic year that includes content that a third grader would be expected to know. One difficulty with this is that sometimes the content of the achievement test does not match the school’s curriculum very well, and therefore contains material that the children have not encountered. Alternatively, the test may not include much of what the children actually were taught in the classroom. If there is a significant mismatch between the curriculum of the school and the content being assessed by the achievement test, the results are likely to be less than accurate.

In addition to group achievement tests, individual achievement tests may be administered to students. Examples of individual achievement tests are the Weschler Individual Achievement Test, Kaufman Test of Educational Achievement, and the Woodcock-Johnson achievement tests. Individual achievement tests are usually more accurate than group tests, as the examiner is able to directly observe the child’s behavior and control the testing situation.

The results of standardized achievement tests may be used as one indication of a child’s achievement in mathematics. Unfortunately, teachers are seldom trained to interpret and use the results of standardized tests, so the test results are often sent home to parents, filed at school, and forgotten. The score reports may be confusing to parents, who may misunderstand the significance of the results. For example, many standardized tests report a grade level equivalent. A third-grade child who performs well in math may earn a grade equivalent of fifth grade. This does not mean that she should be placed in that grade level, but rather that she has scored the way an average fifth grader would on that particular test.

Standardized achievement tests have additional limitations. For example, a child who is in fifth grade is usually given a test for fifth graders, yet talented children often answer all or most of the questions correctly on testing instruments that are designed for children in their particular grade level. When this happens, it is clear that he has high achievement in that subject or subjects, but because he has hit the top of the test (known as the ceiling) by answering all or most of the questions correctly, educators are unable to determine how much more he can do unless he takes an additional test that contains more advanced and difficult items.

High achievement in a particular subject area on a grade-level achievement test is not necessarily an indication of high ability in that area, but simply means that the child has mastered (at a high level) the specific content expected of a child at her grade level. If your child has scored at the 95th percentile or above on one or more subtests of a grade-level standardized test, it is necessary to administer another test of greater difficulty in order to determine if she is able to correctly answer more difficult questions than were included on the grade-level test. This is known as above-level testing. For example, if two children each score in the 95th percentile in the mathematics subtest of a standardized test, that would indicate that both children have high achievement in mathematics compared to other children in their grade level. It would not be possible from this result to determine if both children have similar ability in mathematics, however. Perhaps one of the children would have been able to answer many more complex and advanced questions that were not included on the grade-level test. In this situation, above-level testing will be needed.

Above-level testing is simply the administration of an achievement test that was designed for older children. Through the use of above-level testing, it is possible to determine more clearly the extent of mathematical ability as it is being expressed at the time of testing. This is important, because the recommended educational program for a child who is moderately gifted in mathematics should be very different from the recommended program for a child who is extremely gifted in math. The school may administer an above-level achievement test, but it is often necessary for parents to look outside the school for this type of testing. Talent searches generally offer above-level testing for a reasonable fee.

Dr. Julian Stanley began the first talent search at Johns Hopkins University in 1971 when he founded the Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth (SMPY). Today, there are regional talent searches located throughout the United States, providing many services for academically advanced students (see Table 3.) Located at various colleges and universities, talent searches offer much more than just above-level testing. Services include the interpretation of testing results, national recognition, scholarships to college classes, enrichment programs and summer classes, counseling, and general information regarding acceleration and enrichment options. Chapter 4 of this book contains a listing of the university-based talent searches and contact information for each.

View Detail

Most parents initially contact a talent search so that their child may participate in above-level testing. For elementary school aged children, many talent searches offer the EXPLORE test. The EXPLORE was developed for eighth graders, and thus provides enough high difficulty questions so that it is possible to more closely determine an elementary student’s ability in a subject area. Curricular areas tested on the EXPLORE include English, mathematics, reading, and science reasoning skills.

You should carefully consider whether your child is mature enough to take an above-level test. Some bright children are quite used to knowing all the answers on tests, and can become very upset when they are presented with a test of significantly higher difficulty. Instead of feeling happy about all of the questions he was able to answer, your child may concentrate on his inability to answer all of the questions. Some children may feel pressured to do well and instead do poorly because of testing anxiety. Research indicates that while third graders should participate in above-level testing only if they are clearly very advanced, fourth-, fifth-, and sixth-grade children usually benefit from the experience. Before your child takes an above-level test, you should carefully explain to him the reasons for the testing and include the expectation that there may be many questions on the test that will be hard for him to answer.

Many talented seventh graders take the SAT through regional talent searches. The SAT was designed for high school juniors and seniors and is used by many colleges and universities in their admissions process, because it has a high correlation with grades earned while in college. Students who score well on the SAT in seventh grade are offered participation in many acceleration and enrichment opportunities, including free college courses, scholarships, and summer schools for academically talented children.

Schools usually provide a school psychologist who can administer psychological testing to help determine your child’s general ability level. Commonly called an IQ test, this test is designed to measure a child’s ability in verbal and performance levels. Most schools require that a child earn a predetermined minimum score on an IQ test in order to be considered for inclusion in a gifted program or to receive modification of the regular curriculum. However, most states require the use of multiple criteria so that a child cannot be denied entrance into a gifted program simply because he has not attained the minimum score a school determines as constituting giftedness on an IQ test.

In addition to administering an IQ test, the school psychologist should attempt to determine your child’s rate of acquisition of new material and the rate of retention of material that has been mastered. In some cases this information is gained through testing by the school psychologist, and in other situations, the psychologist interviews your child’s teachers. A classroom observation is often included as part of the comprehensive assessment, and the psychologist usually will report on things such as your child’s demeanor during class time, participation (or lack of it), and your child’s general level of engagement with his learning environment.

Your observations as a parent are a very important part of the information that needs to be gathered, so you should be interviewed and your information should be included in the report. You know your child better than anyone and have spent a considerable amount of time in one-on-one situations with him in a wide variety of settings. You should try to list specific things you have noticed about your child’s mathematics ability. It is also helpful to save papers and projects that he has completed.

In education, we are interested in learning, thinking, and using ideas; educators and psychologists call this the cognitive realm. In addition, there are other factors that affect learning, such as feelings, interest, motivation, fear, competition, and many other factors that are more emotional than cognitive. These other factors belong to the affective realm, and it is clear that children learn best when they are both interested in the subject matter and emotionally comfortable with the work. In fact, a student’s academic performance can be stunted by her own emotional makeup or by psychological, sociological, and emotional environmental factors.

Many affective issues impact learning. Because of this, we can also use some observable affective issues as a part of an informal assessment regarding mathematical talent. In the following sections, we will consider affective issues such as interest, enthusiasm, and problem solving, and how each of these may help you and your child’s teacher in providing a fuller understanding your child’s mathematically ability.

Mathematical ability is distinct from interest. A student does not need to be overly interested in a topic to be considered advanced in that area. As previously mentioned, many children and adults underachieve for a variety of reasons. They may have the talent and understanding to perform at advanced levels, but lack the interest to pursue continued study and investigation of the topic.

Occasionally, we find that a child may be quite talented in mathematics, but not really very interested in it. Children who are advanced in many different areas may show a definite preference for one subject or another. Additionally, what your child prefers one year may be at the bottom of his preference list the next year. Of course, enthusiasm and interest go far in motivating students toward learning success, and both are necessary if your child is expected to pursue his studies independently.

Therefore, you and your child’s teacher cannot evaluate how advanced your child may be in respect to mathematics based solely upon his level of interest, or lack of interest, in the subject. Unfortunately, a child’s lack of interest often negatively affects all other measures of mathematical ability. If a child is simply not interested in mathematics, he may not give his best efforts in completing daily work or tests.

The issue of interest has a serious impact on the mathematical experiences of your child. All too often, students encounter mathematics within their K–12 educational experiences that they find to be boring. While mathematicians and mathematics educators often see the innate beauty in mathematics and think that it is really interesting, students rarely share this feeling. Additionally, traditional K–12 mathematics topics may not be challenging enough to be interesting for many mathematically talented students. Even more discouraging is the fact that potentially interesting mathematics can be taught in ways that your child finds uninteresting.

Students rarely see the ways mathematics can directly affect their lives. Your child may not see how mathematics is interconnected with some of his other interests. So, although your child may find math to be very easy, he may not be interested in actually studying it.

On the other hand, you need to know that if your child is very interested in mathematics, this is not a definite indication that she is mathematically advanced. Occasionally an average or below average student has positive feelings about mathematics. He may like it as a topic, or she may harbor no fears toward it. In either case, liking and being interested in mathematics is not the same as being advanced in math.

We often see students who really enjoy playing with mathematical ideas, and of course, mathematical puzzles and games entertain people of all ages. Some of these people would say that the excitement of the challenge of the puzzle is more important than the mathematics, but it is clear that they are using and enjoying math all the same. Teachers have seen many students who enjoy the challenge of solving math problems. These students take pleasure in being able to solve an equation because they see each problem as a new challenge to overcome. In essence, they compete against themselves.

You may be surprised to learn that success with many video games requires mathematical planning and the challenge of creatively balancing a number of variables. Without even realizing it, your child must perform amazingly sophisticated mathematical calculations while playing video games. Some students who claim to dislike mathematics find pleasure in computer programming, a skill that also requires mathematical understanding. Interestingly, the degree to which a person is willing to use mathematics is more often a factor of how well mathematics is camouflaged within the experience.

Nevertheless, students who involve themselves with mathematical recreations do not necessarily do so because they are mathematically talented. However, students who naturally find mathematics an easy subject to learn may be more apt to use it as a recreational medium. As with interest, enjoyment in mathematics cannot be seen as the single and most important indicator for mathematical ability, but as one piece of a very intricate puzzle.

Mathematics teachers occasionally come across the rare student who demonstrates truly unusual problem-solving techniques. These techniques are often so unusual that they can even take the teacher by surprise. Your child’s teacher may report that he or she is impressed with the creative ways in which your child views a problem and finds the solution. However, this ability is often not demonstrated on the typical tests used to evaluate mathematical talent, because the design of the test forces its taker to process questions and answers in specific and predictable ways.

While the entire educational system is built upon the foundation of academic testing, this alone cannot be the sole indicator for mathematical giftedness. Nor can interest, amusement, or unconventional problem-solving strategies alone be used to determine mathematical talent. The mathematical advancement of a child can only be determined through multiple assessment strategies that paint a complete picture of the child. You will need to work closely with your local school district to create a well-rounded assessment of your child’s mathematical ability.

It is important for parents to realize that nearly every recommendation provided in this book is appropriate for both genders. The recommendations provided here for girls assume that girls often socialize differently from boys and that our culture is not as supportive of girls in mathematical pursuits and professions at it is of boys. Thus, in this small section, we provide to parents some additional recommendations to help support the mathematical pursuits of girls.

Unfortunately, our society does a great disservice to girls who are talented in math. Although the research shows that females can be equally talented in math as males, our culture still gives girls an early message that says that they should not really be good in math and that it is best for them to pretend that they are not interested in it. Consequently, girls often do not receive the encouragement to pursue mathematics, and they seem to be exposed to far less math than boys. The outcome of this cultural bias is that if you have a daughter who is talented in math, she may find that she is the only girl in the group who chooses to pursue mathematical studies. This situation will require you to be especially supportive of your daughter so that she gets the message from you that girls can and should like math.

Some researchers have demonstrated that girls develop socially more quickly than do boys. Relationships and social interaction are more highly valued among girls than boys. Therefore, girls will be more apt to continue studies in mathematics when activities and experiences around the mathematics involve social interaction. The relationships that girls form with other girls and with female tutors, mentors, and professionals will significantly affect the degree to which they continue to be involved with mathematics. In short, the academic discipline, whether mathematics or some other field, can be valued as a conduit through which relationships with likeminded girls can be developed. Nevertheless, although the relationships they build may seem more important to girls than the actual mathematics they are studying, the outcome remains that these girls can progress much further in math through strong, supportive relationships, rather than in isolation.

Girls should be introduced to adult female role models. Introducing your daughter to female mathematicians and women in careers with a heavy emphasis in math can be helpful. In addition, you may want to provide biographies of famous women who have excelled in math. Girls need to see that entering the field of mathematics is acceptable and that many women are successful in mathematically oriented professions. Socially constructed biases against women in mathematical and scientific fields should be discussed and falsified.

In addition to introducing girls to women in the sciences, girls must be introduced to a far broader range of possible occupations that heavily utilize mathematics. With a broader understanding of the vast possibilities before them, girls will be more likely to select a career in mathematics.

Parents and teachers should encourage girls and boys into similar experiences in their pursuits of mathematics. These activities may include Advanced Placement and honors classes, mathematical competitions, tutoring, mentoring, summer camps, and countless other experiences listed elsewhere in this book. However, in doing so, parents must be continually aware that girls interact very differently within mixed gendered groups than within groups of girls alone. Parents will want to know how competition with boys affects their daughters. Some girls hold back when competing with boys and hide the full extent of their talents and understanding. Unfortunately, this often leads to them not experiencing learning as fully as those who unabashedly pursue their studies and are not intimidated with competition.

Parents must continually understand the makeup of their child and must select mathematical experiences commensurate with the child’s personality, interests, and goals. Although additional social dimensions must be considered for girls, the basic principles remain.

• A comprehensive assessment of the child’s mathematical ability and achievement is necessary before beginning to plan an educational program.
• Achievement tests, ability tests, informal assessments, above-level testing, parent and teacher observations, and interest inventories all may be used in an assessment.
• Talent searches administer above-level tests for children who hit the ceiling on grade-level achievement tests.
• Although students may be advanced in math, they may not really be interested in it.
• Interest in math, enjoyment of mathematical puzzles and games, and unusual problem-solving techniques are indicators of mathematical ability, but are only part of a comprehensive assessment.
• Girls may be equally talented in mathematics as boys, but often are discouraged from advanced study of math.

• What tests are you using to evaluate whether my child is advanced?
• How many times is a student tested?
• Do you use external evaluators, or are all evaluations performed in-house?
• Does the school/district use informal assessments in addition to formal assessments?

• How does my child’s performance in math compare with his classmates?
• Do you think my child needs more challenge in his daily math lessons?
• Does my child seem to finish his work early?
• Can you please initiate testing of my child?
• Does the school offer above-level testing in math?
• Have you received training in teaching children who are mathematically advanced?
• Does my child seem to be interested in math?