Product Description

All children deserve an appropriate educational challenge but frustrating barriers and unexpected surprises often prevent this from happening. This is why parents need to speak up and effectively advocate for their children. In Infinity and Zebra Stripes, Wendy Skinner shares her family's story of struggle and eventual success in working with the school system to meet her children s needs. Enlightening anecdotes of the author s experience demonstrate strategies for minimizing parent-school conflict. Learn how to build trusting relationships with teachers and administrators, and how your voice can change your child's life.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1251677 in Books
• Published on: 2007-09-01
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 184 pages

Review
"A must-read for parents who may face the long and winding road of school advocacy for their gifted children. I take comfort in her story... as a kindred spirit who understands and who has been there." --Karen Isaacson, Parent, and author of Raisin' Brains: Surviving My Smart Family, and co-author of Intelligent Life in the Classroom: Smart Kids and their Teachers

"Skinner's family comes alive as she describes the social and emotional aspects of nurturing gifted children. She includes helpful details of how she worked effectively with her children's schools using 'honey instead of vinegar.'" --Wenda Sheard, J.D., Ph.D., Parent, and member of the Board of Directors of SENG, Supporting the Emotional Needs of Gifted

"This book offers sage words for beginning parents and seasoned insights for those more experienced, including teachers. Wendy Skinner s unvarnished chronicle of life with 2 gifted children strikes just the right balance. More importantly, this rewarding little book highlights the responsibility of parents to reach out for information, stay aware of the bigger picture, and not leave the development of gifted children to chance. " --Robin Schader, Ph.D., Parent, grandparent, and Parent Resource Specialist for the National Association for Gifted Children and Neag Center for Talent Development, University of Connecticut

"Every parent of a gifted child would do well to read this book. It helps to assuage the feelings of isolation that come with parenting a gifted child. If I had read this book, or had a Wendy to talk with, when I was raising my gifted son, life would have been much less turbulent.

"This book should be required reading for teachers and administrators faced with planning appropriate educational experiences for gifted children. It should also be required reading in teacher training classes.

"Infinity & Zebra Stripes lends parents the courage to speak up -- speak up for your gifted children so they won't get lost in the system." -- Lea Trimble, Gifted Association of Missouri, Editor, GAMbit

"If you haven't read (Infinity & Zebra Stripes) yet, you'll find it engaging and informative." -- Cindy Lovell Oliver, Florida Association for the Gifted

"Infinity & Zebra Stripes: Life with Gifted Children chronicles Wendy Skinner's advocacy work for her son and daughter. It is a first-person primer on the social and emotional aspects of giftedness in children, and the educational options that were needed to keep her children engaged learners. If you or someone you know is raising a highly gifted child, this book deserves a place on your bookshelf. Wendy Skinner has done a great service by writing about her life with two highly gifted children, and specifically about the struggle to find the proper educational fit in the public school system. Trained as an elementary teacher, Skinner's take on the educational system is not simply an emotional one, but full of useful tips and strategies that will help countless other parents as they advocate for their own children..." -- Jodi Summit, Parent of a highly gifted child, Member, Minnesota Council for the Gifted and Talented

"It details the struggles, the successes and failures of seeking but not always finding answers and solutions that would best serve their two children, both gifted but with sharply differing needs and interests. Wendy does not hold back in describing her efforts that at times frustrated teachers, principals, her husband and herself. I feel that this is one of the real strengths of this book. It is very real and indicates that despite setbacks and unexpected problems, persistence pays off and that answers are indeed available...A most useful and readable book. I highly recommend it." -- Robert V. Heckel, Ph.D., ABPP, Feedback, South Carolina Psychological Association

"The story was encouraging to parents of gifted children to further the exploration of appropriate educational experiences for their children. Parents should advocate for their children in their education endeavors and this author encouraged it without demonstrating defensiveness: an admirable quality." -- iParenting Media Awards' Reviewer

"This book describes the joys and challenges of raising gifted children. The author shares the good, the bad, the awesome and the difficult, and accurately depicts challenges that most parents of gifted children face at one time or another. As I read it, I was drawn back to the childhoods of my own three children (now adults), and wished that this book had been available at that time. Reading the book was like listening to an old friend who understood the unique experience of parenting gifted children." -- Jackie Drummer, President, Wisconsin Association for Talented and Gifted

"Wendy Skinner's account of raising her two highly gifted children, Ben and Jillian, in Infinity & Zebra Stripes: Life with Gifted Children will be familiar to those parents confronted with similar circumstances. Skinner's experiences working with teachers and school administrators are documented throughout this text as well as conversations with family and friends about her children's educational needs. A mother's emotions are clearly portrayed during pivotal revelations of her children's true abilities. When Skinner is told by a psychologist that only about 1 in 100,000 individuals have IQs as high as her son, she comes to realize that his struggle to find same-age peers of his intellect will be more difficult than she imagined...an inspirational read for parents and teachers alike." -- Kristen R. Stephens, Ph.D., Duke Gifted Letter

"Wendy Skinner's book is one that I have recommended to several parents I am working with! Her down-to-earth story of raising two highly-gifted, and differently-gifted children is one that many parents can relate to. Navigating through the school system can be a challenge for advanced learners and their families. Wendy and her husband Brian are great examples of how positive parent advocacy can produce constructive outcomes for gifted children across time. Finding the right 'fit' and coping with the ups and downs of guiding the development of a gifted child is hard work, but Wendy shows that it can be done." -- Paula J. Hillmann, Ph.D., Educational Psychologist and Executive Director Advanced Learning Resources, LTD, Milwaukee, WI

About the Author
Wendy Skinner lives a stone's throw from Minneapolis, Minnesota, with her husband, two gifted children, a dog, a gerbil, and a goldfish. She earned her B.A. in Elementary Education from the University of Northern Colorado. As the quintessential career substitute teacher, Wendy has taught nearly a decade in bilingual, Spanish immersion, special education, and regular classrooms in every grade and nearly every subject. She also teaches writing part-time in a nontraditional fifth/sixth-grade mixed classroom. When she is not teaching or advocating on behalf of gifted children and their families, she spends her time with her family, writing, and selling cut flowers at a farmers market during the summer.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Prologue

Our very bright young son was just seven years old. We had just recently moved him to a new school because he was bored and unhappy in his other school. Now he was happy and excited about learning again.

He always fell asleep late, seeming to need less sleep than the rest of us. One night early in March, his brain was going full strength until nearly midnight. He had just seen a "Bill Nye the Science Guy" television show featuring the topic of evolution. Math was his favorite subject, and he also had been thinking lately about the concepts of zero and infinity. That night, those concepts collided in his brain with fireworks.

Thump. Pad, pad, pad. His dad and I could hear his footsteps while we lay under the covers reading. I checked the clock. It was 11:28pm.

Knock, knock, knock. "Come in, Ben," my husband said. Ben opened our bedroom door and crawled up on our bed with a sheepish grin.

"Can I tell you something?" he asked. He scooted up close to us on his knees. "I know I'm supposed to be in bed, but this is going to keep me up until five in the morning!"

"Go ahead, Ben," I said with a sleepy smile. "If it will keep you up until five in the morning, it must be pretty fantastic. What is it?"

His voice reflected everything from profound awe to giddy celebration. He began with negative numbers and the number one.

"You know you can always get back to one no matter where you are. You could be at negative 10 and add 11 and you'd get one. You could be at negative 1,000,000 and add 1,000,001 and you'd get one. You can always get back to one." Here he paused. "Now, how about infinity? You can never, ever, ever, ever get to infinity. Even if you take infinity minus 10 and add 10 back in, you can't get back to infinity. You just can't because infinity is infinity!"

Ben's enthusiasm swelled. "But now look at nature. Two plus five equals seven. Two plus five will always be seven. But black and white zebra stripes won't always be black and white. In a billion years they'll be different because of infinite evolutionary adaptations," Ben whooped...

His excitement was palpable. He was definitely not sleepy. He had been thinking about this and just had to share it with us. We shared his excitement about infinity, zebra stripes, and all the rest. This was truly fun.

Eventually I escorted Ben back to bed, but not before he made sure that we understood every detail of his discoveries. When I returned to our bedroom, Brian and I just looked at each other with eyebrows raised and big smiles on our faces. I leaped back into bed laughing and pulled the covers back up. "This kid," I said between chuckles, "has got to have more challenge in mathematics than adding five plus five."

This was our son. We enjoyed his love of learning. For a few years, we struggled over finding the right school for him. His younger sister is also highly gifted and different from her age peers. Although the two children are very different, our experiences with Ben helped us know what to do for Jillian.

I think that all parents of gifted children will relate to the joys and struggles we went through. And I think that all teachers will be interested in reading about the school examples and how we worked--sometimes more successfully than other times--with teachers and administrators using a teamwork model, not a pushy parent model, to appropriately accommodate our children's educational needs in the classroom.

Customer Reviews

Infinity and Zebra Stripes

"Infinity & Zebra Stripes: Life with Gifted Children" by Wendy Skinner is a must read for teachers, parents of gifted learners and school counselors. Skinner's book lets us walk in the shoes of the parents of two highly gifted children as they celebrate and support their children's intellectual and emotional growth in public school settings.

Parents, educators, and counselors will enjoy Infinity & Zebra Stripes for its candor, insight and humor.

a captivating account of life with highly gifted kids

Infinity and Zebra Stripes is a very personal account of a family's struggle to find an appropriate educational situation for their two exceptionally gifted children. Mom Wendy Skinner shares her parenting joys and challenges with a candid and often humorous delivery. Topics touched on include intelligence and achievement testing, perfectionism, the reluctant writer, depression and anxiety, sensitivities, intense interests, and social relationships.

The writing is very honest and gifted anecdotes ring true. Seven year old Ben's exploration of the concept of infinity is a wonderful illustration of the profound thoughts that can occupy gifted young minds. Jillian's conversations on God and Santa Claus show extremely high levels of curiosity and inference. A particularly poignant section concerns Wendy's reaction upon hearing that her young son is way beyond the gifted threshold. The professional test administrator discloses where Ben falls on the gifted spectrum, and Wendy reacts physically. She relates, " My eyes and breath were caught and frozen by this statement. It was as if I had a sudden shock. I was aware of a solid thumping beneath my ribs." Many parents of highly to profoundly gifted children seem to share this feeling of panic, with thoughts spinning off into worries about how the child will ever be educated, make friends, or find a compatible mate.

Statistics put children like the Skinners in the top tenth of one percent, which means it's very unlikely they will encounter a true peer in their classroom or their neighborhood. It's no wonder that some parents describe coming to terms with the label of highly gifted plus as similar to working through the stages of grief. Children this gifted do indeed have special needs.

Skinner's open manner and focus on educational teamwork eventually lead to successful full grade acceleration for son Ben and daughter Jillian. Parents currently struggling with advocacy for their own gifted learners may find Skinner's example encouraging and informative. Her emphasis seems to be on polite persistence and an assumption that teachers and administrators share the common goal of finding the best situation for each individual student.

The book ends with an up-to-date list of terrific parent resources. Highly recommended!

A book for someone who wants to understand your child better
This book stands out from others on the subject for several reasons. For one thing, there are two very different children, who are both highly gifted, but in different ways and with contrasting personalities. Many articles focus around one child, so the reader begins to associate that "type" with giftedness. This book shows that giftedness is not tied to a certain personality. And in fact, one child is a girl, and the other a boy, which to me is also important, as gifted girls are more likely to be overlooked or undereducated in comparison to gifted boys. (Skinner was determined not to let her daughter's potential go to waste.)

Another important characteristic of this book is that it is readable for a layperson and told from the heart of a mother. The length is fairly short, the style is conversational, and there are no national statistics or those otherwise omnipresent lists of characteristics. My mother - generally a non-reader - picked up this book and after reading it could finally see through the behavioral and anxiety issues we have always had with my son. In fact, I credit this book with making her want to get to know her grandson and to be as proud of him as I am, and for that I'm so grateful.

Finally, this book is not a kvetch about where public schools fail, nor does it claim to be a how-to book. Skinner simply tells about what worked and what didn't work in their dialog with the school district during both kids' early educational years. Parents may pick up a few tips about maneuvering to find a schooling solution for their child, and educators and other family members gain a better understanding about why this is so important.