finished chapter. the end was about gifted children…and being a “gifted child” i started thinking about elementary school and stuff. the book said most gifted children are “located” through IQ tests…but i don’t ever remember taking an IQ test as a child. i know i was 1 of 2 people who could read in my kindergarten class. in 1st grade it was me, eric, joeyjoe and this girl angela (not my ex bestfriend) who were in the highest reading group. and in 1st grade i started getting pulled out of class to work with the gifted teacher. i think it was me, eric and joeyjoe again, who got to go to her office (which was a closet, shows you how much they cared about us gifted kids) and we played games. they weren’t normal 1st grade board games or anything like that. they were like, problem solving games. like brainstorming things to solve a problem. and we played this game, i think it was called gatekeeper. one person was the gatekeeper and they would choose a shape in their head, from the choices of shapes we were given. then the other 2 people had to ask questions about it, and whoever was able to guess the shape got to go through the gate (got to be it next)…

i’m not sure if meeting with the gifted teacher in 1st grade was special math or not…i know i was in special math at some point, and i know i purposely failed the special math exam in 3rd grade because i didn’t want to be in it anymore. i remember sitting in a room with the other smarter kids taking this test. one of the questions was about how many legs there were on this group of cows…which can easily be solved with algebra…or by drawing cows LOL…but i purposely put the wrong answers, and didn’t really do the other problems… i don’t know why i didn’t want to be in special math anymore…maybe i wanted to just be normal or something. i don’t remember any special treatment in 2nd grade except being in the high reading group again, and having to go to a 3rd grade class for reading.

then in 3rd grade they contacted all the kids who were chosen to go to MPP (Major progress program)…the day they pulled us out of the class to tell us was the day of the in-school recorder concert… i was crying hysterically because i had brought my recorder case but the recorder wasn’t inside. i had to go down to the office to call joanne because my mom wasn’t home, so she could bring it to me…and the whole process of learning the recorder is a funny one too. we had lessons once a week. for the entire year i didn’t play a single note. i didn’t know how to sight read the music, and somehow i managed to never get called on during the lesson to play. then one day i stopped being lazy (3rd grade i was horribly lazy, didn’t do anything haha, seriously… a note was sent home to my mom about how i didn’t do anything, so she took away my tv privaledges, since all i did was watch tv)…so i stopped being lazy and i actually read the notes, and wrote down what they were on my sheet music, and suddenly i could play. and i played so good that i was chosen to play in the concert (not everyone played in it). go me!

really, i was so lazy in 3rd grade. i mean, i think i was really bored throughout elementary school… and high school…but anyway, every year we had the invention convention. everyone had to create an invention and they were all shown in the gym. then the best ones were chosen to be shown in a regional thing. 1st grade mine was chosen to be in the regional show (which took place at a mall LOL)…it was like… a leash to attach to my pound puppy, which was then attached to the bedpost so he wouldn’t fall out of bed at night :). you had to make a little model of it…so my model was a shoe box upsidedown with popsicle stick bed posts, and one of my mini pound puppies attached with yarn to it. apparently it was really great for 1st grade. we went to see the show and never found my invention :(…when we asked where it was, the gifted teacher said she didn’t want to show it because she was afraid it would get stolen (since it had the pound puppy attached)…so i was sorta disappointed with that. BUT ANYWAY THE POINT OF MY STORY WAS…. in 3rd grade, we had lots of time to do this invention. well i didn’t do it. the day it was due i told my mom to find a cardboard box, and put 2 bowls in it… one for cat food and one for water…it was the food box, so that pets wouldn’t make a mess with the food all over the floor…(and i told her this on the way to school HAHA) …and why that was so lazy of me, was because i stole the idea from this girl carrie. it was THE exact same idea… LOL i don’t remember what happened with that… hahah. i didn’t get in trouble or anything.

i guess my procrastination skills go back father than i thought. because I thought i acquired them in MPP…when everyone would wait until the night before a project was due to do it… i remember staying up til 9:30 (which was late for a 9 year old) doing my simple machines project….same with my electricity project and every other project we had to do. but i distinctly remember my simple machines project…someone was at our house meeting with my parents about their wills they were writing…i was in the dining room. i spread everything out all over the dining room table, and then i spent an hour coloring in my eraser with a blue pen… then spent an hour trying to wash the pen off in the kitchen sink… and i spent forever on this chart we had to do as part of the project…. god i was such a procrastinator!! i know people who never turned in the final weather project in 5th grade….and i used to fake being sick to get out of exams, and take them later… hahahah. i distinctly remember faking sick to miss school and take the government exam late, and the native american unit exam late hahah…and actually i took the electricity exam late too because i remember sitting in our special library by myself drawing circuits (and let me just add the stuff we did in 4th grade science was harder than the stuff we did in 11th grade physics)…lol

omg i really shouldn’t get started on all these MPP memories, cuz i got tons… LOL.