Check your state laws to be sure that "partial homeschooling" is allowed and how to do it.
If it is allowed, educate yourself fully on how it works and work out a schedule with the principal.
I've been searching for information on the application of this law and am coming up empty. If someone has direct experience, or knows where I can find some success stories, I'd appreciate some feedback on this particular topic.
If he is going to stay in school for math, you may have to push them with logic and not let them squirm. You see in her letter a lot of "I believe" and "I'd like". You can ask her what she bases that on, ask if other kids that test early 5th are asked to repeat 4th. If they mention gaps, ask what testing they have that shows gaps.
Funny enough, I just logged into the JH CTY math program and see that my DS did a unit today, taking the quiz at 11:40AM. The email says "after this and this, then he can do your thing" so he must have completed those required lessons quickly if he had time to work through an entire unit during the day. This is good news, and I'm tempted to see how this moves forward without ruffling feathers too much.
I do like your approach for calling out the soft words. The teacher (male - btw, not that it's super relevant), doesn't cite evidence of his need to repeat the content other than these soft "feeling" words. I have the iReady test results in front of me. I can cite data. I will use this method in the meeting. Good idea, thank you.
Math teachers, especially, have drilled into them that if you skip anything, you will have gaps. There are a lot of kids who do well in lower level math and then flounder when they hit more abstract math. They hear a lot about it and the need to make sure those foundations are super strong. Then you come along and want to blow all that up. But blow it up you must.
At home, make sure you are not scaffolding too much, because even if he can do higher math, he needs the maturity to be able to approach problems, think them through and stick with it til he has an answer. My kids were advanced in math-- and accelerated 2-5 years (depending on when) and this was something that needed maturity. But one year accelerated, seriously, math in elementary repeats and repeats and repeats.
I'm not sure I understand what you mean by scaffolding too much.
??
I thought scaffolding was teaching multiple approaches, practice, then allowing the student to take control of how they approach each problem using increasing difficulty? Do I not understand scaffolding correctly? How could that be too much? Can you elaborate here?
My intention for this kid is only to keep him challenged. That's it. He is so bored at school. I'm not trying to get him ahead, pushing super hard. In fact, I wish I didn't have to serve up this additional math because it sure would be easier on everyone. The fact is that it doesn't matter whether I teach it or not, he's going to grasp this stuff so much faster than many peers.
You are right that with a sport, and increasing homework with age, the after schooling may become less appealing to him. But it may also be really hard for them to move him up in math if they don't have the structure for it-- scheduling this year, then what next year? I can assure you that your child is not the only one who can benefit. And THAT is what I told them. Surely, my child is not the only one who is ready for this. Do you think we could have a group of kids to do 5th grade math this year? If teacher looked at 5th grade curriculum, it doesn't bode well. I'd hope she KNOWS 5th grade curriculum since she's prepping the kids for it. I'm guessing she is not strong in math herself and if that's the case, you will need to make her more comfortable by bringing the expert info in.
Suggest pre-tests where he tests out of a whole unit and then does the math you provide and agree on a passing score (85%?)
We tried and tried for that, but alas, it's just really hard for them to let go of the "strong foundation" and "can't have too much practice". Even if you tell them your child is bored or hates math, they won't see it as not enough math challenge, they'll see it as tuning out and missing important things. BTDT
Good luck! Thankfully we had math acceleration built in to our schools.
Our school does pre-test, as I have those results in front of me. What I see is that it doesn't matter. Pre-test, pass, do what you have demonstrated mastery of anyway... That's where we are today.
I have to be honest. As much as I care about the whole school and supporting other kids, the easiest solution for me to win with is going to be with my one child (well, two, but the 2nd is a different case study). I can't say I don't care about the other kids, because I do, but they are not my focus. I've tried that for the last two years. I've attended school board meetings and been highly involved with working with the development of a HiCap program. I'm on the parent-advisory committee.
It's all unicorns. The words the district uses do not translate into actions at the classroom level. I can advocate for whole-school change but the bureaucracy will prevent it from impacting my kids. I have to put my actual effort into individual accommodations rather than fixing a broken system at this time.
Why am I such a chicken when I get in front of the people that matter? Does anyone else experience this? I can prepare and prepare, and they start talking and I shut-down in these meetings, allowing them to use their method. Again and again I've been disappointed. This is where I need to change my approach. I need to be more firm. I just don't want things to be adversarial. I'm afraid of the repercussions of that long-term as I have to work with these people for the next 11 years.
