Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Would You Switch a Happy Child?

OTOH, my son LOVED the idea of HSing and resisted the possibility of going to the GT private school, even part time. He really loves his HSing, loved the idea of it before we tried it, continues to love it even on the less-than-stellar days (which every educational solution is going to have).

He has many more true peer opportunities in HS than he had in public school. The myth of the quiet child alone with a book is *not at all* what home school is all about. For our part, we are FAR more social now than we were before HSing! And the kids he's with are far more diverse and interesting than the kids he was with at our lily-white, middle-class public school. He's gotten some great opportunities that he'd have missed in that boring public school class he was in.

I say again, I think you have to ask what your definition of "pretty happy" is, and is that enough for your kids? Could your kids get more educational satisfaction (and general, overall life satisfaction) out of another arrangement?

I wasn't picking a fight with you, Dottie. Sorry, if I sounded confrontational, I didn't mean to. You and acs both know that I respect your opinions.

But especially in the wake of acs's comment, I thought I should stress that the whole "have to want to" and "need peers" stuff aren't necessarily a problem with HSing. They can be problems--just as they can be problems at a school that isn't a good fit for a child--but they aren't necessarily problems.

I just want to be sure that HSing isn't coming off as a bad choice for reasons that haven't held true for us. Those two particular reasons haven't held true for us. They do hold true for some people, and it's good to point that out. But then I think it's also good for me to point out that we had the exact opposite experience. DS6 is far happier and more social now that we're HSing. He's tried public school and he's tried HSing and he picks HSing, without any hesitation. (I'm the one who hesitated, until he wore me down, precisely because HSing is TOO social for me! I can't help but note the irony!)

<shrug> I think much of this comes down to the specific kid and the particular school situation. At this point for Jamie, public school is a known quantity and HS is an unknown quantity, but I think that's all the more reason to trust a mother's intuition. If she sees problems coming in school in the future, they probably will. I felt the same way, and I was right. The problems came sooner than I expected, actually. So doing a little research and checking in with the kids about how they feel about the possibility of HSing seems like a prudent course of action, even if Jamie ultimately decides to keep her kids in their current situation.

And after all, no decision is irreversable. It pays to keep that in mind. As I always say, for me, HSing isn't theory; it's about practice, real life, reality! I'm not wedded to a philosophy, I'm trying to make life work for DS6. If school works better for him at a given point, then that's where he'll go. For now, HSing is a lot better solution for him. Will it be better for DS3? Who knows? I may well have one at home and one in public school. Wait and see...

<double shrug> It's all a grand experiment, and we should probably all expect to change something for our HG+ kids in 6 months or so, no?

I think this is precisely the point I wanted to make in my first post. It would fall on me to meet his social needs way more if we homeschooled. I watch my neighbors who HS and their car is gone most of the time or other people are over at their house. Frankly, as an introvert it looks like heck to me. In fact, if we homeschooled I would probably have to limit his interactions a lot to preserve my own sanity.

As it is, I put him on the bus as 7:15am and we pick him up at 5:00 after tennis practice and he IS happy and full of all kinds of stories and anecdotes about the day. If I had to HS because PS wasn't working, then I would bite the bullet and homeschool. But mercifully we haven't had to face that.

I agree (and suspect everyone else does as well). Our strength is that we have so many different experiences to share. I think we want to make sure that all the stories get told loud and clear. Sometimes I fear it sounds like we are arguing, but I respect all the decisions that folks here have made, and never intend to discount another's experience. I only mean to tell my own.

Agreed, acs. That was my point, too, exactly. Well put.

Ya' know, I think we're all trying so hard to make it clear that we respect one another that we make it sound like an argument! LOL!

Oh, and I agree 100% with you, acs, that an introverted parent--that is, one who feels worn out by social interactions and needs alone time to recharge--should think long and hard about HSing without a good, dependable child care solution! That's so right!

With child care, I am a pleasant, easy person to get along with (if I do say so myself... ). Without sufficient child care, I border on insanity and become very unpleasant to be with. As the child gets old enough for independent playdates, the problem gets less pronounced. But in early elementary, it's a serious consideration that I didn't take nearly seriously enough this year!

Know thyself, and be sure your needs are met, all ye introverts considering HSing!

acs,

I think that a lot of us who are geeky introverts who do homeschooling find that being around our own kids 24/7 brings out our social side. When I drop our kids off for dance class, I usually try to stick around just to have some other adults to talk to for an hour. In fact, some of the other parents have remarked on what an outgoing, talkative guy I am � which is pretty funny considering that I really am a very introverted geek (you don�t get much more geeky than male theoretical physicists!).

I do prefer seeing others outside the house just so I don�t have to straighten up everything around the home � homeschooling does tend to make a mess of one�s house (not that I would be very good at housework in any case).

Dave

Jamie,

Your kids� rate of acceleration is similar to what I myself experienced as a kid (and I think a number of other posters here also) and to my own kids� rate of acceleration.

When I was a kid and was asked how I liked school, I always replied �OK� or �fine.� I really did not hate school, I never cried myself to sleep because of school, or anything like that.

However, especially in grade school, I was extremely, almost continuously, bored. (We were tracked in junior high and there were honors/college prep courses in high school, so that was a bit better.)

I would read all of the textbooks through during the first couple months, and then stare out the window and day-dream the rest of the year (rather relaxing, but�).

So, I think we need to be a little bit careful in thinking that very bright kids are �happy� in traditional school � they may not be really sad or acting out, but they may just be compliant kids who assume that part of the price of being a child is being bored to death for a thousand hours a year, kind of like going to the dentist for 180 days each year.

If you think your kids would be really unhappy homeschooling (or if you think you would hate it), don�t do it. Also, if you can work out a true independent study situation within the walls of the school � not a little bit of enrichment but a situation where they can really work on material at their own level most of the time � that might be great.

Otherwise, my own advice would be to very seriously consider homeschooling. In the best of all possible worlds, the schools would be sort of education centers which accommodated all sorts of mixes between homeschooling and classroom schooling, and if you can work out something like that (which would be quite unusual) that would also be great. We�re homeschooling through a charter school that supports homeschoolers (and which pays for a lot of the curriculum material): this is working out nicely for us.

The other serious issue is gender. Like you, we have two girls. Early in grade school, there seems to be no social issue with girls being bright. But, even in middle grade school, I�m starting to see a few faint hints of the anti-geek/girls-can�t-be-bright syndrome that pervades our country. From what I have seen among children of friends and relatives, that attitude seems to be overwhelming by middle school.

I�m not trying to engage in some sort of feminist rant here when I say that I find that social attitude utterly and totally despicable. That human beings would be discouraged from developing their intellectual abilities to the fullest because of their gender is bizarre beyond words.

Even homeschoolers cannot (and should not) totally control their kids� social experiences. But our kids are by definition free of that hothouse 30-40 hour a week environment that stifles individuality and pressures one to conform to the group. Talking to adult female friends, I think that pressure is a lot tougher for girls than guys. It�s accepted that many guys are �geeks,� �loners,� etc., and I never really felt socially ostracized in school (I was never invited to the jock/cheerleader parties, but then I didn�t want to go to those parties anyway). But I�m told by adult female friends, especially those who excelled academically, that they really did feel some serious pain from the social experience in school.

I don�t think that sort of pain is or should be a natural part of growing up, and I think homeschooling can (partially) avoid some of that.

As to whether to act proactively now or wait until problems develop, I think there�s something to be said for the saw that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. Of course, in the end, you have to work out what is best in your own situation � I�ll be curious to hear how things develop.

All the best,

Dave

Dottie,

Well, actually my kids like going to the dentist (they�ve never had any cavities). But perhaps it would get dull doing it 180 days a year.

You wrote:
>Case in point....my bright middle school child is in excellent company, boys and girls alike!

I always had friends in school, too, usually bright kids (although early in grade schools, my best friends were a mid-level student and a nice guy who happened to have some problems academically). And, we did not even have the jock-nerd conflict in our high school. As the undisputed top nerd, I myself was actually friendly with the three co-captains of the football team (as I said above, they did not invite me to their parties, but then I would have declined an invitation anyway).

Of course, perhaps I was less socially accepted than I recall, and I was just too clueless to realize it. Near the end of my senior year, the girl I�d been sitting next to all year in lit class, and of course having casual conversations with through the year (she was an average student), one day turned to me and said, �You know, Dave, you�re actually okay.� This would seem to imply that she had spent much of the year trying to decide whether or not I was �actually okay.� (I thanked her for her endorsement.)

Anyway, thinking back to high school, the bright girls did seem to be somewhat socially isolated. As I recall, the only guys, even among the good students, who hung out with the bright girls were me and my best friend. This was fine with me, of course: as a guy, I found it rather convenient that most guys seemed uninterested in the bright girls, since I myself was only interested in the bright girls.

Talking to bright adult female friends now (including my wife), most of them do seem to have rather negative memories of the social situation in junior high and high school. I hear that from very few guys � I think there is a real gender difference here (and I�ve read some sociology that seems to back this up). I get a very strong impression from a lot of people, not just kids but also parents, that a �geeky� boy is kind of weird but that a �geeky� girl is just beyond the pale, especially in the high-school years � an attitude that I find unacceptable.

I don�t know if your child is male or female � that could make a real difference. And it will be interesting to see how it works out in high school.

I certainly agree with you that it can be different in different schools � as I said, our school lacked the supposedly universal nerd-jock conflict. But the anti-geeky-girl meme does seem to be awfully widespread.

You also wrote:
>But our schools are nothing like you describe, even with the "easy" work factored in!

Could you elaborate? My remarks on being bored to death were mainly about grade school, which I think is Jamie�s current issue. Were your kids in a situation in which most of their work in grade school was up to their level of ability?

We were tracked in junior high, and, in high school, I was mature enough to seek out teachers with whom I could develop independent study plans (we had a �progressive� principal who was flexible and supportive of such plans). So, junior high and high school were not that bad academically. But grade school was largely a waste of six years.

Was your kid�s experience in grade school different from mine?

It�s true that a lot of us who are homeschooling are a bit evangelical on the subject, but I do realize that homeschooling is not the right solution for everyone. If the parent or child can�t or doesn�t want to homeschool, or if the local school offers an arrangement that gives a good fit to the kid�s academic abilities, of course homeschooling may not be the right solution. On the other hand, a lot of people who are considering homeschooling like the idea but are scared of �taking the leap,� so I think we homeschoolers do have an obligation to explain to them that homeschooling is not as scary as it seems and can actually be fun. And, the tone of Jamie�s post sounded to me as if her �gut feelings� are making homeschooling sound appealing to her and she was looking for feedback as to whether her gut feelings are leading her astray.

I do think everyone should seriously consider homeschooling as one of several options, just as everyone should consider traditional public schools, private schools, alternative charter schools, etc. You are not likely to make an optimal decision if you do not consider all the options.

I actually think the ideal situation would transcend the homeschool/classroom-school distinction with schools being basically �education malls� where you could pick and choose what you wanted and combine that with homeschooling, with outside-of home-and-school activities, etc. But I do not know of any school that yet functions that way.

All the best,

Dave

I agree, Dottie. As a non-evangelical HSer (LOL!), for whom HSing is a solution to a practical problem (An HG+ child in a poor fit public school) rather than a philosophy, I think that it's good to consider the options. But once you have, I think you can move on.

You have, so you should!

The irony of this all suddenly struck me. In the country at large, homeschoolers are definitely the minority, often mocked or mistreated because of their decision. As a result, a little defensiveness makes sense, as does a certain evangelical-ness when you have found that homeschooling really works.

So the irony is that for HG+ kids the tables are turned. Most of the books and articles talk about the dangers of sending HG kids to regular school and how most parents eventually turn to homeschooling. So as I read those articles and see more and more parents turning to homeschooling, I am the one who starts to feel defensive. I, who have a kid in a regular public school placed in his age-appropriate grade, start to feel like I don't quite belong here (maybe my kid isn't gifted? maybe I'm a bad parent? maybe they are all laughing at me). The same kinds of insecurity and defensiveness start to grow. And I start of feel a little evangelical about regular school. I seem to have found the one little pocket of the country where I am the minority.

Usual disclaimer: I'm not saying anyone is actually trying to make me feel defensive. I'm pretty good at getting defensive under pretty benign circumstances--just ask DH!