Hi there. My daughter will be entering Kindergarten next year and has scored very well on one test used to determine admission to a school for gifted kids. The puplic schools also have a gifted program for which she will be tested in a couple months.
What are everyone's thoughts on gifted schools? Is it better to be surrounded by peers who are also intelligent or does that maybe foster competiveness among students or an attitude of "we are so smart and special, we are better than everyone".
I want to do the right thing for her and K is the only entry point into these schools for the most part.

I feel so much of this depends upon the attitude of the parent, and by the way you are thinking, I think your daughter will do just fine. For my children in gifted programs I have explained this school helps with their particular talents, but that people the world over are talented in so many different ways, and b. that many 'gifted' kids go to regular schools because their parents feel that is right for them, and therefore being in a 'gifted' group is no big deal, just what we feel suits their needs best. Basically I have drummed it into them that whilst they find some things easier than others, there is plenty more for them to learn, and that their talents are no more or less worthy than anyone elses.

We really haven't encountered any problems with overly competitive kids as yet. I have heard a number of stories of GT kids being in awe of what another kid can do, but not of showing off .... so far.

I don't have experience with a gifted school, but it seems to me that you could equate it with religious schools - that is, there are sometimes different schools for different interests. Also, you can always enroll her over time in various classes/activities that attract a wider variety of people, like park district programs or sports or what-have-you.

Hi ChelseaMom,

Welcome!

I have my children in a private gifted school. DD5 is in kindergarten right now.

We have been very pleased. Our dd is reading at a third grade level and able to do math at about that level as well. However, this school enables her to do this work without leaving her kindergarten classroom. For dd5 (who is rather young - a summer birthday) this has been a godsend. I know that others on this board have had quite a bit of success with subject/grade acceleration, but I am not certain that socially my dd could have handled it.

One other thing I wanted to mention is the peer group. DD5 is a quirky kid ... and may have had trouble finding kids who shared her interests. Or accepted her as she is. At the gifted school, an obsession with dinosaurs or rocks or pokemon is treated as the norm.

As for your other questions, have you toured the school? Sat in on a class? Maybe observed a whole day? Do you know any parents who currently send a child to that school? That might help you discover if the competitive nature is running rampant. Each school is different, I suppose...

I imagine that even in most gifted schools, there will be kids with a wide range of abilities. I enrolled my DS4 in a school that caters to gifted students, hoping that he'd find true intellecutal peers there, but although he loves the school and they're doing a great job of meet his needs, I'm realizing he's still way ahead of the other kids in his class in many ways, which has been a bit of a disappointment.

Also, because our school gives each student an individualized curriculum, I think there might actually be less competitiveness among the students than in other settings. Because it's all he knows, my son thinks it's perfectly normal for his teacher to work on consonant sounds with some kids and 4th grade spelling words with others. The fact that the school acknowledges the kids' differing abilities almost seems to normalize the differences and makes them less important than they would be if everyone were forced to walk in lock step with each other.

It is better for children to be in a school that "gets" them, adjusts curriculum as necessary and understands asynchronous behavior. Whether that is in a private school of some type or in a public one I don't think matters. Finding the fit is the hard part. You can work around attitude problems for the most part as long as the attitude problems aren't coming from the adults involved. Wolf is in the public school system (in an Independent Study program) after we interviewed the local gifted private school and realized that they didn't "get" him at all. Mind you I also interviewed three other charter programs as well and none of them were a good fit either.