OK, I think I perhaps misunderstood your original post. I am sorry if I did. You mentioned that your DD is in a "cluster group" with 3 other kids identified gifted by ability testing and achievement scores. So does this "cluster group" just all share some similar level materials for certain classes? Is it just for math? That is all I meant by ability grouping - so maybe we are talking about the same thing. DD's school has many, many 3rd graders, which I suppose makes whole-class ability grouping more possible. Are the students in your DD's school just grouped together all of the time? The grouping has little benefit if it completely lacks instruction. Surely the goal of the clustering is not for the identified kids to "figure things out on their own" (or is it??? That would certainly be a poor arrangement!).
