Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy no grade skip due to immaturity or gifted traits

Hello,

DD6 is currently in kinder; she was born on Xmas so she is one of the older ones. Whilst she was not a fluent early reader per se (early letters sounds when she was 2), she recently has taken off like a rocket in her reading over the last few months. She just finished Road Dahl's 'The BFG" yesterday after taking a break a month ago and because I wanted to check if she was comprehending as well as reading it, I gave her a few online quizzes and she scored 9 out of 10 questions. She is doing 2nd grade level math and can do simple multiplication and division but is no math whizz. She is HG+.

Her current school has been wonderful and responsive. They have immediately put her into a 2nd grade reading group and have put her in the afternoon portion of 1st grade after she finished Kinder. Academically she is doing fine; actually, she is still telling me everything is easy, but she has improved on much needed spelling and writing skills.

I am trying to get my thoughts and notes down for our meeting with her new school for next year. She will be attending a GATE/high achieving magnet school for 1st. Problem is that of course the school, whilst the principal is very open and eager to work with us to do pull outs for reading, math, is very anti-grade skip.

Feedback I received from her current kinder and 1st grade teacher is that they are recommending she start in 1st next year due to immaturity. I believe this is due to her impulse control such as speaking out, not being afraid to be different, getting momentarily distracted, still not having close friendships with her classmates in 1st and 2nd grade classrooms. Our DD loves older kids and younger kids but she has a hard time making deep connections here. She is bossy and very sensitive and will tell people if they are breaking the rules. She loves talking to adults and older kids, and so I thought she would make new friends in her new classes but I don't think they have anything in common due to the age difference. Instead of conversing with the girls, she would rather run around chasing the boys. This does seem like a maturity thing with me too, or is it simply that she has no intellectual compatible peers here?

Have your children been branded immature by your school when they are just showing traits of giftedness? I don't know which is which at this point. I do feel that she is very unlike the typical well behaving 2nd grader..she is so full of energy and intensity. But, she does not have behavior problems at school.

I know the principal will bring up the maturity issue when we meet (he knows the 1st grader teacher very well) and I want to be able to counter some of his concerns. I don't think we can pull off the grade skip, and I'm at a loss as to what we cab do for the next school year. Whilst she will be doing more in-depth work, I know she will be doing a lot of work she already knows.
Also, if she grade skips to 2nd grade, I feel she still will need pull outs in math and ELA by middle of the year, so perhaps keeping her in 1st is the best thing?
TIA for your thoughts.