Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment ACT and SAT at a young age

This has all been very helpful. Thank you very much for taking the time to help. She is 9.

With the ACT, I am not sure how she would do on the other parts (science, social studies). It seems like that depends a lot on exposure. If we did one practice test, though, then that would give a reasonable idea.

I understand the point about whether it would be worth taking courses at a less selective school. Right now, I'm not concerned about college classes for credit towards a degree. She may end up doing early college because her charter school only goes to eighth grade and she is working independently, so it would be difficult to transition back to regular public school.

She just has a particular love of some areas and I would like to help her get access to some of the resources at a local state university. That could involve taking courses, but might also involve getting access to student groups and activities where she could find people to share her interests. It may completely not work, but right now they just refer me to the elementary education department when I call. My daughter is placed at the eleventh grade level in independent study for ELA at her charter school, so elementary ELA is no use. She is only in seventh for math, though, so that is a completely different story.

They say they don't allow anyone to take classes until they are at least at the high school junior level, but it seems worth at least asking if she gets a high score. At the very least, we might be able to get lined up with a graduate student we could pay to help as a tutor. First, though, we have to convince someone to talk with us rather than referring us to elementary education.