In my experience, students that are greatly accelerated (Algebra I in 6th grade or 7th grade or earlier) struggle because they are too far removed from those topics and forget many of the things needed to solve those problems on the SAT. Instead of spending time exploring math at a deeper level and understanding concepts, we tend to push them ahead with new standards to cover. This is very deceiving because we think students are getting ahead and know more, but at that young age, they simply learn more facts without conceptual understanding or developing the mathematical reasoning strategies needed for higher level math. In my opinion, both as an accelerated math student in school and through observation as a teacher working with many accelerated students, spending more time developing mathematical thought is extremely more important than pushing ahead through new text books.
Off-topic comment for this thread but relevant to the forum:
There may be students who have accelerated too much in math, leaving them with a weak foundation. But there are also gifted math students who need a lot of acceleration. I am concerned that some teachers and administrators use the logic above to oppose all acceleration. It is not true that all young students, when accelerated, "simply learn more facts without conceptual understanding or developing the mathematical reasoning strategies needed for higher level math".
I think that what he is saying may be true for some kids. My DD9 was accelerated too much in math, IMO, in a gifted magnet, and she breezed through or completely skipped certain concepts that are very important (like decimals/fractions)...we are backing way up, as she has huge gaps, basically reversing the acceleration. I have heard that the kids in this gifted magnet, who are doing Algebra I in 5th or 6th grade, are really struggling when they get to the Jr. High and are faced with Algebra II. My other kid was also accelerated a lot and I'm not as worried about him, but I still want to go through things with him over the summer and make sure he is solid on basic computations, like long division, and gets the practice in. He is one of those kids who likes to do literally everything in his head, so I know conceptually, he is fine, but I'd also like him to know how to do things on paper.
