I have lived with that anxiety since my child was 5 and in kindergarten. Up until then, I thought he would do very well in school. I never imagined that my son's curiosity or his ability to read and comprehend his science encyclopedia might be looked at as a problem. When my sister-in-law told me he needed to stifle his curiosity before he started Kindergarten, I just laughed because I was sure that curiosity and the desire to learn could only be a good thing. How could they possibly be looked at as a problem?
But it was. My sister-in-law was right. When my son started Kindergarten I found out that most teachers in our school don't invite discussion about whatever they are learning and this is how my son had always learned best, just the two of us, since he didn't go to preschool. He was reading at about a 5th grade level by the time he started Kindergarten and he could do basic math easily, and he was so excited about finally getting to go to a real school.
But when he started school he found that kids are supposed to sit quietly, perfectly still with hands in their laps, and listen to the dull boring lessons that the teacher reads and then do lots of worksheets and take even more dull boring worksheets home to work on so that any opportunity for learning what they want is taken away from them. And even worse than that, they had to color, lots and lots of coloring, and it better be in the lines.
I know some people afterschool and this works well for them. One of my teacher friends has done this with her kids and she let me in on a little secret. When her gifted kids came home with lots of ridiculous busywork for homework like word searches, she helped them with it to get it out of the way, so they could actually learn at home. I wonder how many other parents are doing this.
Our school is a small town public school where sports ability is really more important than learning anyway. I know that most schools are not this bad for gifted kids and I think in most cases afterschooling can work for gifted kids. My teacher friend's gifted kids seem to be doing just fine.
