We had a similar sort of problem with a Montessori school our PG son attended. You are not alone there. The problem isn't you or your daughter! <reassuring pat on the back>
It's quite common for GT kids to be in a room with perfectly acceptable, advanced opportunities, but not to be allowed access to them. I call it the "bait and switch" of Montessori, and it happened to us. Some schools are great about seeing a child for where they are and letting them progress from there, others...not so much. In my experience (as well as from what others have said), we pretty much all agree that the teacher matters much more then the school philosophy, and Montessori in general seems to be no better than any other preschool style. Some are great, some are lousy. It all comes down to the teacher.
The "pushing" comment is so frustrating! We ALL hear you!
A common comment from adminstrators is "When do they get to be kids?" Well, they are getting to be kids--just the kind of kids they are! People who don't know these highly GT children just don't understand that this is who they are, and we're not pushy stage moms. We're not pushing them, we're just trying to keep up!
I would keep pursuing K if I were you, given what you've said about your DD. If you need to change schools to get the skip, then I think you should. I'm not sure how academic K is in your area--here, it isn't academic at all. But a pre-K grade skip is one of the easiest for a kid to slip into, and it is one of the easiest to reverse if it doesn't suit the child for some reason. It may not really matter very much now, but the skip now could help her down the road, even if K still isn't much of a challenge for her. If you get her in, just be prepared to enrich her intellectual life at home. If she's HG+, she probably still won't get enough intellectual stimulation at school.
But if early-entrance to K doesn't pan out, you might consider a non-academic half-day preschool for a year. Then enrich your child's time at home so that she's getting what she needs academically from you instead of at school. Preschool can be a time for her to get some social needs met and to play. That's what we did with our son, and it worked quite well for us.
This isn't ideal, but it's much less painful for a child to go this route than to sit through learning letters AGAIN at a highly academic classroom when she's reading books. I think most highly academic preschools are just boring as all get out to these HG+ kids, unless the teacher really sees what she's dealing with and is willing to differentiate the academic work. It happens--and that teacher is worth her weight in gold if you find her--but it's not easy to find.
If there's anything we can do, let us know. We've all been there! We're happy to help!
