You've already been given excellent advice above - I'll add a few more things to consider.
Have you talked to his current school about differentiation/subject acceleration or a full grade acceleration?
What value do you place on acquiring fluency in Spanish? or is your family bilingual with a parent or other person in the household who is a native Spanish speaker?
How does the immersion program work once students reach middle and high school?
The school is about as far away from us as possible within our school district. It's not exactly convenient.
I would give this a *lot* of thought. We've been in a situation where we had to drive our kids across town to school - and it was the right choice for school - but it had a huge impact on our daily lives. We eventually moved to a school much closer to home and the benefits were immediate, and so much more solid that I could have imagined, both for my kids and for myself. The things that you need to consider are the impact on your time, your children's time (riding in the car back and forth) as well as ease of participating in after-school programs, sharing rides with other kids/parents and scheduling playdates with fellow students etc.
He's bright, he's bored, he's a bit disruptive. Honestly, I can't imagine him not being bored in school - he just thinks quickly and gets ahead of things. But maybe this would be fixed by the separate gifted program?
This really might be different in the gifted program. Can he try out the program for a few days or a week?
he's also not especially concerned with achievement. And this gifted program is known for being a mix of naturally bright kids and hardworking, slightly less bright kids (cutoff is 97th). Would he fall behind or disengage if not as "motivated" as the other kids?
I would also consider - what are the teacher's expectations for work in the gifted program? I wouldn't be dismissive of the other abilities in a classroom where the cut-off is 97th percentile - testing is not without error bars, and 97th percentile is quite aways above the average ability in a typical mixed-ability classroom. With a classroom full of high-ability students, the teacher's expectations for quantity and quality of work will most likely go up considerably from a mixed-ability classroom. That *could* mean a student who isn't motivated by traditional ideas of achievement doesn't enjoy the program or perform as a top-level student in the program, or it could mean that a previously non-motivated high ability student finds their inner motivation and suddenly becomes a high-achiever. There's really no way to completely predict how any child will do in any classroom until that child is in the classroom. You just have to go with your gut feeling once you've collected all the data you can
He has the IQ, but there's a lot more to school fit than just test scores. How can I figure out if this is a good move for him? or not?
Talk to as many other parents as you can. Try to find parents that you can get a feel for whether or not you trust their opinion too! Talk to the teachers. Let your ds spend a day or a week or however long he can trying out the school. Ask specific questions about the school curriculum. Ask if you can observe a class. Get as much info from as many sources as you can.
Are differentiated gifted classrooms always a good choice?
And does anyone have any experience, good or bad, with placing a child in a program for gifted kids?
thanks for any answers.
This really *really* depends on the program's setup, curriculum, goals, the teachers, the mix of students (not just ability but personality), the flexibility of the program etc. There is no way to know if my experience, for example, will be the same as yours in a different location/school/time etc.
Best wishes,
polarbear
