There has been a lot of discussion around pushing for grade skipping but less so on the actual trade offs and timelines. So here goes.

My SO and I are torn If we should look at grade skipping or not. On a pure test scores point of view it is a clear picture. Testing 3 to 5 grade levels above grade across the board on most standard indicators (WISC, WJIII, MAPS etc ). So a few questions:

1. How did you make the decision on pushing for acceleration vs just trying to create accommodation or accelerate through other means. Note while their teachers strongly discourage grade skipping they are more than happy to work on IEPs.

2. have heard that kids who grade skip in most cases end up repeating grades in senior years of school anyway since they hit a wall academically or socially. Has this been accurate in your case? If so would you repeating a senior grade a better option compared to staying with

3. In retrospect any other trade offs ?

4. Finally if we do go ahead I am assuming the best time to do so is at the beginning of the new school year. Have folks typically done that? If so when have folks started discussion on this with the school? Jan timeframe for next academic year?


Thanks.

1. I just wanted math acceleration but they couldn't figure out how to do it. When they finally figured out I wasn't going to drop it they offered whole grade (I know bizarre turn of events but he was a good candidate for that too...I just wasn't asking for it). We thought about it for about an hour and went for it. He moved the next day to the next grade up.

2. He won't be repeating a grade later on. It is possible he might even skip again or compact two grades during middle school. We have discussed that this will give him time to have a year as an exchange student in high school if he wants... But I wouldn't count that as repeating a year.

3. Trade offs...hmmm none that I know.

4. My son's skip took place about 4 weeks into the new school year, but it was out of the blue. We didn't plan it, it just happened.

A great place to start may be reading up on the Iowa Acceleration Scale (IAS). Hoagies has a page on the IAS, and Institute for Research and Policy on Acceleration (IRPA) has information on both IAS and " A Nation Deceived".

The IAS is a helpful tool.

Some teachers/schools/districts may oppose acceleration for a variety of reasons, including:
- loss of tuition (private schools) and/or state funding (public schools) for the year by which the child's time at that school is shortened by whole-grade acceleration.
- teacher may be evaluated on student performance, therefore desire to keep the top students. The DoE factsheet requires statewide longitudinal datasystems to include "7.A way to identify teachers and to match teachers to their students".
- teacher/school/district may be evaluated in part on maintaining statistical quotas by demographic (gender, ethnicity).
- desire to have top students raise the average grade-level score on standardized tests.
Note that the above reasoning does not consider what is best for the child, but rather considers that which may be most beneficial to the teacher/school/district.

I'm not familiar with this, which would essentially be a 5th year of high school.

An accelerated child may be driving later than grade mates. This may matter to some, and not matter to others.
More examples in this article from the Davidson Database, Tips for Parents: Acceleration.
More discussion in this recent thread, Radical acceleration....

The best time may be when the child's needs may be better met with acceleration. The end of any grade-reporting period can work.

Does your child want acceleration? The IAS places importance on the child's desire to accelerate or not.

Thanks for the pointers. The IAS scale seems very useful. Will try to get hold of it.

For me the main trade off seems to be in time available outside of school for other activities. when you grade skipped did you not find increased amount of time required for HW etc which curtailed other activities?

Also given the flexibility one has with online programs (CTY, EPGY etc) would that not be good alternate option? In the regrets thread their seem to be a bunch of social options to consider especially for girls.

A downside to a grade skip may be the willingness of some people to deny accelerated children their earned awards.

One example may be the presidential physical fitness award. This program has been around for decades, a mainstay of gym classes, and was recently revamped. In both the old program and the new version, scoring performance tables are provided BY AGE.

I'm aware of children who exceeded published AGE criteria and were looking forward to award day with great anticipation to receive their earned awards, subsequently feeling stung when they were not acknowledged/awarded along with their friends and classmates. Upon exercising great composure in self-advocacy, being told that the school chose to acknowledge/award only those students exceeding the standards for average age for the grade level. This favored red-shirted kids, was fair for grade-level kids, and was punitive for accelerated kids. At least one child was told that since the school assembly and ceremony had passed, it was a moot point and therefore the student was being perceived as petty for inquiring.

Parents may wish to be prepared to obtain their child/ren's scores and advocate for them to receive their legitimately earned awards. Parents may also choose to expose those who strive to "shame" a child into silence.

I'm not sure who I am to have opinions. I have one child, a first grader, so I have no idea how our decisions will play out in the future. All kids are different, of course, but I do see some disadvantages. I was born three months before the cutoff and always did best socially with kids two grades younger than me. I spent an extra year in college on purpose. (My parents had no idea what I was doing.) I stayed for the social experience and so I could take more classes that I didn't need.

I think that social experience is a really important aspect of education for a lot of kids. I'd rather that my child get that from the start, rather than "flunk" herself in college (with my money) so she could spend more time in the cocoon.

My kid has poor motor/coordination, is in that perfect highly successful zone with math, has to work at spelling and some grammar type skills (not much, but some), and is way, way ahead in reading and the knowledge acquisition that comes with reading and being interested in things. She doesn't crave math on her own, so she does what the school tells her to do. If they told her to do more, she'd do more, and that would be nice, but it would take more work. And if she really had to struggle with writing and spend more time with math, spelling, and grammar, would she still have time to follow her interests, the areas in which she might have true talent?

I can see how there might be a lot of advantages in moving up a globally gifted kid or a mathematically gifted kid. But my child's science, reading, and history interests wouldn't be met by moving her up a grade or two or maybe three--and she'd be way out of her league in the writing and social areas.

A few minutes ago my husband texted me from the bookstore. They have been there for almost three hours. He says she's reading all the books about Hanukkah and doesn't want to leave until she's memorized the Hebrew alphabet. If we moved her up, making her less socially successful and giving her a challenge in math, would she lose time to explore her own interests that still wouldn't be met in school? For me, that would be the major disadvantage in moving her up.

We're trying to achieve the growth mindset that gifted kids don't usually get to experience through music lessons, and we never use the word "gifted," downplay "smart" and talk a lot about hard work. But in many ways, I think the fact that she needs to work less at school does allow her more time to persue interests.

Some may say that taking additional courses is not the same as "flunking" which typically implies a failing grade and therefore a need to take replacement credits. Often, with careful planning, taking extra courses can add up to an additional major, minor, or concentration. Alternatively, it can be a means to complete requisite courses for a higher degree in a different discipline. There are many great reasons to extend by an additional semester or more one's college experience.

I would be perfectly happy for my kids to skip a couple of years in primary and do a couple of extra years in high school. The way our school system is set up you only do 5 or 6 subjects for exams. By the time you have done chemistry, physics, biology, maths and English you have limited choices. Having 2 years at each of the final 2 years would allow a greater breadth of subjects. It is also sometimes possible to do extra-mural university papers or work experience.

This seems much more useful than an extra year doing basics already mastered.

The main downsides to skipping seem to be that every problem is blamed on the skip and dome teachers try and sabotage the child.

Questions202 raises some good points, and a lot depends on whether the kid is "succeeding" socially with their age mates or not. Myself, I was MISERABLE with my age mates. I can't know how I would have done if I'd been placed with older kids, but it very likely would have been better.

Well it couldn't have been much worse.

Even after the grade skip, my son continues to do some activities with age mates (sports are grouped by age and not grade in school in the community and scouts we kept him in his scout group by age even though you can go by age or by grade according to scouts...we let him choose and he wanted to be with his friend)...but has also done one activity with high school kids and kept right up/fits in.

I guess I am just not as worried about the social as much as some people might be because he is pretty mature and socially advanced with just a bit of whiney little boy reserved just for me when he is tired or hungry. Also he has a December birthday so he isn't too much younger than some of his classmates.

It was never "versus/or" in our case-- it was and. With any child that truly requires grade acceleration, I pretty much see it as doomed to failure if that is ALL that is going to be done in the name of meeting the child's educational needs. It has to come with a variety of other accommodations, because such children are not just "advanced" and if they were, it would be so much more clear when and if acceleration is a good idea or not. Oh, well, Petunia here is a great candidate for acceleration because she is in fact an 8yo in a 6yo's body. We should just change her birth certificate and move her into third grade immediately." (Yeah, no-- this isn't how HG+ kids look.)

Pretty sure that isn't so. My DD15 is enjoying college quite well, thank you, and has had not a lot of social difficulty, fits in well, has friends, etc. I think that this depends on factors that are simply not going to be very clear when your child is 4-8yo and prepubescent.


There ARE some social trades. She was the last of her friends to have a boyfriend. She is among the last of them to learn to drive-- and it tends to compress a BUNCH of huge life-changing adolescent milestones into the same 18 month period of time, something that isn't true for many adolescents who get to do those things over a period of 4-6 years instead. It's also true that we'd have been happier about a college placement at an elite college 2000 miles away if she were 18 and not 15.


Yes-- January to March. This gives everyone time to work out concerns and-- preferably-- a plan A and a fallback position.

I agree with HK. Grade skipping is one of the many forms of accommodation we have experienced with our DD including SSA, curriculum compaction, online material and live tutors. Grade skipping needs to be seen as part of the package not the solution, because it isn't especially, as our DD needs faster and deeper as well as higher grade material.

The social side doesn't really stress us but it is a big issue for many teachers and parents of NT kids who don't understand that when our DD is academically mismatched she becomes depressed and social interactions also suffer. When she is feeling academically challenged she grows in self confidence in all areas and becomes more outgoing and socially able.

Are we worried that she won't be driving until university? Ah, no. Is she? Nope. Drinking? Partying? No and No. It isn't her desire anyway. If it was there are members of her current class who indulge in all of the above and more. She has her friends who range in age from a year younger to three years older from across grades. None of them find the party scene an attractor and they are all very comfortable with who they are.

I didn't drive until after finishing Uni for a variety of reasons. Lots of kids didn't. I didn't ever hit the party scene and I had lots of friends.

By the wayI haven't heard of kids hitting the wall and having to repeat after acceleration. I have heard a number of teachers tell me that their child was smart enough to grade skip but they didn't "do that to them" and they became very successful, so you shouldnt grade skip your child. I thank them for their opinion and do what is best for my child. Like HKs DD she will potentially be at Uni at 15 unless she takes time off.

Yes. This right here. Our DD11 is so much more happy and comfortable with herself when she's working at appropriate level. She is much more socially well adjusted and confident.

As for needing to repeat or slow down toward the end, I've never heard that. But even if it were true, well who cares? DD is 2-3 years accelerated across all subjects. If she decides in a couple of years to take a year to do a foreign exchange, start a business, do an intensive internship or volunteer, or concentrate on a hobby... and needs to slow her academics for a year, well she at least can afford the time!

I don't see that happening at this point, but it's so much easier to explore those options with a 13 year old than an 8 year old.

The finishing high school too early is a problem in countries that don't really have early admission or if they do financial assistance is less available. But if the kid needs the skip now then you worry about later when it comes. Everything has a price but that doesn't mean you don't do it.

I'll chime in that grade retentions late (at or past secondary level) don't appear to be that common among those I know who skipped. I took an extra year in college, and many extra years in graduate school, which I expect had something to do with waiting for social-emotional maturity to catch up, but I don't view those years as wasted, by any means (and I have degrees in diverse fields to go with them). Rather, the early entries and skips provided me with additional time to explore areas of intellectual and personal interest, separate from career preparation. If early entry to uni is not an option, one can still pursue personal interests and explorations during a gap year or two.

I think an inappropriate grade skip--especially one motivated by reasons other than child-driven educational thirst--might be more likely to result in repeated grades later. Or, for some 2e or highly-skewed children. I have one who has been grade advanced twice, and another who hasn't. They are about equally advanced in math, but one is strong in writing, and the other is about age-level in writing, and maybe a little below in spelling. Grade skipping the second one across the board would require a lot of accommodations (which are not an issue, practically speaking, because we homeschool).

In answer to the original post:

The decision to accelerate the first time was because we were moving from an accelerated learning program to a normal school in another state and DD was over a year above grade level in all subjects. We accelerated mid year in conjunction with the school change which is another natural break conducive to skipping.

The current decision to skip again is because a combination of curriculum compaction and SSA have DD over a year above grade level again and we were tired of the timetable juggle which SSA required. She is effectively only accelerating in English as she has met the requirements of the year above in other subjects.

I can't think of any other trade offs as it were. I can think of a few if we don't grade skip and that will include comprising DDs academic and psychological development for the sake of an artificial grouping based on age.

I agree that skipping students inappropriately could certainly lead to issues. Any decision has to be all about what is best for any individual child and made without projecting parental desires or fears into the decision process. That can be harder than you think as we are all a product of experiences that can colour our decisions.

While it is important that the child be on board with a skip be aware that their fears and concerns can be overwhelming and may mean that your clearer head has to prevail. Kids can't always see what is good for them. A trial period for any skip which has an exit strategy with no value judgement is important to allow everyone to see what can be achieved with support and care.

One other point although not exactly a trade off, you may need to be prepared for 'greater asynchrony'. Our DD is perfectly mature and indistinguishable from her peers who are two or three years older while in a public arena. At home she is allowed to be a little girl with her stuffed toys and cuddles and she can reread Roald Dahl or Captain Underpants if she wants. She is very aware that we are totally happy for her to be herself, whatever 'age' that is.

At this point, we have decided against grade skipping mostly because DS8, currently in third, doesn't want to.
The trade offs he describes resonate with us: he has friends he does not want to lose, he does not want to be even younger than he is now, he likes his teacher, it is only math that is stifling, LA, science and specials are okay.

from our point of view:
he has worked hard to gain the limited acceptance and the few friends that he has. While he does very well with kids who are two years older one on one, particularly a few girls he gets on great with, it is not the kind of social preference that works so well in a classroom.
He is already accelerated (early entry) but because of a fall birthday, he is only a month younger than the youngest regular kid. Every fall, though, the teasing starts, and he is reactive to it. I do not know why he cares, I never did after my grade skip, but he does, and it's his life.
His teacher recognizes his giftedness, and is willing to do what is in her power, which isn't much, but sometimes you are just grateful for the right attitude. He likes to be in her classroom and mostly likes going to school every day.
If math SSA works out, it might be just right for him. He can do with the writing instruction and training that ramps up in third grade. By fifth grade (middle school where I live) he's got to have some things down he hasn't yet. He does not mind the language arts instruction so much, and reading is okay, too, even though he is way ahead, because he is not the only one and the teacher does do some grouping.he is truly challenged in executive function and we will, at this point, emphasize that one and maths.

I think it is true for most education systems that elementary school has to be endured, and if possible, compressed in the shortest possible time, but by middle school, things do have to fall into place - options open up, but expectations have to be met. By high school age, most kids are mature enough to find their niches and profit from what there is on offer in a much wider world that works for them including online and higher education, but between, say, ten and fourteen, you mostly have to make school, and classrooms, work for them. Acceleration in elementary can get you in that place faster, and it is the trade offs in that setting I am looking at now that DS is in third - if I had felt the need for another grade skip between K and second, I might have just looked at getting him through elementary with the least damage.

Now I am looking at fifth grade in the city's gifted program which is where we presume he will end up in either next year or the year after, and which does have a good reputation for supporting radically accelerated (my definition: by two years) kids, and looking at my son, and I am wondering: could he, and by extension the whole family, cope with the executive function demands, the social scene, and the commute, by next year, and my current answer is no.
I shall make sure that things are in place so if I feel the answer is different by next fall, I can move him there quickly.
I don't mean that I, or anyone, should worry about puberty or driving or drinking or onset of menstruation and all that crap that people come up with. But wonder about an 8 year old in fifth grade, or a nine year old in sixth grade in middle school, and weigh the trade offs of the greater options against the demands, I would.

If the average peak annual earnings of bright people are $100K, and if years skipped mean more years worked, then each year skipped is worth $100K. I wonder why people rarely consider this. $100K is a lot of money.

When I went to school, elementary school (grade 1-6) was followed by two years of junior high school, in which most academic classes were tracked. Nowadays junior high schools have been mostly replaced by "middle schools" (grades 608), which are mostly untracked and may be worse than elementary school for gifted children. The differences in mental ages of students in an untracked 8th grade English class will be larger than in an untracked 1st grade English class.

That this is true for a huge number of kids is just so very sad. There is so much that is wonderful and amazing about learning and discovering and being a little kid.

Question to all. Did your early elementary kids actually know of the concept of grade skipping and asked for it. Or is this a question you posed to them before you approached the school?

In one case, school initiated 1st whole-grade acceleration, kiddo initiated 2nd, with subsequent accelerations occurring after elementary also initiated by kiddo.

Purely from an economic perspective, having your child enter post-secondary 3 to 5 years earlier than agemates also allows for a cost-savings on higher education, too. I'm sure that must seem incredibly gauche to parents who don't yet have kids in college, but there is pretty much no WAY to not think about the cost, frankly. It's eye-watering and it climbs by 4-8% annually.

At the rate of tuition increases at most institutions these days, that could easily mean that a fifth year can be paid for out of the savings, or at least partially so.

Compressing primary made school tolerable for our daughter. It did come with some trade-offs, certainly. Particularly in high school, there is an expectation of huge amounts of TIME devoted to study and busy-work (my description)-- that time is not appropriate for students as youngish adolescents anyway, in my own opinion, but even less so for children who are younger.

Screen time is also a consideration-- additional computer time is not insignificant in secondary and beyond. There are physiological considerations about that. We've needed to really watch our DD's ergonomics, I'll say that.

Parents of young college students may have less income and savings than they will a few years later, which is actually a benefit in the need-based financial aid system. It is less bad to deplete your savings on college expenses when you are relatively young.

My son knew about grade skipping because his cousin skipped a grade. The cousin needed to skip again but had a sibling. The cousin is mostly happy now in high school.

In our case: Yes

Heh, we decided it was the best answer, but the school beat us to the punch and suggested it, and then before DS knew we had it in the works he had met a kid who had skipped and told us he thought it would be a good idea if he skipped 2nd.

We early entered, so no for the first skip, though there was awareness of the concept, because we had explained that both parents entered first grade at about that age (one by being days before the cutoff, the other by being days after the cutoff and early entered). The school initiated the second skip, after third grade. Actually without our awareness, until the first day of school, when papers came home labeled with the unexpected grade on them. In the second case, we did have discussions with school administrators prior to the skip, that included both parents and child, and all of the available assessment data (report cards, group achievement, and OLSATs) regarding acceleration needs. So there was some awareness about the need for individual planning, and there was child input on SSA, but not on grade-skipping. OTOH, this particular child is not the sort to bat an eyelash at change, and sometimes doesn't seem to notice it at all.

ETA: Oh, and many members of the extended family, in the gparental, parental, and cousin generations have grade-skipped, several far more radically, so this wasn't a strange concept in general.

We explained both early entry and grade skipping. DS understood that he was allowed early into the preschool's K pullout (3-6 classroom) but needed the grade school principals approval for early entry into first to make the grade skip official, and he very much wanted the early entry. He showed exemplary behaviour to the principal when he came in for a trial day!
We have kept casually mentioning that sometimes kids skip grades when the higher grade might be a better fit, but until recently have discussed the possibility of another grade skip only with teachers. With the school psych observing and assessing DS, so much control was out of our hands I wanted to get a very clear opinion on what DS wanted before initiating the process.

When DD was privately tested, they suggested one or more grade skips would be appropriate and perhaps even necessary. The district seemed to think that it would be the end of life as we know it to skip any child for any reason ever.

DD was adamantly against it back then (after 1st) as she was very sensitive about being seen as different. Of course she was also completely miserable in school. We ended up changing schools to a one-year accelerated school and then found an alternative (outside the district) where it was less about grade skipping and more about just, well, skipping along until you hit the level you needed. This defused the 'feeling different' issue.

Anyway, the point is that sometimes kids don't want to skip even though, for their own well being, they need to. They have advanced intellect, but not emotional development or life experience to make a fully formed decision. This is of course very different from skipping a child because the parents want it. We judge not based on what she says she wants, but what makes her happier, less anxious, and more comfortable with herself.

That is our thinking also Ivy.

I think elementary aged children usually understand about skipping. I have seen recommendations to let them try it even if they are hesitant because it can always be reversed; if they are solidly against it, though, it doesn't seem a good idea.

My daughter was excited about skipping and it has worked well. We're pleased with the decision. Additional skips have been recommended, though, and she doesn't want to do that at present. She does go to a higher grade for individual subjects and does individual work, though, so that helps.

This is one reason we delayed skipping my son for so long. He was miserable, we knew he was miserable, but we also knew his best friend was in his current grade and class and he didn't want to skip because of that. (Also, the group of boys in the next grade up weren't a good fit for him. It was a separate HGT classroom, so we knew he would be with those boys for several years.) We did the skip in middle school and even though he's small for his age, and now even smaller because he's with older kids, he's still happier. I think/hope it's going to get better every year now, instead of worse.

We didn't skip our DD in sixth grade because she said no. She was miserable for the whole year. Kids are still kids and as much as they understand skipping, DD had already done it once, they can't always see all the consequences. Neither can adults so not unexpected.

The point is to consider all options and have a back up plan. Skipping isn't the answer for every kid or in every situation but I am now wary of DD being negative about options because she fears change. We then have to work harder to ensure she can see both the positives and negatives of both sides to an option. Debating has helped actually.

I think this can't be repeated often enough: when your kid is miserable, that is a crisis and doing nothing is not the "safest" thing, and skipping may not be the bigger risk even though teachers, and often parents, and sometimes kids, think it is.
Our kid might be happier in a higher grade, or he might not. He is bored in maths and has meltdowns during revision period at the beginning of the school year. But for the rest of the year, the rest of the day, he is NOT miserable. If he were, this whole trade off debate would have had to be different.
I think it is important to view grade skipping in a somewhat more clinical way: not driven by the stark test scores, but by the child's day to day, demonstrated needs (as we parents, experienced testers, competent teachers and not least our children can assess them).

I totally agree Tigerle. When children are miserable it is a huge red flag. We have seen it twice and it was awful. The other problem is that when anyone is depressed, change can seem even more daunting so paradoxically, making a move can be even harder. We had exactly that situation in year 4 and despite being miserable DD was terrified of going to a new school with a full time gifted class. We had a back up plan and made her try, which may be contrary to what some people believe we should have done, and DD had the best year of her educational experience.

Of course, listen to your kids but also look clearly at the entire situation. Low mood is not conducive to making clear decisions in adults let alone in miserable children.

I have another one that tends to fear change-- and wants ALL of the data (sometimes irrational, that, since it isn't always available without a crystal ball).

She also tends (on the other side of things) to see only positive aspects to change once she is onboard with it, and then minor setbacks (often things which can be anticipated, even) tend to seem like epic failure to her.

She only once "blamed" her gradeskips for feelings of social difficulty in secondary-- and when I asked her what we should have done instead, then, she quickly backpedaled. She didn't REALLY mean that she'd rather be a seventh grader than a junior in high school at the time. Not really. How did she phrase it?

Oh yes-- "Before I answer that, do you know how a wild animal might chew off its own leg to escape from a trap? Well, that's probably what 7th grade would feel like to me at the moment. Yes-- academically, of course. It would be intolerable there. But socially it would also be awful. Have you SEEN how they act??"

I think that was a vote from my then-13yo in favor of "thanks, but being an 11th grader might suck a little bit, and occasionally more than that, but it's definitely not the worst option."

Letting go of thinking in terms of perfect educational solutions was really key for us as a family in meeting DD's needs reasonably well. We weren't going to get perfect. The real question was whether or not it was a good-enough solution.

Think we have DDs with very similar outlooks HK!

We have done a lot of letting go of perfect. Even our current setting is by no means what we expected but we keep working on making it work and DD isn't miserable. That is really important.

While getting the child's input is great there are times when a parent has to make a decision in the child's best interests.

The IAS is a helpful tool.

I tried getting the IAP. It seems to be only available as a school bundle of 10 for $200. Anyone knows how to get one for home use?

A few ideas for locating the IAS (three parts: manual, evaluation forms, summary and planning forms) -
1) Is your child a DYS?
2) Does your local school have this on hand?
3) Does your child's tester/evaluator/psychologist have this resource available?
4) If you choose to purchase the IAS online (new or used), be aware that the 3rd edition is current, as you may find some 2nd edition copies.

I checked the IAS out of the library - it was available via interlibrary loan. I didn't have the official "form" for scoring, but all the information you need to do it is in the book.

We began the conversation with the school from the perspective that a grade skip would be the method of meeting our DD's needs that requires the least amount of effort from the school... simply plop her in another seat and continue doing whatever they were already doing. So we were quite surprised to see them reject that solution entirely, and volunteer to offer alternatives that would require significant effort from the homeroom teacher. Nevertheless, DW and I were quite open to any alternatives they offered, and they were all given an opportunity to succeed. All we cared about were results.

The results were abject failure, and we found alternate means to impose a grade skip despite their lack of cooperation.


I haven't heard much about that, but offhand I'd say my DD would be a very poor candidate for such a thing. I simply don't see her hitting a wall academically. And socially, the consequences of being younger are significantly lower for girls than they are for boys.


The biggest trade-off I've seen so far is that DD seems out of step when grouped with age peers in non-academic settings, like her soccer team. But the reality is that she was going to have the same problem whether she was skipped or not, and it's actually better (in the sense that it's less pretentious and more of a simple statement of fact) to explain that by saying, "I'm in fifth grade" than "I'm gifted."


We started that conversation with our DD's school six weeks into her first school year, to give them an opportunity to see how necessary it would be, because we were already convinced.

When we finally got one into effect, it did begin with the new school year.


DD gets most of her homework done at school, although the why of this is pretty outrageous. She'd rather be playing basketball at recess, but DD says the teachers keep shooing girls away from it. The girls just want to walk or sit around at recess, which is boring for DD, so she makes use of the time by sitting in one of her classrooms and knocking out her homework, so she has more time for fun when she gets home.


DD knew of the idea by the time she began K, because we were already talking about it. She was very interested in the idea. When she was still in 1st grade with age peers, she was incredibly unhappy with us parents, whom she blamed for the placement. We had a lot of work to do to prove to her that we'd been arguing with the school for a skip on her behalf pretty much since she started there. It took her presence in a meeting with the vice principal in which we had a testy exchange on the subject to finally convince her.

Last year (4th) was her first year in public school as a skipped student, and it went well. This year she's already getting bored, and is starting to push us for another skip.


This was 100% true in our case. One teacher felt the need to announce DD's age to the entire class within the first few weeks of school last year, and social problems immediately materialized, as someone started bullying her for it. The staff did nothing about the bullying issue until I got involved. That would definitely be an example of sabotage.

DD's teachers were so quick to criticize every mistake she made and blame it on skipping that she felt the need to prove them wrong every single day. One positive outgrowth of that pressure is she made huge leaps in executive function. Negative ougrowths were a pervasive sense of insecurity, a suspicion that she was a fraud, perfectionism (a problem we were already dealing with that they made worse, thanks), and an inability to celebrate her accomplishments.

I think she is only finally feeling a sense of belonging since a month ago, when she was interviewed as a candidate for Student of the Year. Even then, she was quick to dismiss that honor with, "That's just what Ms. Homeroom Teacher thinks."

My DD has also had her share of teachers that have subtly (and some not-so-subtly) made her chronological age or asynchrony an issue even when it had no legitimacy.


Ironically, one of the very worst offenders was a teacher who was very quick to inform us (as parents) that she was herself a gifted student, you know-- so she understood everything about teaching a student like DD. She was pretty derisive about radical acceleration and often looked for ways that DD was "immature" or "not well-prepared" (subjectively so, I must say).

The continuous sniping from some teachers was pretty toxic, and bewildering to me-- nevermind to DD herself.

At the same time, DD usually had the ability to be fairly sanguine about their behavior. It was a pretty strange thing to have my then-10yo sigh deeply and ask me not to "do anything" about "Ms. _____" because "she really just needs to do this in order to make herself feel better about her own abilities and how smart she is."

Bingo. This was Ms. I-was-a-gifted-student-you-know.

My guess, having interacted with her over a period of about 6 years? MG. At most. There was definitely a sense of needing to connect the dots for her, and waiting for her to catch up, when communicating with her over some point of logic that seemed almost intuitively obvious to everyone in my household.

So basically, she wanted to believe that students like DD are "no smarter than" she is/was, and the reality is that someone like DD is as comparable to her as she is to a student who needs a self-contained classroom to accommodate a severe intellectual disability.

It was the fact that my 10yo innately understood that there was no way to intervene to make that situation BETTER-- well, that's DD. This is an aspect of her that has made radically accelerating her rather painless. She understands unwritten social rules and people so well that she can very fluidly adapt to almost anything. Her solution for Ms. __ was to give her PRECISELY the formulaic work-product that she wanted, and nothing more, nothing less, no surprises, no great insights, no subtlety, no deeper analysis.

A possible downside or trade-off for whole-grade acceleration or grade-skipping may be ineligibility for certain scholarships or youth program opportunities, as mentioned in this thread.

I'm thinking about this again because DS's teacher asked me recently why DS has not been skipped and if we would still consider it. I still find it a very hard question, but we may need to reopen the discussion.

Have you looked at the Iowa Acceleration Scale (IAS)? It provides sound guidance for thinking through a number of issues/aspects which parents/child/teachers may not have otherwise reflected upon.

Familiar with up to 4 years of successful acceleration, while there is good and bad in everything, we have found the benefits to far outweigh the drawbacks.

Whichever choice a family makes...
"Things work out the best for those who make the best of the way things work out." - John Wooden

Ultra, I find that from month to month the needs (and what seems suitable) can appear quite different. We re-assess quite often...

Agreed. We never seemed to buy ourselves more than about 6 months of feeling relaxed and truly great about a new solution to educational needs.

(Keeping fingers crossed on college, which seems so far to be quite a different thing-- hopefully the arcs match longer term).

Our cycle with schools has been about two years: a six month honeymoon period, about a year of "making this work", and then six or so months of "OK, what's next."

We'd just decided to make the current situation last another six months until the end of the school year, but it's not happening.

Oy, I was totally on that bus. Hoping homeschooling will have the built-in flexibility to work over a longer time span.

We seem to be able to do about 4 months successfully... then we troubleshoot... lather, rinse, repeat...

I thought the last one would last longer. Because of its high flexibility (based on homeschooling) we jumped ahead, swapped courses as necessary, and dropped things that weren't working. But nothing lasts forever I suppose.

One reason I am leery of a skip for DS is that we have a serious sibling rivalry problem, exacerbated in some ways by obvious gaps between older and younger (younger tests higher and is also socioemotionally much more skilled). DD is threatened by him already and I feel a skip would not help that relationship. (Despite this, she's been known to ask why he hasn't been skipped.)

The other reason I have been opposed is that the homework load at the magnet program is developmentally inappropriate for children who are age-typical for grade, let alone those who are not. It would not be the difficulty that concerned me at all, but the amount.

We had process about this at our house too. Ultimately it was good for eldest to learn that others have gifts, too, and that he is not the only special sparkle-pony in the universe.

I'd say, meet DS's needs based on HIS needs, and then help your DD learn and grow and accept.


That's a very valid concern. Are you sure that Magnet is the right place for him (as opposed to skipping into a program with a lighter load)?

What do you think you will do for next year? We are in the same situation, only headed toward middle school. After years of not learning, I'm afraid to continue the trend in middle school. I think I might have to homeschool just to bring back that curiosity and love of learning that seems to be disappearing rapidly.

We don't have a lot of other options. There is a program that starts in a later grade that may or may not suit and is hard/probably impossible to get into. That's about it, other than private school or some kind of fringey charters.

Aha. Then I'd set about making a plan that meets DS's needs using the resources at Magnet but customizing as necessary. To wit: "because he's [young for grade, etc], XYZ isn't really developmentally appropriate for him yet... how can we accomplish this end via appropriate means...?"

It's amazing what's negotiable. Not everything is, of course... sigh...

To add to that-- of course, fringey charter might come with baggage that your family finds is completely unacceptable, in which case; NO.

However, if there is one that doesn't, they might be more amenable to the approach that DeeDee mentions-- that of negotiated and highly individual solutions to educational challenges/barriers.

Whether or not that is a real option depends upon how rigid your state and local charter restrictions/guidelines/laws are, and on the particular charter, of course. But it might be worth investigating. A charter might be open to things like having a student do EPGY/AoPS for math as a pull-out, for example.