DD has been tested >99.9% with a very even profile. She is 3 months past the K cutoff and eligible for early entry. She would start K at 4y3m if we went that way. School starts in January but we need to decide in the next 2 months in order to get our application in.

Some background: She is currently in daycare 4 days a week and 1 day with grandparents. She isn't an outgoing girl but is not shy either. She warms quickly to people and likes attention. She has a long attention span for her age, can follow directions and sit still. At home, she likes to play board games and video games, run/jump around, and sometimes some basic pretend play (eg putting dolls to bed, shopping).

There are my rambling thoughts - some might not be as 'valid' as others Any advice would be appreciated

Reasons against early entry
- she is very happy at daycare and hasn't expressed any negative opinions
- apart from one girl 6months older (who I suspect is gifted), she tends to play with the younger children. She says the older girls do not like her
- she loves playing with other kids and would be heartbroken if no one would play with her
- she does not invent complicated games and is quite happy with basic physical activities (eg playing chasing games)
- she is a follower, not a leader, and I worry about her being led astray
- 45% of the children in K would be more than a year older than her (based on previous enrolment history)
- she is not yet reading, however I think she will be by the end of the year as she is starting to write 'sentences' with the 1st letter of words
- by the time the school starts I suspect she will know all 1st grade math concepts (she already knows all of K math). So she would need differentiation regardless of whether she enters early or on time
- being the correct age for her grade would give her a greater chance of getting into the only decent high school in our area (entry test)
- she doesn't care whether she goes to daycare or school next year (she only wants to do what her friend does)
- I think her test result is 'too high'. I haven't seen her display any extraordinary abilities. To me she seems MG
- if early entry doesn't work out, we have no care to fall back on as daycare/preschools here have long waiting lists

Reasons for early entry
- the psych recommended it
- if her test result is accurate, then research shows early entry/acceleration to be a good option and a grade skip now would probably be easier than one later
- I can't find any local schools who have a composite K-1 class (to possibly skip year 1)
- daycare do not believe she is gifted (fine at the moment while she is enjoying herself, but next year she may actually need a teacher who understands her)
- her one good friend from daycare is unlikely to be there next year, which could lead to boredom as she would be among the oldest

Wish you the best with your and your daughter's decision. It is such a tough decision, ours is 3 and 3 months, and I already fear that decision.

Is there any problem proceeding with the early entry application regardless as long as you don't lose your daycare spot? January is a long way away in developmental terms so while your DD may be happy now, her needs may change dramatically in the next few months. Would she be going to school with her older friend from daycare if she went to school in January?

Early entry seems one of the easier forms of acceleration and perhaps simpler to arrange than a direct skip to first grade which could be needed if you stay in daycare next year.

I am not sure why you think that being correct age for grade will help with the high school entry? If it is an assumption that she is more likely to get high scores in the entry exam because she is older then that is not necessarily true. We have found the opposite. Much better test results that occur after acceleration because the material is more appropriate and engaging. It's hard to focus on what is very familiar and easy.

The most important thing we have found for general happiness is an appropriate curriculum. The social side always seems to improve if we get that bit right as we end up with a happier more confident child. But every child is different.

Thanks for the well wishes it_is_2day

We should be able to put in an application without withdrawing from daycare, but daycare will be aware of it as they need to complete part of the application. I just hope that won't count against us when daycare are doing enrolments for next year. I wish they were easier to talk to about the whole situation.

We would like to get into a school that is not in our area, which adds to the complication as the school has been told to severely cut back their intake of out of area students. So we might be knocked back for that reason, and not early entry. Also, I'm not sure what school the friend will be going to as her parents are buying a new house soon and not sure where it will be.

Yes that was the assumption I had made on the test results. Good to know that it is wrong, so at least it is one less thing to worry about.

My biggest worry is that the other kids will not play with her, and she just loves other kids. I just wish I could see her in a preschool type environment with only the kids who are going to school next year, to see how they interact.

I agree that January is far, far, away and your DD's developmental needs would change between now and then. When do you need to finalize your decision?

Not much help here. I don't think 4 year olds should be at school but your 4 year old may be more ready than someone else's 6 year old.

Why did you test a 3 year old who seems happy at school and seems MG to you? Were there some other issues? We don't have the same system but I take it she misses the cut of by a long way not a couple of months? I suspect their isn't a good answer you will just have to decide which is the least worst. We don't have yearly enrollments at childcare here either so I am not sure how much weight to put on repercussions but I am fairly sure their report will reflect that they don't think she is gifted. Would that be a major problem?

I too worried about daycare's recommendations if they don't believe she is gifted. Is this straight daycare or is there a preschool component/program? I ask because I wonder how much opportunity your daughter would have to show her giftedness in a play based daycare? We had the opposite experience in that the day care teacher picked up on our DD's giftedness. They had an incorporated preschool program so more opportunity to demonstrate her academic side.

Rereading your post, the main concerns seem to be:
1. You are not sure whether the test result is accurate
2. The social aspect and friendship groupings
3. Not having care if the early entry doesn't work and you worry it may not because of 1 and 2.

While I have always been told it is possible to underscore rather than over score in intelligence testing, your DD is very young and there is a question of score stability with early testing. Still, I am sure, as Puffin pointed out, that there were reasons you tested so she must be showing exceptionality in some way.

The social aspect worries all of us. No one wants their child alone at school. The problem is that finding friendships and peers is really hard to predict and depends on so many factors. There may be great friendships to be had next year but it's hard to know. No guarantee about the year after though as age is not the only factor.

Is she going to be ready for school in all other ways, toileting, managing clothing, coping without excessive fatigue etc? School can be quite tiring as there are more demands on the child's executive functioning and, hopefully, with the intellectual stimulation. These are things to note as the year goes on.

I would put in the application but reserve judgement until much closer to the day while continuing to assess your daughter's development.

We tested because I didn't want to end up in December and find out that DD was ready for school and that we hadn't done a thing about it. I knew she was advanced but the high result has shocked me, which is why I am doubting its accuracy I guess. I have Ruf's book and originally I thought she was a Level 2 (being conservative). Then as time when on, I thought maybe Level 3. Now I read Level 4 and I just don't know. Some bits yes and some bits no. Perhaps my ideas of what a 3yo should be like are so far skewed that I don't realise how different she is.

Daycare is almost all play based. They have 15mins of group time a day for 3yo's and an extra 15mins for the school readiness group. Given that DD loves physical activities and does not seem to participate in any complicated games, it is entirely possible that she does not demonstrate her giftedness. Also she isn't reading, which I guess is one of the usual tell tale signs.

The daycare section on the application form is all fact based (mostly Y/N questions), such as can she wait her turn, can she count to 10 etc. There are a few short answer questions but on specific topics.

puffin - she misses the cut off by 3months.

ndw - yes I guess those are my worries in a nutshell

Ruf based her book on a very very small sample of children so don't get too hung up on that or DD's reading. It may not be her interest right now.

Doesn't sound like there is anything lost in making the application. There are no simple answers but keeping your options open is always a good idea. If there is one thing about kids, they are constantly changing and surprising you.

Good luck with your decision.

3 months isn't so much unless other kids are routinely held back. School at 4.5 seems young to me though. My kids were picked up at daycare as at daycare the teachers actually take time to talk to the kids and notice that they think more deeply. School teachers don't have time to talk to the kids about non work related things so miss philosophical thoughts.

I would have chosen level 2 RUF for ds1 until the tests too.

How big would the kindergarten be? Has your daughter visited it?

DS started private school at 4.5 (which means we applied and he visited the school at age 3.5) and it was a tremendous success, but his kindergarten had only 9 kids and his school is very individualized, so there was no risk of him getting lost in the crowd.

I agree with the comments that you shouldn't assume your child will do worse on high school entry tests if she starts school early. DS started early, skipped another grade later and is still at the top of his class and performs well enough on end-of-grade tests to earn merit scholarships at his private school every year. I can't prove it, but I do believe that his good academic record and enduring love of school is a direct result of the skips.

I do not think you can not depend on daycare providers to assess giftedness. 0-3 years are years of major changes, and it is expected that children are learning and developing so rapidly at their pace so unless your child is so obvious about their giftedness, it is easy for me to see how it can be missed at daycare. I have seen it with DS who tends to blend in so well that people usually see an average boy.

Most daycares that I have seen tends to be very loosely structured with play centers that the children can wander through themselves, and I can easily see how a range of gifted children are overlooked with their "quirks" seen through the lenses of early child development. Daycare teachers my children have had are amazing but their focus is not assessing a child's academic strengths and long term academic education. They are more focused on fostering non-academic skills, independence and physical skill development.

And we started DS at 4 in a GT program because he was acting out at 3.5 - he told us school was not fun anymore and he could not talk to his classmates. We accelerated him into pre-k at 3.7, and he became best friends with a group of kindergarten kids (pre-k and K mixed a lot especially during summer) but we knew when they left since they were already over 5, he would be miserable again even if we moved him into the new K class (which he did one week of, and hated it since it was basically his pre-k room moved up).

but every child is different. My mother was 2 years accelerated as a child, and felt that age difference through high school even though academics were no issue, and my younger sister was the youngest in her class and it was similar for her - some social struggles in early years (my parents sent her to private school during middle school years because she needed a change of social scene). But she went back to our town high school, which was really large, and in high school, she excelled and she enjoyed college.

This was certainly true in our case. DS was tested as reading at a 4th grade level when he entered kindergarten at 4 1/2, and yet his preschool pooh-poohed me when I let them know we were pursuing early kindergarten enrollment. DS loved preschool, so his preschool teachers saw no need to rush things, but in my mind, it was a matter of prevention, not remediation. DS was enjoying school and I wanted to keep it that way, not wait for things to go sour.

I totally agree with this. The intellectual growth can hit in sudden furious spurts - it's good to have a school environment with the "headroom" to support this.

Every child is different, and I am a big believer in parents being the most qualified to assess what will be the best, or most appropriate environment for their child. I also know it isn't always an easy assessment to make, and other people's experiences can be informative, so for what it's worth, we started our DD in K at 3.8 (she has a January birthday and wouldn't have been traditionally eligible for another 2 years).

For her, it was definitely the right thing to do. She had started preschool at 2.8 (at the encouragement of her toddler care provider), and her preschool director was the one who urged us to have her tested at 3. According to her preschool director, she had already mastered all of the multi-year curriculum there, and she felt strongly DD was ready for K. The psychologist who tested her agreed.

We considered giving her one more year of preschool, but given where she was and her pace of learning, we felt fairly certain she would be past a K curriculum after another year. A jump from preschool to K seemed like a better transition then a jump from preschool to 1st grade. Most importantly, we talked to DD and told her we, and her teachers, felt she was ready for K but it was her choice whether to go to preschool or K. She wanted to go to Kindergarten, so off we went. I can't say it was smooth sailing. It was for DD - she loved it and thrived. It was a good fit for her academically and socially. It was rough for us because many of the other parents in the class were absolutely awful about it initially. The teachers were super supportive, but they did struggle some, not having a lot of training or experience in gifted education. At some points they seemed to expect her to achieve perfection in everything. Ultimately the school brought in a consultant for them and that was incredibly helpful.

She moved on to first grade this year when she was 4.8, and this year has been even better. She is comfortable and confident, and has made great progress without being frustrated. Now we're faced with what do do next year, however, because another acceleration at some point seems likely. That's a whole different issue, though.

Trust your gut. If you feel like she's ready, she probably is. Also, if you don't feel like you're seeing what her scores indicate, it could be because she isn't being asked to perform to that level. Our DD's teachers have learned that often they just need to put something in front of her even if they aren't certain she's ready, and most of the time she rises to the challenge without any trouble. Finally, I do think early K entrance is a good transition point. If you think you'll need to accelerate her, this is a great time to do it.

K would be in class of around 20 students I'd imagine. And depending on the school, it could be around 200-500 kids in total. It is a lot for a young child to handle and at the moment, I don't think she is ready for that.

It is a good point about keeping her having a good time and not waiting for things to go sour.

I have watched her at daycare sit down at a table next to a girl who was scribbling. So DD scribbled too. The other week I saw her sit down with a child who was writing letters and drawing flowers. So DD wrote letters and drew flowers. I guess she just mirrors what she sees around her and maybe she would rise to the challenge if she was asked to perform.

I am going to meet with a principal of another school on Friday to discuss. They have a preschool on site and may be able to evaluate DDs social readiness against the other preschool students.

I think in all, I am leaning against early entry at this stage. But yes, January is a long way away and it is a good idea to keep our options open.