Yes
again to Dottie's post; some of the very courses that my daughter has begged to take have turned out to be the slowest and most obviously 'remedial' or 'fluff' courses. We've since learned to be wary of those.
Part of our problem is that the classess that my daughter is in
are "honors" courses, certainly-- but the definition and practical application of that term varies significantly by location and administration. In this particular instance, what that means is that she (and the other 6-10 brightest of the 100+ students in each 'section') are the "honors" registrants.
She is generally, like Dottie's DS, in the top tier of THEM...
but the problem is that it's a mixed-ability class. DD is problematic here because she really does NOT tolerate repetition with any kind of grace at all. It's that mixture which is bad news. It might not be if she were more internally driven the way some kids are-- but she's not. She does what's required of her unless someone lights her fire; and most of the high school courses she's had, the teacher is (rightly) a lot more focused on the 80% of the class that doesn't get it so well, and less on 'engaging' my daughter, who is tuning out because it all feels plodding and uninteresting.
The way that "honors" works around here is that it isn't a different class-- it's the SAME class, but with
extra work piled onto the regular workload. Jump all of the standard hoops and THEN we'll get to the stuff you're here for. In other words, yet again, increased output expectations.
We, too, have always maintained that if DD is to be accelerated like this, she simply has to be "any other student" from the teacher's perspective. She doesn't get special accommodations due to her age or asynchrony-- except in a few instances where, physically, something is simply impossible (some laboratory set-up or design procedures are physically impossible because of her size, coordination, or strength, for example). We make sure that if her physical limitations impact how much SHE is able to do independently, that she makes it up cerebrally instead; by extending conclusions into a thought experiment, evaluating basic statistics, etc.
It can be an uncomfortable balance sometimes, because she
isn't actually a fourteen or fifteen year old the way her academic peers are. I've at times wondered if her graceless, obvious disdain for material she already knows isn't a
maturity issue at its heart. She can come across (to teachers and classmates) as insufferably arrogant at times, I know, because she is often fairly outspoken about her complaints.
