I agree that as long as you're happy at home there's no need to send your child to preschool - she'll be fine!
[quote=Kathie_K
If you child is gifted, you'll be much better able to nurture her unique gifts at home than a teacher will be able to do in a preschool setting where she has the needs of a large group to consider.
[/quote]
I don't entirely agree with this - I do agree that you can nurture your child's unique gifts at home, but we also had some wonderful experiences at preschool for each of our children. Our preschool groups were never larger than 6-8 children per teacher, and usually were combined in a way such that there were 2 teachers and not more than 10 children in the class at any given time. In our case we chose Montessori, but I think the kind of preschool doesn't matter as much as the staff and the setting. Perhaps we were lucky, but we've had friends who also had great experiences with preschool at other schools in our town, so I don't think we were unusually lucky in our experience. Overall, for our kids, preschool was a great experience because they had the security of another set of adults who loved them, combined with the social aspect of being with other kids which in turn spurned their creative imaginations. Yes, they would have been fine at home, but they also did well having some place different to go and having the extra kids to be with. It also gave me a chance to refresh and recharge which, when my EG ds was preschool age, was extremely helpful - he was one of the kids who questions things intensely all the time and never stops thinking - he was so much fun to be with and I loved that about him, but it was honestly also quite exhausting!
And they would have been ok at home too - just wanted to point out, preschool doesn't have to be a second tier choice, it can work out well.
polarbear
