Hi all, I'm thinking I'm very close to deciding not to push DD5 for a skip this year but wanted to sound it out first.
DD started school a month or so ago, she will do until December and then next year graduate as a first grader to year 2. It will be a composite of either 1/2 or 2/3 - I'll be pushing for 2/3.
DD got it in her head a while ago from her grandparents that kids don't read etc until school (I'm very unimpressed by this) however now she has started she will be up to year end reading within the month if not sooner. I know that I can push to keep her as year 1 this year and get her classified as a 3rd grader next year in the 2/3 class which will keep her with some of her friends. She LOVES her teacher who seems to me to be very open minded about giftedness. She has made friends in her class, equally though the girls she has lunch with daily are all year 2/3 now.
She also is saying she finds math very hard, which I think is odd because the math she does at home is 3rd/4th grade so I'm going to talk to teacher about what is going on here. I'm sure we can fill any gaps in the next weeks if need be.
The only reason I feel some pressure to skip is that we have our IEP meeting next week and this is the time to push. Also if I leave it any later the school year will be more than half over for the incoming class and I think it will be harder for DD to fit in mid/late year. I also think that while DD is very happy right now she will very quickly top the class (so long as she doesn't go into chameleon mode) and she does not do well when bored.
Her class only does incidental science, although she is quite happy with grade 5+ concepts so I don't think a skip will help with that, we just do it at home. We also though, are doing a few hours of math at home a week now at her behest which I just think is unfair at 5.
Any tips? I'm really finding it hard to figure out if my ego is causing me to want her to skip or seeing the potential problems ahead. Or do we take the happy situation for now and accept that any problems that are likely to develop won't be fixed until February - could be a very long year....
I think I just feel very strange about it because even though it is mid year here, DD has only been there such a short time it feels too soon to push for anything. I'm very worried that she is just going to blend into the furniture and her little spark will fade away. (I could be projecting my own experiences here
PS: we don't have the Iowa acceleratio0n scale here as far as I know, and skipping is often discouraged but we did get this on the table with the principal before DD started,
