Update - the school adaptations have started. The gifted coordinator met with my son to talk about how it might work. He seemed quite happy. It's mostly math that will change - he can work ahead at will and when done the curriculum can use that time to do other things. Then, the next morning, he didn't want to go again.
The gifted pull out class was this morning. He didn't want to go because they are working on "big questions". In the last session he seemed to enjoy it (came up with questions that really fit with his interests) but he commented on the fact that the other kids questions were pretty dark. For example - one boy wanted to know what would happen if you went into space without a spacesuit.
So his desire to not go had to do with not wanting to be around people that have those questions and also he finds research annoying. Says that you can't ever find anything. Maybe the fact that random things pop up bothers him or maybe he just needs to figure out how to research better. Can't figure out what's under that - if anything.
Also, the class was going to attend a social media talk by a local expert and he didn't want to go to that because he doesn't like social media.
Anyone else getting things like this?
I was researching how Distributed Learning worked quite seriously and have had some chats with local parents using different DL schools. Felt we were kind of going down that road. I think the idea of a big change like that is hard for him. Probably like any 12 year old. He seems to want it then when presented with the option is backing down.
He has just been accepted into an alternative program for next year. It is at a high school further away but in the same area and it combines humanities, math, science and technology into one class. The group is smallish - 36kids - and they do really interesting hands on work with lots of projects and some trips.
So big changes on the horizon no matter what. I think it would be interesting for him to try DL to experience what it would be like to learn that way. We're back in a bit of a limbo though.
Let's see how the next week rolls out with the new changes I guess.
Any ideas/advice/comments?
