Good advice. I learned that the hard way when I did months worth of agonizing, hair-splitting, research into the preschools in our area only to have to pull dd out midway through the year when I realized the one I had chosen was a terrible fit. You know what they say about the best laid plans...
st pauli girl, you were kind enough to ask about dd4 and her interests. I know this is too general, but she is interested in life! She focuses on a particular topic (U.S. Geography, space, dinosaurs) and wants to learn everything about it. Then she abandons that topic altogether and moves on to the next one.
For most of her young life she has had an obsession with numbers. Just after she turned 2, we moved into a new neighborhood and without me even realizing it, she memorized everyone's address. I'd say, "Do you want to play with that girl we just met?" And she'd say, "The one in the 55 house?" To this day, I ask her for house numbers when I'm sending out the Christmas Cards. She's now very interested in manipulating the numbers (addition, subtraction, multiplication, etc.)
DD loves to read - she taught herself how (no thanks to me) before her 3rd birthday. And not easy readers. More like, sneak up behind me while I'm typing an email, stare at the computer screen and say, "We're going to the museum on Thursday?" So she's always a tough one to keep one step ahead of!
That's probably too much information - and I hope none of it came across as bragging - but it does feel good to talk honestly about my child. Even at the "gifted" school, I often find myself downplaying her "gifts" to other parents.
