What a shame. The fear is that the extreme emphasis on reading skills in the first couple grades of elementary end up causing your clearly gifted son to identify himself as not smart, or just average, and have that attitude become ingrained. Will the general attitude of "I'm so so" or "school's not fun", learned now, affect how he feels years from now even in subjects he would naturally excel at (like math and science).
What do you think is the root cause of the competitiveness? Does the competitiveness extend to the pull-out groups in which its harder to finish first? I guess I am wondering if he finds the pull-outs more stressful than regular class, for some reason which then has to be figured out. The pull-outs ought to be fun and interesting. Do the rest of the pull-out kids happen to be advanced readers so that the group teacher assumes a reading level that makes him the last one finished?
Polly
