Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Recommended Resources Online Charter School?

Thanks for all the info. I just want to keep options open and informed. There are too many days where I just feel incompetent to teach this kid! And thinking about how things will go in the future make me even more terrified.

Well, ditto for me Phey. Take a deep breath and take it one step, one day, one week, etc. at a time.

Remember, too, your child's needs are likely to change. I find that once you can grasp of what your child's interests/needs are, what makes them tick, and how they learn best, it gets somewhere easier. It also gets easier once the child starts to take ownership over their learning and starts to self-direct it. There are a couple of homeschooling books where parents have managed to encourage this process (e.g. Joanne Calderwood's book, Self-Propelled Advantage), which you might find useful.

There are usually more options once children reach middle/high school material. Of course, there are numerous free MOOCs online today, though I realize the quality isn't always consistent. But who knows what's going to be available within a few years.

That's really good advice, cdfox.

We've approached each year with Connections as "yes/no" for THAT YEAR.

We often don't decide one way or the other about the following fall until sometime in May, and it always involves an assessment of how things have been going in the current year, and sometimes an option to "see how we feel in August."

K12 here is a virtual charter through the local district. So, would their bureaucracy/whatever WRT skipping and acceleration apply, or does K12 allow us to proceed at whatever pace? Or is this something I have to ask the district?

UM, our experience suggests that it often equals some chimera of the three things-- local/state/district policy + local virtual school administrative/board policy + national corporate policy.

The mix is a bit unpredictable, however. The only thing that is certain is that any HARD limits that are in written law/policy can't be easily circumvented. Beyond that it's policy and caprice, I'm afraid.

You don't really know until you ask. Our experience was that it was slightly more flexible than the local standard, which was WAY more flexible than the state as a whole, and moderately flexible at the corporate level (and that has changed somewhat since 2006) and that our local administration has been VERY willing to go to bat for us with corporate players who were obstructionist.

Most, but not all, virtual charters are statewide, so they are not part of a district, or rather, they are there own district. They are subject to state rules, and you must do state testing, for eaxmple. In principle, any acceleration is possible, but in reality you are subject to the rules and whims of school administrators. I'm sure k12.com itself is happy for you to do whatever you want, but they don't run the school, they just provide the curriculum, see my post above.

Despite the faults we have mentioned, both HowlerKarma and I have used virtual charters to radically accelerate our kids, so it can be done. But investigate your local option to try to see what they'll do. It would be ideal if you could find gifted parents in the school to ask.

Also June is late to be checking into virtual charters for starting in August. Usually applications start in March or April, depending on area, and there are more applicants than places. But ask anyway.

Well, he's actually registered at a B&M school and will start there in August. I have been thinking of K12 as our "out" if kindergarten goes very badly. I do NOT want to do K12. It would be a disaster for me professionally to pull him from school. However, we were verging on full-on school refusal last year in preschool. So, if he gets to that point again, we will have to pull him. I had no idea the K12 charter could be like a B&M charter with limited spots and so on. I kind of thought you could just do it. Our district presents it as an option for kids with medical needs, particularly. It's newly implemented here and few people seem to know about it. I guess I need to look into it more.

ETA: No, the website for my district indicate that they're open for enrollment for 2013-2014 with no indication of any limits or anything. I would just have to submit the same stuff I submitted to enroll him in a B&M school. (odd, in a way--proof of immunization??)

It depends on the state-- and state charter laws-- and to a lesser extent upon where the charter is actually housed. If it's housed within a home district, then there is a motivation to have an enrollment cap (so that the district can't gut other public schools by pulling enrollment $$ from struggling districts, especially rural/poor performing ones).

State charter enrollment laws will then dictate whether there is a waiting list at that point, or a lottery, or just what happens when there are more applicants than openings.

Ah, well--I live in a verrrry charter-friendly state...

What is this? "A robust Advanced Learner Program "