Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy Grade skipping trade offs

Even after the grade skip, my son continues to do some activities with age mates (sports are grouped by age and not grade in school in the community and scouts we kept him in his scout group by age even though you can go by age or by grade according to scouts...we let him choose and he wanted to be with his friend)...but has also done one activity with high school kids and kept right up/fits in.

I guess I am just not as worried about the social as much as some people might be because he is pretty mature and socially advanced with just a bit of whiney little boy reserved just for me when he is tired or hungry. Also he has a December birthday so he isn't too much younger than some of his classmates.

It was never "versus/or" in our case-- it was and. With any child that truly requires grade acceleration, I pretty much see it as doomed to failure if that is ALL that is going to be done in the name of meeting the child's educational needs. It has to come with a variety of other accommodations, because such children are not just "advanced" and if they were, it would be so much more clear when and if acceleration is a good idea or not. Oh, well, Petunia here is a great candidate for acceleration because she is in fact an 8yo in a 6yo's body. We should just change her birth certificate and move her into third grade immediately." (Yeah, no-- this isn't how HG+ kids look.)

Pretty sure that isn't so. My DD15 is enjoying college quite well, thank you, and has had not a lot of social difficulty, fits in well, has friends, etc. I think that this depends on factors that are simply not going to be very clear when your child is 4-8yo and prepubescent.


There ARE some social trades. She was the last of her friends to have a boyfriend. She is among the last of them to learn to drive-- and it tends to compress a BUNCH of huge life-changing adolescent milestones into the same 18 month period of time, something that isn't true for many adolescents who get to do those things over a period of 4-6 years instead. It's also true that we'd have been happier about a college placement at an elite college 2000 miles away if she were 18 and not 15.


Yes-- January to March. This gives everyone time to work out concerns and-- preferably-- a plan A and a fallback position.

I agree with HK. Grade skipping is one of the many forms of accommodation we have experienced with our DD including SSA, curriculum compaction, online material and live tutors. Grade skipping needs to be seen as part of the package not the solution, because it isn't especially, as our DD needs faster and deeper as well as higher grade material.

The social side doesn't really stress us but it is a big issue for many teachers and parents of NT kids who don't understand that when our DD is academically mismatched she becomes depressed and social interactions also suffer. When she is feeling academically challenged she grows in self confidence in all areas and becomes more outgoing and socially able.

Are we worried that she won't be driving until university? Ah, no. Is she? Nope. Drinking? Partying? No and No. It isn't her desire anyway. If it was there are members of her current class who indulge in all of the above and more. She has her friends who range in age from a year younger to three years older from across grades. None of them find the party scene an attractor and they are all very comfortable with who they are.

I didn't drive until after finishing Uni for a variety of reasons. Lots of kids didn't. I didn't ever hit the party scene and I had lots of friends.

By the wayI haven't heard of kids hitting the wall and having to repeat after acceleration. I have heard a number of teachers tell me that their child was smart enough to grade skip but they didn't "do that to them" and they became very successful, so you shouldnt grade skip your child. I thank them for their opinion and do what is best for my child. Like HKs DD she will potentially be at Uni at 15 unless she takes time off.

Yes. This right here. Our DD11 is so much more happy and comfortable with herself when she's working at appropriate level. She is much more socially well adjusted and confident.

As for needing to repeat or slow down toward the end, I've never heard that. But even if it were true, well who cares? DD is 2-3 years accelerated across all subjects. If she decides in a couple of years to take a year to do a foreign exchange, start a business, do an intensive internship or volunteer, or concentrate on a hobby... and needs to slow her academics for a year, well she at least can afford the time!

I don't see that happening at this point, but it's so much easier to explore those options with a 13 year old than an 8 year old.

The finishing high school too early is a problem in countries that don't really have early admission or if they do financial assistance is less available. But if the kid needs the skip now then you worry about later when it comes. Everything has a price but that doesn't mean you don't do it.

I'll chime in that grade retentions late (at or past secondary level) don't appear to be that common among those I know who skipped. I took an extra year in college, and many extra years in graduate school, which I expect had something to do with waiting for social-emotional maturity to catch up, but I don't view those years as wasted, by any means (and I have degrees in diverse fields to go with them). Rather, the early entries and skips provided me with additional time to explore areas of intellectual and personal interest, separate from career preparation. If early entry to uni is not an option, one can still pursue personal interests and explorations during a gap year or two.

I think an inappropriate grade skip--especially one motivated by reasons other than child-driven educational thirst--might be more likely to result in repeated grades later. Or, for some 2e or highly-skewed children. I have one who has been grade advanced twice, and another who hasn't. They are about equally advanced in math, but one is strong in writing, and the other is about age-level in writing, and maybe a little below in spelling. Grade skipping the second one across the board would require a lot of accommodations (which are not an issue, practically speaking, because we homeschool).

In answer to the original post:

The decision to accelerate the first time was because we were moving from an accelerated learning program to a normal school in another state and DD was over a year above grade level in all subjects. We accelerated mid year in conjunction with the school change which is another natural break conducive to skipping.

The current decision to skip again is because a combination of curriculum compaction and SSA have DD over a year above grade level again and we were tired of the timetable juggle which SSA required. She is effectively only accelerating in English as she has met the requirements of the year above in other subjects.

I can't think of any other trade offs as it were. I can think of a few if we don't grade skip and that will include comprising DDs academic and psychological development for the sake of an artificial grouping based on age.

I agree that skipping students inappropriately could certainly lead to issues. Any decision has to be all about what is best for any individual child and made without projecting parental desires or fears into the decision process. That can be harder than you think as we are all a product of experiences that can colour our decisions.

While it is important that the child be on board with a skip be aware that their fears and concerns can be overwhelming and may mean that your clearer head has to prevail. Kids can't always see what is good for them. A trial period for any skip which has an exit strategy with no value judgement is important to allow everyone to see what can be achieved with support and care.

One other point although not exactly a trade off, you may need to be prepared for 'greater asynchrony'. Our DD is perfectly mature and indistinguishable from her peers who are two or three years older while in a public arena. At home she is allowed to be a little girl with her stuffed toys and cuddles and she can reread Roald Dahl or Captain Underpants if she wants. She is very aware that we are totally happy for her to be herself, whatever 'age' that is.

At this point, we have decided against grade skipping mostly because DS8, currently in third, doesn't want to.
The trade offs he describes resonate with us: he has friends he does not want to lose, he does not want to be even younger than he is now, he likes his teacher, it is only math that is stifling, LA, science and specials are okay.

from our point of view:
he has worked hard to gain the limited acceptance and the few friends that he has. While he does very well with kids who are two years older one on one, particularly a few girls he gets on great with, it is not the kind of social preference that works so well in a classroom.
He is already accelerated (early entry) but because of a fall birthday, he is only a month younger than the youngest regular kid. Every fall, though, the teasing starts, and he is reactive to it. I do not know why he cares, I never did after my grade skip, but he does, and it's his life.
His teacher recognizes his giftedness, and is willing to do what is in her power, which isn't much, but sometimes you are just grateful for the right attitude. He likes to be in her classroom and mostly likes going to school every day.
If math SSA works out, it might be just right for him. He can do with the writing instruction and training that ramps up in third grade. By fifth grade (middle school where I live) he's got to have some things down he hasn't yet. He does not mind the language arts instruction so much, and reading is okay, too, even though he is way ahead, because he is not the only one and the teacher does do some grouping.he is truly challenged in executive function and we will, at this point, emphasize that one and maths.

I think it is true for most education systems that elementary school has to be endured, and if possible, compressed in the shortest possible time, but by middle school, things do have to fall into place - options open up, but expectations have to be met. By high school age, most kids are mature enough to find their niches and profit from what there is on offer in a much wider world that works for them including online and higher education, but between, say, ten and fourteen, you mostly have to make school, and classrooms, work for them. Acceleration in elementary can get you in that place faster, and it is the trade offs in that setting I am looking at now that DS is in third - if I had felt the need for another grade skip between K and second, I might have just looked at getting him through elementary with the least damage.

Now I am looking at fifth grade in the city's gifted program which is where we presume he will end up in either next year or the year after, and which does have a good reputation for supporting radically accelerated (my definition: by two years) kids, and looking at my son, and I am wondering: could he, and by extension the whole family, cope with the executive function demands, the social scene, and the commute, by next year, and my current answer is no.
I shall make sure that things are in place so if I feel the answer is different by next fall, I can move him there quickly.
I don't mean that I, or anyone, should worry about puberty or driving or drinking or onset of menstruation and all that crap that people come up with. But wonder about an 8 year old in fifth grade, or a nine year old in sixth grade in middle school, and weigh the trade offs of the greater options against the demands, I would.

If the average peak annual earnings of bright people are $100K, and if years skipped mean more years worked, then each year skipped is worth $100K. I wonder why people rarely consider this. $100K is a lot of money.

When I went to school, elementary school (grade 1-6) was followed by two years of junior high school, in which most academic classes were tracked. Nowadays junior high schools have been mostly replaced by "middle schools" (grades 608), which are mostly untracked and may be worse than elementary school for gifted children. The differences in mental ages of students in an untracked 8th grade English class will be larger than in an untracked 1st grade English class.