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

That this is true for a huge number of kids is just so very sad. There is so much that is wonderful and amazing about learning and discovering and being a little kid.

Question to all. Did your early elementary kids actually know of the concept of grade skipping and asked for it. Or is this a question you posed to them before you approached the school?

In one case, school initiated 1st whole-grade acceleration, kiddo initiated 2nd, with subsequent accelerations occurring after elementary also initiated by kiddo.

Purely from an economic perspective, having your child enter post-secondary 3 to 5 years earlier than agemates also allows for a cost-savings on higher education, too. I'm sure that must seem incredibly gauche to parents who don't yet have kids in college, but there is pretty much no WAY to not think about the cost, frankly. It's eye-watering and it climbs by 4-8% annually.

At the rate of tuition increases at most institutions these days, that could easily mean that a fifth year can be paid for out of the savings, or at least partially so.

Compressing primary made school tolerable for our daughter. It did come with some trade-offs, certainly. Particularly in high school, there is an expectation of huge amounts of TIME devoted to study and busy-work (my description)-- that time is not appropriate for students as youngish adolescents anyway, in my own opinion, but even less so for children who are younger.

Screen time is also a consideration-- additional computer time is not insignificant in secondary and beyond. There are physiological considerations about that. We've needed to really watch our DD's ergonomics, I'll say that.

Parents of young college students may have less income and savings than they will a few years later, which is actually a benefit in the need-based financial aid system. It is less bad to deplete your savings on college expenses when you are relatively young.

My son knew about grade skipping because his cousin skipped a grade. The cousin needed to skip again but had a sibling. The cousin is mostly happy now in high school.

In our case: Yes

Heh, we decided it was the best answer, but the school beat us to the punch and suggested it, and then before DS knew we had it in the works he had met a kid who had skipped and told us he thought it would be a good idea if he skipped 2nd.

We early entered, so no for the first skip, though there was awareness of the concept, because we had explained that both parents entered first grade at about that age (one by being days before the cutoff, the other by being days after the cutoff and early entered). The school initiated the second skip, after third grade. Actually without our awareness, until the first day of school, when papers came home labeled with the unexpected grade on them. In the second case, we did have discussions with school administrators prior to the skip, that included both parents and child, and all of the available assessment data (report cards, group achievement, and OLSATs) regarding acceleration needs. So there was some awareness about the need for individual planning, and there was child input on SSA, but not on grade-skipping. OTOH, this particular child is not the sort to bat an eyelash at change, and sometimes doesn't seem to notice it at all.

ETA: Oh, and many members of the extended family, in the gparental, parental, and cousin generations have grade-skipped, several far more radically, so this wasn't a strange concept in general.

We explained both early entry and grade skipping. DS understood that he was allowed early into the preschool's K pullout (3-6 classroom) but needed the grade school principals approval for early entry into first to make the grade skip official, and he very much wanted the early entry. He showed exemplary behaviour to the principal when he came in for a trial day!
We have kept casually mentioning that sometimes kids skip grades when the higher grade might be a better fit, but until recently have discussed the possibility of another grade skip only with teachers. With the school psych observing and assessing DS, so much control was out of our hands I wanted to get a very clear opinion on what DS wanted before initiating the process.

When DD was privately tested, they suggested one or more grade skips would be appropriate and perhaps even necessary. The district seemed to think that it would be the end of life as we know it to skip any child for any reason ever.

DD was adamantly against it back then (after 1st) as she was very sensitive about being seen as different. Of course she was also completely miserable in school. We ended up changing schools to a one-year accelerated school and then found an alternative (outside the district) where it was less about grade skipping and more about just, well, skipping along until you hit the level you needed. This defused the 'feeling different' issue.

Anyway, the point is that sometimes kids don't want to skip even though, for their own well being, they need to. They have advanced intellect, but not emotional development or life experience to make a fully formed decision. This is of course very different from skipping a child because the parents want it. We judge not based on what she says she wants, but what makes her happier, less anxious, and more comfortable with herself.