Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment early kindergarten advice or considerations?

I think one of the possible benefits of doing early K is that a kid can get into the habit of being challenged and working. At DSs old preschool he kept hearing the well intended but poisonous comment: "you're so smart". At his new school is Just Another Guy which is a lot healthier for him I think.

This is the whole "Growth Mindset" Carol Dweck thing. I wish I had a link to one of her presentations. I think she makes a lot of good points.

My thinking is line with yours.

I wouldn't even relate "goofing off" to "immaturity" unless the former was getting in the way of his education. If he's got all his work done early, and he's earning top grades, then goofing off is a healthy outlet for coping with boredom.

unfortunately you can not do much about changing your sister's mind.

We found out that DS when he was 3.5 was very cleverly messing with the other kids behind the teacher's back due to boredom (we had someone observe his room)- the teacher thought he was so well behaved. That was just at 3.5, and no one noticed... it makes me suspect that if he remained in that type of environment where he was so bored, it would manifest in similar goofing off or some other not so healthy behavior that would get blamed as being immature. We got him out of there, and now he is too busy and engaged to come up with stuff like that.

Our DS has just turned four. His teachers think that he needs a lot of social and emotional development before entering K. They say that he appears to be a typical student if you didn't know him. His impulse control has improved. But I can't help but feel that if he were in a program that provided challenging activities, they would see a child that is ready for K. But it doesn't matter, I've tried to open up that dialogue with the school and it's just not going to happen. According to our entry schedule in CA, he cannot enter K until he's 5.5. He was doing K work at 23 months-almost 3 and now he's getting close to a second grade level.
We recently asked the school district to test him and they did. Having confirmation for us and a way to communicate with the school district regarding his scores is incredibly beneficial. We have nothing to prove to anyone, and the scores were a nice place to start with a plan. I hope your sisters will come around for your sanity but honestly, being a parent of a gifted child comes with an ongoing lonliness that always seems to be there, somewhere-but sometimes, it's a small part of my day, usually "giftedness" of my son is like 90 percent of our daily life. So glad you posted! I hope you find this forum to be as wonderful as I do.

A couple of other things to think about related to early entry and a full day program:
- How high is your child's tolerance for boredom? My son might have been able to hold it together for a couple of hours at that age if bored, but he wouldn't have been able to do it for 6.
- How many kids in the class? Teacher ratio? Here one excellent school has a kindergarten classroom that has almost 30 kids with only 1 teacher, no aides. My son would have struggled with some of the sensory issues at that age.

Not trying to discourage you. Just wanted to raise a couple potential issues.