Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Kindergarten readiness

Kriston,

I agree that 1st would be a great skip, but it's a hard one to accomplish at least in our school system. 2nd was a good year for DD since it was a good teacher fit and the pace picked up a bit. 3rd grade was torture because we have our first round of achievement testing. The entire year consisted of math drills and DD was bored out of her mind. Focus was on the kids who needed intervention.

For us, getting the early entrance to K was a great option, because we had a hard time with any skips later on. Right now we have subject acceleration that may be enough until middle school (next year). The key is to take it year by year and adjust the plan as needed.

Jen

DS6 is skipping first and entering second - tomorrow
I didn't even consider skipping K or early entrance for DS because I was in HG+ denial; but in retrospect I'm glad I didn't try for it. From what I know about 1st grade in our district, it would have been a bad fit for DS no matter what age. In K at least they had 2 recesses and much more free play (i.e., less time to sit around and watch other kids learn to read and count). Keep in mind that every district is different -- first grade for us is very much about getting all of the kids up to speed with basic reading. Of course, I'm also concerned about DS not spending much time learning this year, but I'm keeping my fingers crossed...

DS4 started half-day K this fall. It was not an easy decision because DS's abilities are extremely asynchronous. His reading and math are at mid- to end of 2nd grade level (we got him tested as was required for early entrance), but his social and physical developments are at (or maybe even below) age level. We made our decision, not based on his intelligence (which we already know will not be adequately stimulated by a kindergarten curriculum), but based on the fact that he enjoys interacting with older children and gets extremely frustrated with kids his age (btw, he does great with much younger children). We just wanted to make sure his first experience with school was fun. So far, he is doing fine. He is having some minor behavioral problems when bored (like throwing his pencil on the floor repeatedly or tearing paper), but not bad. His teacher is really good with him and he loves her.

If you go this route, one thing to keep in mind: you might have to adjust your expectations as you go. You might be surprised that kindergarten is too easy in some ways and also surprised your child is not the best student in some ways. For example, I asked DS today what he is learning and he said, "I don't learn anything in school. Everything is too easy, except for one thing." I got all excited for him and asked him what was hard and he said, "learning to use scissors." I thought that was amusing at first and then I remembered how his handwriting is not very neat. I got a little bit worried about his fine motor development and looked up dysprexia. When I told DH that I was worried that DS has dysprexia, he said, "you have completely lost your perspective. How many 4 year olds do you know who can write, let alone write neatly?" He is right. I have started to think of my son as a kindergartener and without realizing it raised my expectations way up.

All good comments. I'll sing the same tune. We skipped K with one and early with another with winter bdays (but with girls).

I'll say (1) the behavioral piece will matter most probably. As you get closer do you think your ds can focus, task completion, resist instant gratification behavior etc. (2) I think trying it may be easier to undo than not. You could always skip K and stay in pre-k style if you think he would be unhappy with the structure or go to a montessori K with a little more freedom. (3) The big question for us with the dd who is more boy at heart... in a year will she be ready for the structure and no play of 1st. Will she have the ability to follow multi-step instructions. She's hg+ but... she's a dreamer. But look, I've been through this before and I bet everyone will say the same... thinking about all the possibilities can drive you crazy. All you can do is take the scores and your knowledge of your child and take your best educated guess. Know that it isn't locked in stone.

Remind me of this when I freak out again :-)

We had DS4 tested, and he qualified for, early entrance, and decided based on expert advice to keep him in preschool for another year.
Going through Dottie's list, the ones that are problems with us:
1. DS4 still has separation issues, though a bit improved from last year.
3. No long-standing willingness to sit/blend with older kids (maybe because he's an only child?)
4. DS4 constantly says he never wants to go to school.
6. DS4 is one of the smaller kids his age.
7. Very little respect of authority, not a teacher-pleaser type.

He's also a "run-around-when-learning-something-exciting" type kid. Also, learning that he was HG+ helped us realize that academically he would be ahead whether early entranced or not. Finally, on a positive note, we recently learned of the approval of a new K-8 STEM charter school sort of nearby, starting fall 2009. They describe a learner-centered overall curriculum, described here: http://www.seer.org/pages/eic.html This sounds good on paper, and i'm hoping it will be good IRL.


I know how you feel - I expect to have several waves of freaking out when DS actually enters school!

Maybe it helps that DS is my second kid I have more confidence in my parental decisions than I did with DD.

That is helpful I think, too bad I didn't have a third, that kid would totally have it made.........

I would continue to push folks here and elsewhere for stories, opinions on the gender piece. We ran across a lot of folks with kids capable of skipping who decided against because of long-term fears of age/size/social/dating etc. related to gender... can't say I agree or disgree since I have girls I didn't register much of it.

do you have any options outside of public school?