I'm new here. I have a 5 yo son that I am fairly confident to say he is gifted, most likely he is highly or exceptionally gifted. He started phonetically reading at a little over 2.5 and he now can read anything he wants. He's enjoyed some chapter books, but mostly he likes poems and non fiction books about animals or places. He adds, subtracts, and multiplies double and triple digit numbers and has an incredible sense of numbers. His most recent love is geography and he has learned all of the states and their capitals, and knows all of the countries. He can place them all on the map and can tell you what countries border them and knows the languages that many of them speak as their primary language. He learned the countries within a couple of weeks of obsessive study. Anyways, we are highly considering skipping him next year out of kindergarten and into first grade. We have his evaluation with the school in a couple of weeks and I feel that after that is done and the school agrees that we will be able to make a firm decision. I'm so nervous about making this decision. While I can't even imagine him having to sit through kindergarten, I worry about the social consequences, especially later in life (high school sports, dating, driving, etc.) I also wish that he could get the kindergarten experience and have that year to transition into full time school. His fine motor skills are probably normal for his age, so I worry that he wont be able to write fast or as neatly as the other kids in first grade. Ugh... Well... I guess I'm just looking for experiences people have had with grade skipping or not. I've read the research that says that acceleration is the best route most of the time, but would he be ok if we chose not to skip? Of course, any and all advise is totally appreciated. Thanks.

Hi! Welcome to the board!

If your son at 5 can "He adds, subtracts, and multiplies double and triple digit numbers and has an incredible sense of numbers." then going into Gr. 1 will probably not meet his needs and allow him to "learn" something in Math. Check the curriculum and find out for yourself at what grade level the children learn single digit multiplication and division...

As he appears to be highly gifted he probably learns at a much faster rate and would not need any repetition (drills) like normal-average ability children would.

He may not be able to sit through K or Gr. 1.

Your son may have asynchronous development. His mind/ability will be able to learn so much but his output may not catch up. Google for gifted asynchronous development. He may need a scribe to help him output his thoughts. Get him started in learning to type.

It is great that you are here, keep learning more. What local gifted-talented resources are in your local area/state? Private/public magnet schools?

Consider subject acceleration for math ...

Gotta go
Best wishes!

Ok, so we really are talking about unusually gifted here, ok? An when one is an outlier to that extent, worrying about high school is just not useful. My son skipped 5th grade and repeated 9th grade - both were very good choices in our family circumstances. I've heard of kids who did community college for middle school and then started High School at the regular age. There are as many paths as there are kids who need unusual paths. Apply to Davidson Young Scholar's program. Listen to what the school has to say. Spend at least 30 minutes sitting quietly in a first grade classroom, kindy and 2nd grade. My guess is that will tell you all you need to know.

Some families do kindy and skip first, particularly if it's a half day kindy. If your son has done any preschool with agemates then you have a pretty good idea of his tolerance for agemates.

Don't expect to get everything perfect all at once, but don't accept any offers that are just plain silly.

It's a marathon, not a sprint.
Grinity

I agree with Grinity -- your son sounds much more than "regularly" gifted. No need to panic, but you should take some time to read some books on highly gifted kids. That will help you get a sense of roughly where your son lies on the gifted spectrum and will also expose you to the vocabulary surrounding giftedness and some of the educational options out there. To me and many of us here, this board has been invaluable in getting the "inside scoop" on what's out there.

There really are an endless variety of educational options based on your child's level of giftedness, his personality, your priorities for him, his school district, school personnel, and the size of your community. We've personally done early K admittance, skipping K, subject acceleration, grade acceleration, in-class enrichment, and occasional afterschooling for our kids. Nothing has been perfect, but we've chosen the least-worst options and have improved the situation and our kids are happy if not really challenged.

It sounds to me that you will have to do something to make school a better fit for your son if you decide to send him to school. Don't forget that homeschooling might be a great option.

Does your son go to preschool or have other group experiences with kids his age or older? That can be hugely telling about whether he will want to be in K for the social experience or whether being with kids learning the basics will drive him batty. How is his behavior, in general? A lot of early educators are particularly nervous about boys being the youngest in their grades because they assume they are less mature. Any information you can give the school in this regard that shows maturity might reassure them if you decide that you would like him in K early or would like to skip K.

For my DS7, btw, missing the K transition-to-full-time-school was a non-issue. He easily picked up the school skills he needed in a matter of a couple weeks.

I hope you keep posting and asking all the questions you have. The people here are great and experienced. Your son sounds amazing! So, welcome!

One other thing: the population of the school that your son would attend is hugely important. We, for instance, live in a district with a huge number of new immigrant families and a fair number of kiddos who are performing below grade level. While my kids would stand out in most classrooms, they particularly stand out in this school district. That has been good in that they very obviously need accommodations and that has been easier to see. In other districts where the parents tend to be smarter than average, their kids likely are, too, and they might have more classmates closer to their level. Obviously, your son will not likely have classmates as advanced as he is. But, I would strongly suggest sitting in on K, 1st, and 2nd grade classes at his potential school just so you get a more realistic sense of the level of kids both academically and socially at his school. You say that his handwriting is at a more age-appropriate level, and that may very well be true, but you don't know the level of the other kids and that might suprise you.

Also, make sure you get a copy of the curriculum for each grade level. Maybe when you meet with the school you can compare what your son is doing with the curriculum in order to come up with a workable solution.

Hello, welcome to the board! Of course every kid and every situation will be different, but I'll share our experience. For us, regular local kindergarten, with lots of differentiation, worked OK. DS had no interest in learning to write (he has perfectionist tendencies, and when writing didn't turn out how he wanted it to when he was very young, he gave up trying). So, we figured kindergarten would be perfect for learning to write. The teacher was good at in-class differentiation for reading, and DS went to gifted pullouts and also was basically tutored with 2nd grade math. This was all-day kindergarten, so there was a lot to get used to in the sense of "doing school" - more so than his part-time preschool. We kept our goal for the year as learning to do school and learning to write, and anything new he learned was bonus. It was pretty pretty good. We decided not to ask for the moon, but to push for the most in math, because we figured that would be easy for them to do (and easy for them to see how advanced he was), and we thought that reading could be more easily differentiated in the regular classroom.

He then skipped first, which in our district is a "learn-to-read" year, but he still needed a lot of differentiation and pullouts. An opportunity came up at a school for HG kids, which works a year ahead and faster, and we transferred DS(now 7) mid-year. He's been there a little over a month, and it's been great. We don't have the constant worry that he's not learning anything new. Best situation so far. We are hopeful that this will work a few more years, since the school goes through 5th grade, but we take things a year (or less) at a time.

Be prepared for a lot of advocacy, and try to always be on the good side of the school, if possible. We had some misunderstandings with the first second grade class, which reminded us of a few things: 1) you need to do your best to work as a team, 2) always be respectful, 3) most teachers and school staff have no experience with EG/PG kids, and so they don't know how quickly they can learn and it takes time for them to see for themselves (which you should give them, in reasonable amounts), 4) principals have wonderful powers to choose teachers who want your child and who will be good at differentiation, 5) try to get some sort of plan in writing, in case you do have to switch schools and there's no record (we learned that the hard way, even though the school switch was in district).

Also, what sort of options do you have? Do you live anywhere near schools for gifted kids? We drive our DS 45 miles each way to his new school, but it's been worth it for him to have intellectual peers, and we have not had to worry that he's not learning. His handwriting is still pretty bad, but we're working on it, and the new teacher gets asynchronous development.

Best of luck!

Thanks so much everyone for the replies. I often feel so overwhelmed and alone... Its so nice to hear from people who have experience in this.

So, here are the educational options that I know of so far. Public school system: grade acceleration and/or gifted program starting in 3rd grade. The gifted program is fully incorporated at a different school in the district and it really seems to be well done. My niece is in the program and it has been awesome for her. Private schools: there are a few nearby, but nothing that I know of that claims to work for a gifted learner. And as far as home schooling, I may be chicken, but I'm not sure that would work out. I have 4 little kids ( he's the second) and our days are not structured or predictable enough to provide a good structured educational environment. I would prefer to make the public school work since we have a neighborhood full of young kids and they all go to school together.
He goes to a short preschool program, 2 hrs. a day, 3 days a week. He enjoys it. He has fun with his friends and he likes the worksheets. He also plays well with his older sister and her friends. I think socially, he'd be ok in either k or 1st.
Again, thanks for all of the advice and suggestions. It gives me more to think about.

Just to point out - he has achieved all that already in that environment, it can't be too bad Even if you decide not to home school, don't underestimate how important you are!

My DC went to school with all the same age mates, even though we knew our child was clearly capable of more. As a pp mentioned, we used K to focus on the writing and getting used to the classroom rules. No, she didn't learn anything she didn't already know though. Then, she was grade skipped from 2nd to 4th and as others have mentioned, when a child is so far advanced, one grade skip still won't put them at a level where they need to be. Our child is STILL not challenged, but the material is more independent and the switching classes and having different teachers and many other things are more intriguing and have definitely made for a better fit. As we see it, each move or accomodation puts us one step closer to where our child needs to be. Don't expect any choice to be a solve all. There will still need to be accomodations along the way. As long as you go in with that mind set, you can make adjustments as needed and know that this decision won't be the last one. Take it one step at a time and make the decision for now, not worrying about the far advance future. Not doing anything for your child can be just as detrimental to his needs, so always consider that as well.

I'm just curious - what grade is your older daughter in? Has she been tested for the full gifted program? The odds are that even if your first born isn't as far out as your 2nd born that she is still gifted enough to have special educational needs.
((Wink))
Grinity

My oldest is 6 and in 1st grade. She is bright and probably "gifted" as well. There really isn't anything in school that is challenging for her. She is so happy though. She loves the social aspect of school and has grown a lot in confidence and maturity ore the last year. She will be able to test for the gifted program next year. We've mentioned it to her and right now she has no interest in leaving her school and her friends. But, we'll have her test and then cross that bridge when we come to it.

Depending on what kind of tests the school gives for giftedness, it might be worth thinking about - if your DD is optimally gifted and the school has 'more than average' bright kids, then keeping her where she is might be fine, but girls are usually better at 'acting normal' and she may be quite unusually gifted even though she is so much farther behind #2. That will be info worth knowing as you decide. Girls are usually higher in 'EQ' and that helps them fade into the background. I wish I had a nickel for every female here who softly 'lived down' to the expectations others had of her and appeared happy as a child, but is raw inside as an adult with all that gift bouncing around without a talent to channel it through.
Parents of girls have a huge responsibility to insure that the wallpaper they place their daughters in front of is a good match for their dds.

Thanks for indulging me!
Grinity

This was definitely my DD. She was happy, had many friends, and loved going to school. Everyone thought she was really shy, since she rarely talked during class time or raised her hand to offer answers. Even around her friends outside of school she tended toward more demure. But we noticed that the work was way below her academic level and so we pushed first for a subject acceleration and then a grade acceleration. And we are so glad that we did. Not only was the work more appropriate (although, truthfully, easy again after a few weeks), but my DD really blossomed. She started answering questions in class and volunteering information and made new friends who were truly her peers! It was as if she now felt free to be herself and share herself rather than feeling as if she had to hide who she was to fit in. Seeing her blossom and become the funny, outgoing, quirky kid who fits in so well with her older friends has truly been glorious to watch. And if we'd never asked to have her classwork match her abilities, I'm not sure we'd ever have seen the true her!

YES Grinity--these were exactly my thoughts...you said it quite well.

YES.

Beautifully put. My DD can come across as entirely average (relative to age-mates) and rather reserved.

It's astonishing to see.

Hello. My middle son sounds similar to your son with similar learning rate and love of learning and is now in 5th grade- I will share tips I know that have been beneficial:
-Get an independent evaluation completed or request an IQ from the school psychologist. We did this and it has been helpful in advocating
-Speak with the principal prior to his enrollment and request a teacher that is prepared for a high level of differentiation
-Advocate every year for him to be placed with the best teacher- this makes all of the difference
-Regardless of K or 1 the pace of the curriculum will always be way to slow. For this reason, we did the K and have advocated for as much differentiation as possible
-The district tried to have him skip last year (so 4-6th), but we refused. The extra year gives him another year of math in school, he has friends, is a smaller guy and for what? so he could plateau within a few months?
-My oldest is a senior in HS, the extra year does give an advantage on act, and I have been glad to have her at our house this extra 18th year, it goes too fast, I am glad she wasnt moving away a year sooner- you are smart to think of the driving and sports, they are a reality:)
-Consider single-subject acceleration. My son initially advanced 1 grade in math, but quickly reached a plateau- He is now 3 grades ahead in curriculum attending the middle school with a group that is on a track for 2years ahead so he is only with kids 1 year older, but on an 8th gr level (prealgebra)
-The district tested him for this placement and all test scores indicated that he should be there, but they wanted us to sign off one placement lower for their scheduling ease- Fortunately we knew that the test scores indicated this and were able to ask the right questions, dont be afraid to ask,- we did and he is doing outstanding and is clearly in the best placement- always be informed
-Request that he be paired with another student at his level if one is available. My son has this and it is the greatest gift and blessing of all. many schools look to separate the gifted into equal numbers- research tells you they need to be together, advocate for it
-I work in his school and I know that the teachers have their best interest at heart, so I am not "demanding" , but I do offer the types of info you shared with each teacher of things he likes and how he learns- and then we do advocate because if you dont ask and its not happening chances are it wont
-ask for pre-tests of curriculum, when he passes that ask for extentions on his level
-Ultimately, we were not happy with public school during middle school and opted for private for our oldest. In the younger grades, public was better than pprivate for gifted. Now, our school is cutting the gifted program (I am going tomorrow to discuss this...) , but I am aware of the other local schools and their programming and will switch schools for my youngest if the programming is gone- stay informed- if there is a gifted school near you, take advantage of it, I wish we had that opportunity!!
Sounds like you have an amazing little guy...Good Luck!!

We have had a positive experience with acceleration in a private school setting. My DS7 accelerated directly to first grade. We initially worried about motor skills and social skills as well. He did bring home some work in first grade that he wasn't able to finish in class. We were told to expect a 3-6 month adjustment period. This seemed to be right on target for him. He is currently in second grade and doing great. He loves cursive as it is faster for him. Socially, he has a close group of friends and most children/parents in his class don't even realize his age difference (He has always tended to prefer older playmates). One note of caution, we were not prepared for the number of parents who held their children back before starting kindergarten at our school. There was a 2-year age difference with him and the oldest child in his first grade class. In retrospect, it is hard to imagine starting him in kindergarten as he has clearly thrived with his acceleration. One benefit of an early entry is that we hope he will be able to stay with the same group of friends for a while. Hope this helps!

We got our evaluations done. And although they still point to the direction I expected (principle and school psycologist are all for a skip) I'm really confused by the results. I posted over in the testing area, but I'm hoping to get more opinions over here
He took the WJ-III cognitive and achievement. The cognitive portion he got a GIA of 125 - broken down - verbal ability 120, thinking ability 140, and cog efficiency 108. On the achievement side his scores were much higher - all but two were between 140 and 170. Math fluency scored at 120 and reading vocab at 129. Broad math is 155 and basic reading is 171. So I think based on those scores we can apply to DYS.
I'm fighting with myself over having a hard time accepting the GIA of 125. Knowing my boy and all that he self taught himself and his drive to learn and his amazing ability to quickly learn and forever know - I absolutely had him pegged as a much higher level of giftedness. This score puts him just barely entering the gifted range. His tester was a school psychologist intern and honestly knowing that she was an intern I think I wouldve doubted almost any result. Put that with a boy that hates the stress of anything timed, has slow fine motor skills and was on the tail end of a cold, and I lean towards not believing the results. But, then I wonder why I even care. Does any one know how accurate the WJ III cognitive results are? Should it change my plan of attack if he really is only mildly gifted? Hmmm... The more I think anoint it the more confused I get. Thanks for any help and insight.

and the Marathon continues!
WJ-cog isn't one of the more popular IQ tests, so I don't have much info on it. Seems like it sure it hard to know what will happen in kindy until you get there - unless he has had 'issues' with agemates previously in daycare/preschool.

Is it a half day kindy program? If so, you could certainly try it and see how it goes - particularly if the teacher is hand picked. Somehow teachers of younger kids are often better at accepting and accomidating 'individual differences' than teacher in mid-elementary school, after all the flip side of is that the teacher isn't expecting to have to accomidate such a wide range of individual differences.

I love the idea of subject acceleration, for math and reading, if the school will offer it.

It might be nice to do kindy with agemates, then get a WISC IV after he turn age 6 to decide on skipping 1st. Again - not if he has a history of 'issues' with agemates in preschool/daycare.

If it's a full day kindy program, sometimes the schools will allow kindy in the morning and 1st in the afternoon.

Go in and observe! That's the best way to know. I mean it.

Love and More Love,
Grinity

The principle is fully in support of skipping kindergarten. He said something to the effect of he is the best candidate for a skip that he has seen. Do you think it wouldn't be a good idea because of the iq score?

I'm probably out of the majority here in that I don't as quickly jump to the "you know your kid best" spot, but in the instance you've described, I'd say that you have a more than MG child as well. I do know parents of bright but not gifted kids who think they have MG-HG kids and it is usually in an instance where the child is brighter than the parent or there is some parental ego issue going on.

However, unless you're totally making stuff up in regard to development, which I'm going to assume you are not (especially given the achievement scores), I'd just lean toward thinking that this wasn't the best test for him, his age or other factors got in the way, or it was an off day.

I have an older dd (12) who, too, does poorly on timed tests and tended to stress tremendously when she was younger when pressed on time. When we had her tested at age 7 on the WISC (also by an intern although with a center known for GT testing), she came out with an IQ in the lower 130s. Her WJ-III grade equivalents ranged from grade level to grade 18+ and the subtest scores w/in the WISC were all over the place as well (25th percentile to beyond the 99.9th even within one subtest). Overall, we felt that a combo of things likely depressed her scores including anxiety, lack of cooperation on her behalf, speed issues, asynchronous development, and maybe an inexperienced tester.

She later skipped a grade none the less and is still an outstanding student who is regularly in the 99th percentile as compared to kids 1-2 years older than herself. It is a much better fit socially as well. Even assuming that my dd's IQ score was accurate and your ds' is as well, perhaps there are some MG kids who, due to personal drive, need more than in grade GT programs.

Mommy,
Hmm. I have one who looks similar and had doubts about IQ when I got the results as well. But maybe what is going on is that mine (speaking only for myself here) is gifted in appearance because he is gifted by the Renzulli model. That is, the intersection of 'bright' raw intellect, creativity and drive (coupled in our case with sensory issues) comes off as textbook highly gifted. I would be okay with leaving my ds in school if he were happy there, even if he weren�t progressing academically. I think. I�ll be interested in knowing how things go for your family.

Is kindy half or whole day?
Is there a history of previous issues in preschool/daycare with agemates?
Have you visited the school and observed what the classrooms are like?
Are they willing to do needed subject accelerations no matter what the base grade is?

Love and More Love,
Grinity

The kindergarten is half day. No issues with preschool age mates. He's pretty mild mannered and enjoys rules and structure, so a school environment is a happy fit for him. This has been his only year of preschool and it is just 2 hours and play based, so I know things will change a lot next year with either grade. The principle suggested subject acceleration on top of the grade acceleration so I'm sure he would also be willing to do pure subject acceleration without a grade skip. He's a very flexible principle and I feel really lucky that we are able to work with him on this. I have spent quite a bit of time in my daughters classrooms (both last year in kindergarten and this year in first grade) so I have a good idea of what happens and what it is like. I feel first grade would be a better fit. I guess I'm second guessing my ability to see him objectively. Of course every parent thinks their child is brilliant, and I tried hard not to let the mommy in me think that he was anything different than he was. He does have extreme drive and focus. It is an intensity that gets him to attack anything he wants to know. Maybe it is his drive an not IQ that has allowed him to achieve what he has.

Even if that 125 is right on target (and I'm not saying I think it is), it seems to me that this is still a situation where a grade skip would be in order. It is pretty clear from the achievement scores that your child has already mastered most, if not all, of the K skills, (and probably many or all of the first grade skills). So why would you want to repeat those K lessons? Give your child a chance to work with material that won't be so boring or even insulting or depressing. If the level of giftedness really isn't too extreme, this single grade skip could end up being enough to accommodate the need for acceleration for at least a few years, if not most of elementary school. And if you are right, and the LOG is higher, then it may be that another skip will be in order during this school year, and it will almost certainly be easier to get that from first grade than from K.

Aculady - True. Thanks. I think I needed to hear that. When we first got the results and the school agreed that it was the best thing to skip him, I felt so much peace with that. I think it is what my gut is telling me is best. I think I've been over thinking the 125 number. His achievement scores actually put him from mid 2nd grade to mid 4th grade on everything. I think well keep moving forward with the skip and hopefully I can stop worrying.

I think that this and the support of the school says it all - take the offered accomidations and remember that you can always shift things around later if it becomes clearly needed.

If you were being unobjective about your son, then why wouldn't you be unobjective in the same direction about your dd?

Enjoy!
Grinity

I can't remember if you and/or your school filled out the Iowa Acceleration Scale to determine whether a skip is appropriate. It is a very objective form that considers many different areas - test scores are only a part of it. And you come out with a score at the end that aligns with excellent, good, OK, or not so good candidate for grade/subject acceleration. I highly recommend it.

I second St. Pauli girl! We used the IAS when DD skipped a grade this past year, and it is a very useful tool and will make you feel better about your decision because it factors in more than just test scores.