Also, several of these kids skipped high school entirely and are in college, Ivy or similar. |
Being a 13-year-old enrolled in college usually isn't a good thing IMO. |
14 usually and they were taking courses at some local college while being homeschooled. Also, they are used to traveling and dealing with older kids and adults since they were little kids through chess. |
They usually major in something math related since they are chess=math=music prodigies. The other alternative is to send them to a magnet like TJ for high school but then that does not leave much time for music and/or chess so some parents either keep homeschooling or send them to a regular HS with less homework. |
If you personally know of "many of them" from your son's activities, it is highly unlikely that they are prodigies. A prodigy is extraordinarily rare. The fact that you would know many makes it very unlikely that they are truly prodigies. Are you a homeschooler yourself? |
Doubt "they" are prodigies. Prodigies are rare. I know lots of homeschooled kids, including some family members. I don't know any who is a prodigy. Either you're liberally defining prodigy or mistaken. |
I don't homeschool and it has never appealed to me. These are the top kids in the country for their age and I am sure there is a future US or World champion among them including the current Jr World Champion so yeah, these kids are "true" prodigies. |
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In most cases I assume these are parents who want total control of their kids...control who they interact with, control what they learn, control their environment etc
I think kids should interact and learn from and with all kind of different people and get some separation from parents. Wanting to be together 24/7 for 18 years is unhealthy in my view. |
Taking courses at some local college while being homeschooled does not equate to being in college, Ivy, or similar. By that metric I was in college when I was enrolled in local college courses while I was in high school. FFS. You're chess mom, aren't you? The one with the child who is also a model? |
Top in country? Please list their names as it should be public enough... |
NP, but you can find the Jr World Champions name in press. PP who knows him, what state are you located in? He's not in the WMA. |
| The current Jr. World Champion is Kazakh. Maybe PP is posting from Astana. I'm sure there is a robust homeschooling community there (there isn't). |
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I know several families who homeschool, some religious, some not at all. All of the parents have advanced degrees and place a high value on education. Not only are the children not socially awkward, they are exceptionally friendly, earnest, appealing kids. My sample is small, but I doubt most of the PPs know more families than I do. The kids I know all seem bright and intellectually curious, they are self-starters, and they have all transitioned very easily to high school. I am surprised that most previous posts are highly negative--I don't share these experiences at all.
It may be that the people I know are the more educated homeschooling parents since I know most from college/grad school. But these people are definitely out there. I do agree with others that the requirements should be higher for parents. I think my friends would all agree as well. One thing that occurs to me... there is a certain amount of self-selection among homeschoolers. Maybe a higher than usual percentage of homeschooled kids are children who were unhappy in high school, or isolated, or bullied, etc. Perhaps the families chose to homeschool for these reasons? In any case, I truly don't see how or why families living in this area would raise more "socially awkward" children due to homeschooling when there are an infinite number of opportunities for socializing during and after school hours. |
Here you go: http://www.uschess.org/component/option,com_top_players/Itemid,371/ |
Meant the current Jr US champion: https://new.uschess.org/news/jeffrey-xiong-is-the-2016-us-junior-champion/ the current Jr U12 World champion: https://new.uschess.org/news/nikhil-kumar-clinches-gold-in-batumi/ Enjoy! |