Reply to Age Cutoff for Kindergarten

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Can you really think of advantages to being possibly the youngest and/or smallest child in a class? IMHO as a long-time educator, it's not usually in the best interests of a child--even an extremely gifted child.[/quote]

Yes: you're working at your ability all through high school and college and are not crushed by the stultifying boredom of being a year behind where you should be academically.  Many kids (myself included) started in a school with a December 30th cutoff and moved to other school systems with earlier dates, guaranteeing that I was the youngest all the way through.  It was never a problem, and my best friend in high school was someone who'd been held back in 1st grade (for legitimate reasons) and was therefore 14 months older than I was.  It wasn't a problem.

Instead of concern-trolling all these posts on the assumption that no child could possibly be ready for kindergarten three (or six or ten) weeks earlier than another child, why not just answer the questions about the actual school options.  To quote an old favorite poster: sheesh![/quote]

But that's not what happens.  Kids who are gifted aren't steadily a year ahead of their peers.  Instead, they learn at a different pace.  So, if the teacher introduces least common denominators, and then spends 30 minutes on practice problems, the kid is not going to be challenged for 25 of those minutes, whether they're in 8 in 4th grade or 9 in 4th grade.  Whether they'll be bored during that time, or they spend it doing something of interest, has to do with the curriculum (e.g. Is the material presented as a sheet of similar math problems, or is it something like a project that allows kids to challenge themselves by moving ahead or going into depth), the structure of the classroom (e.g. is a kid allowed to demonstrate knowledge by doing the last 3 problems correctly, and then skip the rest?  Do you allow kids who enjoy working as peer tutors to do so?) and the personality of the kid.  I don't remember being particularly bored in school, despite learning very quickly.  I do remember the novel I wrote quietly in the back of my math notebooks, the elaborate dream worlds I built in my mind, or the fact that I'd practice translating the word problems into other languages.  But I'm an introvert and spent a lot of time in classes where the teachers were happy to let me do my own thing if the work got turned in.

Now if your kid is ahead because they've been pushed academically, and not because they naturally learn quickly or have a eager curiosity, then pushing them will keep them ahead, but it will also teach them that learning is a passive, adult directed thing.

-- teacher who is a former gifted child and has experience with grade skipping from multiple angles.[/quote]

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