My kid's a genius

[brianakell]

Well ok, maybe not yet. But doing grade up level in several areas. We constantly work with her on under standing and learning new things. She gets involved in house projects, working on vehicles, math etc. We're concerned she's going to be bored in school, for quite a while. Fortunately, real small school, so teacher can pay attention a bit to each kid. To be honest I really wonder about the pace they're teaching kids at in other grades. For some perspective shes in kindergarten, been killing doing 1st grade math since september. Example, Kindergarten is working on number recognition now. She's been working on addition/subtraction for nearly a year, and she's understanding multiplication and division conceptually currently, working to solve problems. She's very nearly reading and figuring out spelling better than a second and third grader (we have friends we've helped with homework). Shes also one of the older kids in her class. Friends are more the 1st graders than kindergartners. Small school, so the K-1 is one class.

She does extremely well with talking to new people any age 0-90, and making friends easily, so not just a socially inept bookworm (no offense to those of you!)

Should I just be proud of my little overachiever, or should I seriously look into supplementing her schooling, even another school to challenge her? I want to be sure she "gets to just be a kid" but bored kids in school are recipe for disaster in my experience as well.

[lex137]

I don't have any kids, but my brothers a teacher so maybe ask her current teacher, or a teacher on here can help?? Good thing she's smart, we are going to need more children like her to keep this society a float.

[brianakell]

I don't have any kids, but my brothers a teacher so maybe ask her current teacher, or a teacher on here can help?? Good thing she's smart, we are going to need more children like her to keep this society a float.

Teacher is noticing, but she can only see that kiddo does work well and quick, not that its below her. She does about 70%1st grade and 30% Kindergarten math currently. Teacher wants to be sure she gets a good base in different concepts. Thinking I may ask Teacher to try kiddo in some 1st grade reading/writing stuff.

Heck the other night she asked about the Great Wall. Which lead into a discussion about disagreements, compromises, war, emporers, kings, queens, parliment, US govt, dictators. Common traits, similiarities etc. She determined her teacher was a nice dictator!

[Lurch]

You should be very proud and let her make the decision if she wants to be challenged in school. Since it's a small school it maybe easier for her to take a couple of classes higher up in grade level yet stay with her friends in her grade. I would talk with the school and see what they think the best course of action is and go from there.

[newracer]

Both of my sons are in the gifted and talented program in the Poudre School District. In all honesty I think it just a bunch of BS and and some of what they have done was just for numbers to get the district more money. They don't really do much for the kids specifically, that I saw. They don't even consider kids for the program until 4th grade if I remember correctly. What they have done is moved forward in classes quicker than normal. My older son took all the 6th, 7th and 8th grade math in one year, no he is in pre-calc as a sophomore. My younger son is on the same track. The both are doing the same in science.

Until you daughter is a little older I would just supplement her education at home to make sure she is being challenged.

One down side, my older son is in a science class that he doesn't know anybody because they are all upperclassmen. Therefor he almost always works alone on group projects, but he prefers it and does better than anyone else anyways.

[RCCrawler]

My daughter is in the exact same boat. We put her in a charter school that has an IQ qualification for entry. All of the kids in her school must have an IQ of over 130. She is in second grade and is currently testing at a 5th grade level for most things. Her school understands the joys and difficulties in working with gifted children and all of the teachers are amazing at pushing children to their fullest. From the students to the teachers to the admin staff to the parents we have nothing but good to say about of 3 years at the school.

If you take the time to look around a bit good schools are out there, sadly now days the good ones aren't the ones down the street in your neighborhood.

[Rucker61]

Both of my sons are in the gifted and talented program in the Poudre School District. In all honesty I think it just a bunch of BS and and some of what they have done was just for numbers to get the district more money. They don't really do much for the kids specifically, that I saw. They don't even consider kids for the program until 4th grade if I remember correctly. What they have done is moved forward in classes quicker than normal. My older son took all the 6th, 7th and 8th grade math in one year, no he is in pre-calc as a sophomore. My younger son is on the same track. The both are doing the same in science.

What schools? PM if you'd rather.

[Irving]

We are in a similar situation, but I don't think it is because our daughter is naturally gifted. My wife has been spending a lot of time teaching our daughter since before school. When she got to school, they gave her the tests to see where they were. The teacher told us some areas that she needed to work on by the end of the year. We asked for some teaching material and she was at those goal levels in a month or two. Now, she is regularly paired up with older kids in reading groups and helps (tells) other kids with their work at school. Getting a teaching guide is very helpful, as it gives you some focus on what to work on. It also helps that she is at a smallish montessori school where she can easily be placed with kids at her appropriate level for each subject. I also worry about how this will be handled when she is older and at larger schools.

In our case, I really think that the hour/s my wife spends with her each night are what really help her excel. My kid learns for hours after school each day, on the weekend, and during break, where as I think a lot of kids ONLY learn in school, so the learning curves are different.

My wife is so great at being involved in the teaching, and I am so bad at it. I try to involve her in whatever side project has my interest, so we've been learning to cook together and stuff like that.

[Snowman78]

My daughter is in the exact same boat. We put her in a charter school that has an IQ qualification for entry. All of the kids in her school must have an IQ of over 130. She is in second grade and is currently testing at a 5th grade level for most things. Her school understands the joys and difficulties in working with gifted children and all of the teachers are amazing at pushing children to their fullest. From the students to the teachers to the admin staff to the parents we have nothing but good to say about of 3 years at the school.

If you take the time to look around a bit good schools are out there, sadly now days the good ones aren't the ones down the street in your neighborhood.

Stargate?

[sniper7]

Keep her challenged and keep it constant. Kids that learn well typically like to learn a lot and continue learning, at the younger ages they soak up everything and the basics are what stick for life and the building blocks to help them achieve the advanced levels.
I wouldn't go having her look at skipping grades or anything like that though. Find her after school programs, extra work in her classes for extra credit, or talk t the 2nd grade teacher and ask about getting some of the subject materials to challenge her at home or in down time while other kids are still working.