Home Schooling

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Originally posted by stardusttwin
I don't think you can ever learn too much, when a child is curious and has intrests the worst thing one can do is hold them back. I think people get concerned when a child becomes so knowledgeable bookwise but then has no ability to interact with others there own age.

I started reading at a very young age (my mom is now a retired teacher), at the time I was also small for my age so when they wanted to skip me she refused (from pre K to 1 grade and then later again from 5th gr to 7th). How that affected me? I have mixed feelings about this. When I was 4 I was tutoring other 1st grade students teaching them how to read (when my mother found that out she hit the roof and then moved me to private school).

I don't really remember this but my mom told me that at the first "audition" (I don't know what they call it for schools), we were in a room with other parents and kids. All of the white children were given the "See Dick Run" books to read, each took their turn and could read but i her opinion did nothing all that special. When it was my turn the lady in charge handed me the "Life in the City" reader (I'm showing my age but if you are of a certain age group we had these series of books throughout elementary school). Well they were shocked when I opened the book and started to read. The woman thought I had memorized it and asked me to read from another book, which I did. Although they finally offered me admission my mother decided from their attitude she wouldn't put me there as the token black and instead put me in a Christian school. While my religious instruction was fine, the teachers I had didn't know how to deal with me academically. In hindsight, they should have given me additional assignments since my mom wouldn't let me be skipped. Instead, they put so much an effort to keep the slower kids up to par I just coasted by with barely any effort (again with me as a tutor). You know in elementary school its never "cool" to be the smart kid so instead of embracing my abilities I was constantly trying to pretend I didn't know as much as I did. If I had other interaction with kids outside of school who were "like me" I wouldn't have felt like such an outsider and would have kept my love of learning fresh. And frankly although I consistently scored outside of my age range I don't believe I ever scored "genius" (my math/quantitative skills sucked then and now). I just needed to be moved up because I was ahead of others in my age range.

In hindsight (and in discussions with my mom), she finally acknowledges that things could have been handled differently. She was so concerned with me being overwhelmed socially but didn't see how it hampered my education at the time.

My suggestion, you can teach your child additional things to keep his brain occupied but let him go to school. If there is something that your son has an aptitude for seek other avenues for him to study that outside of school (for me it was piano) and be with others that are on his level. You can also engage his mind by teaching him another language - if you start now, he'll be fluent by the time he finishes elementary school and can still start a 3rd one in JHS. There is so much in this world, one can never learn too much. In other parts of the world its normal for children to be fluent in many languages and its easier to learn as a child. There is so much that is NOT being taught in school (especially about black history and dare I even go into carribean history) you can't run out of material. I think if you give your son additional / supplemental educational support at home he will turn out well rounded.

[The following is from my mom]
To ease your mind, there are tests that you can have administered to test his IQ and levels. I'm not sure where you live but if you really believe he is above average there are other programs for kids that are better than being home schooled especially if you are not a trained educator. Everyone focused on the success stories, but home schooling is not neccesarily the best choice for a child who may be gifted. What ever school you place him in you have to be prepared to supplement it. Do your homework and get him in a good school and you can always add to it.

stardusttwin - this was a wonderful post and you and your mom gave 96sweet great advice.