Suddenly -- middle school!!

[Jen Becker]

We just got back test results for my (9.5yo, 4th grade) daughter that show that she's far more gifted than we had thought.  She's not the type who pushes herself -- she's bright and quick, and it's clicking now that all of elementary school (except math) has really been a review of things she already knew.  But she never asked for more, she was happy to just get her (easy) work done quickly and go off to play.

 

Well, now that I'm realizing how advanced she actually is under there, I'm thinking of effectively skipping 5th grade (except for math) and moving into middle-school, logic-stage work.  But this is all new to me -- I hadn't even started thinking about 6th grade.  We school heavily over the summer (because we live in Florida and it's too hot to be outside), so I need to start doing some heavy research.

 

What would you suggest I look at?  Some of the topics I'm considering are formal logic; word roots; Greek, Roman, or American history; anatomy; and economics.

[quark]

You can do all of that and still call her 5th grade. The only issue might be if you use a cover school or some such authority that insists on grade labelling.

 

We continued calling kiddo whatever grade level kiddo was until we were sure that early graduation was going to happen formally/ officially.

 

So let her rip with whatever catches her/ your fancy!

 

Edited to correct darned typos.

Edited February 17, 2017 by quark

[EndOfOrdinary]

I would not formally change any grades. The future is too fluid. Ds wanted to graduate early, so we grade skipped. Then he decided on Ivy League, so no early graduating and we had to shift back. At least in this forum, kids are all over in work level. Ds is technically in 6th grade, taking outsourced humanities classes at an honors high school level, Algebra & Geometry mish mash, college level in environmental stuff, and middle school for summer camp. He has the life skills of a college kid, but swims like a 4th grader. It is not something which quantifies well, so most of us just stopped quantifying all together :)

 

Welcome to the fray!

[8filltheheart]

What have you been using with her up to now? Textbooks? Design your own courses with novels, whole books on subjects?

 

My educational objective is to create an environment that allows my kids to blossom intellectually by developing their critical thinking skills. I am not a box checker, so the subject isn't as important to me as what they are doing with what they are learning. Working through the levels of Bloom's Taxonomy vs. checking off subjects has led to my kids being incredibly strong academic students.

 

My kids don't use textbooks (with the exception of math) until high school science. Exploring areas of interests, following rabbit trails, doing research, etc....the staple of my kids' educations.

Edited February 18, 2017 by 8FillTheHeart

[Dmmetler]

I would also agree not to skip. DD has a 1 year skip due to PS before we pulled her, and in many ways it's a detriment. Most homeschool activities define middle school as a range of ages. Most competitions go by school grade,'meaning that she is competing against older kids who ALSO are highly accelerated, and some of whom are at schools with earlier cut offs than the state requires. Sports...well, that's by age and ability.

 

And honestly, get out of sync enough and it doesn't matter. A 12 yr old in a college class or at an academic conference stands out whether she's officially a 6th grader or a 7th grader or a college student.

[SarahW]

We just got back test results for my (9.5yo, 4th grade) daughter

...

and it's clicking now that all of elementary school (except math) has really been a review of things she already knew.  But she never asked for more, she was happy to just get her (easy) work done quickly and go off to play.

 

Just curious about what exactly you mean by this.

 

What test did you do? Was it an achievement test or an intelligence test?

 

What (except math) did she already know? She already knew everything in your history program? or your science program? Or are you talking about spelling/reading/writing?

 

 

I ask because on achievement tests the "grade level equivalency" number can be confusing. And the number given in an intelligence test is hard to translate to a "grade level."

 

If she knows all the content subjects, does that mean the non-fiction books in the children's section of the library hold no new information for her?

 

 

But if you are saying her language arts are solid, and she is able to do more abstract thinking, then fine, you can bump up to some higher level courses where she is expected to do more than just regurgitate information and to actually do her own thinking and response and synthesis. Just keep in mind that, no matter what the numbers say, if she's not used to being expected to do that you may need to work with her to show her how it's done.

 

But, she's still a kid. Bumping up to higher grade level courses means that you start losing the cute "kid stuff." If that doesn't matter to her, great. But you may want to think about keeping a mix of kid things in your day.

[RoundAbout]

I agree not to grade skip if you are homeschooling. I have a 4th grader who is halfway through doing AOPS Intro to Algebra, plus a smattering of  other math and computer science topics designed by me. A friend of mine with a math degree had commented that my son was doing high school and college level work in mathematics so I should stop tagging him as 4th grade in social media. I pointed out that he does not have the stamina or executive function of an older student and I didn't want to start projecting those expectations on him just because he could think at a higher level.

My son is quite tall for his age and I remember when he was 3 and 4 wondering why he was so much less mature than other three year-olds. Turns out I wasn't comparing him to other pre-schoolers but to kids the same size which turned out to be kids who were 6 and 7. I think it would be easy to make the same mistake academically by labelling him a grade that was much higher than his maturity level. So we're keeping him at his age grade unless we decide on early graduation at some point.

[8filltheheart]

There are ways to keep things little kid friendly while increasing level. Unit studies are a fun way. Buying annotated versions of children's classics can open up a lot of ways to explore different ideas.

 

For example, when I was reading the annotated version of Wind and the Willows, We learned that Grahame's ds published a little newspaper that included articles he wrote about wildlife, stories and poems he wrote, local advertisements he sold, and pictures he drew and then he mailed them out to family and friends.

 

Easy idea for incorporating across subject teaching while doing an in-depth lit study (which for this age might mean studying the real animals, British history, et, and creating a newspaper to mail or email to family and friends.)

 

Lots of great novels are available in annotated versions. They offer insights to allusions, historical context, bio on author, etc.

Edited February 19, 2017 by 8FillTheHeart

[EndOfOrdinary]

I agree not to grade skip if you are homeschooling. I have a 4th grader who is halfway through doing AOPS Intro to Algebra, plus a smattering of other math and computer science topics designed by me. A friend of mine with a math degree had commented that my son was doing high school and college level work in mathematics so I should stop tagging him as 4th grade in social media. I pointed out that he does not have the stamina or executive function of an older student and I didn't want to start projecting those expectations on him just because he could think at a higher level.

 

My son is quite tall for his age and I remember when he was 3 and 4 wondering why he was so much less mature than other three year-olds. Turns out I wasn't comparing him to other pre-schoolers but to kids the same size which turned out to be kids who were 6 and 7. I think it would be easy to make the same mistake academically by labelling him a grade that was much higher than his maturity level. So we're keeping him at his age grade unless we decide on early graduation at some point.

One of the first homeschool groups we attended when we lived in Big City had a child who looked at least 8. He was atrocious! I kept wondering why on Earth his mother brought him when he obviously was not mature enough to handle these younger children (he did not have a younger sibling). Turns out, he was 5. He was not atrocious; he was giant! When I later saw a picture of Dad, it made much more sense.

 

It is very easy to slip into this idea that there are narrow parameters our kids have to fit into. One of the best parts of this forum for me have been seeing those arbitrary boundaries I place on my (and other people's) children without realizing it.