On a happy note, you're raising a gentleman who knows not to joke about weight with a lady. :) So sorry you had a rotten experience, though.

I have to chuckle about the not finishing textbooks part. Someone mentioned never learning past WW2 ... I'm not even sure we made it that far, the years we had world history. It was kind of sad. I wonder if part of it was end-of-year rushing, and I also wonder if part of it was because the teachers had lived through many of those decades and didn't really see it as 'history' that needed teaching? I know I have a hard time viewing the 70s or 80s or 90s as history ... the new American Girl doll Julie totally took me by surprise! I will say, we've been lucky ... I only ever hear PS teachers bemoan homeschoolers on chat forums. The PS teachers I know in person don't say such things to me. Then again, my kids are young still, and I do have a teaching degree, which buys me a little leeway. LOL.

I think it's Jack Prelutsky that has a book of poetry out now, where the poems are half-finished to inspire the reader to complete them. I haven't seen it in person yet, so not sure what age it is for, but something like that would be a lot of fun to work on together, I bet. Is she wanting to write rhyming poetry? Or just poetry? There are all sorts of forms, and some are easier than others for little kids. There's one kind that's just like a list ... pick a theme word, like her name or favorite food or something, and write it down the paper (one letter per line) ... then think of a word that relates to the theme that starts with each letter. Or do haiku when she's ready to count syllables in words. One fun activity is to cut out colorful words from a magazine, the bigger (font size) the better, and then arrange them into silly sentences and poems. (It helps to glue them to stiffer paper first.)

Both of mine have used them at 3.5 to 4.5. Well, my second is still in them. Both already knew their letters and sounds. It's a good review of that, though, and it's also a nice gentle handwriting practice. It's quite a jump from the 3rd primer to ETC book 1, though ... they really have to be ready to sound out words for that one. Anyway, it fills the little one's desire to do school like big brother. I wait on handwriting otherwise ... my oldest and I struggled and eventually quit handwriting in K, and he's doing much better now in first. Not sure whether I will just wait till 1st with my younger one, or what ... we have some time yet. (We like a very plain handwriting font so it works well, no confusion. My older one is using A Reason for Handwriting this year.)

I've seen, and read of, gifted kids of both types ... the intense ones and the ones where it's hard to tell. Sometimes, in the latter case, it's partly perfectionism ... they don't even want to TRY until they know they can get it right. (We've got more than a bit of that in our house, LOL, and I'm not just talking about the kids!) I like hearing that reading yourself improves your kids' reading ... because I'm a total bookaholic. If there's a correlation, my kids are going to be reading geniuses! LOL. Looking back, I'm not sure I ever did see my parents read too much, though I know my mom did read for fun. Just not often where I could observe it... she's more a bedtime reader. But she sure allowed us access to books ... frequent library trips, trips to used bookstores and thrift stores to buy as many as we could carry, things like that. Definitely was encouraged in the right way. And in spite of my obvious obsession with the printed word, I was not an early reader. I think I was taught in first grade. (I can recall being taught and feeling stupid about the whole thing, actually.)

Well, *I* love reading about all your smart kids! :) Mine are still pretty young so it's not an issue for us, much. My son is 7, first grade by age, and that's what we call it. He's young for his age, so for outside activities it works well to keep him with his peers. Plus his motor skills lagged a bit. His math, on the other hand ... I've got him in 2nd grade math but really he just skates through it ... I never really know if I should 'skip' him up a level or just let us coast along happily. I'm figuring we'll start collecting credits in each subject when he hits high school level in each subject, and if we need to stretch things out with dual enrollment and work internships and things, no harm done. We've got several good community colleges and a decent university in our area, so at least there are plenty of options. I'd also, should we ever have to enroll him in school somewhere, prefer to have him on record as a lower grade, and test out of it, then to think he's in a higher grade but not measure up to whatever the school might require. But like I said, mine are young, and so we're still kind of newbies at the whole thing. :)

Margins ... that's a good concept.