Adapting to school

[REPU]

Hello everyone, I just got involved in all this early learning world and find it very interesting, but since I'm just starting, I have many questions and many worries.

For example, once you have a baby 3 years old who can read much better than the average 3 y-o children, what happens when he/she starts school and finds himself so way ahead of his peers?

Could this generate an adaption problem? As he might be bored in class, will he develop a lack of atention?

I believe all this can happen, but can also be dealt with if parents are aware in advance and provide important information to the child and the school. Of course, the baby needs to know that even if he already kows whatever he is going to be taught in school, it's nevertheless important. He also needs to kow that he shouldn't build a distance on that advantage that he has, and that relationship with his peers is very important. The school needs to know the baby's starting point, but here in Spain, we have a public school system wich starts at age three, and we are going to have a hard time looking for a school that has enaugh flexibility to accept this and work on it, rather than ignore it and waste the kids potential.

The one thing that is clear to us is that all this YBCR, LR, LM, Doman, Sichida, or whatever other methods used, have only one direction: giving a person the posibility to be happier in the future. I certainly don't want a very smart, great reader baby who can't get along with his peers at school, or who has lack of atention problem, or just isn't happy. Knowledge should be a way to live a more fulfilled life, at least I don't see it as an end itself, but as a way to reach happiness.

Sorry about this negative approach but what can I do, I'm a worried father!   Aren't we all? Inevitably, after reading about education I end up asking myself, Am I doing the right thing?

Any suggestions on how to deal with this problems of adaptation to school and peers?

Thanks everyone!

[TracyR4]

Well, several things can happen. Generally children who have early education are happy and well adjusted. If you do things joyously , and have fun with your child then you should have a happy , rounded , well adjusted child.  If you force it upon your child , allow him to do naughty things and get away with poor behavior, well you will reap what you sow. And to quote Glenn Doman , " You can take all that early education , roll it up into a ball and throw it away." 

But so far from reading the boards here I haven't heard of any children causing trouble, being disruptive or have difficulty with behavior in schools.  If they do either its one of two problems , A) the behavior was caused by poor parenting OR B) there is something physical or mentally going on with the child that needs addressed.

As for adjusting to school. My daughter is 4, reads at about a 1st grade level at the moment, and has done just fine in school. She is well loved by her friends in prek/K , and all the kids in the school all the way up to the 8th graders :>) Her teacher loves her.

Now with that said it depends on the teacher that you have that will determine your child's success in school. I know my daughter's teacher does believe young children can learn more than what people give them credit for. BUT I think her thinking is still really limited. She definitely doesn't give my daughter the credit she does deserve when it comes to reading. It took me almost all year to get them to let her read a book and quit drilling her on her alphabet. Finally when she does she is given really easy material to read and my daughter just rips through the book and it irritates her teacher. Sooo, with that said we will be homeschooling next year.

 
Not all teachers are like that, you MUST interview the school and the teachers. Granted when my daughter first started preschool she didn't read at all. She did know her alphabet and the sounds though. And whether she was reading at the beginning of the year wasn't on my priorty list at that time because the purpose of me sending my daughter at the time was purely social reasons and for her to learn that not everyone is out to hurt her ( she's had medical problems since birth and has been poked and prodded by enough people to scare anyone). But now that has changed and its been difficult to get her teacher to really respond to what I would like for her to be doing right now.

Which leads me into , what can you do? You can interview and find a good school that will challenge your child , OR you can homeschool. Homeschooling is not hard. I did it for 8yrs up until this year. My girls wanted to give school a try so I let my other three go too.  Honestly O love homeschooling and can't wait to get back at it this year.  Those really are your own two options in education. If you chose homeschooling you can  do it yourself, or if you live in the US and certain states offer cyberschooling by public schools. Some can hire tutors. It just depends on what you want to do.

Other then that m daughter hasn't seemed boared with school. We do what is called Afterschooling. We do extra stuff at home.

[TeachingMyToddlers]

My theory is that is you do nothing else with you child, teach them to read before school. You don't have to go crazy with lots of subjects, but if you are that concerned, just get them *somewhat* ahead of their peer group. Studies show that kids who start ahead, stay ahead, so give them a gift of giving them a better chance of starting and staying at the top of their class.

I think you will find your child will learn so easily and have so much fun, neither of you will want to stop. You can also opt to teach subjects that don't "show" so much. So basically teach them to read at a basic level, and then teach them to become proficient in music or foreign languages. Unlike spewing scientific facts, their precociousness won't be quite so obvious if that's what you're concerned with and those subjects will not be covered in depth at such an early age. But they will greatly impact your child's brain development, early music training is so wonderful and influential, as is studying one or more foreign languages. In the end, you may find they are exceptional students anyway because of studying a minimal amount of early reading along with music and foreign language.  But if you don't feel so comfortable pre-teaching subjects that the teacher will cover, skip teaching science and math and developing his reading skills beyond kindergarten level.

But again, I think once you start, you won't want to stop. You will realize your child deserves to be educated at his level and not dumbed down for the sake of the masses! Even so, you can reach a great compromise if that is what works best for your family. Also, if it is in your power to do so, see out the best private college prep schools. Good luck in deciding, these forums are a wonderful resource for any subject imaginable!

[REPU]

Thanks for sharing your experiences, it's been very helpful to read them.

I agree with TeachingMyToddlers when you say that a child shouldn't be dummbed down for the sake of masses, but then again, if his/her happiness is the priority, I wonder if homeschooling is the best choice. I'll try to explain myself. Early learning works, thats for sure, therefore, as the child improves at a higher rate than non-early learners, you'll probably need to end up homeschooling (at least that's what a lot of parents say in the forums, and that reveals an adaption problem, only it's not a problem of the child adapting to school but the school adapting to the child). One thing that I wouldn't want my baby to miss is the school experience, class-mates through the years, playing at the school, I think it has so many important values to it that makes me unsure about homeschooling. Furthermore, when both parents work all day, it's just impossible to homeschool propperly. I don't want to start something that I'm just not going to be able to keep up with.

So I guess I'll just get started taking your advice and start with matters that are not taught at the school in the first years, like languages. As a matter of fact we already do that, I only talk to the baby in english, my wife does in spanish and my mother in french. I'll try to focus on those and reading.

Thanks again.

[TracyR4]

I do want to stress that homeschoolers aren't chained to tables in the home. If you live in an area that has a homeschool co-op or even just a small group your child can easily grow up with children and have experienes with them just as school children do.

Think socialization really only occurs during recess and after school. More so when they get older.
One thing I can say is that my girls had more socialization when homeschooling than they did going to school this year. Sometimes homeschoolers actually have to tone it down a little because its easy to oversocialize ( if that's even a word).

I do know many homeschoolers that work full time and they manage to homeschool. You can find those homeschoolers on the Well Trained Mind board. There are those that work full time, part time, single moms and dads etc that homeschool.

In the end all it really boils down to is if you WANT to homeschool. If not and you know you don't then your better off not doing it. But as for the social myth aspect of homeschooling that's just hooey.  As long as  you , the parent , physically don't keep your child away from others they can have the same experience as other children who are in a brick and mortar building.

[REPU]

Thanks for your opinion TracyR4, I'll think about that way.

Certainly, I think homeschooling can be fine (even better) but, before taking the decission I think it is very important thinking about a number of things can affect, other than, of course, WANTING. That's where my worries begin, whith all-day-working and so on. Sadly, there are no homeschoolers where I live, and no co-op can be made in that sense. I have a friend that homeschools her three children, but she's far away now living in another part of Spain.

[PY]

Well I am a mom of a three year old how reads most books without a problem..sentences and more sentences.We decided that it is time for she to go to a preschool part time three times a week. we also know that she is going to this school that are 8 kids a class and the teachers work individualy. We also know that she won't go to public school because the education level is low and there are no good results.
I just need to try and see how she does on this school otherways I will look for another school and keep looking until I find the right fit for her...but for now my priority is she to be happy..I have the academic side under control in the house.

[Tanikit]

My 3 year old daughter is reading at a first grade level. She went to school last year and I never told them she could read - it took many months before she showed them, but she was there firstly because I was working part time and secondly for social interaction. She made friends with children slightly older than her and played with them too even though they were a class above her. There is more to preschool than just reading/writing - in fact that is not even part of preschool here so she fitted in fine, did crafts, sang songs and even learnt her ABCs (I had only taught her phonetically) The teacher did find it surprising that she knew everything she was asked, but she needed some work on fine motor skills too.

My sister was advanced a year as she read at 2, I managed ok at school though went to gifted classes and outside events and read to the class in grade 2 and never read the school readers but was given more advanced books. We are trying to homeschool now and will have to see if this is viable for our family as education where Iive is shocking. I think the idea is to do what is best for my daughters and make another plan if its not working rather than not teach them to prevent problems later (that way you get other problems instead) Children are very adaptable and will cope no matter which you do - school/homeschool, but it will be the parents responsibility to try to help their child find alternatives if they are battling (even if you teach a child in school to day dream if they are bored)

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