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Comment by amykhar | Hacker News Reader

On the flip side, you have to challenge them and give them the opportunity to work hard. I think schools get lazy with gifted kids. Gifted kids deserve to be challenged and put to the limits of their abilities the same as non-gifted children, but schools just don't do that. Tracking children by ability in the US has been labeled elitist. Funding often isn't there for enrichment programs. Parents are expected to provide enrichment for these kids outside of school, but it's not always possible either financially or time-wise.

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I'm just going to keep posting this when the subject comes up...

"A 20-year longitudinal study has traced the academic, social, and emotional development of 60 young Australians with IQs of 160 and above. Significant differences have been noted in the young people’s educational status and direction, life satisfaction, social relationships, and self-esteem as a function of the degree of academic acceleration their schools permitted them in childhood and adolescence. The considerable majority of young people who have been radically accelerated, or who accelerated by 2 years, report high degrees of life satisfaction, have taken research degrees at leading universities, have professional careers, and report facilitative social and love relationships. Young people of equal abilities who accelerated by only 1 year or who have not been permitted acceleration have tended to enter less academically rigorous college courses, report lower levels of life satisfaction, and in many cases, experience significant difficulties with socialization. Several did not graduate from college or high school."

https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ746290.pdf

Acceleration has its benefits, but the ideal solution would be to accelerate the educational aspects for the child without accelerating the social side.

I'd rank the options (from most ideal to least) as

1. Gifted kid with other gifted kids, with individualized coursework (ex: Davidson Academy in Reno, Nevada)

2. Gifted kid with other gifted kids, with standardized but accelerated coursework (ex: a g&t magnet program)

3. Gifted kid in general population, with individualized coursework

4. Gifted kid accelerated several grades ahead

5. Gifted kid remains in general population at normal grade level for age

And 3, 4 and 5 are really toss-ups depending on the personality of the child

I was transferred from a poorer middle school and my HS admin prevented me from going into the accelerated classes. I had a bad time in university and have not been able to return.

It hurts me every day. I hope it will get better, but I do not see it happening in this life.

No-child-left-behind really screwed the gifted programs. All the money went to get the marginal kids to pass the tests.

I was in the first big wave of gifted programs in the mid-80s. My teachers had doctorates. There were 10-15 kids in my classes. We did lots of off the wall stuff.

Now, my child is in the same boat, but her class size is 30-35, and the curriculum isn’t particularly special.

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