Already high achieving but needs harder work?

[ragged]

Sorry this is jumbled. It plays on my mind, I even ask this a lot in threads & not sure it's answered.

A million disclaimers apply, especially when an individual child simply could never be happy with any "too easy" work. Still... When an MNer says their already high-achieving child is still not being stretched enough, it often sounds like they want their child to be accelerated, to cover material that is maybe 3-4-5+ years above usual for their age.

Which makes me think that the child would be ready to take GCSEs 3+ years early. Is that what those parents want? And if so, why? And if they don't take the GCSEs early, won't they just end up bored & twiddling thumbs come age 14-16, unless they go to college quite early which has its own drawbacks? Is it just deferring boredom to accelerate in primary? AIBU to think that some parents aren't thinking it thru when they complain their already high-ability child needs harder work, or is there something they envision that I haven't thought of?

How do private schools stretch Gifted kids "more"? Do they go sideways or do they accelerate, so that the child is either sure to get all A*s at 16 or sitting GCSEs early with still very good marks, & then go to 6th form college years early? What path does a "bright" but not super-genius-gifted child end up following in the private sector that can be so superior to state ed?

Dear ragged, those exact questions I asked myself recently, and again with no definite answer, DS sat number of his GCSE subjects earlier(almost 2 years) did very well as expected, but to no real benefit to anyone including himself, now at college still doing very well and in line with his class mates, worth mentioning DS solely state educated.
DD Yr1 on the other hand is in independent sector, small class, able girl not being particularly stretched in any way, she is doing well, but she probably would do just as well in the local state primary school, on more personal level I do wonder What exactly are we paying for?
I have an insight into both state and private education with my own children, and if I tried to pick a value for money and all rounder, I would have to say state.
No independent school nor any school can guarantee or predict A and A* at GCSE/A level with any child, regardless of how much you pay for it, but good school on the other hand state or private will ensure that your child is being catered for to the best of their ability.
As for academically grabbing ahead with DD, well I have stopped doing that, I am much more relaxed now, because it is not important to me, of course hindsight is a wonderful thing and I have it, I have been there before with DS, he did just fine, he is exactly where he should be and that is all that matters.
IME lot of high ability children tend to level at some point in their education due to many factors, adolescence being probably most important one, there comes the point where teenagers get the taste social life and freedom, in our case that is when levelling happened with DS.

My experience was my DS was doing maths with P7 when in P4 (Scotland). He was aware they would go to high school the next year leaving him on his own doing maths again (he spent the whole of P3 doing maths on his own) The school (state) were happy to get work from the high school for DS to stretch him but they couldn't give him a maths teacher if he encountered problems. His headteacher spoke to us and suggested we try the independent sector. We did, he was offered a scholarship and he never looked back. The Independent school had qualified teachers in each subject from P4 and a lot more breadth in subjects. We felt at state school he would be pushed down a one way road with his maths and we didn't want him sitting his exams early. As you have said, we could see no reason to let him sit exams early as we had no intention of sending him to Uni early. We wanted him to be challenged and stretched but only for his own benefit and to avoid boredom, the academic results could all come in their own time. Sorry bit of a ramble, hope it makes sense.

So the benefit of going private was more breadth in his talented subject. When did he finally do (Scottish equiv to GCSE) in that subject, how did he do, did he end up twiddling thumbs at some point?

I was thinking that maybe the argument of acceleration & early exams was that they would level off due to teenage angst/boredom/disinterest so at least they got the material covered when still keen, but in that case... don't they "lose" what they've learnt before they're old enough to go to 6th form? You've got people on MN saying that a lot gets lost over a mere 6 weeks summer holiday, never mind if you did your GCSEs 2 yrs early & then had to twiddle thumbs for those 2 yrs.

It wasn't just that the maths was more indepth, but the breadth of subjects meant he could focus on other subjects like Latin and Greek, along with the sciences. He is now 13 and has been awarded a scholarship to Harrow, He goes in September. Up till now he has never twiddled his thumbs. However, the teenage years are upon us and you never know!

My trainee evil genius took GCSE's in math, IT and tech three years early after he gave his Ed Psych hell. He wants to resit IT as he was not happy he did not get the A* he was after. {He is a self driven perfectionist} His state school have since opted to follow the ed psychs advice and continue to enrich the ciriculum for him so he is doing a couple of extra maths [stats & maths for engineers] BTecs in Engineering and Tech as well as all the science options.
I do not want him taking A's until sixth form as if he did what is he supposed to do with himself and I question if that will have taught him the joy of learning or study skills to cope with Uni onward.
I went to art college at 12. Loved the teaching but the students were way too old and the social gap was unbridegable.

For a really gifted child it does not matter if its a good state or private school as long as its supportive and able to provide both differentiated teaching and enrichment opportunities.

I think it really depends on the child and how their G&T manifests itself. My ds needs to be stretched sideways, not upwards. He is oblivious as to whether he is on grade level or 5 levels above. He just needs information and gets depressed when he's not getting it. I moved him (from state school) to a small esoteric private school this year and it has been enormously successful. I have found that in some subjects (math) he is working at grade level, in other subjects (english) he is doing some work (reading/comprehension) far above grade level and some work (writing) at grade level and then in yet other subjects (science) he is working sideways and upwards in all sorts of different and amazing ways. For example, if they are studying the effects of volcanos on the environment and ds tells the teacher that he knows that subject already, she will give him some other more detailed aspect about volcanos to research and write a report about. He is happy because he gets to learn more, she is happy because he is not floating away from the class, and I am happy because everyone else is happy. In addition he has a fabulous clarinet teacher who lets ds explore the instrument and music creatively. Ds is by no means going to be a professional clarinet player, but he enjoys the instrument. So instead of making him just learn one song after another, this teacher has been showing him how to record himself with Garage Band and play jazz riffs along with YouTube videos and added him to do a solo with a rock band of other kids at the school.
I think it's important that you know your child and what they need and don't just lump them in a single category of g&t.

Sound's great sofia,just what we need for our dd.

I think this goes to the heart of what education is fundamentally about. Surely more than SATS and GCSEs? I would love my son to be more intellectually challenged: philosophy, debating, the Arts, criticism, theatre, creative thinking, politics, lateral thinking, etc etc. He is verbally gifted rather than globally gifted and would thrive on a really creative curriculum. I don't think that a mixed ability RE class will get his juices flowing - I think he may be seen as a nuisance in that kind of class.