What do you do when your fyos son teacher says your child is 2 years advanced?

[pomegranate1975]

My son fyos teacher has said that my son is 2 years advanced in maths and english/reading etc. We are in australia, school starts january and finish in dec.
I said to her okay.
So now should i do something? Should i get him tested? or dont worry about anything?

What age is he? Two years advancement when young is not that unusual ('very able' rather than 'gifted', in normal label terms) in an average cohort in school due to the way children develop different skills etc at different times. The school simply need to ensure they meet his needs in terms of what he needs to stay stimulated in class. There is probably no real reason to pursue educational testing unless you are concerned about other things too. If you think he needs/would benefit from some additional stimulation look to having him learn a musical instrument, which is a great way to help a child develop creativity, stick at something challenging and be stretched, without the burden of simply giving more and more school work at a young age.

FYOS?

I imagine that if the school have identified it then they will be able to differentiate the work appropriately. Outside school if he is bored then find out what he is interested in and encourage him to pursue additional interests, give him access to lots of information books. Or just let him enjoy being a little boy and be happy that you don't need to spend hours cajoling him to read.

Ds (4) is also reading about 2yrs above his age and is ahead of some children in his sisters' classes in yrs 2&4. I imagine that when he starts in September that he will be one of the most able readers. I know too that there were children who were reading Roald Dahl when dd1 was still struggling with 'oh no Floppy'. Fast forward 4 years and she is as fluent as most of them and has overtaken others once reading clicked for her aged 7. Reading early takes the pressure off about whether they will be able to read but doesn't necessarily mean that they will retain the lead. It is great though that he has discovered a love for studying early.

Ok so fyos means first year of school?

And school starts in January, so he either started 5 months ago or will be starting in 8 or so months? I'm assuming the former unless your first year teachers assess pupils well in advance of starting school.

Compulsory school age in Australia is 6 but different states have different starting ages I think, however it's safe to say that he's probably either 5 or 6.

I don't know the Australian curriculum but here this would be the equivalent of a year 1 child working at the level of a year 3 child. Have you taught him to read, given him maths tasks etc, how self taught & motivated is he?

My question to you would be what have the school said they are going to do? If they are doing to differentiate then great, you probably don't need to do much other than follow and support his passions.

In the uk if a child this advanced is at a school which isn't really meeting their needs and they can afford to then parents may send the child to private school as many work about 2 years ahead due to selecting only bright pupils.

Testing is likely to tell you his IQ and his specific strengths and weaknesses. It might show that if his learning were accelerated he could steam even further ahead. However testing is more accurate for children 7+.

If he hasn't started school yet then my thoughgt would be slightly different!

Thank you for your replies. Yes he is 5.2 years old and first year of school in kindergarten. The teacher just talks alot about him that he writes sentences up to 3 pages long and has completed all the australian kindergarten and year 1 curriculum. He is well ahead in maths as he has completed the kindergarten and year 1 mathletics. He gets 100% in everything she says. Now they plan to give him year 2 mathletics. The teacher says they pull him out for extension work and so amazed he just picks up eveerything after one or two times teaching. He is so motivated and so proud of himself and just speaks up with answers. He is very competitive and always want to be the best. He is a very happy kid and helps other kids in class when they need help. The school hasnt told me what they plan to do. So i have no experience on what i should do or just ignore.

It sounds as thought they are offering him the extension he needs in the level of his academic work.

You say he is happy and enjoying school, so relax and let him continue to be so. School is about so much more than the academics - he will be developing social, physical and emotional skills as well.

Some schools offer the opportunity to accelerate a student to the next year group, but to be honest it does not sound like there is much need for him to do this at this stage. Certainly worth considering for future and possibly something to discuss with school. This happened with me and in primary school it was not a problem, but in secondary school when puberty kicked in and I was smaller/less developed/less physically advanced than the majority of my peers it did cause some interesting issues!!!

Enjoy having a happy child who is enthused by learning - long may it last!

As the school are offering him the extension work and he's happy, other than praise him there's nothing extra you need to do at the moment, just watch and make sure they carry on stretching him.

You must be very proud. I would advise you to restrain from calling him "clever" when he does well, but to praise his "effort" and "hard work". I think it focusses the reward on the right thing. You don't want him to find in a few years he's coasting on "clever" without any effort.