|
Skipping from Nursery to Kindergarten
By Inderbir Kaur Sandhu, Ph.D
Q: I have notice my son love to learn at the age of 2, he knows to identify letters from A-Z, pictures, numbers and shapes. At the age of 3, he was able to spell 20 words, read, enumerate months of the year, days of the week and solar system. He can identify numbers from 1-100 till thousands. Before he reach 4, he was able to write his name and letters. Now he just turn 4, he was able to write letters in his own without tracing and write numbers from 1-100.
Just now I enrol him to school and they assess him that he can go kinder 2, no need for him to go for nursery and kinder 1. But I did not agree, I told them let him go with his same age.
A: Based on research studies, children who went to the nursery, have an advance compared to them that only went to the Kindergarten. Apparently, they learn faster, more capable of interacting with other children, more independent when it comes down to their basic needs (toilet, food, etc).
But it is also true if your child is very advanced and/or gifted, s/he may likely feel unchallenged and get bored in an unstimulating environment. This may cause the child to disrupt others or eventually be loner by isolating her/himself. Having said that, I feel it really depends on your child. Nursery is like a play school – its exposure to early interaction with others be it children or teachers. If your child is socially less exposed, this would be a good place to learn early social skills. Children learn primarily from other children while playing together. Unless you are able to provide this for your young child, pre-K could be a good place for a start.
Although not mandatory, it does give them an advantage of fitting in better in kindergarten, as they are quite prepared from their nursery experience. The best would be to find a playschool or nursery that would be able to tweak learning a little to suit your son but in the same classroom with peers. Once he has settled down, he could be slowly accelerated. Some of the skills learnt at pre-K could be early skills crucial for children at that age. Therefore it really depends on your child whether he is ready to accelerate or need to remain with peers to for his initial social skill learning.
Do discuss your concerns with the school and they may be able to advise you accordingly. Have a beautiful journey!
|
Checkout these other gifted children questions
