So, yes, going straight to college would have appeal.

Now, I look at my kids growing up. They are soon to enter middle school, and I hear that all the GT classes (Howard County) have one hour homework each. We will probably pick and choose because I don’t think this is the right path- unless they are passionately driven in this direction.

Just because you are good at academics shouldn’t mean that’s all you do!

I politely dismissed that idea as insane. I began to think about it. It no longer struck me as quite so insane. I went in with my eyes open. The relentless homework overload which leads to sleep deprivation saps kids.

A woman who likes my comments on another forum just wrote to me about homeschooling. Her husband is very resistant. The boy is in 7th grade. I am urging her. While there’s still time.

Given that a lot of gifted kids have trouble falling asleep, we’ll start later to accommodate brains that have trouble turning off at night. I’m thinking nothing before 9:30am. You’ll see less anxiety with sufficient sleep.

Strict bedtimes like CTY. They told me early on they don’t allow work to go back to the rooms because these kids would be up all night. Finally! Someone actually gets perfectionism! My experience with gifted school programs is this: Don’t be a perfectionist. We’ll give you lots more work and if you can’t get over the perfectionism, fooey on you. But perfectionism isn’t a cold you get over in seven days! It’s a state of being. I’m not saying you don’t address it. Just not that way!

This is a no-brainer, right? So how come no one is doing it? And I’m just getting started…

But we sure could use a PG high school. I’ve long harbored ambitions to start one myself. IQ cutoff 145 with SAT scores to match Davidson as well. I’m not an IQ or score snob. Heck, I unschooled during our lone homeschool year! Only tests that year were chapter ones in her on line geometry course, that’s it. But that’s how I would get my critical mass. I’m thinking boarding school.

I’m looking for an alternative to TJ and Montgomery Blair. Not for my kid, too late, she’s graduating in June. The Washingtonian piece had a very telling comment. One student was quoted, “TJ is not for smart kids. It’s for motivated kids.”

Very very telling. We tend to divide highly gifted kids into two categories. Very motivated and driven or smart slacker. I’m looking for that rare breed, the third category. The consummate intellectual, the child who does not work for grades, who inhales material, who is sensitive and smart and wants to learn all the time.

I’m not after the go go high pressure world of DC. I want my kids getting all the rest their bodies need. That doesn’t mean I won’t cultivate ambition and dreams and soaring as far as your balloon will take you. I just want something different that what already exists, for all the kids (like mine) who need that. Creativity, joy, outdoors, field trips, vibrant discussions, a Great Books high school with some serious kick ass STEM. (Okay, just lost my credibility. Okay, get over it .

You want a heavy homework school where kids have almost no self-directed time? That’s what TJ and Montgomery Blair are for. I’m looking for something different. For the kids who need different. My school would also be well versed in 2e. My daughter did CTY summers for seven years and I’d like to model some of this on that.

A friend whose DS had started reading at age 2 was stuck in a 1st grade class where fewer than half of the other students could read and the school offered him no real accommodation. Now certainly not all gifted kids are early readers (my DH wasn’t) but I would’ve expected the majority to be reading by 1st grade given the IQ cutoff of the school is 145. And certainly a GATE school OUGHT to be able to figure out how to accommodate a kid advanced in reading.