|
You
are here: Home
> Homeschool
Resources > Homeschooling
gifted children
Homeschooling
is fast gaining popularity amongst many parents. With
this practice, there is no dearth of material, curriculum
and advice on homeschooling a child.
However, not every
child is gifted. So if you are a lucky parent
who has a child proven to be gifted, then you must
take special care of your child.
Investing in best nourishing
the special gift of your child today would potentially
lay the foundation for a tomorrow of your child that
would brighten the face of your family and maybe your
country. As a
parent, this is a lucky chance that not many other
parents have - try to make the best of this rare chance.
Why prefer homeschooling
gifted children?
The first question
that would strike your mind if you have a gifted
child is that is the conventional school
even the right place to send your child to, or is
homeschooling a better option.
The answer to this
is that if you have an option to carry out the exercise
of homeschooling consistently for a number of years,
then homeschooling is definitely a better option.
Why so?
That is because a conventional
school would have a class of children. Of course they
would try their best to take personal care of every
child, but they have their limitations. They would
still have to go with every child rather than moving
ahead with your gifted child and leave some other
lesser fortunate children behind. The whole class
of students definitely progress at a pace that is
reasonable by their standards, but what is the impact
on your child? S/he would solve most of the problems
at school much faster than his/her compatriots and
then get bored very quickly as s/he waits for the
others to catch up. This is a complete wastage of
his/her time, talent, patience and energy. It is better
avoided rather than faced.
On the other hand,
if your child is doing homeschooling, then you control
the standards of what s/he learns. S/he does not have
to wait for her classmates to finish a math problem
or a grammar question that is trivial by his/her standards.
Rather, at his/her own time and pace, s/he can jump
from one problem to the next and then end up with
the feeling of an achievement of meeting his/her desired
goal. And often, a gifted child would keep attempting
to set his/her goals high, no matter whether you push
the other way.
How to go forward?
Take a modular approach
The next question is
how to go forward with the education of the gifted
child. There are some special courses available. However,
the best way to go is to take a modular approach and
make the best of the existing regular curriculums.
As a parent, you are the best judge to identify the
subjects that your child best understands and loves.
Remember that while your child may be gifted, s/he
may not enjoy every subject equally. Remember, gifted
children develop in an uneven manner.
So you would have to
identify which are the subjects that your child loves
and excels at. These are the subjects in which your
child would cover more than his/her age group. For
example, if your child is of an age of grade 2, s/he
may be able to understand math of grade 5 if math
happens t be one of his/her stronger subjects. If
that is the case, encourage him/her till the level
that s/he automatically takes to, but never push him/her
hard to go further. On the other hand, there would
be other subjects that your child may not really love.
So in spite of his/her gifts, s/he would not want
to move high up in such subjects. This is not a problem
- just relax and make sure that s/he is at the level
of his/her peers in these subjects. Proceed faster
on the higher grade subject modules that s/he likes
more.
Avoid the most critical
mistake that parents make - strike the right balance
The biggest challenge
that parents often face while educating their gifted
child is that of identifying the upper limits
at any given point of time. The way that you would
want your child to move forward is a relaxed environment
in which the child will stick to the core discipline
of education, be at par with peers at the subjects
that are not his/her primary interest and move rapidly
forward within his/her subjects of interest. But when
some parents see their child doing so well in some
areas, they tend to commit one or both of the two
following mistakes.
1. They pressurize
the child to move their standards up in other subjects
too. For example, if a child is thee grades ahead
in social studies, it does not mean that s/he will
also love to be three grades ahead in languages,
and some parents fail to realize that.
2. They pressurize
the child to reach yet higher levels in their subjects
of strength. If you child of an age fit to be in
grade 2 is comfortable solving problems of grade
5 in a subject, let him/her do that and don't pressurize
him/her to reach grade 6 right now unless s/he naturally
takes to it.
The bottom line
As a parent, you are
lucky to be the proud father or mother of an exceptional
child. Feed the right intellectual diet to the talent
and it will reap you the best possible rewards in
the longer run.
Back to
Top ^
|
