tiia wrote:Well, if someone is just ahead of the curve (and teachers are hopefully competent enough to see that), there is the option to let the kid skip a whole year. I know someone, who just did that still in elementary school, because it was obvious that one year above was more suitable. The grades were still good until the end, leaving no doubts that this had been the right thing to do in this particular case.
Unfortunately this depends quite a lot on the teachers ability to make the right decision.
Easier said than done. When we moved to Russia the first time, my kids up to that point had only been homeschooled. My second oldest was due to be in 7th grade at that point. He was way ahead in math and English, even ahead of his two-years-older brother. The school here made all four of our kids "sit" for exams (even the 6-year old), and because our son's science was only at 7th grade level they didn't let him skip to 8th grade. Within 2 weeks he came home complaining he was bored in math. They were so stuck on inclusion that they weren't willing to let him sit in an 8th grade math class, even though there was one during the same time as his math class.
So after 2.5 years there his math levels suffered. My wife then homeschooled him and got his math skills back up and he was doing calculus by 10th grade. When we moved to Kyrgyzstan he wanted to attend school there, even though it would be his senior year. Spoiler (and proud dad moment): he graduated valedictorian and is now in AFROTC at Virginia Tech with a 3.8 GPA majoring in...wait for it...Russian!
So while it is nice to say that skipping a whole year is an option, you have to have a cooperative school system. Frankly, homeschooling is best for kids that are at different levels in different subjects.