What to do with an exceptional child?

Question

My daughter is two years old, three in Sep. Her birthday is a week past the deadline to start preschool. She already knows her letters, can count to 30, can write her letters, will actually write a word. Knows her shapes, colors, etc. Her father was reading at age 3, and I'm sure she could too. The question is what to do with her? I've looked at preschool curriculums to do at home, but it's stuff she already knows. Are there any activities to get her involved in?

Answer 1

I would tend to focus more on her social and emotional skills at this age.  It's fabulous that she already has all these academic skills--now work on social skills.  These are JUST as important at this age.

Answer 2

Check out the book

Better Late Than Early: A New Approach to Your Child's Education

by Raymond S. Moore and Dorothy N. Moore

Answer 3

Enroll her in a preschool.  My granddaughter has been attending one since she was an infant and at four will begin private school in August. She has a late September birthday. In some areas, your child might qualify to take an advance placement to enter school early after she has turned 5.

Answer 4

I agree with getting her into other activities like swimming and tumbling.  This will further develop her mind and start teaching her athletic skills.

As for teaching aids....look at kindergarten curriculum, it will be a little more advanced.  Also start the reading, I was reading by 4 and it was because my mother always read to me and pointed to words as she read them.

Answer 5

Seeing as though she's three and very smart already.  I would involve her in a few recreational activities.  She should excel in those as well.  Things such as:  swimming classes for toddlers at your local YMCA or toddler dance/tumbling class.

Answer 6

You could try a Montessori preschool if the other preschools have a cut off date ( altho that really surprises me, where I live , most of the preschools have classes from 2 and up and the cut off date here is the end of Sept ~ the Montessori ones here that I know of would take a child that is going to be three before the end of Sept , I would think that most of them are the same... but I cant tell you that for sure.)

You could get some K curriculum ~ either from workbooks from teacher stores, book stores, or places like SAM's club ( they have really nice workbooks for under $10 that cover most of what they need for that grade ) OR you can get bunches of things online ~ there are many many websites that have things for free taht you can print out.

These are for *preschool* but if you search the sites there is probably alot more on there that you could use ~

http://www.kidzone.ws/tracers/index.htm

http://www.first-school.ws/

http://www.kidzone.ws/

http://www.dltk-teach.com/

http://homeschooling.about.com/cs/langea...

http://www.preschooleducation.com/

http://www.first-school.ws/theme/alphabe...

**http://tools.atozteacherstuff.com/handwr...

http://www.atozteacherstuff.com/

other sites~

http://www.kinderplans.com/

http://www.letteroftheweek.com/

http://schoolexpress.com/

http://www.earlychildhoodlinks.com/teach...    < this has a list of other sites>

www.preschooleducation.com

http://www.mothergoose.com/free_preschoo...

http://www.tlsbooks.com/kindergartenwork...

http://pbskids.org/arthur/parentsteacher...

http://www.sabine.k12.la.us/vrschool/kin...

( this one has a LONG list of sites that may be helpful)

( that's just a few that I have bookmarked right now I am sure if you did searches you could come up with hundreds more :-)

Getting her involved in other types of activities would be great as well ~ depending on where you live ,you should be able to find at least a few things for her that she might like ~ gymnastics, ballet / dance classes, the YMCA and other gym type places usually have classes and sports activities for kids her age, also local libraries may have reading activities or arts and craft activities for her age too. < also, some public school will offer preK reading activities for parents to bring their kids to ... here where I live, they use to do what they called PreBear reading ...I *think* it was done once a week and the kids came , listened to the story and the did a craft that went with it as well as got a snack and a copy of the book to take home>

and while I am nor sure if you would be interested in homeschooling or not, you might look into finding a local homeschool group because most will have feild trips, classes, and / or other activities for kids that your daughter could participate in.