On grade level books and learning to read: Wow that’s some serious insanity I had not been aware of. When I was in 6th grade one of the vice principles had a bookshelf in his office full of (I think donated?) books. Anyone could borrow one, and keep it if they read it and wrote a report on it. The first one I borrowed was the a compilation of Plato’s dialogs and the Republic—that was my first real introduction to Philosophy as an academic subject. Also, my brother-in-law was reading chapter books at 3. And my whole first grade class was expected to be reading chapter books.
On even ‘gifted’ schools mostly not wanted kids to get far ahead: Many (in my limited personal experience, most) teachers are not experts in the subjects they’re teaching. A 7th grade math teacher is, if you’re lucky, an expert at teaching 7th grade math to typical 7th graders. They hopefully have a familiarity with 8th grade math and should be able to explain it, but I expect many would struggle to explain 10th grade math. Similarly, I wouldn’t expect them to be prepared to teach 7th grade math to even very bright and curious 4th graders—I would think doing that may require a deeper level of mathematical understanding and also social/psychological awareness in order to adapt the approach to where the students are.
On grade level books and learning to read: Wow that’s some serious insanity I had not been aware of. When I was in 6th grade one of the vice principles had a bookshelf in his office full of (I think donated?) books. Anyone could borrow one, and keep it if they read it and wrote a report on it. The first one I borrowed was the a compilation of Plato’s dialogs and the Republic—that was my first real introduction to Philosophy as an academic subject. Also, my brother-in-law was reading chapter books at 3. And my whole first grade class was expected to be reading chapter books.
On even ‘gifted’ schools mostly not wanted kids to get far ahead: Many (in my limited personal experience, most) teachers are not experts in the subjects they’re teaching. A 7th grade math teacher is, if you’re lucky, an expert at teaching 7th grade math to typical 7th graders. They hopefully have a familiarity with 8th grade math and should be able to explain it, but I expect many would struggle to explain 10th grade math. Similarly, I wouldn’t expect them to be prepared to teach 7th grade math to even very bright and curious 4th graders—I would think doing that may require a deeper level of mathematical understanding and also social/psychological awareness in order to adapt the approach to where the students are.