Last night we were invited to my grandsons new school school as they were putting on a concert for the parents to show case what their children have been up to. They also had a fete with various stalls so they could raise funds.
We arrived early a couple of hours before the concert and made an evening of the event. It was great to meet the teachers in person who seem to adore my grandson and all mentioned how well mannered he is with his please and thank yous.
His class teacher mentioned to my grandson that he could take us around and show us his class room which he was more than happy to do. There are 6 other kids in his class which is actually kind of fantastic because he gets more one on one time with the teacher.
Having missed schooling for the majority of this year he has been in catch up mode so this is ideal for what he needs right now. His previous school had been sold and they have been using temporary class rooms and as we had expected not much teaching was taking place. What gave it away was one of the school projects had a glaring spelling mistake with Autum and no n. My grandson even mentioned it was spelled incorrectly so you can guess what the caliber of teacher was.
The work they were doing was following an online teaching app and my daughter has the same app herself and raised her concerns. We pulled him out of that school as it was more like a baby sitting class and he is far smarter than that. Special needs does not mean you are dumb and useless and it turns out he is at the other end of the spectrum.
In my grandsons class they have a "feelings" wall where each day you write how you are feeling. This must be new as I can never recall doing this kind of thing. On his he has written he is happy to be at a new school and also happy to have new friends. He is in his happy space and it showed when taking us on a tour of his school and classroom. what has been noticeable is the moving around so much has been traumatizing thinking that no one wanted him which is sad. He knows that this is not true and why he is one big smile every day.
I mentioned he is at the other end of the spectrum as in order to be accepted at this school you have to be independently tested by a psychologist. This is an expensive private school and they are very particular on who is accepted into their school so they do the pre testing first. This involves a 3 hour test involving various different methods and not all writing. The IQ test he scored 138 which places him in the top 2% and could have told them that prior to testing.
The only areas he is lacking on is things like the all roundedness of other kids his age who know about Sleeping Beauty and Snow White And The Seven Dwarfs. An easy remedy as we will watch the 1960's versions and not the latest DEI crap released recently. We never took the kids to watch the latest versions as we do not agree with how they had changed things to suit the narrative of today. Politically correct cartoons should be more about innocence and the story line without hidden agendas.
Apparently he is streaks ahead of his age group and we need to be aware in order to push him and keep him in the right direction.