I was bored a lot, having learned to read a bit before turning four and then not starting kindergarten until I was nearly six. Kindergarten was the only year I wasn't bored, because everything was learn-through-play, general-exposure activities, and it didn't matter that I could read because they weren't bugging us with reading lessons (possibly alphabet, I can't recall). I'm not sure my kindergarten teacher even knew I could read. And I did know my grade school teachers were supposed to be teaching me things - I just didn't realize until maybe fourth grade that the worksheets were part of it. I thought those were just in-between activities to make us be quiet, like handing a kid in a waiting room a copy of Highlights magazine. Well, actually, I think I must have known the math worksheets were lessons, but not so much the endless word searches, coloring all the things that begin with R, etc.
At that stage I didn't think what I did in school made any difference, though, it was just something to be scrambled through as best one could. I figured most people learned most things at home. By the time I was sent to private school (eighth grade on) I had a whole raft of skills I was behind on, because they were the sort of thing everyone just assumed I must know how to do, and it didn't occur to most of my teachers that I might need some systematic instruction. I was quite grateful to the one teacher who realized I had missed all the formal grammar instruction and set me to working through grammar exercises on my own. She was otherwise the most boring teacher I ever had (she was close to retirement and I think may have been suffering chronic pain - possibly in better health she was more fun), but she was sensible and fair and had the right insight when I needed it.
That said, my oldest sister went to private school for her whole education, with quite good teachers and a lot of personal attention, and was grade-skipped to boot, so not lacking in challenge, and she still had a whole lot of trouble getting consistently good grades until her second time through college. We both had stellar achievement scores, and some of our grades were very good, but neither of us could have gotten straight A's any more than we could have flown. Much much later (well after getting a PhD) she had an adult ADHD diagnosis, which explained a lot about both her and me.
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Date: 2022-06-19 10:53 pm (UTC)At that stage I didn't think what I did in school made any difference, though, it was just something to be scrambled through as best one could. I figured most people learned most things at home. By the time I was sent to private school (eighth grade on) I had a whole raft of skills I was behind on, because they were the sort of thing everyone just assumed I must know how to do, and it didn't occur to most of my teachers that I might need some systematic instruction. I was quite grateful to the one teacher who realized I had missed all the formal grammar instruction and set me to working through grammar exercises on my own. She was otherwise the most boring teacher I ever had (she was close to retirement and I think may have been suffering chronic pain - possibly in better health she was more fun), but she was sensible and fair and had the right insight when I needed it.
That said, my oldest sister went to private school for her whole education, with quite good teachers and a lot of personal attention, and was grade-skipped to boot, so not lacking in challenge, and she still had a whole lot of trouble getting consistently good grades until her second time through college. We both had stellar achievement scores, and some of our grades were very good, but neither of us could have gotten straight A's any more than we could have flown. Much much later (well after getting a PhD) she had an adult ADHD diagnosis, which explained a lot about both her and me.