<p>Actually, there is more to being challenged than being ‘allowed’ to read ‘harder books.’ S was reading ‘harder books’ from the time he started kindergarten, but still had no challenge nor peers for math or English in his 1st grade school. The 6th grade teacher in the 2nd grade school he attended tried to have all the ‘advanced’ kids stay together in their math book, but finally just let the kids go at their own pace (whereupon their finished the book in a few weeks). There was no higher level of math available for them at that school. </p>
<p>When I was in school in the dark ages, where was “programmed texts” that we were allowed to do when we completed our other school work. I did it and was able to cover pre-algebra and algebra at my own pace using those texts. Don’t know why kids aren’t encouraged to use computer and other resources to continue advancing once they’ve exhausted current curricula in their schools.</p>