Spelling words at five and six is not gifted, could even be considered slow by olderstandards at least. My sister and I could read and spell a lot of words before that. I don't consider myself gifted; we were just encouraged early on and loved our books.
I'm very glad I wasn't home-schooled though as I would have missed out on a lot although I can understand why people choose to do it now.
I started school around 1970, and we weren't taught to read and write until 1st grade back then.
Another mom on another thread was saying being goal-oriented is more important than being "gifted", and this story illustrates that. Success seems to be more a result of a person's interests and how much that person is willing to work toward a goal.
The fact that their child is now a spelling bee winner and is doing some high school work at age 11 says that age five does not set one's destiny.
I have a child who could read my old college textbooks when he was five. He did many other things that, looking back, I realize now were extraordinary, and he was teaching himself. But only because he was interested in those things. Now at age 10 he's more interested in baseball than anything else. ;-)
What would you have missed out on?
As info, I'm part of a group of home educators that provides coop classes for students as well as sports, drivers ed, volunteer and internship opportunities, graduation with cap/gown/valedictorian (of course based on SAT/ACT scores), and a Spring Formal. Are they missing out?