Gifted Children

Lunar_Eclipse

Petra: No need to keep repeating yourself. In fact your replies are becoming increasingly rude and disrespectful to life choices others are free to make, which does not automatically make then invaluable employees, as my examples clearly show.

I wanted to share experience that people can have very successful careers after dropping out of university (which is not typically done lightly!) It's narrow minded of you not to touch them as an employer without listening to their reasons. A friend of mine dropped out following the death of her father which affected her hugely. (She went on to become a best selling author.)

I'm not naive enough to suggest the majority of those dropping out become successful. Just that it needn't be the end of the world, as parents probably feel at the time. Plenty of people gain average degrees which don't necessarily gain them better careers than school leavers after all (though I know this is only one supposed benefit of a degree.)

Also "you are only at university for 3 years" is not necessarily true. Many degrees are 4 years (mine), Medicine is a minimum of 5 for example.

Finally, I'm not defending it! I think perhaps we've touched a nerve. I'm showing there can be life after dropping out. 20+ years after university, DH is much more employable than I am. He dropped out, I've got a First. No-one cares about what pieces of paper we do or don't have any more. Experience is what counts now. A degree just typically gets you starting higher up the ladder. But there are varying speeds at which to tackle the ladder for those so inclined to climb it!

quidsy

My friends husband dropped out of uni after 18 months, joined the army, got de mobbed, got a job as a bank teller then in an investment firm & within a couple of years is now earning 150k a year plus benefits & bonuses. A degree isn't the be all & end all. For some people they just realize after a while that it isn't for them or whatever other factors occur. It doesn't make them unemployable.

52reynolds

With several post grad qualifications in Gifted Ed, plus 10 years co-ordinating an accelerated program here in Melbourne, I suggest that you DO need to know how gifted your child is even at 3 years old. You can't really "hothouse" children as they only learn what they're ready for (check Dabrowski's Zone of Proximal Development). If a child has an IQ of 150, say, then at 3 they already think like a 4.5 year old. This is where it then becomes an issue with social skills, as they are already thinking & feeling differently from their age peers. The gap between them & kids the same chronological age then just keeps getting WIDER! By age 12, that 150 IQ child is now thinking like an 18 year old, with emotional maturity somewhere in between. Keeping them with age peers actually harms highly gifted children. That's why you need to know how gifted they are. IQ testing can be done now, but if you can keep your child stimulated enough for now, the testing will be more accurate from about 5 years old. It needs to be a formal assessment by a psychologist who specialises in gifted children- don't use any old psych as that can also lead to problems. You will need to plan schooling with some acceleration, and most teachers here in Australia, perhaps similarly in UK, do NOT know how to teach gifted children effectively. Find as many support groups as you can, the road can be quite hard. Good luck.

wannabe_sybil

Be careful what you wish for.

My son, bear, who is nearly nine, is probably quite gifted. Last year he begged and begged and begged for extra maths. School were indifferent. As I am numerically illiterate we got him a maths tutor as a treat.

Over the summer, when he was between years three and four, he was scoring 100% on mental maths tests for year six. The tutor was getting him to write it down in roman numerals to try and challenge him. It sounds good, doesn't it, having a bright kid.

Except now I worry because as he gets bored in school he is less likely to engage and more likely for his abilities to be dismissed. Without the tutor I don't know whether he would be bothered paying attention at all. The tension between his academic ability and his age, plus two years of quite horrific life experiences, have left me scrabbling round for emotional support and ideas for him as frankly I don't know what to do. The school are writing me off as one of 'those' parents while I am trying to keep up with what bear can do and working out what he needs. Last year he could tell the teacher about a particular maths thingy because he had seen it on YouTube - seen it, remembered it, understood it, sailed through the examples.

I honestly do not know what to do for the best socially and academically, especially as I am on the floor after the last few awful years myself.

Watching how things are at the moment, I can see no correlation between academic ability and happiness.

daytona0

Every child is gifted.

wannabe_sybil

daytona0 wrote: »

Every child is gifted.

Absolutely agree with this.

GobbledyGook

As someone who worked in learning support I worked with some children who were struggling more than average and some who were classed as gifted

I've always said that if ever any of mine were gifted, one of my DD's is clever, but not massively over her peers given she's the eldest in the class, then I would focus on their weaknesses and let the schools focus on the plus sides.

I lost count of the amount of parents who couldn't understand that the fact they'd focussed on the child's amazing ability in spelling/grammar for their age meant they've manage to gloss over the fact the child was seriously struggling in maths.

Even the brightest child in the world will struggle if the basics in another area are neglected to focus on their talent.

silly_moo

holidaysforme wrote: »

There are very very few truely gifted children. There are lots of bright children, children who have amazing memories, and powers of recall, but that does not make them gifted.Really gifted children are usually musicians or athletes, not three year olds in nursery able to build a tower with blocks bigger than the other three year olds.;)
Gifted children are a teeny tiny percentage of the population.

There is no way on earth that a three year old would be identified as 'gifted' in a Nursery school. That's utterly ridiculous.

Now that's a bit unfair. I never claimed he was a genius but he IS good at numbers, spelling, has a wide vocabulary and great memory for his age and it's only natural that we want to encourage him to develop these skills. And it would be nice if the nursery did set him more challenging tasks. They've been working on numbers 0 to 5 for the past few weeks - I'm keeping my mouth shut every time they say how well he did but it's getting really frustrating. He could do that before he was 2 years old.

Petra_70

holidaysforme wrote: »

I can't actually believe I'm reading this. OP, here's a few things for you to consider.

G&t is very much overused and lots if children in any class in any school in the UK will have that label.it's pretty meaningless!

There are very very few truly gifted children. There are lots of bright children, children who have amazing memories, and powers of recall, but that does not make them gifted.Really gifted children are usually musicians or athletes, not three year olds in nursery able to build a tower with blocks bigger than the other three year olds.;)
Gifted children are a teeny tiny percentage of the population.

There is no way on earth that a three year old would be identified as 'gifted' in a Nursery school. That's utterly ridiculous.

He's three. When he goes to school next year, there will be lots of children doing exactly what he's doing and some will be doing it faster than him.

He's a child. He needs to learn to play, share, develop social skills and make friends. The best thing you can do is help him with this, not obsess about whether he's a genius or not.:)

Lastly, you really do.not want to be 'that' parent who thinks their child is special and brighter than all the others.:rotfl: I know from teacher friends that parents like you provide a few laughs in the staff room on occasion.

I'd back off if I were you and allow your son to be a child. That's what's really important.

:T:T:T

Far too many parents seem to think their children are gifted, and better than other children.

They are free to think this of course, but when it extends to the outside world and everyone in it, having to hear about little Johnny or little Jennifer being so amazing and gifted and talented, and facebook being full of pictures of their 'little soldier' and their 'little princess;' it just becomes too unbearable for words.

Re the last sentence of yours that I bolded:- I agree. Nobody likes the parent who crows on and on about how amazing their children are. And they are mocked behind their backs

susancs

silly_moo wrote: »

Now that's a bit unfair. I never claimed he was a genius but he IS good at numbers, spelling, has a wide vocabulary and great memory for his age and it's only natural that we want to encourage him to develop these skills. And it would be nice if the nursery did set him more challenging tasks. They've been working on numbers 0 to 5 for the past few weeks - I'm keeping my mouth shut every time they say how well he did but it's getting really frustrating. He could do that before he was 2 years old.

I relation to numbers, I wonder if in reality they are challenging him. If for example you are stating that he can recite the numbers in ascending orders while this can be useful, it means little in itself. Children need to understand what the number system really means through play. One of the firstthings they have to learn is about conservation – that 3 is always 3 no matter how it is arranged or presented, whether it isthe number 3, the letters forthree, 3 bricks, 3 buttons on a coat. Before a child can understand numbers for things that can be seen s/he needsreal objects which can be seen and handled witha chance to check that the count is right each time.