Is your child "gifted"?

My eldest son was able to spell and write his own name before he was two, He has just turned 8 now and spell words such elemental and unfortunate, and a lot of words that i cant even spell lol!! And all of these words they havent even got to in school yet. He is top of his class in all his subjects and sometimes helps other kids in his class if they are a bit behind. His teachers in his school have said to me that he should have extra work to do at home, but I dont want to burden him down with extra work in case he gets bored with school. He has already told me that his teacher goes too slow for him.I wouldnt do anything differently at all. I still let him go at his own pace. If I start to treat him differently then he would think that there is something wrong with him, and I dont want to change him.

i dont know if its classified as gifted or not, but by 2, my daughter could read numbers and do simple math. but i let her be too. she loves jigsaw puzzles too and was building them by 11 months. at 2 she was building 24 piece puzzles. she is lefthanded and only time will tell.

i dont know if its classified as gifted or not, but by 2, my daughter could read numbers and do simple math. but i let her be too. she loves jigsaw puzzles too and was building them by 11 months. at 2 she was building 24 piece puzzles. she is lefthanded and only time will tell.

The way to know more about how to tell if a child is a "gifted" (I'm not a fan of that particular word) is to go to some sites that offer "legitimate" information about the signs of it. Doing a search like, "how to tell if your child is gifted" or "traits of giftedness in children" will yield many sites. Some are more reputable than others, so look for the ones that tend to be linked to places like universities, hospitals, or groups that are specifically aimed at gifted children.

There are times when the information appears to conflict because people look at different things when they're defining "gifted". If you look at enough information, though, you'll get a general idea of what information appears to be consistent between the different sources.

I've done quite a bit of "research" into giftedness, and there is a lot of misunderstanding about what it is. Most children with good, normal, parents who talk to them are plenty bright and learn a whole lot of things early. That's how children are supposed to be.

Giftedness isn't particularly how many things a child knows . Its more about how a child (or person) views and processes the world in general. A "plenty bright" child will pick up information far more quickly than many people think normal, healthy, children do. Many parents who have children who learned their colors, numbers, letters, and maybe something like states and capitals, think their child is gifted, when - really - the child is just "good and plenty bright".

Gifted children may have any number of traits, which can include having a "look-before-you'leap" approach to new people and place, being socially very mature, having interest in a wide a variety of activities and being good at all of them, reaching developmental milestones early, having a large vocubarly early, excellent memory, a well developed sense of empathy, and any number of other things.

The gifteddevelopment.com shows a good list of traits found in gifted and profoundly gifted children, but there are all kinds of places that work on behalf of gifted children.

Exactly where "plenty bright and above average" crosses the line to "gifted" isn't always a really clear-cut thing. You can have a kid who tests in the area of the "gifted cut-off point" on the IQ scale but who has test results a couple of points below for one reason or another.

Other than finding ways to supplement the child's formal education at home (because schools can't/won't always meet the academic needs of gifted children) and trying to help the child understand why he/she may feel more grown up than peers, there may not necessarily be anything all that different parents need to do.

Its a good idea to have children evaluated by a psychologist to know exactly what you're dealing with. There's a big difference between those more common "nicely bright" kids and profoundly gifted children.

Be careful not to believe everything you read about gifted children. There can be a tendency of people who don't completely understand giftedness (and that includes even experts) to see giftedness as more of a problem than it needs to be.

Besides aiming to meet your child's academic needs, it may be a good idea to let the child be in plenty of activites where he/she isn't any more gifted than the next kid. It gives children a chance to feel "like everybody else" rather than always feeling different.

Don't over-emphasize a child's giftedness when dealing with the child. Gifted children are children. Paying attention to teaching them about being a decent, nice, human being who respects others is important for these kids too.

Be aware that many gifted children find ways to hide it once they're in school.

Children who are gifted may feel underestimated because "the world" treats them as if they're much younger than they feel. They may also have to live with frequently having other people direct envy or hostility toward them and wanting to "take them down a peg". Then there's having to live without schools addressing their "intellectual curiosity" and/or understanding the level of work they need. As a result, gifted children may feel as if the "the world" isn't very nice to them.

When they feel adults around them don't understand who/what they are they may have a sense of "raising themselves" even though they know they are loved. The thing that may give a gifted child "an attitude" isn't necessarily his knowing he's as bright as he is. It may more be having realized that adults don't how intellectually mature he is, so he "figures out" that they "aren't smart enough to know he's in there" so he's on his own.

The song, "I Am What I Am" (from La Cage..")has the lines, "I am what I am. I don't want praise. I don't want pity." There's some wisdom in those lines.

My dd is "gifted" and the only thing we did was support her interests. She has books for her favorite subjects and we did activities and field trips. We just lovingly supported/support her. I kind of figured she was gifted when she could talk in complete sentences at only a year. She's done almost everything early academic wise. Physically, she doesn't seem to be as coordinated as most kids her age. She entered school a year early and just started the gifted program this spring. Why schools wait so long is beyond me. She'll be starting fourth grade next year.