Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Parenting arms race article

How do you know they were smarter than you? Did you have IQ scores for these kids, or were you making an assumption based on achievement?


I agree that different attitudes about learning come from the family environment, but that doesn't change the fact that people with extremely high cognitive ability still think in a fundamentally different way than 99+% of other people, and that for many highly gifted students, an environment with other students of similar capabilities would be a huge benefit for them.

I think this fact is hard for many people to accept, as a couple of people have noted on this thread already. Think of it this way: how well would a student with an IQ of 120 relate intellectually to a special ed student with an IQ around 90? How happy would the bright kids be if their classes were filled with slow learners, and the teacher had to keep the discussion at a level suited to the slower-learning group?


Yes, that's a very important part of this conversation for me. But it still doesn't change the fact that people with very high cognitive ability think differently. ETA: IMO, this group includes highly creative people as well as high IQ people. But creativity is also a form cognitive ability (that admittedly isn't measured by IQ tests).