Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion The ultimate brag thread

Ironic brag: DD7's school has a positive motivation policy where students can be instantly recognized for good citizenship by any school personnel who notice unusually good behavior. The librarian presented one to DD yesterday for quickly selecting a book and reading quietly.

Next, she'll get one for singing off-key and having ears attached to the sides of her face.

I have some interesting quirky things that have caught me by surprise lately.. DD is 14 months.
When she was 11.5 months I gave her a book to look at in the car seat and didn't want to read parts of it to her (like the picture of a bottle of milk, because she'd want to nurse.) So she started flipping the pges by herself and when she got to milk, she pointed to it and signed milk. After that, she regularly started "reading" all her books. She was already looking through them alone, but now she signs for all the pictures she recognizes. She signed a questioning "airplane" once when a semi truck pulled up next to us when she was in her seat. I thought that was interesting.

She mastered her 3 piece shape knob puzzle by 13 months and is now doing pretty well with an 8 piece knob shape puzzle. The handles are so tiny that she has a hard time manipulating the shapes, but she seems to usually know where they go.
I believe she knows over 70 asl signs now, too. She isn't talking a lot and I'm really happy we got her the Signing Time DVDs, because when we *don't* know what she wants she gets tantrum-y very quickly.

A month or so ago I decided to give her a play wooden dinnerware set. She immediately took the play utensils over to drawer we keep silverware in, got on her tip toes, managed to open the drawer and throw the play utensils over the top of the drawer to get them in. Then she closed the drawer and went on her way. I about died. She has never attempted to put them in any other drawer except the one we keep the utensils in, too.

She also started throwing papers she finds on the floor (a PROBLEM in my messy house lol) in the trash and we showed her how to work the pedal so she doesn't have to touch the lid.
We got her her own cleaning set because she is always trying to sweep the floor, use the dust pan and uses rags to "clean" the floor like she sees daddy doing.

Embarrassing (to me) brag: So I was rushing around getting the kids packed into the car to bring them home from the daycare. I put my 28 month old in her seat, then put my 10m old who was in her infant bucket into its base. Hop in the front seat, about to get going, and from the back seat I hear "Mommy, Mommy!!!! (very urgent tone) You forgot to buckle me in!" I looked back at her and said, wow, you're right, thanks for telling me! Quickly hopped out and got her all buckled in, then we went home.

I was pretty worried/embarrassed I'd done that, and amazed that she told me...

At this point it feels like something she says daily surprises me.

My daughter has been playing a bit of starfall here and there, and has a few phonics based educational apps for the i-pad. A couple of weeks ago she started sounding out words. At first I thought she was memorizing, so I wrote something simple out to test her. After she read it to me, I exclaimed "I can't believe my 2 year old is reading."

She responded "I'm not two. I'm two and three quarters."

I wont be posting that exchange on facebook.

DS9 won the school spelling bee! Of course, now he's going to be insufferable, since he said he didn't have to study for anything and then proved it.

This year, for some reason that has something to do with another school pulling out of regionals, the elementary school is not sending anyone on up the line, so we don't (thank goodness) have to worry about what to do if he goes to state. Maybe next year we'll have a better answer for that and have to worry about it.

More funny than brag...

Over dinner, DS (age 3 years 11 months) says: "Mommy, what does dedicated mean?"

Wondering about the context where he heard the word, I ask him to put it in a sentence for me.

He thinks for a second and then says: "How would you define dedicated?" (A sentence, just not quite the one I was hoping for.)

After giving him the reply, he quotes the dedication page from an e-book he's seen on my iPad twice.

Yeah, "I just did -- 'what does dedicated mean'!"

DS, about to turn 4, is making a "book" for his sister, because she is making one for him about his beloved deep sea animals. So far it says: ET B LONZ TO (DD's name).

("It belongs to DD.")

So cute.

My dd9 will be playing Irish fiddle on stage with The Chieftains next month when they are in our area. She is really excited. It will be her 2nd time on stage with them because she played with them last year.

Our local paper had an article about a week ago about the ACT test and studying. They posted in the article a table of the average ACT scores for all of the local high schools (about five or six of them) including one that is one is ranked by US News as one of the best performing high schools in the nation. I do realize that average ACT scores include the low performers, but this one charter in particular has a reputation of not attracting or running out the lower performing kids so their test scores tend toward above average for most, if not all, students.

Dh has always been skeptical that dd13 is particularly smart for some odd reason despite her being 1-2 yrs younger than her classmates and ample indication that she quite intelligent. I pointed out to him that dd beat the average ACT score for every local high school including the charter as a young 12 y/o (8th grade). He said something to the effect of, "wow, maybe she is smart."