Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Pre-school Is my child gifted

Sorry for the length of this post. I compiled a list of my son�s milestones. I am not sure what to do with him as far as school goes. Should he be tested? Should I homeschool? I know he needs the social interactions. My wife is a stay at home mom. We don�t force anything on him, he simply loves to learn. With the progress he has made I don�t see the use of kindergarten, and he isn�t even 3 yet.



Prior to 24 months �
� Can recognize alphabet both uppercase and lowercase.
� Knows the phonics sounds of all letters
� Can recite alphabet forwards and backwards as letters and phonics sounds
� Can name and arrange objects in alphabetical order.
� All animals and sounds they make
� Can count to twenty forwards and backwards
� Single digit addition with low numbers 1,2,3
� Arranging objects by size or color.
� Knows colors of the rainbow in order frontwards and backwards.
� Some sight words ~20-30 words
� Plural forms of most animals (e.g. geese, oxen, octopi.)
� Knows most opposites
� Knows simple sign language (more, please, thank you, yes, no, etc.)
� Can recognize the alphabet in sign language.
� Knows most simple shapes (square, circle, triangle, oval, rectangle, and star)
� Able to spell first name





2 years old � 3 years old.

(Currently 2 years 11 months)

� Can recite Spanish and English alphabet
� Knows how many letters in alphabet
� Knows some letters of the greek alphabet (pi and omega)
� Can recognize numbers up to 100
� Can count to 100 in English and Spanish
� For every letter of the alphabet he can name an animal, food, or object.
� Knows the colors of rainbow in English and Spanish
� Knows several common words in Spanish.
� Knows all the parts/planets of the solar system, and info about each one.
� Knows almost all sight words
� Can verbally spell out close to 100 words when asked.
� Knows denomination of coins but not worth (nickel, dime, etc.)
� Can read the hour hand on an analog clock.
� Can recognize and complete patterns
� Can recognize comparitives such as who is happier, or which is newer.
� Knows left and right.
� Knows the parts of the body
� Five senses and the organs involved.
� Can spell out words when asked frontwards or backwards
� Can sound out new words
� Can read full sentences and whole children�s books. (minimal cueing needed)
� Know difference between vowels and consonants.
� Able to skip count by 2s,3s,5s, and 10s
� Knows sign language well can identify words signed to him at full speed.
� Knows much more sign language (share, be nice, don�t touch, all colors, etc)
� Can sign letters of the alphabet, has difficulty with some dexterity wise.
� Knows, can recognize, and sort by number of sides all polygons (parallelogram, rhombus, trapezoid, pentagon, hexagon, up to dodecagon.)
� Able to recognize advanced shapes in everyday life, such as trapezoids and parallelograms
� Can recognize stop signs and knows traffic light meanings.
� Knows months of the year and days of the weeks. When written can arrange them in order
� Know his whole name and those of all his family members
� Knows address, birthdate, and state he lives in.
� Knows how many continents there are
� Able to use ipad/computer to search for what he wants
� Taught himself all the Spanish he knows from searching for it. ( we are not Spanish)
� Fluent in the use of ipad.
� Assemble jigsaw puzzles with alphabet on them at a 6+ puzzle age.
(doesn�t do as well with picture style puzzles)
� Speaks in full sentences.
� Perfectionist everything must be in a line or in the right order
� Sensory/tactile issues, doesn�t like his hands to have anything on them.
� Doesn�t like any loud or even moderately loud sounds/noises.
� Can recite several childrens songs from memory
� Does not share, play with other kids.
� Enjoys adult company.
� Hardly plays with any toys besides educational, but not for lack of toys.
� When asked his favorite toy it is the alphabet.
� Has an excellent memory, can remember things when shown only once or twice. Can remember the color of someone�s clothes the last time they visited.
� Cannot use a pencil, marker, or spoon well.

Welcome! Your son may well be gifted, but it's not certain. Notice that almost everything you've listed here is memory-based, and then think about the amount of memorising that every child does at this kind of age, learning their native language(s); although it's unusual to know so many things normally known only by much older children, and seeking these things out (rather than being heavily encouraged into them) suggests giftedness, it isn't conclusive.

So I'd caution against making firm plans on this basis right now. Find out as much as you can about the schools available to you, find out about homeschooling, and decide later. If there's a good kindergarten available to you, it might be useful, even if not for academics.

I can't resist pointing out that here:
your son has been misinformed: the plural of octopus is not octopi (because the word isn't Latin in origin). I think have heard a case made for octopodes, but in reality the plural of octopus is octopuses.

Welcome.

ColinsMum provided a lovely reply.

I will add that if you believe your child may be gifted, you may wish to read the book A Parent's Guide to Gifted Children as it is a highly accurate guide of what to expect and a prepared parent is best able to navigate the journey.

Possibly you are already familiar with lists of commonly observable traits/characteristics/behaviors in gifted children, such as the following…
1- http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Articles_id_10501.aspx
2- http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Resources_id_11194.aspx
3- http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Resources_id_15710.aspx
4- http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Articles_id_10162.aspx
5- http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Articles_id_10106.aspx

While there is general agreement that giftedness is an observable phenomenon, there may be important differences in the details.

Please know that giftedness cannot be diagnosed on a public forum.

OP, you appear to be posting under a real name. Please note that a username or nickname is encouraged in order to protect anonymity. Part of the Board Rules shares this advice:

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He sounds like he is very bright, but as for "gifted", or how bright he is exactly, I think it depends on how much time you are spending teaching him. For instance does he skip count because you have spent a lot of time rehearsing, or does he truly understand the concept? Does he know shapes like trapezoids because you talk about it a lot, or does he pick it up with seemingly no effort?

Some of the things on your list are actually red flags for disorders like autism or Asperger's, for instance not playing with other kids (kids that age do a lot of parallel play rather than interacting, but he should be interested in what other kids are doing and want to be near them), the perfectionism (needing things to be in a certain order or lined up), sensory issues, not playing with toys, and being extremely interested in the alphabet rather than normal toys. At that age he should be doing pretend play. For instance if you give him a play phone will he put it up to his ear and pretend to talk, even though he knows it's not a real phone? Does he play with toy cars or trains and pretend they are real? DS would move his trains around his tracks while yelling "choo choo" at that age, and he would make his trains talk to each other. I'm not trying to diagnose him with anything, I was just concerned by a few of your bullet points.

Those things also stood out to me, fwiw.

Such children very often have difficulty relating well to peers because of the depth and narrowness of their range of interests-- that is, adults are more forgiving than other children are of a 3yo who ONLY wants to talk about, for example, washing machines. Adults might find it quirky but charming to have a child talk to them about model airplanes for an hour-- another four year old not-so-much, particularly if there isn't any give-and-take in terms of venturing to other topics.


You might do some reading about hyperlexic traits and maybe be sure to pay particular attention to some of those red-flag kinds of areas.


Prodigious verbal and visual memory, lack of play with "toys" or peers, preference for adults, need for order (in particular ways), sensory issues, potential motor concerns (though from the description, I wouldn't automatically say this was unusual), fascination with numbers and symbols, and very early literacy would all fit there. Some of those things are also quite common among gifted preschoolers-- but not all of them.

Some of them are also quite transient in some children-- real kids are way more than a set of bullet points, I'm aware, and no brief description on the internet is ever going to provide a full picture of who a child is.

A play based pre-school was a very good experience for my DS8. Kindergarten helped him develop "real school skills." Maybe a Montessori program would be a good balance for your son. Even at 4 DS had his own agenda that came off quite strange but also charming to adults and teachers. Alternatively, as many homeschoolers mention here, there are plenty of opportunities to connect socially not bound artificially by age.

Your child is unlikely to end up average. How far from average remains to be seen. Some of the things made me think aspergers but intense kids can seem like that even if they turn out not to be. Enjoy your child and have fun then get him tested when you feel it would serve a purpose.

Oddly enough both mine found left and right easy at 3 to 3.5 then lost it again.

FWIW, both my kids were quite hyperlexic, and neither of them are on the spectrum.

It can be so hard to tell with a child that young... many different cognitive profiles can have similar behaviours and characteristics. My advice is to follow the lead of your child and let him indicate his needs to you by his interests and behaviours.

Good luck

On the other hand, if I had made a list of my son's milestones, it would have matched yours very closely, especially in the before-2 category. He now has an IEP for social/emotional development issues, and we are continuing to alertly monitor at home for the possibility of Asperger syndrome, although we haven't taken him to be tested for it.

The use of kindergarten is mostly social for a kid like this, but that can be a big deal. He may not make much progress on math, but he should learn to avoid dominating a group discussion while still participating in it, to stand in line when required, to shift tasks with everyone else even if he's "not done." I would probably not skip kindergarten - you would be better off skipping 1st or 2nd grade. But if he's not even 3 yet, you really don't need to know the answer to this yet, even if you want to. As annoying as it is, I think you just have to wait and see.

Yep, it could be either, and there is no way to tell at this stage. My experience is that a parent really doesn't want to hear that, but it doesn't make it less true. Sorry!