Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Weirdly gifted

For those that have gifted girls, is it difficult to tell that your child is gifted? DD 12 is a great kid. A teacher suggested we might want to have her evaluated in first grade to consider a grade skip. IQ (WISC) in the high 150’s all index scores were in roughly the same range. Fast forward to fifth grade and a new school, they suggested an updated evaluation, a different IQ test this time, results in the high 150’s and index scores again roughly in the same range. The thing is DD is not super academic. She does love to read and has always been interested in programming. Other than that she is kind of a jock. She loves to play sports (and is very good at them), dances hours every week, is pretty popular with peers and makes friends easily. Her standardized test scores are always really high but her teachers remark about how “normal” she seems. Her peers and teachers seem shocked when she wins any academic awards. I don’t know if it is masking and I should be concerned or just not worry about it? FWIW her school does not have any kind of gifted education so she has never received anything. She has done a few things through JH CTY though.

She could be hiding it but she could also genuinely not be that interested in academics. She may find something that interests her later but nothing taught at 12 is that inspiring. She also probably gets more recognition and approval for sports.

Being GT does not necessarily mean one must present as "not normal". I have known several other GT individuals (145+ on contemporary tests, or 160+ on old SBLM) who interact very well in a wide range of environments, are quietly very accomplished in areas of interest to them, and have received the same "normal" comment throughout their lives. I would consider it less masking in those cases, and more high social reasoning and code-switching.

In addition to the suggestions above, don't forget that if all she's ever yet been fed is academic pablum, it's no big surprise if she doesn't relish sinking her teeth into the mush.

Like many people I know, she may become a lot more interested in academics when she is exposed to the beauty and complexity of the real thing, taught by people who know, and love, their subject. Math is the greatest source of joy in my son's life - but he learned to hate it at school. I loathed history as a student - and now it's a favourite hobby.

I feel a sudden urge to re-read "Is it a cheetah?"
http://www.stephanietolan.com/is_it_a_cheetah.htm
(Ah yes, as always, it somehow manages to be both a comfort and a heartbreak.)

Some of the greatest sportsmen (and sportswomen, ofcourse!) are what they are because of their superior IQ. To be great at sport, one has to be great at planning, anticipating the next set of moves (sport is a lot like playing chess), reading the opponents, responding to a plethora of inputs simultaneously, analysis of the game etc etc. I am not a sporty person, but, my extremely gifted husband was effortlessly good at sports and for the longest time, it was expected that he might end up playing sports as a career before he switched to a STEM field. So, it is possible that your daughter's giftedness is showing in sports at this time. Giftedness does not mean that a person will present as a nerd or they do not fit in well with a crowd of peers. My son has mastered the art of blending in so well that he actually speaks in a different manner when he is around his peers than when he is at home.
If she loves reading and programming, I think that you should encourage her to program more and do some writing of her own like short stories and poems. After age 12, it is a lot easier to cope with a lack of gifted programming in schools because of the availability of outside resources like online classes, internet resources etc. For programming, she can easily work on her own project in her spare time and most programming languages have support groups, tutorials, youtube videos, books etc easily available on the internet. Good luck.

It's not odd, my son is highly gifted and only really cares about sports anymore. He excels at anything he has tried. Our school has 2 different programs. We attempted just regular school plus enrichment at 1st, then skipping for math. But we can tell he has become to bored with school and we think that is why he puts EVERYTHING into sports. We are lucky enough to have a school for the Exceptionally Gifted Students allowing him to work at an accelerated pace.