from the article: "The most appreciated abilities in society, such as creativity and leadership, rarely fully present themselves early on."
Hmm. I don't think I agree! Thoughts?
Making judgments about a young person's potential at any one moment overlooks the fact that time is needed for complexes of genes to get in tune. And so we write people off. For others, we write the check too soon.
This would argue against IDing gifted kids, wouldn't it? And then we get into the "We should treat all kids the same/all kids are gifted" stuff, don't we? That, by the way, is the most common response I've heard from my friends to the fact that DD is entering a FT gifted program...
It's an interesting question, though. There's an article I read somewhere (I believe it may have been linked to here) about the # of kids who test gifted at one age but not another. It was a bit of a mind-blower for me and really called some of my beliefs into question.
ETA--ah yes, last sentence: "This is reason enough to treat everyone as if they have the potential to reach full bloom."
I agree and I disagree, because I fear the real-world implications of such a belief system. It sounds perfectly reasonable and heaven knows I don't want to write anyone off, but in a classroom I think this belief, writ large, leads to everyone being given the same curriculum.
