The kids who looked more advanced than my DS as a toddler now are behind him in terms of certain things.This.
DD15 really didn't seem THAT extraordinary to us at the time. I mean, sure-- she seemed "bright" but not like a prodigy or anything. Sure, she knew letters and numbers, etc. but we don't really know just HOW young she knew all of that stuff, never mind to what extent. It never occurred to us that: a) it might be odd (family is mostly HG+ people on both sides), or b) worth exploring or noting. She didn't learn to read early, (well, okay-- not relative to the crowd here, anyway) and she wasn't really "self-taught" with any major academic skills as a toddler or anything.
She's never really had a fascination with puzzles or mechanical things,
per se. They are really all different.
It wasn't
until DD learned to read (at nearly 5) that we realized what we might be dealing with. It was the
rate of progression over an impossibly short period of time that made it obvious at that point. Within a month or two, and with no further instruction, she was zooming through about 3rd-5th grade materials.
Looking
back at that point, we realized that she has always been that way, developmentally-- nothing-nothing-nothing, BANG-- mastery. Like,
real "mastery." Adult-level mastery. Nothing tentative or mistake-prone or fumbling about it. I can probably count on one hand the number of spills she took when "learning" to walk. I use quotes there because she has always seemed to be a kid that thought it over for a bit, then let things "gel" and then demonstrated complete mastery of the skill/activity. We call this "quantum learning" because it isn't really a
process so much as a binary state-- ground state (not mastery) and the next energy state (mastery). The "how" of it is just as unclear as excitation via photon/electron, basically-- something just has to "match up" right, and it happens. How my DD learns things is still a completely black box to me-- it often feels like inputs are being poured in with no external indication of it (and past the point at which it feels weird, even), and then this transition happens with the speed of an explosion, almost like a cartoon. Hard thing to explain. In talking with an educator with a PhD in gifted studies, this is
apparently one of those indicators that is SO telling that many educators have never actually SEEN it in a child-- because it is often the domain of very high levels of giftedness.
That and her awareness of others-- she's always had that, too. She could unerringly tell me what ANY other person was thinking/feeling emotionally by the time she was two. Like an empath-- she just reads microexpressions and body language that well. I've never known another person who could do what she does there-- she's like a human polygraph.
DD has never been tested, but is clearly
functionally PG. The only other family member that she is similar to was well into PG range. This would not have been clear and obvious to anyone observing her for "tells" at 15-24 months, however. The things that I see now, with the benefit of hindsight?
* sense of humor-- she had a slyness about her and a WICKED sense of humor-- she enjoyed things that most children don't "get" until they are well into elementary school, such as puns, etc. She clearly had complete theory-of-mind at an age that it should simply not be possible.
* observant and prolific memory for details
* CAREFUL-- this was most evident with fine-motor examination of things like eyelashes, earrings, etc.
* understanding of human psychology, social conventions/structures and motivation that has always seemed "old" in every way-- and compassionate/understanding and kind. She was a child that had the ability to make others question a skepticism about reincarnation, honestly. I finally understand the Dalai Lama thing now; there are really children who are born that way. I had no idea.
* she seemed to intuitively understand cause and effect-- and this informed EVERYTHING she did-- she understood that standing up meant sitting down, that dropping a bowl of food meant that it would be gone, and that objects had permanence.
