My husband and I once worked with a man whose daughter was highly gifted. The girl's dad told us her SAT score and it was very close to what my husband's son from a previous marriage made. We were curious about the girl because my husband's older son is also highly gifted but had problems in school, found it boring, and decided to take the GED instead of finishing high school. He could make very high scores on tests without trying but for some reason wouldn't do what was required to finish community college classes and dropped out of that too. He was very good with computers and was usually able to get jobs when he wanted to work but he had absolutely no work ethic and would sometimes go months without working and stay on his computer most of the time. When he did work he could find jobs that paid very well even without the degree but then quit because he didn't like dealing with office politics. He's 34 years old and now that he has worked at a convenience store for the last year and a half he wishes he had worked a little harder.
My husband and I asked our friend how he was able to instill such a good work ethic in his daughter. He said it wasn't anything he did but his Asian wife worked with her after school and maybe that had something to do with it. I remember thinking that was kind of sad that the poor girl went to school all day and had to spend hours doing more school work just to please her mother. That poor girl is now a doctor.
So here I am trying to homeschool a 10 year old who already knows more than I do about so many things. The older he gets the more he reminds me of his adult brother. He wants to stay on the computer more than he should. When I say something about it he points out all the things he has learned from the internet and he does tend to do things that could be considered educational. I have trouble limiting his time on it because I know he has learned so much more than I knew at his age. When his adult sister has trouble doing something on the computer, she has to call her 10 year old little brother walk her through it and I can see that this might be a useful job skill. If something doesn't work the way it should he is on the internet to find out why and how to fix the problem. He rarely buys anything without checking online reviews and making sure the item is exactly what he wants. He increases his typing speed by using the computer, another job skill.
I sometimes feel like I am being really mean when I make him practice handwriting and piano and things to help develop motor skills and speed when he would rather work on something on the computer, but I often think of my friend's daughter with the Asian mother who had to work so hard after school but is now living a better life because of her cruel mother.
