What really kills me about people who criticize along these lines is that it almost ALWAYS happens with those that probe for information deliberately first. I mean, I try to be subtly evasive about my child's extreme giftedness. I do. I'm not shouting about her grade placement, I'm not volunteering the information to other parents. So what am I supposed to do when they persist in that line of questioning, though?? Lie to them?? WHY? If it makes them feel so defensive/inadequate/whatever, then they should have taken the hint and left it alone, you know?
Makes me crazy, it does.
Wow! I couldn't agree more with the above sentiment. I just had a recent encounter with such a person. She kept probing for information. I'm, generally, tight-lipped about my DC's abilities. I figure DD can speak for herself and will show her stuff when she's ready. Still the other mom kept probing.
Anyway, one day she saw my daughter with an X-grade workbook. Or as my DD calls it "Game book". This mom took it as an opportunity to drill my child on the material and when DD resisted used that as *proof* against my child's abilities. That certainly struck me as defensive. It *really* ticked me off, too, to say the least.
The other mother is always going on about her child and his intellectual capabilities. I should have known that there was a huge comparison going on, but I didn't even think of it. Honestly, when someone tells me that their child can do/knows X,Y,Z I *belive* them. I don't use it as an excuse to compare or jump to test their child's knowledge when an opportunity arises. Sometimes, I wonder if the kid would be interested in a book club or somesuch with mine, but other that...I figure the parent knows their child.
Whatever the reason, I find such behavior - testing other people's children then vocally telling the child that "in their opinion" the child is incapable and the parent doesn't know extends far beyond defensiveness. It's plain disrespectful.
I don't *do* disrespectful. So, I ended the friendship on the spot. I am glad to know that it was all about sizing up and cutting down my kid so she could feel better about hers. It made it clear to me that spending more time in that situation was unhealthy. Perhaps, another red flag, was that the child tended to be a braggart about his abilities and tended to use the failings of other children to show how he was better than them. I thought it was just a bit of childish immaturity. Now, I'm not so sure.
Luckily for me such people don't come around often - the defensive turned outright rude kind, that is. The plain ole defensive type are a bit more prevalent, though.
MM.
P.S. I did resist the urge to tell the other mom that the book, while two grade levels above my DC's age, were still two to three levels below her ability. See, now *that* would have been bragging.
