Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion For those who have gifted AND non-gifted kids

This is a question that I am embarrassed to ask anyone for various reasons but I am really curious.

My DD (21 months) and I had a mom and her DD (3 years old) over yesterday. The 3 year old went over to a shape chart (that we had long discarded in the corner because DD learned shapes around 18 months) and started asking what the shapes were. My DD answered, including trapezoid, octagon, ect. The 3 year old didn't even know square or triangle. The 3 year old is smart, she just didn't know these. I didn't ask if the mom hadn't exposed her to shapes before because obviously that would have been rude.

My question is: can non-gifted kids learn the shapes, colors, letters, letter sounds when they are really little too but most are just not exposed to it? Or does it just take them longer to learn? It seems so easy for DD to learn things (after exposure just a few times) and I don't know why and can't understand why other kids (even older) don't know them. How can an entire year (kindergarden) be dedicated to learning this info? I can't tell/don't know if my DD is "gifted" or if I am just exposing her to materials other parents aren't. She is my only child so I don't have another child of mine to compare her to. My closest nephews to her (3 and 4 years old) don't know many things she does but I can't tell if they don't know it because they were never exposed to it or if this is stuff that is hard to learn. None of her friends are talking much but she is talking in 5-6+ word sentences but could she just be talking so much because she loves me reading to her and we read so often? She is obsessed with space and knows all of the planets and talks about things orbiting (including her food that she "orbits" around her placemat), and constellations and wants to draw lines to stars to connect them and make constellations. She loves new words (her current being "fiasco" from a Fancy Nancy book. Can other toddlers learn these things but they just can't speak as well so no one knows? Or could they learn it if they were exposed to it and they just aren't? If kids can learn things so young and it is so easy for them to learn it, why aren't these things taught when they are younger?
DD learned the shapes, colors, letters (in order), letter sounds, counting, ect. before or around 18 months. She learned the body parts so young and seemed bored so my housekeepers daughter taught them all to her in Spanish. My mother was with DD at a hotel (when DD was 20 months) and a older kid was playing with her. The kids ended up realizing she knew Spanish and started asking her questions. DD replied (they asked her where her head was in Spanish) and corrected their pronunciation.
Can all kids learn this so young but they just are not exposed to it? I am seriously wondering. I don't mind if DD is not considered "gifted" but I really want to know why other kids don't know these things so young. Does my DD learn things quicker and absorb more, or is it just that she is exposed to these things that other kids aren't? Can other kids learn this stuff too and they are just not exposed to it?

I agree with the Dude.

My 18-month-old that knew all of that stuff is three years old now. In my experience, some kids are just not exposed to that stuff at an early age. They are not interested, and good parents follow their babies' interests. And, then some kids, like ours, gravitate towards this type of learning at an early age.

For me, it wasn't that DD could learn letters, colors, shapes, etc. at 18 months, it was that she seemed to be hungry for the rote memorization that these things provided. And, it continued. I felt like we had to feed her need to memorize up until about 2.5. Then, in the span of about one month, reading, counting, and math really clicked. Coincidentally, at about this same time she became interested not so much in just memorizing, but thinking critically about science and history. Now, she still memorizes a lot, but we are blown away by what she can understand.

My DD cannot do jigsaw puzzles very well. Because she does not gravitate toward them, we do not expose her to many puzzles. So, her exposure to puzzles is low BECAUSE she is not very good at them.

I would say some of both I think. I have 4 children, ranging in giftedness. Oldest is 10 and she is my nerd child, gazillion questions on anything, super excitable, emotional, justice oriented, and was the one skipped at 2.5 yo to the 4-5 year classroom cause she knew everything they were teaching in the other class. Spoke well and often, was able to jump in the middle of lesson/game early on and be right on track with the class no matter what odd thing she was doing on the side.

The twins are 14 months younger, and I was adamate I was going to have them tested for speech delays. They were around 3 when they started speaking well enough to not have to ask them to repeat something (I still think they were speaking some twinish). Took me a while to find out, they were about on track regarding their learning for their age, I was just compairing them to my nerd child. I now think we are dealing with some dyslexia, so I have to stay on top of them and their work (one is worse than the other).

Little man 5yo was just not a talker, and could not make him interested in anything that he doesn't want to do. But he can read and has for about a year now and is doing math on his own, and he is my only coordinated child (even as a toddler, didn't really fall, the only one not to fall down stairs, and good with a ball).

Then there are children who are not exposed and really have just not seen these things before being put in a classroom setting. Maybe the parents wern't exposed, maybe the parents don't know how to teach their children casually about shapes numbers and letters. There are children who don't know what their name looks like on paper or don't know what their last name is, because they've never been shown.

I guess what I'm trying to say is they will all work at their own speed, and that year of kindergarten is really needed for some of these kids, because it might take some of them that long and longer to learn all the stuff they cram into kindy these days. And it took me a while to learn that I can't compare any of my children to each other (including the twins, still struggle with that one) and can't compare them to anyone else. Education is definatly not one size fits all. Once it starts to click for a child no matter the age they will get it.

I'm probably rambling, in the middle of my 3rd day of 12 hour stretches at work lol.

In our family, I find that it is mostly a function of how quickly a child picks up new concepts.

My gifted DD may only need to be exposed to a new concept one time to get it and remember it. But even she has weaker areas; it took her longer to master telling time with an analog clock than I expected, for some reason.

Our nongifted children may receive the same exposure, but have to go over it more times to master the new concept. In that sense, they need MORE exposure, I guess. It isn't so much a matter of reaching a magic age, but reaching a magic amount of exposure to an idea.

For example, when I read Harry Potter to all the kids, my gifted DD remembered the words of each incantation and what that spell did after a single hearing. My nongifted kids might remember an occasional spell, but are much fuzzier on the precise details of the story unless it is repeated to them.

Also, the nongifted kids are generally less interested in some of the intellectual stuff and that may be part of the reason WHY my gifted DD picks up concepts faster. She is simply paying closer attention. Of course, it's hard to say whether she pays closer attention because she gets it easier or whether she gets it easier because she pays closer attention.