Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Parenting and Advocacy when did your PG kid "get it" about him/herself?

My DS6 son doesn't yet understand how different he is. This is wonderful so far, in most ways. Even though he is subject accelerated by 3 years and regularly comes home asking when school is going to "stop going so slowly", he really doesn't know how far out he is. (In fact the psych who wrote his evaluation noted that he doesn't know that he is gifted let alone profoundly gifted.) It's wonderful because he doesn't feel isolated and he's not conceited at all. It's not good because he doesn't know that there is anything to advocate for and doesn't speak up at school about how "slow" it is. I'm just wondering when it's going to click for him. We're not going to tell him anything. We're just watching him sort it out.

For DD9 it was when her wonderful first-grade teachers started giving her math lessons with the older kids (it was a Montessori classroom for 1st-3rd grade). Later the other kids started making comments to her (not mean though). Now she's pretty much fully aware of it, although we still haven't shared everything about the 2e stuff because we're still not sure what the answer is. But I think letting her sort it out worked out pretty well. Plus I don't know what you could tell a kid that age ahead of time that they would be able to understand and process in a sufficiently mature and useful fashion (although I'm sure there are some that can--but not our DD).

DS6 knows school comes really easy to him, but I'm not sure he knows he's gifted and certainly he has no concept of how gifted. Going to a higher grade for subject acceleration has alerted some of his classmates, but I've heard him explain it as "so I can learn new things, just like you get to do," which is sufficient for his K peers.

When DS6 was only 2, we had to talk about some of the differences between him and his playmates, as he would get very frustrated with the fact that they were "pretending" to talk like babies and would ask them repeatedly to please stop pretending and speak like a two y.o.. We used really broad strokes and talked about how everyone learns things at different ages, has different things that come easily, etc. In 3 y.o. preschool, kids would ask him to read and he'd then ask them to read to him... and wonder why they were pretending they couldn't. So, again, we had similar talks, also emphasizing what came more easily to those peers. (Drawing, shooting baskets, whatever stood out.) So I think he's noticed some of the differences for a while.

In K this year, I was volunteering once when DS left to go to math and I heard one of the kids comment to DS that he was really smart, to which DS immediately replied, "But not nearly as good at drawing monsters as you are!" All this to say, I think he has a sense of it, but just in the "we each have our strengths" sort of way, which seems very appropriate.

When ds7 was in a pre-k at a gifted, structured school, I had to withdraw him because the school refused to accelerate or accommodate him. I said to him that he learns differently than others (like oranges and apples) and that we had to find what worked best for him.

Last year, in kindergarten at a gifted, Montessori-type school, he was regarded a bit of a mascot or novelty and had some comments to him. There was a little bullying issue with him wearing glasses, which were for vision therapy.

Did he fully understand then how different he is or since then? I'm not sure. Perhaps. I don't know though. However, I have noticed that he often edits when he says depending on who's around, but not always.

With the 2e issues, we've got a photo of our son in a helmet when he was 3 months old on the mantlepiece. It's actually a cute, endearing photo, which I love. He's also been in neurofeedback on and off this year and knows it's due to being born with a traumatic brain injury; one neurofeedback provider came out and told him to be transparent. I've mentioned some stuff casually about the other 2e stuff, but ds7 hasn't really asked about it yet - except for pestering me why we still are on a crazy diet (e.g. dairy-free, sugar-free, processed/refined-free, nearly grain-free, everything-else-it-seems-free diet).

I just finished reading The Spark by Kristine Barnett. Her son Jake was featured on 60 Minutes with Morley Safer. He's a STEM-prodigy and autistic, but she said that he started to feel loneliness around 8 years old. She watched videos of savants and child prodigies with them to help him feel less alone and isolated in the world.

DD still doesn't really know.

I mean, she knows that she's gifted, and she knows (intellectually) that she is "more gifted" than most of her gifted peers-- both same-age (because they are doing work she did years ago) and academic peers (who have to work much harder than she does to earn the same grades).

She only knows a few other PG people. Most of them, she doesn't "click" with on a personal level, but the handful of EG people she likes pretty well. Most of them are 1-4 years older than her, so they tend to have similar interests and academics going on, so a lot in common...

One problem with having a HG+ child that doesn't KNOW how unusual they are is that they tend to measure themselves in ways that are really unhealthy since they lack external rubrics for doing so... other than perfection.

My DD is refreshingly unconceited, which makes her extremely likeable. On the other hand, she is far more insecure than she probably ought to be. She tends to assume that she's "nothing special" by default, even when others treat her like a mascot/poster child.

If anything, I think that my DD as an adolescent prefers to NOT think about being something of a singularity. She has avoided considering it, I think, because it makes her feel very lonely.

Our DD seems to have it figured out in this phrase she has uttered more than once: "I'm a 10-year old trapped in an 8-year old body."

HowlerKarma - your DD sounds like my ds7. That's how he is. Though, I think he swings from being insecure to being overconfident at times.

I think not knowing how unusual you are can be good, but I take your point about perfection or the lack of external rubrics. These kids tend to flip and meltdown if things don't come out exactly perfect on the first go or as they anticipate.

I've been drumming into ds7 to try hard to keep his expectations low, like rock bottom low, at times - or more within reality. That way, I said, you'll be so happy when things/situation exceed your expectations or when things work out better than you anticipate. I like to think this has helped to some degree.

It's hard though some days. No one seems to be so excited about x, y, z as ds7 is and, at times, it's starting to dawn on him. I think he'd be so over moon to share a conversation with someone who is also so excited about x, y, z. And that's where it can be challenging. Not to mention about not 'clicking' with anyone on a personal level.

Kristine Barnett specified this difficulty in her book, The Spark, with her autistic/prodigy son, Jake. She said that she needed to find someone to truly capture his imagination, to encourage him, to challenge him. Jake was starved for a conversation with a scientist/mathematician and someone more on his level. He had to go to college early because it was the only place where he could get a sense of enjoyment, an excitement, that felt like play and where he belonged and could be accepted.

Dd is now 13yo and has some inkling of her remarkable abilities (lots of external indicators: test scores, grades, competition medals and trophies), but the topic only rarely rises to the surface level. For example, dh and I were recently discussing the minimum math SAT score needed for a program her brother wanted to sign up for. The number was in the 500s and dh and I had a brief discussion about whether the cutoff was high enough to be a significant filter. Dd then raised her head from a book - "What was my score?" "750." She responded with a calm "Oh, cool," and then her head disappeared back into the book. I am sure she quickly forgot the score.

My DD realizes that she 'gets' stuff that is beyond most of her age peers but she also 'gets' the fact that this doesn't make her 'better' than them.

We explain that it is no different to being taller, fatter, skinnier, better at sports etc.

My challenge is keeping her stretched so that she doesn't learn to take it easy - like I did LOL

My ds doesn't "get it", but he knows he's different. For sure in k, he realized he was different. It was a very hard year for him. He ended up resorting to excessive silliness to get kids to give him attention. He gets that everyone has different strengths, but didn't understand why he didn't get to learn at school.

However, since school has been out a week plus, I am seeing my ds back to his old self. I'm loving it!!