Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Interesting 'Symptom' Report

My spatial skills are laughably bad. I could get lost in a cardboard box. I think it's at the level of an LD, though I just compensated all though school, somehow. Math was not a strength, but I did okay. I navigate by landmarks, which I remember well (again--compensatory) but I can't give directions to people, because it's like--oh, I see the BP gas station so now I turn. I can't even construct that in my head very well from memory. I can read and use a map just fine, but my ability to use a map of my home city and a map of a strange city are fairly similar. I have virtually no mental map of areas I should know, is what I'm saying, but I can USE one if given one.

I am wretchedly bad at chess.

I CAN put together Ikea furniture, but it's hard for me. I do MUCH better with directions that have words.

Oh, but I'm a crazy good speller. Won lots of bees as a kid. THAT I can see in my head!

Thanks all! So interesting to hear people's perspectives, how they visualize, etc. DS loves minecraft and, while I do not know much about it, he was on MC Edit this morning incidentally doing something in which rotating cubes was involved so I suppose he is working on it through minecraft. He also does chess - I don't think he is especially good but definitely learning and noticing where he is weak so I suppose that helps.

Ultramarina, I can't really deal with picture stuff - diagrams, maps, Ikea directions, either... I prefer instructions/directions with words too!

Thanks for sharing this strategy... I mentioned it to DS and he said he would try that.

I had a dream last night and thought of this thread. In my dream I was watching a car, and it flipped over and rolled multiple times. It was like a movie scene and I could see every aspect of the car as it moved. But when I try to do this awake, it is really hard (and I'm fairly poor with visual spatial ability in general). Makes me wonder about different parts of the brain being activated during sleep. Most of my dreams are very vivid with a lot of visual detail that I don't have awake.