Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Pre-school "Playing Dumb" or "Lying" -- how to handle

I've noticed a problematic trend with my 3 yr old daughter. She is starting to "lie" to adults. I put the word in quotes because these aren't typical children's lies. Instead, I suspect she is attempting to manipulate some of the adults in her life (the ones who don't realize she is capable of doing this -- not myself or my husband).

I work full-time and she has a nanny. Part of the time, I work from my home office, so I can hear their interaction but I'm out of sight. I frequently hear her say things that aren't true to her nanny. Specifically, she will tell the nanny she doesn't know information or skills that she does know. This is a new nanny who's only been with us a couple of months. She was a preschool teacher and she's been pretty good about keeping our daughter mentally stimulated, but she really doesn't "get" our daughter (no experience with gifted kids). So I will frequently hear her try to introduce a topic to our daughter and our daughter will "play dumb," as if she knows nothing about the topic. I tried to warn the nanny about this trend, so the nanny now asks, "Have you ever... (played this game, learned anything about this topic, etc.)" But our daughter, if she doesn't want to play the game or learn about the topic, will directly lie to the nanny and say no, even if she was just playing the game or discussing the topic with me in the morning.

I'm worried because we want to put my daughter in preschool -- we have a place on the waiting list at a great montessori school for once my daughter decides to potty train -- and I can envision her "playing dumb" for her teacher and then becoming a behavior problem in the classroom because she's bored (she does not handle boredom well).

Anyone seen anything like this? Any advice? We've had the usual conversations about telling the truth, even if it's something she thinks the adult doesn't want to hear, and I've encouraged her to find alternate ways to tell the nanny if she does know about a topic and just doesn't want to discuss it at that time. She's been pretty protected up to this point, so I don't think she's gotten any negative messages about being smart. I'm not sure why she's taking this approach, and I'd love to help her find a better way to handle things.

I'd say this is probably just social experimentation. The child is sorting out who knows what by testing whether the nanny knows what you know.

At that age, the nanny could let it go by saying "I'm skeptical of that." Letting DD know she knows, but not making a big deal. Our kids *loved* this kind of conversation at that age--precisely because it was so informative about what other people thought, and also funny.

I don't know if you have set academic goals for this time, but I'd say it's OK for your DD to try to lead the conversation, too. If it's child-led much of the time, she may not feel like she needs to control the adult brains around her.