Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Profoundly frustrating

Hi all. A bit nervous to start a new thread and hoping I can make myself understood. Hoping for some idea if others have had similar experiences or can offer insights.

We have a DS4 who has been tested by a psychologist and sits firmly in the profoundly gifted range. We did the testing at the suggestion of a child psychiatrist and a new day care centre he's recently started at.

As the test would suggest he's well advanced in most areas as well as having absolute pitch and is certainly an extrovert.

He is also still however using nappies for number twos and frequently wets his pants while at daycare (which is only recently begun - a month or so - the first one was a fail, he bit kids and was very unhappy) and at home unless he's constantly and regularly cajoled to the bathroom - the only way we know how at the moment is to give him math challenges. If asked directly he will always claim not to need to go.

We're trying to direct his huge energy levels and love of information but he can be highly resistant to structured learning of almost any kind. Violin is currently being attempted for the very reason that it can't be absorbed in one go and hopefully might teach some appreciation for perseverance. Slow going and barely progressing. The frustration of high ability but low 'aptitude' (for want of a better word) is a real concern. Pen skills, ie drawing for example is very rarely in evidence.

Now is the time we find ourselves considering actual school and frankly cannot imagine how it can possibly work.

Have others made it all work school wise? How much of his social developmental delay can be attributed to giftedness? Is there something else going on?

Zanzi,
We started violin for dd at 5 for similar reasons.

Maybe he will fall in love with his k teacher. That's what happened to my daughter. She always wanted to do what her k teacher wanted. I remember feeling so jealous.

What are your schooling options?
Chrys

Our experience won't help as we started early with socialization, using a parent/child playgroup throughout the one year and then put her in a 3/4 day playgroup at 2. As an extrovert, she needed the interaction.

I did the potty training at 22 months, the 3 day method. She was smart enough to get it, though it took me 2 of the 3 days to figure it out. The resistance in these types of kids seems to build as they get older. DD is now 5 and I use much "adult" explaining when I want her to do things. No more "cajoling" except on the fruit and veg consumption. We find it works better to talk it out with reason.

We started the piano at her 4th birthday, though we had wanted to wait. But we were pushed by the music school for almost a year to start with her. It is a pain since I must practice with her, no kid likes to practice everyday, or rarely does a kid like to practice everyday. But I do talk over with her the need for her to learn to be a tortoise since so many things come so easily for her. And although DD started doing math in her head at 2, she seems to do it now as a hobby now to amuse herself, and I think the music helps with the brain development there.

Although it is her nature to be fast, she seems to have pretty good habits now that she has more than a year of piano under her belt. Her handwriting is great. Her coloring and drawing have greatly improved. She takes her time. I never thought she had artistic talent and am amazed at what she produces now.

But I do have to work with her on technique when she does her piano practice. Kids that have ability can easily just memorize the notes and play the piece, though not how it should be played. Getting them to make the minor corrections so that it has the "flavor" of what the composer wanted and not just the notes is what gives her good habits and that is a real test on me. But being one that didn't develop good habits, it is my goal to help her learn to be a tortoise and so I sit with her and practice everyday and work on her technique. I will be glad when this phase is over.

Between this and the puppy training, I think I want to jump into the Hudson river sometimes. There are many times of standing up and counting to 10.

Zanzi,

My GD5 had a lot of potty accidents at Pre-K when she was 4. The problem with her was that she never wanted to miss anything to go potty and she would often wet her pants on the playground. The teachers also said she would refuse to go before they went outside. They almost suspended her from Pre-K for this. She finally got to where she stopped having accidents at school the last part of the year and we made it through. After that she did fine (I think her control got better with age). However, she is in K now (no accidents at school) but she will sometimes refuse to go or wait too long and have accidents at home now. This relapse just started in the last few weeks. Not much advise here, but I think some gifted kids are just too busy to want to stop for mundane things like going to the bathroom. Hopefully, he will outgrow this with maturity and/or peer pressure. Hang in there - it will get better.

As far as structured learning at school - that can be a very big problem in regular classroom for even HG kids - especially those who are more intense, outgoing, and stubborn like my GD. I would start visiting schools, asked to observe, and talk to them about how they will handle your son as early as possible.

Hopefully some here will have better suggestions.

I second GM5's post about potty accidents...my DS7 when he was between 4-6 would have accidents because he said he didn't want to stop what he was doing....they get so involved in whatever it is they were doing that they don't want to miss out on anything. Or they just get so focused on what they are doing that they ignore the potty signs until it is too late to make it. I was really worried that the other kids would start to make fun of him for having the potty accidents....he has outgrown this now that he is 7 but we do every once in awhile have to watch. If we are out doing something really cool or if he is massively focused on something, I will make some reminders about a bathroom break....hang in there

Thanks all. Very helpful, at the very least it always helps to hear others are in the same boat and you're not out there all alone.

Chrys, schooling at this point seems to be leading towards a very costly selective school which doesn't accelerate but sets a high bar for entry. The principal said that whilst there weren't kids there at quite his level there were 'similar' kids and that they'd had kids just like him before.

I didn't ask all the questions I need to (he's yet to get in) so I'm not completely clear on what's possible there. That and it costs a bazillion dollars to go there. We're also looking into some Govt. selective schools, which do accelerate.

Ah, the crazy gifted 4 yr old boy who won't use the potty . . .all too familiar. My son was refusing to do #2 in the potty until several months past his 4th birthday, and had only decided to pee in the potty around 3.75. There really was not much we could do . . . we just went cold turkey and it took close to a week to get the pee in the toilet. He is now 6 and did make it through kindergarten with only one accident (though he still refuses to do anything other than pee at school). I laughed at the math incentive - the only way I can trim my son's fingernails is if I've given him a hard math problem to focus on while I'm clipping. It does get better, but as far as our experience goes, you might just have to wait until he's ready to manage that aspect of his life.
As far as school goes, DS was in daycare/preschool from the time he was a baby (half days) and really never socialized much with the other kids - and we were shocked when he finally started to during the second half of kindergarten and now in first grade is really well integrated into the classroom. It's a sort of gritty public school with a lot of kids with disadvantaged backgrounds, but there are a handful of high achievers as well - and they've been able to differentiate enough to keep him interested and challenged (at least in reading - I don't think he's really being challenged in math, but we're working on it.) Good luck!

The something else going on is his personality. Picture an intense driven business executive in a 4 year old body.

A wonderful teacher who 'gets' him might make things work, or not, it sort of depends on how much growing ability he has 'under the surface' that wouldn't be seen until it's challenged.

I wouldn't say that he's delayed socially until you put him in a room with other PG 4 year old boys, and then, if he still is looking much less socially able than the others, you can say that. I wish I had advice for how to find a roomful of PG 4 year olds.

Picture taking a 8 year old, who is burning to learn, and who happens to have the emotional maturity of a 4 year old, and place him in a preschool all day. How would you expect that boy to act? I'll bet 5 dollars that your son is doing better than that.

If possible, make the effort to sit in a kindy class now, and see what it's like at the end of the year. Imagine your son there, from the academic point of view. Ask yourself if there anything to be gained for him academically? I don't think academic development is more important than social development, but I sure don't think that it's less important.

Is homeschooling an option?

As for the bathroom, I wonder if he doesn't like to be reminded by you, as that puts him in a '1 down' position. See if you can reward him for being responsible for checking in with himself to see if can perceive a need to go. Say, give him a timer, and tell him that every time he sets it for 20 minutes, and you see him take a breath and ask himself aloud 'do I need to go potty' that you will give him the candy bit, or token towards some reward. My son is 13, so I may be being completely unrealistic about what a 4 year old can do - it's been a long time - but is there someway he can be they guy who checks up on things 'down there?'

My hunch is that all of this is colored by the fact that you are probably exhausted. Work towards rewarding independent play, so that if you have to homeschool, it won't wear you out, ok? Your needs matter too.

Love and more love,
Grinity

I totally agree about the frustration of it all. DS5 was the same way re: needing constant reminders and saying he never needed to go...and he still does that at times. When he turned 5 last summer we were quite worried because he was skipping K and going to first and we worried that he would get wet in first. Thankfully the #2 has never been an issue, somehow potty trained himself with that quite early...but never get the #1 down. DS5 will literally wait so long that I would see a spot on his pants and he would still insist that he didn't have to go!! I was worried that this would happen in 1st grade and the kids would tease him...but for whatever reason it hasn't yet to my knowledge. Of course in school when he is bored I think he enjoys bathroom breaks. But at home he gets so into whatever he is doing. I have to remind him that he can go right back to it and it won't go anywhere. Very frustrating....we tried a bunch of things that maybe you have too.

I will tell you what finally helped and worked for the most part. We used to just tell him that he needed to go on his own, that I may remind him from time to time but it is his choice whether he goes or not. Then I would comment on the signs that I saw that he needed to go, and then sometimes he would go and we would praise him. Other times he would still insist that he didn't need to and I would let it go after just reminding him that his body looks like it needed to go and what happens when he gets himself wet. If he peed during an activity then he had to go get his change of close, change himself and then that activity was over (for example if he was on the computer having fun and didn't want to stop so he had a spot on his pants...computer time was over, games would end, etc). this seemed to work pretty well and it took all the emotion out of it. We didn't make it a big deal, we just made it completely more work for him and not fun if he got wet. I would remind him matter of factly when I knew he had to go. It was tough not to make him go..especially one day when he literally waited 8 hours and kept insisting he didn't have to go. He went 8 hours later and made it to the bathroom without getting wet. It takes lots of time and energy, but eventually this will improve. Good luck!!

I'm not clear how the math challenges relate to using the bathroom - you sit there with him and do math while he poops? Or you reward him with a math challenge afterwards?

I don't think you should have to cajole a very intelligent 4 y.o. to use the toilet. If he's having consistent accidents then using the toilet periodically shouldn't be a choice - he should be required to go every two hours. You don't want him to think he has the right to make other people deal with his poop and pee because he's too engrossed in something and doesn't want to be interupted. Of course he isn't thinking this consciously! He is very young and will sometimes get absorbed in something and forget. But it's still a very real (and kinda gross) imposition on other people. When he is reminded to use the potty he should understand it is his responsiblility. He should want to avoid the consequences of not using the toilet.

I like the idea of sitting with him and doing math problems or reading him a book out loud while he poops. Seems like a good way to help him build positive associations.