Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Pre-school guilty, confused, wondering...

Oh - we never did anything really academic during the preschool years. We just had a lot of open ended toys around - blocks, legos, dress up stuff, dolls, kitchen toys, etc. And we're always ready to answer questions. We did a lot of active play and cooking in the kitchen. I have 2 kids that showed no interest in reading, but we never introduced them to easy readers until they were 5. My daughter briefly leaped slightly in reading interest at 4 and dropped it again. Both jumped in reading in kindergarten. My son was tested achievement wise yesterday and is at that 99th percentile achievement wise as a 3rd grader, even though he wasn't there at K. He is still the same kid. And he had a lot of knowledge as a preschooler. Just not the kind of knowledge that would be on a standardized achievement test. :-) And I was completely in the dark my DS was even GT until mid-kindergarten (neither DH or I were IDed). It was quite blissful not knowing actually.

I personally think my kids lost nothing by never seeing a workbook that young. They both are very active and have great social skills too. The problem with many standard workbooks for gifties is they are incredibly slow paced and repetitive IMHO. I've picked up a few as filler homeschooling, but have rarely had luck unless they're way, way above level (which sometimes makes the content "boring"). Or they're designed for gifted kids.

I think there are a lot of different issues here:

• perfectionism vs. learning to be careful
• following directions vs. being in control
• learning tasks vs. mundane work
• age expectations vs. mental ability

First, you characterize her as being a perfectionist, and say that you'd like to help her get over that, but you also say that you'd like to teach her to be more careful. I'd respectfully suggest that these are contrary ideas at this point. To address the perfectionism, I'd suggest embracing the idea that it is okay to make mistakes, to not put forward your best effort all of the time, to do things wrong, etc. You can't really teach that at the same time that you're teaching her to go slowly and carefully so that she doesn't make mistakes.

Second, yes, of course, it is important for kids to learn to follow directions. And of course that will conflict with her very natural desire to be in control. Personally, I wouldn't want academics to be the battleground in a power struggle with a preschooler--it's an area in which she will always win. And like others have said, if she goes to school she will learn soon enough to follow directions.

Third, I think a lot of people believe that you must work through all the mundane details of something before you can really learn it. And perhaps that is true for some things, and some learning styles. But for most things that is simply not true. My kid still does not know the proper names for several letters ("c" and "s") but that hasn't stopped her from reading beautifully. Am I worried that because she hasn't memorized the alphabet she will miss out on learning? Of course not. When she needs to know it, I've no doubt she will learn it easily enough. It's not true that she needs to learn those details now, and if I tried to pretend that it was, she'd see right through me.

Finally, I think you've got to remember just how young your child is. Her academic abilities may be years beyond her emotional age and her physical abilities. You can't expect her to sit still and pay attention and work hard and concentrate and cooperate and follow directions and be careful at her age for more than a minute or two, if she isn't interested. And a minute or two may be enough time for a child to work through a simple letter-recognition workbook page, but it isn't enough time for her to learn anything significant at the academic level she is at. So if you want to push academics at this age, you're either going to teach her well below her level (in which case she'll learn that academics are a waste of time) or you're both going to get frustrated by her perfectly age-appropriate inability to concentrate and work hard for long periods (in which case she'll only learn that there's something wrong with her--which there isn't).

Whew, that was long. I guess I feel pretty strongly about this topic.

I was just discussing this with another mom while waiting outside dance class. She asked if dd4 was trying to read, and I said, well she's got some sight words, and memorizes lots of books, but just doesn't seem to enjoy the books when we go at them in a 'lets learn to read' kind of way, so I don't really do much about it. She said she knows several other parents who say their kids are already reading at 4, but they don't seem to enjoy it~ I wondered what it would take to make a kid learn all that stuff if they weren't ready, and didn't enjoy it.

My kids seems more the sort to have interests above their ages, rather than outright ability to gather information on their own (read) at age 3, so I help them with that - answering questions about space, vocab., anatomy, flipping through books on the human body, etc.

When I hear something like this, I just assume that the parents are using a liberal definition of "reading." E.g., the child recognizes his or her name and a few signs here & there. I just can't (or don't want to?) imagine a child who is really reading at 4 without any interest.

I really think this has more to do with personality. Just to be fair, there a few people on this board whose toddlers do workbooks and seemed to enjoy them and I would hate to offend them by implying that it is yet another 'hothousing' example. Not saying this is what you were implying but it could come off that way. I, personally, see nothing wrong with workbooks, so long as the toddler enjoys doing them. My DD doesn't and would rather do other things. If she enjoyed them then I would happily buy them for her and let her go to town on them. But for TT's question of guilt, etc ... nothing to be guilty about if your DD isn't interested. She will have plenty of time to experience worksheets when she gets into school.

my son never tends to learn alphabets and stuff.
yet he knows everything.
he is also very fast in grasping dance moves and songs.
he knows and remembers a lot of things in one speck..!
is he gifted?

cuddlycutebaby,

The best thing you could do is read Deborah Ruf's book 'Losing Our Minds'. She gives a run down of examples for each level and at different ages which should help you with your question.