Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Questioning assessment of kids based upon parents

It is possible that my parents and DH's parents are all MG, though my dad claims that he's been tested and is just about average. I wouldn't be terribly surprised if my mom was MG, but I very much doubt that either of DH's parents are anything other than ND. They seem pretty run-of-the-mill to me. But (and I hope this doesn't sound awful) perhaps I just really can't tell the difference between ND and MG people. At any rate, none of them have college degrees, and all are working-class.


With dyslexia you'd rather expect them to be spelled differently each time. But I also think that these words, though misspelled according to the dictionary, might not be misspelled according to the circles in which some highly intelligent but uneducated parents might travel.

Most people - even most very intelligent very well educated people! - have startlingly poor understanding of statistics. Something I've seen stated repeatedly even here is that siblings usually have IQs within 10 points of one another - nothing wrong with that as a statement, but it gets used with the implication that if you have one child who has tested with some IQ then if your next child tests more than 10 points below that then the test must be wrong. Frankly, this is statistical nonsense so many ways that I hardly know where to start. (If you think about it, we collectively have plenty of experience even of the very same child testing more than 10 points apart on different occasions, so why we should be surprised at a child's sibling testing more than 10 points away from them, I cannot imagine). I think the root cause is a strong cultural tendency in the US to believe in the entity theory of intelligence - almost everyone here appears to believe at core - even if they deny it when they think about it - that there is a fact of the matter about what a child's "real" IQ is and that that number tells you something permanent about the child. Everyone should read Dweck. (Can you tell I've been out to a congenial argumentative bookclub tonight and had several glasses of wine, lol?)

Yes. I'm thinking of a dyslexic person I know well who can make that kind of mistake. She wouldn't self-correct in the way that a non-dyslexic person might - e.g., noticing "per se" and realising that that's the same phrase as what they've been spelling "persay" - because the kind of attention she can pay to the written material isn't the kind of attention where she'd notice that kind of detail. It's as if all her attention goes on getting the gist of the text.

I can spell well, but I don't type well, so my posts on boards like this are full of errors. I'm not particularly pedantic about checking my posts before I hit submit as it just isn't that important to me that everything I write is perfect (I have better things to spend my time on). As long as my message is conveyed and readable I'm not concerned. Sometimes I'll go back and edit my post if I find something that bugs me a lot in the post, but otherwise I'm not bothered.
I think there are countless reasons why people make errors in their posts and not all of them are linked to intelligence. I'd hold back on the judgements personally.

An unsophistcated mother's reply: �
My conversational contributions are often contradictory or confusing coupled with inconsistencies and errors.�
My mother would come off sounding better through her hesitation and self-conscious self-censoring. �She's not gifted or if she is she's only barely so, the gifted genes are from my dad's side. �At some point when I was telling someone that as a child I sounded like an encyclopedia or a concordance with perfect grammar and excellent manners (what happened?!) �
What does this mean for my kids? �The midwife who delivers for me laughed and said after nine months of seeing my three year old lately "he's going to be a genius but not a nerd". � �Could I sound intelligent again? �Who knows. �People end up figuring it out anyway if they spend too much time with me. �As for advocacy "Persistence overcomes resistance". �

Yay! For the mommy brains and the compassionate intelligent posters who live on this forum. �

Also, I've said I'm sure my son is PG since slightly after he was born. �And not only have I not had him tested he doesn't match all the milestones online. �Like he's never done a jigsaw puzzle, he doesn't speak elegantly. �I'm still sure he's "way up there" and other people keep telling me so. �PG runs in my dad's family (unbeknownst to my single mom) �and I was id'd as a teenager (not just extremely smart, huh?). ��

Anyway I just read an article linked here from Psychology Today�that said the "gifted" label is all in how it affects the child. �Some children enjoy the label as praise, acknowledgement, and encouragement. �They go on and try a little harder and do a little more. �Some children get anxiety and self-image issues from the "gifted" label and are afraid they can't live up to it. �

That's why I love it here.
Grinnity says, "Genius is as genuis does". (sic lol)
Dottie says "The proof is in the data over time."
You can just look for the advice and for the solutions that work well right now.

I'm glad that something about this thread is beneficial to you although I don't know what -- lol! I did want to reiterate that none of this came up in relation to anything I've seen anyone posting on this board and that I am not at all questioning the assessments of children that parents post on this board. It does seem that the ambiance here attracts parents whose kids probably are HG+ or at least those of us whose kids aren't HG+ recognize that and are upfront about it.

I am working on self examination and making an effort to ascertain if I am being judgemental which is why I posted this.

I think it makes sense to take what you read on BBs at face value, but also not to swallow hook, line, and sinker. I've had some practice suspending judgment, because unfortunately that is also how I have to deal with every single thing my sister tells me. In the end, what difference does it really make if they're right or wrong or honest or dishonest? You just respond as though it's true.

It's because their kids learned Sesame Street Phonics.

I am most definitely not gifted, yet I have a much better vocabulary and command of the written word than my spouse who is brilliant. I have no idea what his IQ is, because it's never been officially tested. When I was practicing administering the Raven's test for my job, I practiced on him. He answered all the problems correctly and started making up his own. And yet his spelling is abysmal on a good day, and I've sold hundreds upon hundreds of articles to a plethora of publications.

Spelling and command of the written word is sometimes just a gift, not a sign of intelligence - at least on the gifted level.

Is comparing intelligence and education a fair thing?

I have met many very intelligent people who, for some reason or another, received limited education.