Hoagies tweeted this link today and I though I'd post it as it covers topics that have been covered on a range of threads recently - 'real' success, early adversity, genetic influences on ability, blooming late etc. So I thought I'd share it

http://www.psychologytoday.com/articles/200810/confessions-late-bloomer

Thank you for sharing that!

That is thought-provoking and inspiring!

"Think of genes as players in an orchestra, with different sections responsible for different traits. Not only do all the individual players have to be in sync, but so do the sections. Just as the percussion section might have trouble getting its rhythm together, the genes that underlie a particular trait might be activated later than the genes for other traits that contribute to an ability. So one trait, like gregariousness, can develop early on while another trait, like speech production, may lag�which can be awkward until the two come into harmony."

I will be thinking about this all day!
Thank you for posting

I love it!

Maybe we should cross post this to the success thread:

"According to University of Pennsylvania psychologist Angela Duckworth, passion is a component, along with perseverance, of what she calls grit. It particularly enables people to reach for goals that may be a long time in coming, she discovered in interviews with achievers in fields from investment banking to painting. Her studies show that grit and self-discipline predict educational attainment just as well as, if not better than, IQ."


This was interesting:
"There even appears to be an optimal amount of formal schooling after which schooling can deter creative achievement. Beyond that lies the danger of getting too entrenched in the traditional thinking."

I have a bunch of blurbs I liked, but I won't paste it all lol.

from the article: "The most appreciated abilities in society, such as creativity and leadership, rarely fully present themselves early on."

Hmm. I don't think I agree! Thoughts?


This would argue against IDing gifted kids, wouldn't it? And then we get into the "We should treat all kids the same/all kids are gifted" stuff, don't we? That, by the way, is the most common response I've heard from my friends to the fact that DD is entering a FT gifted program...

It's an interesting question, though. There's an article I read somewhere (I believe it may have been linked to here) about the # of kids who test gifted at one age but not another. It was a bit of a mind-blower for me and really called some of my beliefs into question.

ETA--ah yes, last sentence: "This is reason enough to treat everyone as if they have the potential to reach full bloom."

I agree and I disagree, because I fear the real-world implications of such a belief system. It sounds perfectly reasonable and heaven knows I don't want to write anyone off, but in a classroom I think this belief, writ large, leads to everyone being given the same curriculum.

My IQ in second grade (when school was considering skipping me) was 126. In sixth grade we reached no ceiling at 150. Most school psychs don't like to give a cognitive again if they have one after the age of 8 because they almost always get the same results and feel like they've wasted their time. The ones I know do acknowledge that IQ is less consistent for people of lower socio-economic status.

I did wonder what would have happened for the author of the article if an adult, parent or teacher, were advocating for another test instead of the student.

According to what I read in...Nurtureshock? If you test kids before they are 7 or 8 for a gifted program, you could miss some who would have qualified for the gifted program otherwise. I haven't looked into the studies they cited, though.

I thought this was an excellent article. Thank you for sharing.

It always reminds me to not coddle DD in her learning environment, a la Terman. Though no one wants to put huge adversity in front of their child.

And like Atlas said, Passion cannot be bought.

Ren

I think given current education realities, you might be right to be worried - but of course, what we want is for all children to be challenged at their readiness level whatever that is and however fast it moves, since that would be good for all children.

Something I'm curious about, and it came up in discussion somewhere else recently too. I'm sure we can all agree that late bloomers exist. (Whether this shows in IQ tests, or "only" in what they can do, is another question, and to my mind not really such an interesting one, so I'll leave it here.) Setting aside the deleterious effects that can arise from the gifted label itself engendering a fixed mindset, and from underchallenge, does the opposite really exist? That is, does it really happen that children appear to be highly gifted at a young age, and later turn out not to be, even though the child has had a good education and has not been labelled or encouraged into a fixed mindset? I think that in answering this question one has to beware of a "no true Scotsman" situation, since I'm immediately aware that I want to rule out children who have been painstakingly taught e.g. to read by their parents because they don't, to my mind, "really" appear HG, but there might be a danger of taking the later slide in achievement as the evidence to show that they weren't "really" HG earlier... Not sure how to handle that. Maybe it shouldn't really be any harder than the late bloomer side though. So, question for you all:


I can't think of an example, although I can think of several examples the other way round - children who didn't appear HG before 8, but who seemed obviously so by 15.

I'm inclined to think that children bloom at different times, as the article eloquently says, but that once a child has begun to bloom one shouldn't expect the bloom to fade, barring serious adverse circumstances. What say you?

Ultramarina, good point. That's why they make that term "zone of proximal development", what an individual is ready to learn right now! There's a pretty good argument for frequent continual re-evaluation, but who's got the time or desire? (besides kids parents)
Thank you Giftodd, it was nice to read, like a cup of tea for the mind. The illustrative pictures were lovely as well. I liked many parts but lol'd at the part that said since we're living 30 years longer these days we get a second middle age lifespan. Woo-hoo!

Thanks for posting that link. Very interesting!


Exactly!

I don't think it would necessarily! I think it would advocate for ongoing assessment and teaching to individual children instead of pigeon holing kids into a few groups. Many gifted kids really aren't served by the typical grade level enrichment and acceleration offered. Maybe I'm a dreamer, but I'd love to see education more customized for ALL kids. And maybe this is the reason we're homeschooling at the moment. The no child left behind paradigm is clearly not working.

Anyway - great article. Thank you. I was a bit of a late bloomer myself.

Well, you may be a dreamer, but plenty of teachers and school districts share your vision. And yes, NCLB has been a very slow train wreck, very difficult for this teacher who started her K12 career in 2002 to live through!

I was at late bloomer, so was my DH. Our kids seem to be as well, even the one who is not LD is "underachieving" for a 5yr old of her IQ. My 18 mth old is on fire :-). I can't think of anyone I know who has done the reverse.