I was looking to get some feedback here...Obviously there is a correlation between early milestones and giftedness - what I was wondering though, is if there is a correlation between particular early abilities and particular levels of giftedness. For example...does the kid who reads super early, had an interest in chemistry at 3 more likely to be PG than the kid who makes up stories and had really good fine motor? (mind you I just made those up).

I have a gifted DS3.5...he hasn't been tested yet, so I have NO idea about his 'level'...besides doing the Ruf test thingie online (he was a level 4...though he didn't talk till he was 2 and I don't know how much that throws things off, or even how accurate that test is) - sometimes I think I'm dealing with extreme giftedness, other days I think I'm deluding myself (not sure this will ever go away, haha) but I just think it would be nice to KNOW more about where he falls on the giftedness spectrum...at least somewhat, for decisions about schooling etc etc.

I guess I was looking for some real life experiences...parents with two kids with differing levels of giftedness, did you see a marked difference (or any difference at all) in the their early abilities?

Thanks!

My boys are not a good example. One is 2e and was delayed until about age 4 significantly...he has Asperger's so his early language delays are understandable. Then my second child looked completely different in the development department when compared to the delays my first had so we kept telling ourselves...oh that is how it is normally supposed to be (and he was completely advanced with all milestones) and so we didn't recognize his gifted traits (although we thought he was extremely funny) until he was about 5.

Younger son is at least HG but one test shows PG so who knows. Older son doesn't test well so not sure, tests at just qualifying for the program using disadvantaged criteria but in real life presents much higher than that. The 2nd e probably gets in the way.

We have threads about this quite often - it's fascinating to compare experiences I guess - so you might want to search (google works better than the site's own search). I think it's fair to say that any rule you might make has exceptions - e.g. we certainly have PG children talked about here who didn't read early - but generally their childhoods can be made sense of looking back. But then, humans are good at spotting patterns even when they aren't there... Fwiw, mine was a late talker, early reader, and now excels academically. We have not tested as it doesn't seem helpful (though in the US there are schools for which you have to, and some people find it helpful for other reasons too). There's nothing a tester can tell you that's as valuable as you knowing your child. It's never too soon to think about education options and think "what if" your child has particular needs, but it's important to keep an open mind about how things may change too.

PS Take Ruf's levels with a large pinch of salt - they're based on anecdata not science, it seems.

I remember talking to DD's pediatrician at her 16 mo. checkup because she was only saying a few understandable words at that point. In the next couple months her speech took off and at 2 her speech was clearly very advanced and she was talking in 20 word complex sentences with no articulation difficulties. She would rattle on to complete strangers, and call them "honey". She used the word "honey" in every other sentence. People thought she was a couple years older than she was. She was also able to count up to 40 or 50 at age 2 with one-to-one correspondence. She started reading at 4 and was fluent by the time she started K.
We did see a few things when she was a baby--for instance she was very socially adept and would do things like fake sneeze at 9 months old just to get attention. She wanted people to look at her and say "bless you." But in terms of gross/fine motor skills and speech at age 1, she seemed pretty average. We didn't really start to see that she was advanced until she was 2.
I always thought of her as being verbally advanced and very articulate, so I was kind of surprised by her IQ tests a week ago--she scored 153 for perceptual reasoning and 135 for verbal comprehension. I was totally not expecting a PR score that high--I've always thought it was my DS who was advanced in that area, with his photographic type memory.

DS scores in the 99th percentile for his GAI now at age 6, but had some huge delays. He was actually advanced for motor skills as an infant and was walking well by his first birthday. He said his first words around his first birthday. He was able to climb out of his crib and walk up and down steps. But then at around 1.5 speech/motor skill development pretty much stopped. We now know he has developmental coordination disorder. But even as a toddler he was clearly intelligent. He was obsessed with figuring out how things worked. At age 1 he was fascinated by high chair and carseat buckles and would snap and unsnap them while examining the mechanisms. He loved puzzles and shape sorters. When he was 2 or 3 I caught him trying to take my computer apart. He had a screwdriver and electrical cords in his hands and said he was fixing my computer. He was very good with a computer and knew how to operate Windows and the mouse at 2.5 or 3. Around his 4th birthday I figured out he could read by sounding out words, and he was fluent w/ reading by his 5th birthday even though he hardly ever worked on it.
Now at age 6 he scores in the high average range for verbal ability but above 140 for non-verbal ability. With him, I think there has been a lot of uneven brain maturation and he seems much like one of the kids described in the book "The Einstein Syndrome".
It's hard to tell with preschool age kids what is really going on but both of my kids had signs of advanced abilities, even as toddlers. With DS things were esp. confusing because he had advanced abilities mixed with delays. Turns out he's 2e.

That is my guess, too, MoN.

DD didn't read particularly early (4, almost 5). I also don't think she walked particularly early (11 mo). The only really good clues that we had until she did learn to read were related to her apparent social skills and observation/memory. She also always did things with pretty much complete mastery once she DID do them. More like quantum jumping than "developing."

My personal pet theory is that the LOG is probably given away more by the rate of complex skill acquisition/development than by age at milestones. A child that slowly acquires a vocabulary of 2K words by 2yo is probably not at the same LOG as one that acquires that same vocabulary over a course of 2 or 3 weeks at two.

That is just my armchair hypothesis-- it's based on the fact that such stories are almost universal among this group's elementary (and older) children who are clearly HG+ and not "leveling out" as older kids, and that even most other parents of GT kids do NOT have such experiences-- at least not the ones I've met. I'm not sure how to 'check' a young child for such a thing, however-- it's mostly opportunistic observation.

My daughter did not read until 7. (No instruction either. We unschooled.) Her WISC VCI was 166.

Thanks for the fascinating insight, everyone!

DS had essentially NO words until 2, and then, in the span of a few weeks was babbling off sentences with a vocab much higher than we could count, from delayed to advancee...it was like a light switch turned on. We have a new little one (5 months) and my DH and I keep wondering whether he will talk earlier and if so...what 'baby talk' really sounds like...because our older DS didn't do it. it was nothing and then boom, conversation!

HK, I totally get the 'quantum learning' thing...I always say this to DH...we show DS3.5 something once, and he gets it. It's a bit freaky really. Esp with math. I was originally wondering if the higher level topics he's doing are really as 'hard' as they are meant to be...I mean, spending maybe 5 mins teaching your 2 year old how to identify even or odd, and then him just getting it, to the million billions whatever the number. or him wanting to try something in grade 5 on IXL (we usually do 2nd and 3rd grade) and me being incredibly dubious but I'm like, ok...whatever...and he picks decimals. and then, after a 5 min explanation of how the hundred square grid works (the colored portion is the part of a whole, etc etc, count by tens - he already knows place value and skip counting for every number through 12, so that was easy enough) and then, oh, he's doing 5th grade math (granted, he wouldn't be able to do everything in 5th, there are definite foundations that are missing there - math is his passion). Mind you, these are the times that terrify me more than make me excited. I mean, it's exciting but...how do you DEAL with that??

Reading is an interesting one over here. He learned to read entirely on his own at 2.5, was sounding out unfamiliar words a bit before that but wasn't really interested until then. He loves to be read to, but still doesn't really like to read out loud, even though, when he does, he can pretty much read anything we put in front of him - so we don't push the matter. I figure he will eventually realize that reading on his own is fun and stimulating and so will want to do it. Until then, we'll read to him, and he will read on his own when he feels like it. (That's pretty much the rule in general: if there is interest, he flies ahead, if there is no interest...well, there is really no convincing stubborn boy to do anything he doesn't want to in that regard. So we don't.)

I just want to make sure he is happy and challenged. Our school board doesn't grade skip AT ALL and doesn't do pull out...but they will bring in materials...I just don't know if it will be enough. Right now he is in a loosely Montessori school, and his teacher just rolls with the punches, which is so awesome. Lately, we have been considering homeschooling more and more. Luckily, we have a little bit of time to decide, as he can stay in the Montessori another year, or two if he does K there. But it's not cheap! If public school could work something out...free really does sound nice over here....I'm not holding my breath though.

My first son started speaking at 5 months and by a year was able to have full conversations. By 20 months he could direct me to the shops and taught himself to read by 3. he also always seemed to know early maths skills. He sat early (5 months) but crawled and walked on average times (10 months and 14 months). We pegged him at about level 4 on Ruf's scale.

second son's first word was at 3 months and then nothing for ages so he took longer to speak clearly but had an advanced vocabulary from when he started speaking. He also taught himself to read before he was 3 and now at just over 5 years is a voracious reader. his maths skills are also astounding and he grasps things faster than older kid. Again, physical development was almost identical to first son, except that he is really strong at ball skill sports. We peg him at level 5.

third son's first word was also at 3 months, and although everyone says he speaks well for his age it's not the same as the other two, and sometimes I am unsure about him. Until he does things like randomly spelling out words with foam letters or funny things like that. I don't know his approx level just yet - my Ruf book is missing *fume*.

We are now a more ecclectic homeschooling/unschooling family so there is a lot less that we formally do with the kids. Having said that, he follows a lot of the same "signs" that oldest boy followed so for now I am assuming same LOG - his drives and intensities are the same except for being MORE tactile sensitive (bummer).

For me, the level is a good indicator of the speed at which they will need to work more than anything else. But honestly if you are already having doubts, chances are school without modifications will be too slow and cumbersome.

I loved Ruf's LOG guide mostly for the anecdotal stuff - it helped me to understand that "normal" for my kids is different, and that's okay. It also helped me come to terms with what I could expect more or less and it helped me to settle down a lot to understanding and accepting my kids just the way they are.

I know parents of young children would like a crystal ball regarding their children's level of giftedness, but based on my sample of three, Ruf's and similar tools would have proven completely inaccurate. My oldest was the one who often got unsolicited comments from specialists (friends as well as treating doctors). He flip over after he was readmitted to the hospital as a newborn, observed as behaving like a toddler when he was 8 months, and physically put together 24-piece jigsaw puzzles quickly and without adult input by his second birthday. However, he only tested moderately gifted at age 8 and his verbal comprehension index came out higher than his perceptual reasoning index. The pyschologist did write that the score was an under-estimate but I don't believe it was that far off based on the other real life and academic sign posts beyond the early childhood years. My younger DS, who meets the DYS criteria by a comfortable margin, had few astounding attributes in the early years. There was one therapist who noted his creative problem solving ability at 8 months but he never received my older DS' frequent unsolicited commments from professionals. My younger DS did demonstrate the ability to apply simple multiplication and division at age 4 without active teaching. However, he did not read until age 5, in the fall of Kindergarten, but was able to read Harry Potter independently by age 6. DD, twin to my younger DS, falls between her two brothers IQ-wise, but I can't think of any wow attributes from the preschool years at all. She did not read until winter of kindergarten and did not progress to Magic Treehouse until the end of kindergarten.

In observing my children's contemporaries, I see a lot of reshuffling during the first few years of school. Part of it has to do with chidlren's different development trajectories and different focuses at different times. Environmental factors also play a role as an enriched early childhoods and deprived early childhoods tend to skew early results.

We noticed DSs memory very early. I felt like he remembered events or stories by 6 months. One time at around 18 months in mid winter he he searched at someone's house for a garden hose he had last seen at under 1, wanted to play in the water. He was still barely speaking but clearly had been recording events nonetheless. I know other perfectly bright infants or toddlers that could remember something all day but forget it by the next, shape names etc. Tell ds something once, maybe twice, it's always there. The memory really made a difference to how ds appeared to others then and now. he just accumulated world experience so effectively he had experienced double or more life events. He is pg according to the Wisc in all but processing speed but I don't think he would have stood out to others early on so much without the working and long term memory. I still don't really see his nonverbal type abilities, maybe more what his interests are or aren't that is driving what's visible.

I agree with others that while some children show very precocious behavior, many others are not advanced and are even delayed. I know that my children seemed to take one step forward and two steps back at times. I think what's most important is to remain attuned to your child's unique pace try to keep up with it! Good luck.

Gail Post/ www.giftedchallenges.com

There is something slightly different about my son but that's it. I did get he is so clever type comments but I expected clever. He was very persistent though and advanced if you did stuff like block stacking, shape marching. Late to roll, average for crawling, sitting and walking. IQ 158. Ds4 was early to sit, roll and crawl but pretty average for walking. Has no persistence, more socially adept (aka manipulative). Unofficial assessment >99 percentile. Formal testing next year.

I don't think RUF or milestones are very accurate.

I have two children. Although the younger has not been tested yet, it appears his IQ is probably higher. He was much less impressive with early milestones, though still noticeably ahead. His sister, on the other hand, was freakishly early with language and also knew and memorized all kinds of things very early (alphabet at 16 months, etc) with little to no effort on our parts. She is still an incredible memorizer; she would probably do very well in medical school.

My oldest rolled over the day after he was born and looked up at us with a big goofy smile on his face. The doctor was standing in the room when he did it and was SHOCKED and said it must have been an accident. He started laughing at me when he was 2 weeks old. He could stand at 3 months. He hit every physical milestone, including toilet training, way WAY before any child I've ever head of. He is now an NCAA Div 1 athlete. We knew pretty much from birth he was different as did all the mommies in my baby group. My younger child, is a completely different kid. He had delayed milestones. He spoke early (sentences at 9 months) but didn't walk until he was almost 2. They both have PG IQ's but little DS is the higher of the two. He is 9 and can't tie shoe laces or ride a bike both things that older DS could do at 2.5. They both have a rather odd take on the world. Older DS's girlfriend is always trying to figure him out but I don't think she ever will

It is my understanding that most studies for correlation with early milestones have involved subjects who were known to be gifted (high IQ) and a methodology of looking back at their early milestones and traits.

Taking the correlations as predictive... applying these correlations in looking at early milestones and traits of other young children, to diagnose giftedness (high IQ) or prognosticate the level of giftedness (high IQ) which may be substantiated on tests when children will be old enough for testing... may not be as accurate.

One possible reason may be that due to limited number of research study subject volunteers, there may not have been control groups in some studies. For example, there may not have been subjects known to have average IQs or low IQs and a methodology of looking back at their developmental milestones and traits... to compare with the results of the gifted.

The closest study I have become aware of which begins with young children and has been shown to have some predictive ability (and has been referenced as guiding intervention and policy) is a Hart-Risley study in the 1960's which came to focus on what is now called a meaningful difference, word gap, word deficit, vocabulary gap, or achievement gap. It is my understanding that neuroscience has more recently explained this gap by revealing that early synapse stimulation provided by hearing conversation from birth (and pre-born?) aids further synaptic and neural development which leads to growth in achievement.

The Hart-Risley conclusions were: talking with and reading to a child from birth stimulates synaptic growth as well as vocabulary growth and understanding. This drives interventions and public policy through educating parents to talk with and read to their children from birth, in order to fuel brain development and maximize later academic and intellectual growth and achievement. (Study overview and book description here. Book: Meaningful Differences in the Everyday Experience of Young American Children. Companion Book: The Social World of Children Learning to Talk)

A word about possible paucity of study subjects and reluctance for families to participate in studies - it may be that studies will in the future be conducted without parental knowledge or permission, by means of various entities tracking many data points on our children. While some welcome this, others have stated a concern for a growing inclination to refer to labels and various population groups rather than regarding individuals as unique persons having many traits and strengths, and capable of developing more than anyone may predict... by means of adopting a growth mindset.

Here is a brief roundup of free, downloadable pre-literacy and literacy resources available from the US Department of Health and Human Services, National Institutes of Health (NIH), Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD)... which appear to back the findings of Hart-Risley... including:
1) A Child Becomes a Reader: Birth to Preschool (2006) 36-page PDF, subtitled Proven Ideas from Research for Parents
2) Put Reading First: Helping Your Child Learn to Read (2001) 8-page PDF, subtitled Helping Your Child Learn to Read, A Parent Guide, Preschool - Grade 3
3) Shining Stars: Preschoolers Get Ready to Read (2007) 9-page PDF, subtitled How Parents Can Help Get Their Preschoolers Ready to Read
There are also a number of free, downloadable reports available on literacy research, including:
4) Developing Early Literacy: Report of the National Early Literacy Panel (2010), 260-page PDF, subtitled A Scientific Synthesis of Early Literacy Development and Implications for Intervention
5) Child Development and Behavior Branch (CDBB), NICHD, Report to the NACHHD Council (2009) 74-page PDF, no longer current. NOTE: See page 45 for information foreshadowing a push for Social Emotional Learning (SEL).
6) Developing Early Literacy: Executive Summary of the National Early Literacy Panel (2010), 11-page PDF, subtitled A Scientific Synthesis of Early Literacy Development and Implications for Intervention
7) Early Beginnings: Early Literacy Knowledge and Instruction (2010), 20-page PDF, subtitled A Guide for Early Childhood Administrators & Professional Development Providers

You have written about the "growth mindset" a lot, but the fact is that intelligence *is* largely fixed. Studying algebra or French or the piano should be done because of the intrinsic value of those activities or because academic achievement helps you get ahead, not because studying makes you smarter. I have seen little evidence that it raises "g". I doubt that lying to people (or to put it more diplomatically, muddling the meaning of concepts such as "intelligence") is the path to educational progress.

Interesting point. Intelligence includes both fluid and crystalized intelligence.

Ultimately, upon graduation and in real-life situations few are asked about their IQ, g, or Gf while many are asked for their demonstrated skills, achievements, and accomplishments... this accumulated knowledge is commonly considered when individuals regard the degree to which another is smart/intelligent.

The reason we advocate for innately gifted kids is largely because they need the appropriate size challenges to be able to convert their IQ into skills, achievements, and accomplishments. Their inner cheetah needs the challenge of chasing that proverbial fast antelope, lest they become underachievers.

This is not to take away from every kid getting their appropriate challenge-level curriculum. IQ is not the sole determinant of the degree of skill development, achievement, accomplishment... these may be based upon drive, persistence, grit, determination, motivation, and external/environmental factors including opportunity. In the final analysis, individuals may be much less known for their IQ or g than for their skills, achievements, accomplishments, and other characteristics and personal attributes.

I find this interesting with a 2e pg son and thinking about the childhoods of people such as Stephen Hawking and someone who I knew briefly that worked at a very high astrophysics level (ie. helped discover the Higgs Boson and worked at the CERN, etc.).

I haven't read Hawking's bio, but I believe that Hawking didn't show much aptitude or display his remarkable abilities until much later in life. Ditto for the astrophysicists I briefly knew. I asked his recent widow if she knew whether her husband was like my son (ie. flying through algebra at 8 yrs old) but she said that he wasn't like that at all as a child.

I'm not sure if these two individuals (Hawking and the other astrophysicist) just didn't display pg signs, if they were late bloomers, didn't put up a stink in school or something else was going on. But it's somewhat hard for a mere mortal to wrap their head around. I know the astrophysicist, who I knew, was a very unassuming, shy, quiet, gentle man who did not wear his achievements on his sleeve. So it's entirely possible that perhaps he just slipped under the radar with his earlier education and then excelled once at university and as an adult. I don't know.

This would fit for ds12. He entered kindergarten not yet knowing how to read and then by the end was reading one to two grade levels ahead. He seemed to sweep through the levels quickly.

This reminds me of my brother who is a high energy physicist and is always going to CERN. I just saw a photo of him on facebook having a casual dinner with two physics nobel prize winners.
Nothing remarkable at all about his early development, as far as I can recall (though I am 3 years younger). He was always a good student and I remember he liked to break into places and pick locks just for fun. But he talked, walked, read, etc. at normal ages. In fact, I think he was delayed with a lot of motor skills and never got into sports at all. Fits the stereotypical clumsy geek image in that respect. My DS seems to be following in his footsteps and looks like he will be very good at math (he doesn't get it from me!). He is also poor with motor skills. I wonder what it is about kids who are very mathy or geeky being on the clumsy side of things. I think there is something to the stereotype.

The ability would have been recognized at a young age if someone had looked. And they could have learned a lot faster if they'd had the internet.

Bostonian, I am far from an expert on this topic, but I google really well I like to read the "nature vs. nurture" debates regarding IQ. And I keep coming up with articles that talk about the "plasticity" of the young brain and how the brain changes because of stimuli, skill acquisition and also the "use it or lose it" theory. I also keep reading that for boys, the frontal lobe develops a lot later than for girls (apparently, for boys it develops when they are well into their teens). Considering these factors I always wonder if IQ is really a "fixed" entity or if what we see in testing is what is "visible" during that timeframe to the tester.
Playing violin early (at the age of 6) is being attributed to Einstein's Corpus Callosum being larger and for his right frontal lobe being "significantly enhanced" - and hence he was a genius - according to recent papers from researchers. So, I tend to wonder if IQ is fluid and develops depending on how the child is intellectually stimulated.

HK, my DS has also reached his milestones in quantum leaps - he does not grow into them - he just reaches them one day. He got up and walked one day and the very next day was running very fast. He read and swam and did pretty much everything else in the same way - 0-60 under 5 seconds is how I refer to his acquisition of new skills. I never gave much thought to it assuming that his "perfectionism" was what made him wait until he could reach mastery in anything before attempting it. But, reading your experience, it makes me wonder if this points to a very high rate of acquisition of new skillsets.

There's a lot more heat than light in these debates, to my mind. And no contradiction between g being fixed and studying algebra or French or whatever making you more likely to achieve great things, because it may do that even if it doesn't change g. We may be able to have a nice neat definition of intelligence that's correlated with things and is reasonably stable - people could argue about how stable and under what range of assumed conditions - but what, as far as I'm aware, nobody has ever been able to show is that in the right hand tail, say beyond 2 standard deviations above the mean, there's any further effect of IQ on success (I mean, no known correlation between an individual's IQ above that level and the probability that the individual will make a breakthrough of any kind - it wouldn't surprise me if e.g. the correlation with income still held). Terman tried to do it and got negative results. IIRR, others have found similarly negative results and there's no reputable positive result in the literature (if I'm wrong about that, I'd be interested to get a reference). We do not know what Einstein's IQ was, and there's a lot of "Einstein's IQ must have been stupendous because he was a genius and geniuses have stupendous IQs" in the popular imagination, which gets us no further forward at all.

To my mind the most useful way for parents of the children we talk about here to think is probably "My child's IQ is never likely to be the factor that limits their achievement. So what else matters, and how do I remove the obstacles that might otherwise limit my child?". I think that's what we're doing when we, for example, provide emotional nurturing, enough challenge to help our children learn to tackle hard problems, enough opportunities to give them a good chance of encountering the things they most want to learn about, etc.

Yes.

^ +1

{like}

Interesting. Feynman, also a physicist, became an expert at fixing radios as a child (and earned money doing this; that was in 1930s, during the depression). *Practical* interest in 'how things work'.

Exposure. DC was *very* clumsy - until he started going to a good gymnastics program (not rigorous by any means, just good - for everybody). He is now better than many of his age-peers. (And now off-the-topic: *absence* of exposure matters a lot - sorry, I do not want to derail the thread.)

It was actually hilarious because he was so "perfect" behavior-wise and a straight-A student, but couldn't seem to stop himself. He broke into his high school a few times at night, and he also broke into the large corporate bank building that my mother worked in. I sat in the car and watched him do it. He wasn't trying to steal anything or mess anything up, it was just for the fun of it. My mother was horrified when she found out.

Unfortunately, for some, the child's IQ does become a factor that limits their achievement, because our society may only be interested in teaching to a different strata.

Ah, that brings back memories of Ted the Tool's MIT guide to picking locks.

Yes, I agree that IQ shouldn't matter or other test scores, except it can limit their options or opportunities. Already I've faced barriers with my pg 2e ds8 from being in DYS and other programs. I don't have a qualifying test score yet I have a portfolio and many, many work samples to show his prodigious talents - which DYS has approved and shows pg.

So what else matters and how do I remove the obstacles that might otherwise limit my child? Well, these are my questions too.

Matters - I'd have to say the rate and speed that they're learning or going through material; my son had global developmental delays. Most kids are not picking up college level textbooks. They're not plucking out and getting excited by quadratic equations. They're not devouring books like potato chips. They're not so intense, so curious, so probing, or wanting to go into such depth or breadth.

Stereotypical mathy/physicists clumsy geeks - Put my grandfather, great uncle, uncle, and now my son in that column. Probably loads more in my family as well. They all have had an intense desire to see how things work and take things apart.

After writing this, I realize my grandfather and uncle were not always textbook motivated to learn math/physics but was still intensely driven to gain knowledge with transistors, wires, and other electrical do-dads.

To clarify, my point is that many parents on gifted forums report experiencing schools which are focused on teaching lower-achieving students while gifted students are faced with benign neglect.

During the school day, gifted students may be socially isolated, expected to teach themselves, and/or pressed into service tutoring low achievers, rather than being grouped with intellectual peers at a similar level of readiness and ability and being taught with appropriate curriculum and pacing at their challenge level. The current thread on deliberate self-harm discusses some of the problems which can occur when a child is steeped in this type of toxic learning atmosphere.

Meanwhile, the subject of correlation between early milestones and giftedness seems closely related to this recent thread: 4yo needing constant input which describes the difficulty in keeping up with a child and how exhausted parents can become in supporting the natural pace of learning set by their gifted child(ren).

Cdfox, my mind's awhirl with your post, because it raises some very interesting points. My guess is that the learning style and interests(hands-on, VSL, creative, taking things apart) of these people were probably not recognized in the classroom with the focus on auditory-sequential learning in areas outside of their domain of strength. In fact, the very nature of how they learn was most likely viewed as a problem in the classroom and their spatial strengths regarded purely as a mechanical or practical aptitude. Maybe late blooming is really just late recognition once they are finally able to enter university.

As to how to remove the obstacles for your DS and other strong spatial learners, it seems like a systemic problem. Despite the growing focus on STEM, advocates are still in the stage of making a case for the importance of spatial skills and inclusion in selection criteria and assessments.

According to the Vanderbilt study listed below that shares your concern about how many spatially talented students are missed by talent searches, "70% of the top 1% in spatial ability did not make the cut for the top 1% on either the math or the verbal composite".
https://my.vanderbilt.edu/smpy/files/2013/02/Wai2009SpatialAbility1.pdf

Is there an opportunity to get help from someone experienced in gifted advocacy for your DYS situation? Perhaps someone such as Linda Silverman at GDC, who specializes in VSL research and understands learning challenges. My PG 2e science loving DS and I will be trudging up behind you and your DS in a few years, so please leave big footprints and a flashlight

http://giftedissues.davidsongifted.org/BB/ubbthreads.php/topics/162888/1.html

http://www.spatiallearning.org/

Thanks EmeraldCity. I'm trying. Really I am trying here to make heads and tails of the situation. It's not easy with these 2e kids and I'm finding that there aren't many road maps or guides here. Jake Barnett is seen as an anomaly, I think.

Most pg 2e kids are not featured or identified as easily as people like Terence Tao or Tanishq Abraham -- who displayed profoundly giftedness in infancy or around 2 years old. My son had global developmental delays and other issues so I had dismissed those examples because they didn't reflect my son's asynchronous development which was partly due to his special needs. One of the reasons Jake Barnett has garnered attention is due to the autism and due to him not reaching those early developmental milestones like Tao or Abraham or many pg kids either.

I contacted Dr. Linda Silverman a couple of years ago. I also saw her colleague Dr. Lovecky last June. She inadvertently muddied up my head a bit more, though, by saying she thought my son was more a mixed learner and not a true vsl which I had previously thought. Still, ds8 definitely has visual spatial strengths -- despite being born with visual deficits and been recently diagnosed with convergence insufficiency. And in fairness, Dr. Lovecky gave some sound, practical advice to follow before pursuing future assessments and testing.

I'm thinking about contacting Joanne Ruthsatz or someone like her. I contacted Ellen Winner at BC (who studies prodigies) after reading a NPR article and she responded to my e-mail, but that was it. Annoying. It's not like you can easily find these people to help.

Still, your points about learning style, environment and the focus within the classroom are very valid. VSL gifts are often neglected and underrepresented in g/t and other programs. That's very true. And schools are very much asl-focused and geared to those who are rule-based. That's one of the reasons why math, music, and chess prodigies have been studied so much -- 1) relatively easy to identify, 2) very asl and rule-based who are easy to study and research. They stand out. The same cannot be said for many vsls.

There's also always been less attention and credit given to informal and visual learning. Ian Stewart makes this case for math and how math should be much more visually based than it currently is but won't be because visual maths is seen as being less rigorous or intellectual as formal maths is. And while Benoit Mandelbrot may have shown interest in math in early childhood, he wasn't a math prodigy or a pg either -- yet he's the founder of fractal geometry!

Charles Darwin, too, didn't enjoy school or do well in it. Ditto for Edison, Roald Dahl, Bee Gees, somewhat the Beatles, and many, many others. We just tend to forget those who didn't play by the rules or be more sequential/orderly oriented.

Indigo - your points about the school, curriculum, and environment are accurate and relate to EmeraldCity's points and what we've previously experienced with ds8. But, of course, one of the problems is that most gifted schools do not cater and cannot/will not accommodate pg kids, especially if there's only one pg kid involved. In these situations, it can become, as you've aptly described, a toxic atmosphere.

Both of my kids are much higher with the perceptual reasoning index on the WISC than verbal. DD scored 153 with extended norms. DS appears to have a photographic memory (or something close to it)--how many 6 year olds know the exact shape of Idaho or any other state and can draw it from memory?
I'm not sure how it's going to play out in a gifted program where the focus will probably be on writing and reading. DS is very strong in math along with the visual-spatial skills, but he is quirky and 2e.

The pscyh who gave DD the WISC wrote a lot about visual spatial learners in the report with a lot of links and info for us and the school--but I doubt anyone from the school would actually check any of those references or try to tailor a program to her needs. DS's neuropsych also said something in his report about the high perceptual reasoning score and how he may struggle in a traditional school setting. Right now he is doing ok--he is about 2.5 years ahead or grade level in reading and 3 in math--but the gap will probably close at some point for reading.

Exactly. A lot of so-called "late bloomers" are actually "early bloomers" who are recognized late.



I think the Jake Barnett case is something quite different from what you describe. Instead, he did display profound giftedness at a very young age, but the professionals, incompetently, did not understand what they were looking at, and so they incorrectly diagnosed autism when there was no autism.

Cdfox, your DS is lucky to have such a strong advocate. I will PM you with the name of someone who I hope can help.

You're right about the gifted schools. So many seem to prefer high-achieving gifties within a certain range of abilities without any of the more challenging characteristics.

The question then becomes what to do for the outliers of the outliers?

Hi everyone - this is just a reminder to please keep this thread on topic, in regards to Marnie's original post.

Thank you!

Mark

From my experience as a parent of much older kids. (Mine are 19 & 14, and I've known many other kids their age.) There are some toddlers that are just obviously gifted. They read incredibly early, or pick up an instrument, or show amazing mathematical ability. And others that don't really bloom and show until they are 7 or 8. Kids are all different and it's very hard to test preschool age kids for giftedness.

For example my son was one of those obviously gifted at 3, while one of my BF's girls wasn't interested and didn't really read well until the beginning of 2nd grade and then she just bloomed.