I am working with a tiny 4 year old boy who is really struggling with behavior issues at school (running, biting, pulling hair, etc). This is never done maliciously - he seems unable to control himself. We are in a country where getting an assessment is a very unusual situation. Luckily I have tracked down resources for this family. The flip side of all this is that he is only 4 and reading at a 2nd grade level in his native language (which does not use the Roman alphabet). On top of that he has figured out how to phonetically read English by watching TV and videos. Mom has admitted she was moved from K to 2nd when she was little, and she had behavior issues as well. In this country acceleration is unheard of.

The organization that plans to assess him says there is no IQ test in his language. They are baffled that I would even ask for him to be tested for IQ. I suspect that some (not all) of his behavior is utter boredom. Very little to nothing known about giftedness here. Thoughts?

Thoughts...
1) For educators and for the professional testing organization, you may wish to share a link to the free Davidson Educator's Guild. This is a nice starting point as individuals can join and read in their personal time, as life-long learners; This is just to raise awareness does not attempt to advocate or influence policy and practice, per se. At some future point when it seems to fit into the conversation and/or circumstances at hand, you may wish to share a link to the Acceleration Institute.
2) For the mom who was accelerated, you may wish to share the link to the Acceleration Institute, as this information seems pertinent to understanding her own experience and possibly that of her child, as well. The mom may need or benefit from this forum, as well as having access to articles on the Davidson Database and knowing about websites such as Hoagies Gifted Education Page. IMO, she really needs to know that she is not alone.

I wonder what the point there is to an assessment in this situation. Neither the organisation nor the family nor the school (where I assume his behavioural diifficulties come into play) appear to be able to understand giftedness as a concept, let alone be able to do anything about it.
Could you suggest a sort of response to intervention plan? As in, have you tried to give this little boy books? Specifically books for school age children? Tried to let him read to others, write up plans for the day etc. It would be good for both the mom and the little boy to know that they are not alone, but it appears they would be no nearer an actual solution to the problem. Are you in a position to suggest one?

We live outside the Western world but with kids who attend an international school staffed by internationals.

What do you hope to achieve with testing? Identification of learning disorders perhaps masked by the gifted presentation?

Is the child in a class with children his age or has he been accelerated?

I strongly suspect that a formal evaluation isn't necessary to achieve your goals. If the child is acting inappropriately for his age, knowing he has a high IQ isn't going to help you. He may have learning or developmental disorders such as autism that make it difficult for him to control his actions or express his needs and wants effectively. Can he get medical testing in your location for developmental disorders or is that also unavailable?

Can you make your best guess as to his needs/limitations/gifts and develop a plan for the parents and teachers to guide them in implementing a behavioral system that allows the child to still have access to higher level learning material?

FWIW, in our location, people needing non-medical testing for educational purposes fly to their home countries. One child gets a type of occupational therapy via Skype. Another child flew to a major medical hub monthly for occupational therapy. These are rich children of Westerners. The local children with special needs generally muddle through with minimal support or to into full-time special education.

Thank you indigo. I might send her some info if I think she can get it translated into her native language. Even telling her about our journey seemed to be of comfort to her.

The school is willing to work at his level. His behavior is getting in the way. The assessment is going to look at the whole child (bio/psycho/social). The organization works with kids with learning differences and physical issues.


I am not a teacher, but I have had him in my office a couple of times to give the poor teacher a rest. He and I had a good time, but the teacher admits he does much better one on one. We were drawing pictures, and he wrote his name on his paper and then wrote out "green" when I asked where the green block is. Then it was back to playing balls and puppets. He went back to class and raked his teacher across the face. Sigh.I wonder, of course, what is going on at home.

Yes, if we can truly get an idea about what is going on and what level he is working at, I can make suggestions. I never knew that my family's experience would come in so handy on the other side of the world.

Did you know -

1) The Acceleration Institute's original 2004 report, "A Nation Deceived" is free, downloadable and available in an International version, in nine languages? The webpage lists: Arabic, Chinese, French, German, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, Russian, Spanish.

2) There are several free online translation services. While the grammar in the free versions may not be as polished as the grammar in the purchased upgrades, I find the translations to be generally useful.