Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums GT Research confused -- PG

I agree with the last three posts (before Wren's because we crossposted and I haven't read hers yet) in their entirety.

Judging LOG strictly (or even to a great extent) by school placement doesn't make any more sense to me than judging strictly by IQ score. Intelligence is more complicated than either of those would indicate. Motivation plays a big role.

Then, too, even if my DS is ready for college at 10 or 12 or even 14, he's not going! Frankly, I'M not ready for that! He'd take online college courses, have a private tutor, travel...but I'm NOT going to send him away to college at that age.

I think the majority of parents feel that way. I'd bet most PG kids feel that way, even. And there are so many things kids can do and learn between 10 and grad school that there's just no reason for them to go that route if it's not the ideal solution for them.

They need to learn, yes. But life is not a race with the one out of grad school fastest getting the prize. And for most of these "tail" kids, grad school at 12 is not something they need. If they do, more power to them, naturally! But most don't need that. Even the PG kids.

I guess it seems to me that you're looking for some hard and fast rule to define LOGS, Wren. There simply isn't one. Not yet, anyway. We're all stumbling along trying to figure it out. There are so few kids in the tails that the tails get lumped. It's almost inevitable because we don't have good ways to distinguish the PGers from the EGers from the HGers because there's so much involved in intelligence, including motivation and opportunity, as Crisc mentioned. Our tests are not designed to distinguish at the tails. Talk of 180 and 200 IQs are misleading and outdated--the tests that are usually given don't even go that high anymore! We're all sort of stuck, and none of us are crazy about it, as Grinity indicates.

Heck, Mia and I were fantasizing not long ago about creating a test designed exclusively for the tail, so that we could tell an HG kid from EG from PG with precision. Ah, what a lovely dream...with no real way of existing in the real world!

So I guess my question to you, Wren, would be why does the difference between EG and PG matter to you at this point in your DD's development? Does it change the way you're going to raise her or educate her if she's "only" HG or EG and not PG? Is this just curiosity or do you have a personal stake in the question?