I love the physics recommendations. My DS6 could be Annette's child.
I think it's hard to understand how other children can have trouble doing things that come so easily to your own child, until you see your own child struggling at something (which I know is a rarity for most parents on this board!).
I don't think it's lack of exposure, based on my experience with my DS6 struggling with reading, and my DD4 simply not showing the deep critical thinking skills DS6 did at her age. DS6 is gifted, and DD4, well jury's still out, but I'd say not gifted if I didn't know that her IQ should be near the rest of her family's.
DS6 knew his letters and sounds around age 3, but stubbornly resisted learning to read, and at age 6, he's still struggling to read IMO. He has a lot of DH's reading problems. DH still can't sound out new words, like unusual names or words in another language, correctly. Both DH and DS will read letters backwards, insert sounds that aren't in the word, skip sounds that are there, etc. Meanwhile, DS6 is two years ahead in math, and we've been talking about physics, math, death, god, infinity, and mechanics since he was three.
DD4 is exposed to all of the same things that DS6 was exposed to, but doesn't pick up on them the way DS6 did. She's advanced for her age in math, but not as much so as DS6 was. Her reading is a bit more advanced, but she's still not an early reader. She has other capabilities and interests that he doesn't, like her understanding and appreciation of art and music. We've followed both of their leads in what they're really interested in, but they're both exposed to the same things, and have very different responses and ability to absorb and critically think about them.
I find the saying "you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink" is true. Children will master concepts and skills when they're developmentally ready to do so, and gifted children are leaps and bounds ahead of non-gifted children in their development.
