Half the prodigies I studied seemed to be under pressure to be even more astonishing than they naturally were, and the other half, to be more ordinary than their talents. That sounds like it's probably true. It makes sense that might be true.“A prodigy is a group enterprise.”, says the article. Anyone's success is a group effort and too often like to forget about everybody that helped them when they succeed. I guess the tendancy for parents to say, "It was all her" confirms that delusion. (a thing priveledged people like to say). Nonetheless, Natalie said, “that was my present to her: I gave her her own life.” Beautifully said. That's what I have planned for my kids. I think that's the healthiest goal post as a parent. Chloe explained that whereas her son’s American teachers gave him broad interpretive ideas to explore freely, his Chinese teacher taught measure by measure. This makes sense to me. I wanted to believe in child-led learning, that kids would know what they need and then I read a statement that teachers teach children stuff. That blew that theory for me. Unless the whole world's wrong, which I guess they might be. "In my experiences raising three extremely gifted boys who are not prodigies, much of becoming a prodigy requires finding the appropriate teacher/mentor to teach the advanced adult skills. There would be far more American prodigies if our universities had a system of mentorship designed specifically to work with children who might be interested in mathematics, or robotics, or medical research. I've met many gifted kids who are still looking for that professional adult who will take the child's gifts and interests seriously. It's very hit or miss.", said someone in the comments. I have to agree with that. When the tiger mom article came out and everybody was harping on the pushiness I thought that was a complaint among the priveledged, Type A, accomplished, well off parenting. Barely middle class parents have less time or money for talent development, as well as different priorities out of necessity. I truely don't understand why pushiness is harped on as being the biggest failing our culture has towards advanced ability children. I call "B.S."
Also I plan to send that quote about all the genius (had to google, i never can spell that right), about all the genius and insane people being on the same continuim spectrum, I'm going to email that quote to any of the brilliant people I know right away. "Genius is a degenerative psychosis belonging to a group of insanity.. and neuroscience demonstrated that creativity and psychosis map simalarly in the brain."
La-la-la-lovely.
