The term "special" is just so trite at this point. {sigh}
It's what "gifted" was about 1990, I think.
It's gradually become code for a style of parenting which is mostly about entitlement and recognition from outsiders of a child's exceptionality, with little actual regard for reality, come to that-- but, um-- only the positive aspects. Of course.
The real issues of being high-cognitive ability are a decidedly mixed bag, and there's not much that you can do about those facts of a child's state of being any more than you'd determinedly attempt to alter a child's PHYSICAL development. It would be considered barbaric. So even if your child is the tallest one in his/her class of agemates, or has some other attribute that s/he loathes and feels makes him/her "different" or "weird" then...
yes, "special," I suppose. Though that isn't what the term is generally accepted to mean these days.
Are kids (or people, really) who are in the 1st or 99th percentile "special"?
Yes, I believe that they are. Most human systems are best-suited to the middle third of the natural distribution of ANY human trait. Ask someone in the 99th percentile in height how well they like an airline seat or a random rental car, for example.
Why is it wrong to note that cognitive function operates along a normal distribution, as well?
THAT, it seems to me, is the real heart of the matter. We accept that a 100% "growth mindset" is probably delusional when it comes to other developmental traits, but refuse to admit it when it comes to academic ability and achievement. Yes, WORK is necessary to meet potential-- but let's just be honest and admit that not all potentials are identical. Hard work can move individuals into various states of meeting their individual potential, all right-- but just as four hours a day in my backyard or at the gym is not going to turn me into Serena Williams, no amount of after-school-tutoring is going to turn a bright, but neurotypical student into a person like my child, my self, or my spouse. We are "different" in that way from most people. Just like elite athletes are inherently somewhat different from me, with my mediocre athletic ability.
Parents who are genuinely parenting gifted children, I've found, tend to talk mostly about the challenges of not fitting the system the way it exists, and how to get needs met in a world that isn't intended to serve them or their kids. NOT about little Johnny or Suzie's latest adorable and extraordinary photo-op or point of awesomeness. We don't need anyone to tell us that our kids are special, we don't care about wearing a badge that says we're entitled to live vicariously through them, and honestly, we don't ASSUME their accomplishments as our own.
We, um, also don't tend to ATTRIBUTE our accomplishments to our children, which is something else that I have seen an awful lot of among the parents that seem to need the label for reasons that have little to do with their child's needs at all, and mostly to do with wanting a badge that says "Special Parent" with a few gold stars next to it.
As for the question in the thread title, it depends largely on how one defines "gifted." Numerically, some definitions imply that the top 3% of cognitive ability constitutes the "gifted" population. Well, is three persons per hundred "special?"
Okay, maybe it isn't. But at some point out there, moving to rarer and rarer innate cognitive ability, it does cross the line, right? I'm thinking that just where that line is probably is a subjective thing. I don't consider that MG persons are all that "special." That's merely my perspective, however-- they seem "bright" but not extraordinary. There's not a clear bright line that divides gifted from not-gifted, after all.
Now, relative to "bright" people, say, at the 90th percentile of ability, a profoundly gifted person IS extraordinary. They will perceive the world in terms that others don't grasp, don't understand, or see only far more slowly. That's all, though-- I dislike the mythology that there is some corresponding deficit to those who have extraordinary cognitive ability like that. PG people have higher cognitive ability. "Lower _______" isn't part of some universal package deal. That's as ridiculous as claiming that athletic ability comes solely with being an arrogant jerk, or being deficient in cognitive ability, which is also untrue.
