I was tested by a private psychologist through my school when I was in 6th grade, and they said I was gifted, although I never found out what my IQ was. I thought that was bunk because although I liked to read, I couldn't do math. I was (am) also very artistic. I did have unusual interests in elementary school, like wanting to be Japanese and being completely interested in Japanese culture (I am of various Celtic descent) and being very interested in plants and gardening to the point that I joined a plant of the month club at 10 and was very happy receiving plants through the mail until my dad found out by getting a bill. But I didn't feel that much smarter than the next kid, although I did feel like I didn't belong etc. probably because of my unusual interests.
Fast forward to now, my 9 year old son just tested HG (GAI 159). We had him tested by a private assessor because he was inattentive in class (and this going several years to 1st grade). His third grade teacher told us she thought he was gifted and wanted him to get tested in the school system which we did (at the moment awaiting results), but we also had a private assessment done because our understanding was the G and T test would not tell us if he had ADHD or other issues. Assessor said very smart, very persistent, slow processing (21st percentile) due to perfection and anxiety, but not ADHD.
Also had my 7yo daughter assessed turns out her score is almost the same numbers (GAI 160).
Neither of them appear to do any of this advanced stuff I read about all the time - like what you see on those "how do you know if your child is gifted" lists.
Neither of them read early, they both learned in kindergarten and were not in the top reader groups. Now my son loves to read non-fiction books about science and animals and many of the book are adult level books- but I don't know if he's actually really reading them or just reading parts of them with the pictures that interest him. When he was 18 months the ped told us to get him help because he had no words. It turned out that he had childhood apraxia so we did speech therapy. At that time he was assessed and found to be age appropriate or slightly delayed in everything with the exception of puzzles, he was about a year ahead of his peers [EDITED: I have since looked back at the assessment they did then and he was actually advanced several months to several years in everything except fine motor. The apraxia was related to his physical development, he understood everything but couldn't physically talk.]. He also likes to draw animals of his own creation, and between 1st grade and 2nd he made a very long "mural" of pictures by taping 8" x 11" pieces of paper together (100 feet). I admit that seemed unusual.
My daughter couldn't care less about reading, she just wants to do all the age appropriate stuff like rainbow loom, playing with stuffed animals, art, minecraft etc.
I actually wouldn't believe they were HG except for the following:
Both have tons of the over-excitabilities.
Both kids have chosen best friends that are either at least a year older or are gifted or both.
Both kids have way too much energy.
My son constantly starts sentences "Well, technically... " but I say that a lot so I'm sure he picked it up from me.
My son does something I do, which is when something interests me I get sort of obsessed about it, read about it, talk about it, generally annoy people with my all consuming interest in one particular subject until I'm over it. Currently his is How To Train Your Dragon.
My son would much rather talk to adults than kids any day.
But any physics breakthroughs going on? Nope.
Do they say things every once in while that are interesting.. yes. So can anyone shed light on what is going on? Am I just looking at it the wrong way? My son and daughter do fine at school but they are not at the tops of their classes, they are 3s and 4s (proficient and advanced in all areas). My daughter's behavior is fine, my son gets "impulsive, inattentive" notes. All his teachers love him though.
In my life I have met many many people that I felt were more intelligent than I am. This may be my own perception of myself. One caveat, I did recently discover that 80% of my close friends were actually in the GATE program as children. It's actually weird, either there were a lot of us, or I have a radar for this...so maybe I have a lot of intelligent friends which is why I don't see it?
I just keep feeling like I am missing a piece of the puzzle somehow...
PS I also have tons of family stories about how smart my parents, grandparents were: my dad took apart clocks and put back together at 3 years old, doing math in his head that was incredibly hard to do, etc. My mom went to the national spelling bee, you know that sort of thing. My kids seem (to me) to be moderately gifted, I don't see the HG part...
If you have read this far, thank you.
