While we are on the topic, I have been feeling like I shouldn't really participate in this forum because I do not have a PG child. How do people feel about people with children who are only gifted or HG participating?
No one will ask you to prove that your child is gifted before replying to your post. Many parents, including myself, have posted about children who have never had an IQ test, although they have shown other signs of giftedness. If you have a question, go ahead and ask it.
This.
My DD15 has never been tested. A test is just a number-- and a snapshot. Some kids are more photogenic than others, let me also add, here.
There
are "risks" associated with testing, and not everyone is comfortable taking them. (If it's lower than achievement/performance would indicate, then what? If it's HIGHER, is that a burden?)
Since DD15 is kicking it in a college STEM major, I feel pretty comfortable saying that she's at least HG. She matches up with "PG" qualities on most checklists, etc. The biggest 'tell' in my estimation is the
rate of learning that such children are capable of. It's not that they are more mature, more emotional, more-- well, more of anything in particular.
Like other people, when you've seen one gifted child, you've seen one gifted child. There
are tells, I think-- but they aren't what a lot of people think that they are, and they are not easy to observe unless you have a window into the child's everyday life for a long period of time.
Nobody would have predicted my then-3yo to be anything more than "bright." She doesn't tend to be especially showy, and she's extraordinary at blending in socially-- more than that, she tends to probe others very rapidly for their expectations of her; then she sets about meeting them in every way.
