Gifted Issues Discussion homepage

The courses regularly go on sale, so I suggest not paying the list price for anything. I bought courses on statistics and astrophysics for my 8yo boy, and he preferred the little blue books distributed along with the videos to the videos themselves. I agree with him -- it's faster to read than to listen to someone talk. A big audience for the courses are people who spend a lot of time driving to work, who can listen but not read in the car.

And maybe also mamas of infants. I've been really bummed that I can't even finish a book lately. I wish I would have had good videos to watch when DD was first born. I spent hours chained to the couch bfing or letting her nap on me. DH and I managed to watch ALL of the seasons of 24 in the past few months. We'd watch an episode when he got home from work. We'd probably do the same with these.

Maybe I can just buy one or two. Our local library doesn't have any, but I might be able to get them from a library from the closest city. It will be a PITA though.

Are you teaching or studying?

Yes! Aren't they fabulous? We have watched quite a few by now, and have an embarrassing number stacked waiting to be watched (we watch a lot more in the winter, and I splurged at the end of last winter). The only one we have that I'd vote a definite "avoid" is the high school chemistry one - it starts from the premise that you hate math and are scared of it and need to be dragged through an exam. Whilst it might well be good if that's the case, it bemused my chemistry-and-maths-mad 5yo...

Really memorably good ones:
- the particle physics one, a tour of the microcosmos or something like that. We all watched this beginning to end, including DS-then-6. Only caveat is that there is no maths, and if you would have been happy with it, you'll miss it.
- the Bob Brier history of ancient Egypt. He's a natural story-teller. Long though!

Things we've enjoyed:
- Joy of Mathematics
- Mathematics of the Visual World
- Meteorology, the wonders of the weather - have yet to finish this though, as you really need to concentrate!

Things that have only just been started:
- From Yao to Mao, history of China; I've watched the first couple of episodes, which were promising
- Calculus; despite liking the lecturer from other things, I'm not yet totally convinced, on the basis of the first couple of lectures

On the shelf waiting to be watched I have the history of maths one, the integrated history of Greece and Rome, empires before Alexander, and a couple of the geology/earth sciences ones.

If anyone's watched any of the medieval European history ones, I'd particularly appreciate reports on them.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/01/f...ait-for-their-real-careers-to-begin.html
Generation Limbo: Waiting It Out
JENNIFER 8. LEE
New York Times
August 31, 2011

...

Meet the members of what might be called Generation Limbo: highly educated 20-somethings, whose careers are stuck in neutral, coping with dead-end jobs and listless prospects.

And so they wait: for the economy to turn, for good jobs to materialize, for their lucky break. Some do so bitterly, frustrated that their well-mapped careers have gone astray. Others do so anxiously, wondering how they are going to pay their rent, their school loans, their living expenses � sometimes resorting to once-unthinkable government handouts.

�We did everything we were supposed to,� said Stephanie Morales, 23, who graduated from Dartmouth College in 2009 with hopes of working in the arts. Instead she ended up waiting tables at a Chart House restaurant in Weehawken, N.J., earning $2.17 an hour plus tips, to pay off her student loans. �What was the point of working so hard for 22 years if there was nothing out there?� said Ms. Morales, who is now a paralegal and plans on attending law school.

Some of Ms. Morales�s classmates have found themselves on welfare. �You don�t expect someone who just spent four years in Ivy League schools to be on food stamps,� said Ms. Morales, who estimates that a half-dozen of her friends are on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. A few are even helping younger graduates figure out how to apply. �We are passing on these traditions on how to work in the adult world as working poor,� Ms. Morales said.

<end of excerpt>

Yikes.

Thanks Bostonian for the post but people don't want to hear about that here.... I keep talking about the limits of options for our kids and there seems to be a feeling that our gifted kids will somehow find a way.

Anyone read the op/ed by David Brooks?
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/02/opinion/brooks-the-vigorous-virtues.html?_r=1&ref=davidbrooks

he writes "deeper structural problems. Tackling them means shifting America�s economic model � tilting the playing field away from consumption toward production; away from entitlement spending and more toward investment in infrastructure, skills and technology; mitigating those forces that concentrate wealth and nurturing instead a broad-based opportunity society. "

This is not going to get better for our kids just because they are gifted.

Ren

Yeah.

Law school.

That will help you lard up with $150,000 in debt for a $40,000 per year job in this economy.

I think it's more that the focus of people here tends not to be so much on material success, but more on keeping kids happy and learning, then supporting the ability to achieve academically later on. If a child matures into a thinker who is poised to make great discoveries, she's simply different from the many educated people out there who have difficulty finding jobs. It's not about finding a job for that person, but about expressing brilliance.

So, for example from the article, I think the highly educated person who wanted to work in the arts simply doesn't matter in a discussion about exceptionally gifted people. Nothing in the article suggested that she was on the path to being an exceptional artist. Who cares if she can't find a job, really? (I mean, it's good if she does, but it doesn't matter in making life choices for my family and children.)

Also, I really do think that as long as my kids turn out to be psychologically stable, high ability will let them excel to some extent in their chosen field, so I don't worry too much. If they turn out not to reach much of their high potential, as long as they're able to live well enough, I don't care much what they do. I just don't care much if they become wealthy; I do care to give them the best shot at reaching the limits of their potential based on their gifts.

LOL. Seriously.

It would be relevant if we are assuming that Dartmouth serves as a proxy IQ signal to the world.

That is to say, if you went to Dartmouth, you assume IQ = 99th percentile and above.