Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Pre-school Typical Toddler?

I know the parents on this forum are not experts, but are very experienced with gifted children. I would like your thoughts and opinions about my son. He is only 19 months, so I imagine it may be too early to tell if he is gifted. Some quick background. He was awake for 6 hours straight after birth. He didn't sleep much and was very aware and interacted with people and his surroundings. At his newborn dr appointment he grabbed the doctors finger and pulled his upper body off the table. The doctor said he should not be able to to that. He sat up completely unassisted and with out using his hands to prop himself at four months. I can't quite remember when he crawled. He walked holding onto my hands at 4 months and would do so for 30 minutes at a time. He walked from person to person at 7 months. Now at 19 months he knows his alphabet, upper and lowercase, and their sounds. He is starting to read some words. About ten that I know of. He knows his colors and shapes including oval, diamond and crescent. He has a long attention span and loves longer stories like "The Little Engine That Could" and "The Poky Little Puppy". He also has a vocabulary of at least 100 words and is learning about 6 new words a day. My husband thinks this is typical toddler behavior, but I don't think he has been around many other toddlers. Is this typical? Am I just an overly proud mother? Sorry for the novel-length post. I've had a lot on my mind.

This is definitely not typical behavior - spend some time at a preschool or daycare.

A wonderful book for this stage is Ruf's '5 levels of giftedness' it will help you sharpen your observation for milestones.

It's very usual for one parent to be more 'alarmed' by the unusualness of a child's behavior than the other - very often the Dads will be the one to say 'It's all in your head.' I'll need to find a way to nurture the good parts of your husband's attitude, while winning him over to your side - this is a long slow process. I was one of those females who expected my very intelligent husband and our very excellent local schools to know what was 'best' - but it turned out that I actually new best soonest. That was a hard journey.

Keep posting, keep us posted. Best Wishes,
Grinity

That is not typical!

Welcome to the forum.

DW and I were the same way until we took Mr W at 4 mos to a company picnic and met other kids twice his age. Our babysitter, who had taken care of lots of kids, had told us all this, but we kind of blew her off. Our pediatrician made the same comments later on.

The book Grinity mentioned is good. But be prepared. Its one thing to intellectually understand, its another to have facts stun you along the way.

Hello Elizabeth! I'm new here too, so I don�t have a lot of experience. But I believe that parents, in general, are pretty good at noticing out-of-the-ordinary things with their kids on whatever end of the spectrum, and sometimes on both. So I bet you�re right to think he's gifted.

As a fellow mom with questions, I�ve found these ideas helpful:

*read up on giftedness (www.hoagiesgifted.org is a great place to start).

*keep a detailed record of milestones, abilities, and humorous or unusual things. Make sure to write down any of the �typical� developmental items in the 0-5 year old range.

*find a safe/supportive place, like here, to talk about your parenting experiences. Especially till your husband catches on. (All my husband is sure of is that we haven�t slept well in two years and that one child is all he wants, since we probably would not survive a #2 if at all similar to our #1.)

Hope this helps!

Definitely start reading up on giftedness!! And definitely keep records of "typical" milestones as you are doing. It always becomes more obvious the more time you spend with other toddlers the same age.
Enjoy the journey, it is great to find a place like this to share on as it can be very isolating experience otherwise

welcome...it's not "average" and you likely are in the right place

I would say the parents here actually are experts. We are experts on our own children and children "like" ours (I use quotes because you won't BELIEVE some of the specific examples of sameness while comparing your child to those around him and seeing how unlike the average child he probably is). And there are also plenty of parents here who are also psychologists, educators, etc...

Your son in not average. A vocabulary of 100+ words at 19mo is not average. My 2nd DD was using appropriate complete sentances around that age...I'll never forget "Look, in the blue sky, an airplane." coming from the back seat. I almost wrecked the car!

I would bring home a book or two on "average" milestones and behavior, like what to expect from you 2 yo and leave those around for DH to read as well...and start planning now for early kindergarden or a first grade skip...or homeschool.

I agree with "enjoy the journey" advice. Just enjoy your son's uniqueness and get ready

Welcome!

All of the early milestones you mention are either at the high end of the chart or off of it, and it may be an early indicator of Giftedness.

Or it may not.

Having raised three gifted kids, all I can say unequivocally is that each developed and reached different milestones in their own unique way. My first cruised furniture at 6 months and was running by 9 months. My second refused to walk and speed-crawled until he was well past the milestone of when he should have walked. The last actually went through x-rays to make sure there was nothing developmentally preventing him from walking - which there wasn't physically but later proved to be one of the first markers for dysgraphia.

My advice is to record all the milestones - they'll ask about them in school when you're asking for gifted testing, and it's amazing how easily you forget which kid did what when. And my second piece of advice is to just enjoy your little one, try to keep them learning, playing and happy, and savor the days.

Thanks everyone for the comments and advice.

I think my husband may be coming around. This last weekend my husband asked if I had feed the d. o. g. Spelling out the word dog so that our pooch wouldn't get excited and think it's time to eat again. We were both amazed when our son said,"dog". We tried spelling the word out loud again and he once again said dog. We also spelled "cat" out loud which he also got correct.

I reminded him that our son is only 1 and 1/2. He was stunned.

I can't wait to see what my little one will do next!

I feel like you are describing my husband, Grinity. In fact, I recently told him I needed for him to read Ruf's book because he had yet to admit our son is gifted. Through the course of that conversation, I stumbled upon the reason: He has a "problem" with the word "gifted". Seems he has a stereotypical idea of what that means. Education on the subject is the remedy for that!

Anyway, he is getting into Ruf's description of Level 2 and has admitted our son is at the very least a Level 1. He's said the book is very interesting, so I'm satisfied he's going to learn we need to know what to expect from schools-and that's why knowing if he's gifted is so important...not just so we can label him with a word.

I have another DH in denial over here! I've showed him that book, too. He has accepted she seems to be somewhat ahead. What it really took was going to some play group type events with me. I think we hang out with some pretty smart / educated parents... and that they probably have very bright babies... but he finally saw what other babies her age act like.