Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Finding like souls in GT programs?

I think that is true from what dd said. Dd said that about 20 of the 80 kids who apparently have a GT id showed up. She also said that the ones who seemed actually bright all left early (as did she) and that the only ones who expressed interest in ongoing GT meetings were the kids who struck her as the least bright.

A friend likes to weave and knit. I once looked at her yarn collection. I counted hundreds of shades of red, yellow, blue, etc. And then saw how she combined the shading to produce something gorgeous and almost infinitely complex. She said I was the first person to notice all this.

I see the same blindness to complexity among my high achieving peers. In fact, they often try to reduce complexity to make things "go better" when in fact they destroy options by doing that.

I am going to gently say that I would encourage your daughter to spend less time trying to figure out who is really smart and who is not and more time trying to find kids she likes who share her interests.

Probably true and also why I bring this up. Dd has always been pretty centered and never been one to go around judging others as stupid. I think that the lack of peers this year coupled with entry into official teen-hood has been leading her more toward having a distainful attitude that would be nice to see nipped in the bud.

My interest in her finding other HG kids is due to the fact that, when she had some friends like that in middle school I didn't see this side of her. I have encouraged her to join clubs, start clubs... Her homework load this year has been crazy but we are hoping that she'll have more time to fit in extracurriculars next year.

I think that your dc are in a gifted only school gives them the opportunity to have potential intellectual peers which may make the focus on who is smart or not less of an issue. I certainly don't want dd to go around judging people's intellect. I do think that being in an environment where you feel like few, if any, of your peers are people with whom you can have a conversation that doesn't include trying to convince them that the U.S. isn't literally selling states to China lends itself toward having a child/teen develop distain for others. That isn't positive. I do think that having some intellectual peers would help her attitude and, thus, want to support her finding other gifted kids.

Cricket, do you have a 4-H program near you? IMHO the benefits of 4-H are endless but I most appreciate the real life experiences that come from showing animals or competing in a food prep competition or building legos.

4-H has taught both my kids that success isn't always about winning, it's about learning and doing your best. Dd has lost to others in the ring for ridiculous reasons, such as the judge didn't like the color of her animal's collar. It shouldn't be like that, but that's life and sometimes you have to suck it up. Sometimes, the not-so-smart kid who really worked with his animal, wins. It's not always about brains. Effort counts!

She's learned sportsmanship and how to lose with grace. More importantly, she's learned how to win with grace.

Unfortunately dd is vegan so I'm not thinking that 4H is the best fit for her, but thank you.

LOL