Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums GT Research Opinion, nature or nuture

OK, the DNA has to be there, but, here's an observation and I would like to hear what others think.

I was at a school/family party on Saturday. Talking with mother (astrophysicist, husband/father is a PhD in physics) about son, who is 2 months older than DD. She said that she has not observed anything that would be considered gifted. She happens to know another astrophysicist that I know, whose husband is also a PhD in Physics whose DS is 2 months younger than DD. I do not consider that boy to exhibit any unusual gifted tendencies.

Now, both these mothers work long hours and the children have been in daycare since 3 months. Looking at similar highly intelligent couples, where the women started working at 3 months and the children went to daycare or full time nannies and I don't see any gifted tendencies.

There is that childcare bible, "The Early Years" I think, some Harvard researcher, who says that up until age 3 there should be some biological caregiver who has a real vested interest in development because the enthusiasm for milestone achievement won't be there otherwise. (I paraphrase, but that is the gist).

So I am wondering, not that these children won't grow up and be in university at 12, but clearly they do not show the signs that people on this board talk about. Although, I don't think of myself as hot housing my baby and toddler, I think that as the primary caregiver and A-Type helicopter parent, I had to contribute to her development. She obviously has to have good DNA to have the reasoning power, or am I just that good? (just joking) Seriously, how much do you think the primary care and brain development is linked in those early years?

Would really like to hear.

Ren

I think it's a combination of both, that way we parents(mothers especially!) can feel twice the guilt .

Haha, more later.

Well, HG+ kids are pretty rare. And what you see of a child as a casual observer isn't always the full measure of a kid's abilities. Add in the potential for GT denial in parents who are probably GT themselves or underreporting for fear of seeming to be bragging, and I'm not sure we're looking at a very scientific cross-section here!

If you're just using that story to explain why you're asking the question, then I guess I'd reply that there are GT kids born in all sorts of families: working moms, single parents, rich, poor, etc.

Certainly nurturing any child's gifts--in the generic sense of the word--from a young age is always likely to make those gifts stronger. But there's good childcare and bad childcare out there.

I had an sitter--a retired teacher who was very aware of GTness and very happy to nurture it--during my kids' early years who treated my kids like her own grandkids. They got so much from being at her house. She offered all sorts of learning opportunities for them that they wouldn't have had at my house. They got lots of attention from her. They got to be around older kids in the afternoon, when the primary grades got off the bus. There were people to read to them, to play with them, to talk to them. I have another sitter now who takes the kids on walks and teaches them about fossils and rocks. They're as happy as clams and have learned so much from her.

Bad childcare is bad for kids, GT or not. Warehousing kids is never a good idea. Yes, I think a neglectful childcare situation can hamper brain development, and I doubt anyone would disagree with that. But there's lots of childcare out there that isn't like that, and I think that good kind can be quite good for kids.

I don't buy it that the astrophysicist's kids are not GT because she worked. To be honest, it sounds like some sort of anti-feminist "keep the women barefoot and pregnant" argument to me, and I always bristle at those. I'm guessing that wasn't your point, but it's what it sounds like to me.

LOL! Love that!

I think it has a lot to do with it. I can't quote statistics, but here's how I understand it. Everytime a child is introduced to something new from birth to age 5, a dendrite connection is made in the brain. It's like a PO box. So, if you take your 6 month old to the zoo, several PO boxes might open: zoo, animals, drive time, stroller. Then, when she goes to the zoo again, she's already got a box to put that in and can add to the box. This happens over and over again. So, if you are at home with your child and go to museums and libraries and parks and stuff, you are building more boxes (dendrites). Then, later in life, maybe at 6, your child sees an ad for a zoo and her brain automatically goes to the zoo box for information. If she's never been to the zoo before age 6, the box isn't there. I think day-care kids don't get this kind of exposure unless it's a really good daycare. On the other hand, if you stay at home with your child and don't interact at all, those dendrites aren't built either. I've never put mine in daycare (just Mother's Day Out twice a week) so I certainly can't speak from that side. And, I certainly am not condemning or criticizing anyone who uses daycare.

Well, I guess I think the "build more connections" argument is the one that has been used to sell all that Baby Einstein-style crap that's on the market these days, and I think that is such a load of nonsense.

You don't need to play only classical music for your baby or take him to the art museum from birth in order to nurture brain development. What babies and young kids need is security, affection, and daily interaction with adults who talk to them, sing to them, read to them, point things out to them, etc. Nothing fancy, just the normal sorts of stuff that people have done with kids for...well, for forever. Kids can get that treatment in lots of different ways and from lots of different people.

I have to agree with Kriston.

Primary care is very important to newborns and young children, but it has more to do with security, love and acceptance than it has to do with academic ability.

My PG child never had to attend day care and by choice did not attend pre-k or K, yet she is doing extremely well academically despite the fact that she started school at 6 1/2. I did not actively teach her at home. We read a lot, took lots of trips and did a lot of hiking when she was little. That was pretty much the exposure she had prior to school. Lots of Love, time and attention.

And by the way, Wren, if you were to meet my dd she would not appear to be PG to you. Socially she doesn't stand out as "different". She is able to play with children from different age groups and with varied interests.

Maybe it's gifted denial on the part of the parents--high caliber professionals may have high expectations, so they're not easily able to recognize "gifted" characteristics. Maybe their reference point is skewed. I think it's more likely that the childcare situation has made it so parents are unaware of gifts, rather than their working has failed to nurture their child to be gifted.

My first son was very verbal and classic encyclopedia of info about his topic of interest at any time. Everyone thought he was gifted--and he is HG/PG. The second son was virtually silent (my H confesses he thought there was delay with him), but he tested significantly higher than #1.

On the other hand, I know a number of kids who went to Montessori schools and were reading fairly well before Kindergarten. Some of them are GT, but many of them are not based on what they are doing in early elementary school. This is what I don't really like about the Ruf levels. It points to certain skills (that my child really wasn't showing in preschool), but doesn't really deal with the intensity or speed of learning. I could have never spent 2 hours reading a day with DS - he had way too much physical energy. But science experiments, exploring the library, going to the science museum, sure. At 7, he regularly sits and reads for 2 hours on his own.

So even if you are looking at a preschooler that doesn't read, write, or compose concertos, maybe they mastered legos years earlier than normal, memorized every species of dinosour, or can give their parents directions on every errand they run. Or maybe they are just intensely imaginative. Maybe they analyze plumbing systems. I think parents that aren't thinking about GT behaviors don't see GT behaviors. I don't think it just manifests itself in one way, especially in young kids. I didn't see them until DS went from not reading to being the best reader in his class over the course of a year and got some shockingly high test scores from the NNAT.

So suppose you have a PG child and that child is read to 2 hours a day from birth. Suppose you took that same child and put them in an environment where they were read to 30 minutes a day. The child when placed in the first environment is going to read faster than the if he is placed in the 2nd environment. Does that make the child less GT? It really depends on the education the child gets afterwards and what other learning opportunities the child is exposed to IMHO.

My child also doesn't scream HG+ by any means! He can blend well and kids of all ages.

Some abilities are not as visible to acquaintances as others. My DS is very strong in math but it really doesn't come up in everyday conversation. Occasionally he says something that amazes a cashier. I don't think friends of our family are aware of the extent of his abilities in that area at all.