Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment Correlation between early milestones and giftness?

After writing this, I realize my grandfather and uncle were not always textbook motivated to learn math/physics but was still intensely driven to gain knowledge with transistors, wires, and other electrical do-dads.

To clarify, my point is that many parents on gifted forums report experiencing schools which are focused on teaching lower-achieving students while gifted students are faced with benign neglect.

During the school day, gifted students may be socially isolated, expected to teach themselves, and/or pressed into service tutoring low achievers, rather than being grouped with intellectual peers at a similar level of readiness and ability and being taught with appropriate curriculum and pacing at their challenge level. The current thread on deliberate self-harm discusses some of the problems which can occur when a child is steeped in this type of toxic learning atmosphere.

Meanwhile, the subject of correlation between early milestones and giftedness seems closely related to this recent thread: 4yo needing constant input which describes the difficulty in keeping up with a child and how exhausted parents can become in supporting the natural pace of learning set by their gifted child(ren).

Cdfox, my mind's awhirl with your post, because it raises some very interesting points. My guess is that the learning style and interests(hands-on, VSL, creative, taking things apart) of these people were probably not recognized in the classroom with the focus on auditory-sequential learning in areas outside of their domain of strength. In fact, the very nature of how they learn was most likely viewed as a problem in the classroom and their spatial strengths regarded purely as a mechanical or practical aptitude. Maybe late blooming is really just late recognition once they are finally able to enter university.

As to how to remove the obstacles for your DS and other strong spatial learners, it seems like a systemic problem. Despite the growing focus on STEM, advocates are still in the stage of making a case for the importance of spatial skills and inclusion in selection criteria and assessments.

According to the Vanderbilt study listed below that shares your concern about how many spatially talented students are missed by talent searches, "70% of the top 1% in spatial ability did not make the cut for the top 1% on either the math or the verbal composite".
https://my.vanderbilt.edu/smpy/files/2013/02/Wai2009SpatialAbility1.pdf

Is there an opportunity to get help from someone experienced in gifted advocacy for your DYS situation? Perhaps someone such as Linda Silverman at GDC, who specializes in VSL research and understands learning challenges. My PG 2e science loving DS and I will be trudging up behind you and your DS in a few years, so please leave big footprints and a flashlight

http://giftedissues.davidsongifted.org/BB/ubbthreads.php/topics/162888/1.html

http://www.spatiallearning.org/

Thanks EmeraldCity. I'm trying. Really I am trying here to make heads and tails of the situation. It's not easy with these 2e kids and I'm finding that there aren't many road maps or guides here. Jake Barnett is seen as an anomaly, I think.

Most pg 2e kids are not featured or identified as easily as people like Terence Tao or Tanishq Abraham -- who displayed profoundly giftedness in infancy or around 2 years old. My son had global developmental delays and other issues so I had dismissed those examples because they didn't reflect my son's asynchronous development which was partly due to his special needs. One of the reasons Jake Barnett has garnered attention is due to the autism and due to him not reaching those early developmental milestones like Tao or Abraham or many pg kids either.

I contacted Dr. Linda Silverman a couple of years ago. I also saw her colleague Dr. Lovecky last June. She inadvertently muddied up my head a bit more, though, by saying she thought my son was more a mixed learner and not a true vsl which I had previously thought. Still, ds8 definitely has visual spatial strengths -- despite being born with visual deficits and been recently diagnosed with convergence insufficiency. And in fairness, Dr. Lovecky gave some sound, practical advice to follow before pursuing future assessments and testing.

I'm thinking about contacting Joanne Ruthsatz or someone like her. I contacted Ellen Winner at BC (who studies prodigies) after reading a NPR article and she responded to my e-mail, but that was it. Annoying. It's not like you can easily find these people to help.

Still, your points about learning style, environment and the focus within the classroom are very valid. VSL gifts are often neglected and underrepresented in g/t and other programs. That's very true. And schools are very much asl-focused and geared to those who are rule-based. That's one of the reasons why math, music, and chess prodigies have been studied so much -- 1) relatively easy to identify, 2) very asl and rule-based who are easy to study and research. They stand out. The same cannot be said for many vsls.

There's also always been less attention and credit given to informal and visual learning. Ian Stewart makes this case for math and how math should be much more visually based than it currently is but won't be because visual maths is seen as being less rigorous or intellectual as formal maths is. And while Benoit Mandelbrot may have shown interest in math in early childhood, he wasn't a math prodigy or a pg either -- yet he's the founder of fractal geometry!

Charles Darwin, too, didn't enjoy school or do well in it. Ditto for Edison, Roald Dahl, Bee Gees, somewhat the Beatles, and many, many others. We just tend to forget those who didn't play by the rules or be more sequential/orderly oriented.

Indigo - your points about the school, curriculum, and environment are accurate and relate to EmeraldCity's points and what we've previously experienced with ds8. But, of course, one of the problems is that most gifted schools do not cater and cannot/will not accommodate pg kids, especially if there's only one pg kid involved. In these situations, it can become, as you've aptly described, a toxic atmosphere.

Both of my kids are much higher with the perceptual reasoning index on the WISC than verbal. DD scored 153 with extended norms. DS appears to have a photographic memory (or something close to it)--how many 6 year olds know the exact shape of Idaho or any other state and can draw it from memory?
I'm not sure how it's going to play out in a gifted program where the focus will probably be on writing and reading. DS is very strong in math along with the visual-spatial skills, but he is quirky and 2e.

The pscyh who gave DD the WISC wrote a lot about visual spatial learners in the report with a lot of links and info for us and the school--but I doubt anyone from the school would actually check any of those references or try to tailor a program to her needs. DS's neuropsych also said something in his report about the high perceptual reasoning score and how he may struggle in a traditional school setting. Right now he is doing ok--he is about 2.5 years ahead or grade level in reading and 3 in math--but the gap will probably close at some point for reading.

Exactly. A lot of so-called "late bloomers" are actually "early bloomers" who are recognized late.



I think the Jake Barnett case is something quite different from what you describe. Instead, he did display profound giftedness at a very young age, but the professionals, incompetently, did not understand what they were looking at, and so they incorrectly diagnosed autism when there was no autism.

Cdfox, your DS is lucky to have such a strong advocate. I will PM you with the name of someone who I hope can help.

You're right about the gifted schools. So many seem to prefer high-achieving gifties within a certain range of abilities without any of the more challenging characteristics.

The question then becomes what to do for the outliers of the outliers?

Hi everyone - this is just a reminder to please keep this thread on topic, in regards to Marnie's original post.

Thank you!

Mark

From my experience as a parent of much older kids. (Mine are 19 & 14, and I've known many other kids their age.) There are some toddlers that are just obviously gifted. They read incredibly early, or pick up an instrument, or show amazing mathematical ability. And others that don't really bloom and show until they are 7 or 8. Kids are all different and it's very hard to test preschool age kids for giftedness.

For example my son was one of those obviously gifted at 3, while one of my BF's girls wasn't interested and didn't really read well until the beginning of 2nd grade and then she just bloomed.