Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Is my 15-month-old gifted?

My DD was reasonable beyond her years and well-behaved 99% of the time and then she turned 3.

Welcome to the forum.

OK we are still told crawling is essential here (NZ) but you are more knowledgeable. Climbing ladders and scooting etc do the same thing with cross body stuff but crawling through tunnels is fun. I guess I never questions the experts stance on crawling because both my kids did so it was never a concern to me.

If your kid is a read at 3 type you won't need 3 years. If he is like mine you will probably still be asking the same questions at 5 or 6. At that point I just got him tested.

Eta. Research time. I have a friend whose foster child is a bottom shuffler.

Sounds like my DS at that age...good at puzzles, fascination with buckles...as an infant he would examine the mechanisms and snap/unsnap repeatedly. If he saw someone else's carseat he would make a beeline for it so he could examine the buckles. Loved those wooden high chairs in restaurants, the straps kept him entertained. He loved the Tupperware shape sorter thing that looks like a ball that splits in half and did it like it was no big deal at around your DS's age. He was quiet and laid back and fascinated by figuring out his toys and everything in the house.
He also crawled at 8 months, walked at 10 months...but for what it's worth he is now behind in terms of motor development and is diagnosed with "developmental coordination disorder" with a "physically impaired" IEP with the school system. So what I'm trying to say is that for us, looking at motor milestones meant absolutely nothing in terms of predicting the future. I started to get worried about motor delays when he was 2 and not making progress. Up until then everything seemed normal. He is doing better now at age 7 but has been in and out of therapies since age 4.
Your DS could be gifted but it's really hard to say looking at a one year old, since they develop so differently and at different rates. The kids who looked more advanced than my DS as a toddler now are behind him in terms of certain things. DD (now 8) looked perfectly average until she was around 2 and her speech exploded.

The kids who looked more advanced than my DS as a toddler now are behind him in terms of certain things.

This.

DD15 really didn't seem THAT extraordinary to us at the time. I mean, sure-- she seemed "bright" but not like a prodigy or anything. Sure, she knew letters and numbers, etc. but we don't really know just HOW young she knew all of that stuff, never mind to what extent. It never occurred to us that: a) it might be odd (family is mostly HG+ people on both sides), or b) worth exploring or noting. She didn't learn to read early, (well, okay-- not relative to the crowd here, anyway) and she wasn't really "self-taught" with any major academic skills as a toddler or anything.

She's never really had a fascination with puzzles or mechanical things, per se.

They are really all different.

It wasn't until DD learned to read (at nearly 5) that we realized what we might be dealing with. It was the rate of progression over an impossibly short period of time that made it obvious at that point. Within a month or two, and with no further instruction, she was zooming through about 3rd-5th grade materials.

Looking back at that point, we realized that she has always been that way, developmentally-- nothing-nothing-nothing, BANG-- mastery. Like, real "mastery." Adult-level mastery. Nothing tentative or mistake-prone or fumbling about it. I can probably count on one hand the number of spills she took when "learning" to walk. I use quotes there because she has always seemed to be a kid that thought it over for a bit, then let things "gel" and then demonstrated complete mastery of the skill/activity. We call this "quantum learning" because it isn't really a process so much as a binary state-- ground state (not mastery) and the next energy state (mastery). The "how" of it is just as unclear as excitation via photon/electron, basically-- something just has to "match up" right, and it happens. How my DD learns things is still a completely black box to me-- it often feels like inputs are being poured in with no external indication of it (and past the point at which it feels weird, even), and then this transition happens with the speed of an explosion, almost like a cartoon. Hard thing to explain. In talking with an educator with a PhD in gifted studies, this is apparently one of those indicators that is SO telling that many educators have never actually SEEN it in a child-- because it is often the domain of very high levels of giftedness.

That and her awareness of others-- she's always had that, too. She could unerringly tell me what ANY other person was thinking/feeling emotionally by the time she was two. Like an empath-- she just reads microexpressions and body language that well. I've never known another person who could do what she does there-- she's like a human polygraph.

DD has never been tested, but is clearly functionally PG. The only other family member that she is similar to was well into PG range. This would not have been clear and obvious to anyone observing her for "tells" at 15-24 months, however. The things that I see now, with the benefit of hindsight?

* sense of humor-- she had a slyness about her and a WICKED sense of humor-- she enjoyed things that most children don't "get" until they are well into elementary school, such as puns, etc. She clearly had complete theory-of-mind at an age that it should simply not be possible.

* observant and prolific memory for details

* CAREFUL-- this was most evident with fine-motor examination of things like eyelashes, earrings, etc.

* understanding of human psychology, social conventions/structures and motivation that has always seemed "old" in every way-- and compassionate/understanding and kind. She was a child that had the ability to make others question a skepticism about reincarnation, honestly. I finally understand the Dalai Lama thing now; there are really children who are born that way. I had no idea.

* she seemed to intuitively understand cause and effect-- and this informed EVERYTHING she did-- she understood that standing up meant sitting down, that dropping a bowl of food meant that it would be gone, and that objects had permanence.

Probably the best guess of a 15 month old's IQ is the parents' IQ.

I'm quoting these because they express well how my DS2.8 operates.

He is one of the children who showed a lot of early cognitive milestones spontaneously, and later growth has just confirmed that those early events weren't flukes. At 15 months, it wasn't evident that those milestones were imminent, they just had to happen spontaneously with time.

One thing I'll add to the list is an early ability to be reasoned with, and to negotiate in turn. I don't think DS has ever truly had more than a handful of tantrums because he's always been able to process the rational arguments presented to him and, from about 16-18 months onward, he had sufficient vocabulary to rebut and make simple, logical counter-arguments.

Long ago, I read an article about making of the music video Scream. :hides in shame: Anyway, the choreographer commented that Janet Jackson learned conventionally, one step at a time with instruction whereas her brother watched and watched until he could do it and he was perfect the first time. I remember thinking, well, that's the difference between ordinary performer (Janet) and gifted performer (MJ).

DD does not function like a gifted performer in most areas. She seems to have talent in a few area but outside those areas, she doesn't go from zero to mastery. Her father went from not being able to hold a pencil to being able to draw a person with 10 fingers and toes. DD(newly)4 started drawing around 10 months and now finally, her figures have hands with fingers but SO says her drawings have more details and have much better artistic quality overall compared to his at the same age. I have done a lot to expose her to art and have created an environment at home in which developing visual art skills is not exactly optional so nurture can make a different, I suppose.

What made me suspect DD is different when she was much younger were her problem solving skills and the joy she finds in numbers, among other things but I simply thought those were her strengths just like everyone else has their own strengths.

It is funny though my one who has tested PG was easier to reason with at 2 than he is at 7 and learnt stuff through sheer persistance. My younger who tests lower does that watch then do thing and will never actually admit to being wrong so can't be reasoned with - I have always put this down to perfectionism.

You said "negotiate" and it's funny... less than a week ago we were putting my son to bed, and our routine naturally includes reading a few books right before we nurse. He gets to pick the books, so often we tell him, "Okay, just one more." Well, we had read 3 books that night and we were telling him, "Okay, time to go to bed." He looked me in the eye and held up one finger, shaking his little hand for emphasis. Well, we just had to acquiesce!

@Mana - Your comment made me laugh because that's so like my daughter. It was like a switch was flipped shortly after she turned three and we had our first ever screaming reaction to something. It totally shocked me. She still is a very mature three, but she's three for a fact. Ha.

To the OP: My question is this.. why does it matter? At such a young age, there really is no reason to know for sure. With every young child you just want to keep introducing them to the world around them. It sounds like you're giving your child plenty of opportunities to grow but I wouldn't bust out the workbooks or anything. By the time my daughter was 18 months or so I really began to get suspicious about her being gifted (I was tested as gifted as a child myself) but I feel like I 'knew' by the time she was two. She is about three and a half now and hasn't been tested but if she tested and wasn't gifted I'd be pretty shocked. Not only is she ahead in academics (around a K-1st level on most things) but she has so many of the common emotional gifted characteristics as well.

I am not personally going to test her unless a need arises for school reasons or whatever reason she might need that label. I just do my best to try and keep up with her super active little mind and keep her enriched.