Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment "Gifted" or just "Talented"?

Hello! I'm turning to the experts on this forum to help confirm if my child counts as "gifted" or simply very talented.

Public/private school admission is not an issue, as we homeschool, but I do need to negotiate with after-school academic program coordinators, and in a couple years, CLEP proctors and college admissions. I don't want to throw the word "gifted" around if my child does not in fact qualify, while I'm trying to lobby for early admission or skipping levels.

My 11 yo DD began reading at age 3, not exactly independently, but she identified the word "box" spontaneously all on her own, and so I took the cue and began her formal instruction. She completed 1st grade at age 4 and is currently chugging through freshman high school algebra and chemistry. Her 2 siblings study at a similar level or one year behind. I had her take the Stanford Binet in Sept and the Stanford + OLSAT in November. To be totally transparent, the SB was not independently proctored - I just bought the online version for her and sat her down at the computer.

Her SB gave her an overall IQ of 143: her 2 highest categories, "visual" and "knowledge", were 145, and her lowest category, "innate", was 125.

Her OLSAT gave her only a 119 SAI, in the 88th percentile. However, the Stanford academic portion was in the 95th percentile for the complete battery: Reading 98th, Math 96th, Language 95th, Spelling 83rd, Science 96th, Social 97th, Listening 96th, and Thinking Skills 99th percentile. She told me that she ran out of time on the OLSAT portion and could not get to all the questions, but the academic portion is of course untimed.

The Stanford+OLSAT rates her AAC (academic achievement score) as "high" because it considers that most kids with her OLSAT score would not have scored so high on the academic portion. Likewise, the Stanford Binet considers "innate" intelligence her lowest category, while her high categories are mental skills that are learned. So I'm questioning if my child is gifted, or if she is simply a very bright child who has been extremely motivated under a custom school program. I want to advocate for my child, but I don't want to claim she's more than she is.

I'd be very grateful for any feedback!

Welcome, Faylie!

As a general comment, I would be very very cautious about making any consequential decisions based on an online IQ test. These really cannot be compared to individualized administration of a gold standard instrument by a qualified professional. I would actually consider the OLSAT administration to be more likely to be a valid measure in some ways, since it was being used more similarly to how it was designed to be used. Granted, she ran out of time, so that would be a mark on the other side of the account. Bottom line, you do not currently have a good measure of her cognition, though I think we can reasonably place her above average.

That being said, as a homeschooling parent, it isn't really that important whether she is "truly" gifted or "just" academically advanced. Teach the child you have in front of you with whatever seems to feed her thirst for learning and growing as a whole human at that moment. As it happens, I am a qualified evaluator, yet we did not have any of our children formally evaluated for cognition (granted, I think I have had a pretty good idea of where they each fall, based on my clinical judgement), mainly because we could meet their needs in homeschooling merely by being alert to their development and following their leads.

With regard to afterschool programs, if you are addressing her core academics in homeschooling, afterschooling is merely supplementary, so I would probably focus on enrichment in areas of nonacademic interest. If she is in algebra I this year, you will probably be looking at college-level courses in about two to three years, depending on how quickly she goes through the next few courses, and also on whether you choose to homeschool precalculus and/or calculus at home or have her enroll in college courses. Most states have early college/dual enrollment programs of some kind at the community college or four-year state university level. Nearly all of them are open to high school juniors/sixteen-year-olds. If you have your DC reported to your local district as a grade eleven student by the time you are looking at dual enrollment, the CC or SU will most likely have to accept her, and will then place her based on their testing. They actually will not care at all about the gifted label.

Our experience: one of our children homeschooled high school, with the last year enrolled full-time in college courses, all of which transferred directly into the four-year university where they matriculated as a first-year college student with sophomore standing. Since the first college course was taken as a middle teen, the process was smooth and uneventful. Even if it had been earlier, the CC has a process for allowing youth learners (10th grade and below) to take courses. The net result after previous early entries and grade-skips was beginning a full college course load about two years young for grade (but nominally as a high school student).

Our homeschooling journey was relatively low-key, with months or years where the pace slowed to a crawl in some of the areas of strength, but with these always in response to developmental interests in other areas, led by our children. With a homeschooling philosophy that is about growing healthy, happy humans in the context of loving relationships, we didn't see a need for advocacy based on labels. By the time we reached college settings, it was more effective to present performance data (SATs, college placement tests, etc.) than measures of cognitive ability, and once there were any college credits on the transcript, it was only having prerequisite courses that mattered.

In other words, relax! Labels are helpful for advocacy in a traditional school setting, but not really important when homeschooling. Enjoy your lovely, bright child, and follow her lead.