Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums General Discussion Organizationally Challenged

I've read that many gifted people have difficulty with organization. DS7 has great difficulty with it, and I've always chalked it up to him being just like me. As mine always was, his desk at school is the messiest in class. He seems oblivious to the mess (will just walk over it in his playroom) and frequently forgets to bring things home from school, turn in his homework on time, etc.... Of course, if it's something he's interested in, he NEVER forgets. LOL

So, my question is whether this issue with organization is common to those who are gifted, or if it frequently represents other issues like ADHD?

Any experiences with this?

Thanks for your thoughts.
~S from MD

I liken DS to an "absent-minded" professor type... Typically forgetting things left and right. One week, DS left a lunchbox at school 3 days in a row so on the 4th day, took lunch in a paper sack and brought home 3 lunchboxes (I save the ones from previous years if they are in reasonable condition). DS forgets jackets, gloves, etc. Has the messiest desk at school, etc. Yes, if its something DS (just turned 8) is into, will typically remember.

Just to throw things off, DD5 remembers almost everything. DD's stuff and my stuff and DS and DHs! Excellent working memory for things...

A family friend of ours had the same issue with their DS20 who is away at Duke. Now that he is on his own, things have improved dramatically.

Could be a thing with boys and/or enabling Moms (come on, I have 3back-up lunchboxes)!

The issues are a bit different with our DS since he is still only 4:6. But there is certainly something in the area. Namely, he is often off - and I mean *way* off - in his own world. The teachers at school have mentioned it in an increasingly exasperated way. At our parent-teacher meeting in November they said that every day at recess when it is time to go in precisely 12 of the 13 kids are properly lined up and ready. Invariably it is DS who is off wandering somewhere. One day they spent half an hour combing the school and playground for him before someone finally found him happily hidden inside an enormous truck tire singing to himself and "letting" his hands talk to one another. I don't know if this is an organizational challenge, but it seems to be in the area. As with your DS's, though, when he is focused on something he can be laser-sharp. Do you both find the spaciness trait as well as the organizational challenge? It's too early for us to have much evidence of the second.

I am worried that the teacher is starting to think our DS has ADHD. She made some rather cryptic suggestion about that the other day. I think I've read here or elsewhere that this is a common mis-diagnosis for gifted kids (especially gifted boys?), but I don't have any memory where I saw that. Do you have a link, S from MD?

BB

LOL, I am amazed at all the backups. You must know your child well. : )

Our DS is 4.5 and is similarly spacey, off in his own world, and forgetful as well. He is very inconsistent though as he will often wake up in the morning and tell us what day it is, whose birthday it is, etc. He reminds me of everything and has and excellent memory. But he will lose and forget things, which I am fairly sure is part of his age. No one has ever mentioned ADHD with him yet, although I have thought that they would as he can be very engergetic and hyper at times. He does not at all have ADHD and I know that only because of my background in that area..but still I could see how gifted children could be misdiagnosed. DS is constantly moving and constantly thinking. I have found that days he is more mentally stimulated he is less physically active though. When I see him getting really antsy I can give him some sort of challenge and suddenly his back on task. But he falls off of his chair almost every day (this is seriously not an exageration) because he can't just sit and eat a meal...he has to do a million things and talk, etc. But if he is really into something using his brain he is much better at sitting (but still falls some). And I have also noticed that when he is spacey it is often because he is thinking of something, doing math equations in his head, listening to something else going on intently (like a tv in the background or a conversation, or music).

DS has always had a hard time paying attention to things that do not interest him. And, frankly, where a lunchbox is just isn't very interesting.

We have lost tons of stuff including a brand new $80 coat. Now DS wears only a sweatshirt because we are not buying him another coat. We gave him the option of going to a second-hand store so he could buy a replacement with his own money, but he decided to just be cold. This has been a painful lesson, but one I think he is learning, very gradually.

I will say that his organization has gotten much better with puberty. I believe that the exectutive function portion of the brain does go through a spurt around 12-13. So we are optimisitic. OTOH, DH does have ADD which was not diagnosed until adulthood. DS has not been diagnosed or treated for ADD, but we still keep the possibility on our radar.

I don't think GT kids are necessarily organizationally challenged. DS7 seems to have it pretty well in hand, considering he's only 7. I'm sure some kids are really bad, but I doubt the numbers are any worse than those for the general population. Just my sense from seeing GT kids...

My guess is that the problem is that many people expect GT kids to be better at it than they are. Something of the "If you're so smart, why can't you remember your lunchbox" kind of thinking. But 8yos often forget their lunchboxes. <shrug>

I guess I'm saying that I'd tend to blame it on asynchronous development. But I have no specific evidence for that. I may be way off...

Addendum: I'm re-reading this later and I want to be clear that I definitely think some GT kids are lousy about organization. I don't mean to sound like I think they're not. I just mean that there are some ND kids who are disorganized messes, too. I don't think GT kids are necessarily any worse or any better about this because of their GTness.

Certainly GT kids are not necessarily organizationally challenged. I have not data, but I do think that at least some, though, do have (or appear to have) significant problems in this are. DS has organizational issues and all his teachers say that he is the last kid into the class and the last one out because he can't remember what he needs and his stuff isn't organized.

But as I watch DS13, I am struck by how much more he has to organize than an ND child. Initially, this was because of his own brain; he was interested in so many more things than other kids--everything that was happening in the classroom was of interest (what was on the board, the books on the shelf, the extra material in the text), so the details of what to take on the bus just never made it onto his radar until he was already on the bus and had time to reflect. Because of his curiosity, he had to organize more material than other kids.

Now, the fact that he is HG forces him to take on more organizational challenge. He goes to more different classes than other kids his age. He signs up for all sorts of extra activities and the teachers give him extra projects. Since his schedule is unique, his teachers can't use the same systems for coaching him that they use with the other kids. So he has more to organanize than other kids and less help getting it organized.

The bottom line for us is that his executive functioning is average, but he has to run a lot more stuff through that part of his brain and sometimes he just can't keep up. This leads to organizational problems. I am sure he isn't the only gifted kid who has this problem.

I do agree that I don't think GT kids are worse than kids that are not identified as GT. Kids will be kids, but I do think that it is more noticeable at times. Almost daily when I see my son do something stupid I have a thought in my head that goes a little something like this "why in the world would you ever do something like that? Oh yeah, you are 4 that's why"

Yup, acs. I hope my addendum clarifies what I meant. I totally believe your DS has greater problems with organization than most kids, and I didn't mean to suggest he (or anyone) didn't. I just meant that I don't think GTness guarantees organizational problems, as Mama22Gs was asking about.

Sorry. It may be an early bedtime for me tonight. I'm not saying what I mean very well today...