Gifted forum- offensive? One upmanship?

morah

Thu, Dec 16 2010, 6:28 pm

Didn't read the whole thread, but here's my take:

If we are talking about truly gifted, then no, it's not offensive. A truly gifted child is not simply "MY child is the MOST talented, the smartest, etc" with all the superlatives that every parent thinks about their own kid. There are kids who are so highly, off the charts intelligent, and it is not necessarily a bed of roses or all easy. It comes with certain unique issues and struggles, and, believe it or not, highly gifted children are often learning disabled in some way.

Not to brag, but I am really smart. I graduated top of my class; straight-A student, near-perfect SAT, got into 2 Ivys (went to Stern, that's another story), straight As through college, and I'm in a top tier grad program now. But I'm not gifted. I'm just really intelligent coupled with a good work ethic, and that combo has served me well in life. It doesn't hurt that I'm very well-read.

My husband is gifted. And trust me, there's a difference. His genius is readily apparent, but he has always struggled with school. He's not a good student and has to work hard not at grasping concepts taught, but at organizing, studying, taking tests, etc. He had social problems as a kid because he was so above and beyond the league of the other kids his age. It took hard work to get over it, and there are still things he struggles with today. he is very talented at a range of intellectual pursuits, some mathematical and scientific, others more creative or humanities-based. It is a tremendous bracha, but not an easy one. I can understand why parents of children like this might want a place to talk about the very real issues that come up with gifted-ness, amongst people who understand what it really means and who get that it's more than just being a lot smarter than the other kids.

Fox

Thu, Dec 16 2010, 10:28 pm

I've read through this thread, including the recitations of SAT scores, etc., and I think people are really missing the boat. I can't find anything that has been brought up that is a problem unique to "gifted" kids. Gifted kids need the same support that every kid needs -- just for different reasons.

]Need for Individualized Instruction
I was fortunate enough to attend a university laboratory school in the 1960s and early 1970s. Most of us were the children of professors, and we ranged from normal to true genius. No one was identified in any way, however. We were grouped into classrooms made up of students in three grades, and we worked at our own pace on programmed instructional materials. When the teacher needed to present a particular lesson, he/she would simply call up those students working at that level to the front. There were kids doing remedial work as well as kids doing work at the college level. Oh, and the mantra that was constantly repeated was, "Big 'uns help little 'uns." Students who had mastered a particular skill were expected (and graded!) on helping "teach" the skill to others. Of course, the best way to learn something is to teach it, so it was a very clever and sneaky way to make sure we really knew what we had studied!

It completely flummoxes me why Jewish schools don't avail themselves of the many psychometric-based programs that teach basic skills as well as advanced subjects, particularly for Limudei Chol. Granted, much of the software is expensive, but it is amazingly cost effective. Some subjects, too, are easier to teach in this way than others, but the notion that every child has to be precisely on the same level is insane!

So I can completely understand a thread on how to get schools to adopt more individualized instruction; ways to provide such instruction for kids who need it, etc. -- but it is certainly not limited to gifted kids or their parents.

Problems are Problems
I see a lot of posters commenting on problems that are common to gifted children, but I don't see that the giftedness or lack thereof is really the point. For example, many gifted children have difficulty socializing successfully with their peers. This can be because they communicate in a more adult manner; it can be because their interests differ; it can be because they are shy; it can be because they are simply happy to spend free time reading, etc. And, yes, it's necessary to know a bit of background about a child's overall functioning. But a child who has difficulty socializing is . . . a child who has difficulty socializing. Knowing that someone is or isn't "gifted" makes very little difference in the kinds of suggestions that might be made.

A child who has difficulty socializing because he/she is immature may need coaching on how to approach peers and develop relationship successfully. A gifted child who has difficulty socializing . . . may need coaching on how to approach peers and develop relationships successfully.

Gifted Is as Gifted Does
Another positive attitude I attribute to my experiences at the lab school was the idea that everyone is "gifted" in some way. There are very, very few people who are good at everything. Most of us, though, have skills, abilities, or talents that are significantly above average. As other posters have pointed out, these are "gifts" are not always associated with schoolwork, and it is sometimes difficulty to identify them in children.

For example, I have a teenage DD who is without question a brilliant entrepreneur. She could market sand in Saudi Arabia and make a killing doing it. She has at least three small businesses going, and she comes very close to earning an adult-level parnosseh. Luckily, for me, since I'm always borrowing money from her. She's also very interested in history and sociology, etc. But school is not her thing! So she's doing high school online in between fielding phone calls from real estate agents and business brokers and a bunch of manufacturers in China. She can't convert fractions to decimals or spell her way out of a paper bag, but she can calculate the tariff on a half-load of shirts and discuss the minutiae of NAFTA regulations when manufacturing in a Mexican border town.

So is my DD gifted? Well, I guess it depends on whether you want to borrow money from her or not! But her particular "gift" doesn't make her unique. It just means that while certain of her problems come from a different place than those of, say, a learning-disabled teenager -- the solutions and issues are really the same.

Not That I'm Bragging, But . . .
Take a lesson from the British: a lot of nasty, mean comments will be avoided in general forums if people add a dollop of self-deprecation to their posts. It's usually not necessary to say how gifted your child is. It doesn't really matter if he's tremendously gifted; pretty gifted; somewhat gifted; gifted on Tuesday and Thursdays; gifted but can't remember to bathe . . . the list goes on. Just tell the relevant facts and move on to the main point:

Quote:

Chaim memorizes things easily, so school is very easy right now for him. He gets bored and starts misbehaving. Anyone have ideas on what we (parents or rebbe) can do?

Quote:

Shayna Maidel is an excellent reader. In fact, I caught her reading the WSJ the other day! Who knows? Maybe she's into hedge funds behind my back! Making friends, though -- there she could use some work! Any suggestions on how to get my little bookworm to develop her social skills in addition to her love of reading?

Quote:

Yankel is bright and inquisitive, but he has a teacher this year who believes that kids should be very quiet and docile. That's not Yankel! I don't want him to lose his curiosity, because I can see that he learns a lot that way, but I don't want a miserable year. How can I work with this teacher to get her to allow a little more elbow room for someone like Yankel?

Keep the focus off the fabulousness of your child, and people will usually be nice. Being "gifted" is not a pizza -- if I serve my family too many slices, you're left with none. All our kids can have "gifts." Our job -- and a much harder one it is -- is to be able to recognize them and encourage them!

Seraph

Thu, Dec 16 2010, 10:55 pm

WriterMom wrote:

Just to jump on the grade-skipping tangent - my husband's brother, who is freakily brilliant but socially beyond inept, skipped a grade of school, and it was not a good thing. My husband is therefore adamantly against skipping a grade for our kids. I'm trying to discuss with him the fact that one data point does not a trend make, but he gets an equal vote, and he's very against. The child in question is the tallest in his class, somewhat athletic, and comfortable around older kids, so I'm not convinced skipping one year would be problematic at all.

There is a girl in his class, though, whom I just love because she's brilliant and a sweetie, but she skipped a year and so far (early yet) it looks like this might be a problem. This is the first year since the skip, and she still spends lots of recesses crying because she doesn't have anyone to play with. She's extremely intelligent and more than capable of the academic work, but she's tiny for her age, somewhat immature, and has a lot of trouble relating to kids in her new grade. She doesn't want to play with the kids in her old grade because she's very conscious of being skipped (also a sign of immaturity, perhaps.)

So this is an example of how an extremely bright child (whether or not "gifted") can be a challenge. I hate the thought of a child being bored by curriculum too elementary, and failing to realise his or her potential. Yet a child who's challenged by the curriculum while crying every day at school is also not the solution. Keeping a child in their age-appropriate grade and supplementing with tutoring is expensive and time consuming, and not feasible for many.

Can I just add that I was like that? I skipped 5th grade, and I remember many many many many many times in sixth grade and on that I was called so many names, baby being the most frequent. And I spent many recesses and lunch breaks crying. Oh, and the fact that everyone in the class had a bat mitzva one year and I had it a year later caused problems for me also...
And this is with having been one of the older ones in my original class. (My birthday is in february, there were 4 girls in my class of 20 older than me.)

HindaRochel

Fri, Dec 17 2010, 12:56 am

Fox wrote:

Quote:

Chaim memorizes things easily, so school is very easy right now for him. He gets bored and starts misbehaving. Anyone have ideas on what we (parents or rebbe) can do?

Quote:

And I would make certain that my kid hears me praise OTHER children as well, also, as Marina pointed out, praise action not the gift. Not, you are so smart, but "that took a lot of thinking...Kol hakovod for working so hard on it..."

Ruchel

Fri, Dec 17 2010, 6:33 am

I skipped a grade. My dad skipped several grades (not on purpose, basically his studies were interrupted by the war and he started again after as if he had gone to school all these years). My dh skipped a grade (though only in kodesh, I think they didn't "believe" in chol skipping in his school). Some of my other relatives would have benefitted greatly from it...

I loved it, though I had to catch up on maths and never learned my multiplication tables.

I was still the tallest (of all, later only of girls), still the first student in many courses, still bored but less.

If I didn't skip, I would have been so bored I would have left school at 16, as I already considered with a skipped grade. I also davka was MORE comfy with older kids. Meaning, my best friends in the class were either "gifted" kids who didn't skip a grade, or intelligent but non working kids one or two years late.

I had no problem keeping my friends one grade below, or befriending even older kids if they were up to it. I also loved adult company. The teachers, the supervisors, the plain clothes cop in the "problem" area, they were all more interesting than many of my classmates. I never thought it was a problem, neither did the adults around me.

IYH my dd will stay at a level allowing to skip Smile

especially for a frum girl, skipping is a blessing in case you become pregnant as a student. If not, you can still take it cool, choose carefully, even take a sabbatical year to unwind after graduation or learn something "stam".

amother

Fri, Dec 17 2010, 6:54 am

Fox wrote:

]Need for Individualized Instruction
I was fortunate enough to attend a university laboratory school in the 1960s and early 1970s. Most of us were the children of professors, and we ranged from normal to true genius. No one was identified in any way, however. We were grouped into classrooms made up of students in three grades, and we worked at our own pace on programmed instructional materials. When the teacher needed to present a particular lesson, he/she would simply call up those students working at that level to the front. There were kids doing remedial work as well as kids doing work at the college level. Oh, and the mantra that was constantly repeated was, "Big 'uns help little 'uns." Students who had mastered a particular skill were expected (and graded!) on helping "teach" the skill to others. Of course, the best way to learn something is to teach it, so it was a very clever and sneaky way to make sure we really knew what we had studied!

It completely flummoxes me why Jewish schools don't avail themselves of the many psychometric-based programs that teach basic skills as well as advanced subjects, particularly for Limudei Chol. Granted, much of the software is expensive, but it is amazingly cost effective. Some subjects, too, are easier to teach in this way than others, but the notion that every child has to be precisely on the same level is insane!

So I can completely understand a thread on how to get schools to adopt more individualized instruction; ways to provide such instruction for kids who need it, etc. -- but it is certainly not limited to gifted kids or their parents.

Problems are Problems
I see a lot of posters commenting on problems that are common to gifted children, but I don't see that the giftedness or lack thereof is really the point. For example, many gifted children have difficulty socializing successfully with their peers. This can be because they communicate in a more adult manner; it can be because their interests differ; it can be because they are shy; it can be because they are simply happy to spend free time reading, etc. And, yes, it's necessary to know a bit of background about a child's overall functioning. But a child who has difficulty socializing is . . . a child who has difficulty socializing. Knowing that someone is or isn't "gifted" makes very little difference in the kinds of suggestions that might be made.

A child who has difficulty socializing because he/she is immature may need coaching on how to approach peers and develop relationship successfully. A gifted child who has difficulty socializing . . . may need coaching on how to approach peers and develop relationships successfully.

Gifted Is as Gifted Does
Another positive attitude I attribute to my experiences at the lab school was the idea that everyone is "gifted" in some way. There are very, very few people who are good at everything. Most of us, though, have skills, abilities, or talents that are significantly above average. As other posters have pointed out, these are "gifts" are not always associated with schoolwork, and it is sometimes difficulty to identify them in children.

For example, I have a teenage DD who is without question a brilliant entrepreneur. She could market sand in Saudi Arabia and make a killing doing it. She has at least three small businesses going, and she comes very close to earning an adult-level parnosseh. Luckily, for me, since I'm always borrowing money from her. She's also very interested in history and sociology, etc. But school is not her thing! So she's doing high school online in between fielding phone calls from real estate agents and business brokers and a bunch of manufacturers in China. She can't convert fractions to decimals or spell her way out of a paper bag, but she can calculate the tariff on a half-load of shirts and discuss the minutiae of NAFTA regulations when manufacturing in a Mexican border town.

So is my DD gifted? Well, I guess it depends on whether you want to borrow money from her or not! But her particular "gift" doesn't make her unique. It just means that while certain of her problems come from a different place than those of, say, a learning-disabled teenager -- the solutions and issues are really the same.

Not That I'm Bragging, But . . .
Take a lesson from the British: a lot of nasty, mean comments will be avoided in general forums if people add a dollop of self-deprecation to their posts. It's usually not necessary to say how gifted your child is. It doesn't really matter if he's tremendously gifted; pretty gifted; somewhat gifted; gifted on Tuesday and Thursdays; gifted but can't remember to bathe . . . the list goes on. Just tell the relevant facts and move on to the main point:

Quote:

Chaim memorizes things easily, so school is very easy right now for him. He gets bored and starts misbehaving. Anyone have ideas on what we (parents or rebbe) can do?

Quote:

OP from original thread.

Fox, I think that school system you mentioned is fantastic. I wish more schools would follow this model. About the self deprecation thing, I agree but I'm just wondering something. Am I simply weird that I dont get offended when people praise their children to the skies? I am asking sincerely, not with sarcasm.

When people tell me about their children's accomplishments I am happy for them, not jealous or feeling they are bragging.

What I would find offensive would be if they compared their child to someone else's or to the child's sibling in a negative way. For example: "I wish my Shmueli was as smart as his brother Yankel. Too bad." That I would find deeply offensive.

To reiterate: intelligence is a gift from Hashem and has nothing to do with bechira. All is in the hands of Hashem except bechira. We can only say how good a person is by their choices in life, not by how smart they are or how talented they are. And even then it's hard to judge because we don't know their struggles.

You can be a complete baki in gemara and still be a rasha.

Fox

Fri, Dec 17 2010, 7:27 am

amother wrote:

Am I simply weird that I dont get offended when people praise their children to the skies? I am asking sincerely, not with sarcasm.

When people tell me about their children's accomplishments I am happy for them, not jealous or feeling they are bragging.

You're not weird; you're gifted!

Well, I actually don't know that for a fact -- you could have simply spent years working on yourself to reach a madrega where you don't feel threatened by others' success.

But whether your attitude represents a result of spiritual work or is simply a "gift," it's a level that many of us have trouble reaching. Some people, like you and my DH, are genuinely thrilled for other people's good fortune, whether it comes in the form of exceptional children, ample parnosseh, good looks, popularity, success in school or learning, or whatever. My DH is truly perplexed by all the halachas and musar that focus on jealousy; why would someone be jealous? He just doesn't understand!

Some of us are mature enough to know we should be unreservedly happy for others, so we put on a good show, but we still feel a little niggling envy or jealousy. Others of us have ups and downs -- we try hard not to feel jealous of others, but we find ourselves becoming cynical at times. And some of us were clearly standing in another line when Hashem handed out the midda of feeling a friend's simcha.

Oh, and even the most spiritually mature among us can be hit with a nisoyon that causes our otherwise lethargic jealousy "snakes" to rear their heads. I don't think there is a soul here who would condemn a women experiencing IF who finds it painful to be around her friends' new babies.

I have to admit that I am very jealous of people who don't feel jealousy or envy . . . oh, wait a minute: No, I am completely happy for them! Anyway, yasher koach on this midda -- your kids' real "gift" is having a mom who sees the world this way.

amother

Sat, Dec 18 2010, 3:49 pm

Fox wrote:

amother wrote:

OP from original thread again:

Thanks for the warm words Fox. They mean a lot.

Grandmama

Sat, Dec 18 2010, 4:04 pm

Seraph wrote:

Just humor me-
Do you find the concept of a gifted forum offensive?
Do you find the concept of giftedness offensive?
Do you think the gifted label to be about one upmanship?

Thank you for starting this thread.
Based on the following, I am happy I researched this, so now I know for sure that we are all "gifted".

Characteristics of Gifted Adults

perfectionistic and sets high standards for self and others
has strong moral convictions
is highly sensitive, perceptive or insightful
fascinated by words or an avid reader
feels out-of-sync with others
is very curious
has an unusual sense of humour
a good problem solver
has a vivid and rich imagination
questions rules or authority
has unusual ideas or connects seemingly unrelated ideas
thrives on challenge
learns new things rapidly
has a good long-term memory
feels overwhelmed by many interests and abilities
is very compassionate
feels outrage at moral breaches that the rest of the world seems to take for granted
has passionate, intense feelings
has a great deal of energy
can't switch off thinking
feels driven by creativity
loves ideas and ardent discussion
needs periods of contemplation
searches for ???? in their life
feels a sense of alienation and loneliness
is very perceptive
feels out of step with others

Please don't expect to have all of these to be a gifted adult.

As it says above, you don't have to have all of these, just most of them, which I can certainly identify with. Therefore, I feel much better about myself and everyone around me. Thanks!

HindaRochel

Sat, Dec 18 2010, 8:39 pm

Grandmama wrote:

Seraph wrote:

Just humor me-
Do you find the concept of a gifted forum offensive?
Do you find the concept of giftedness offensive?
Do you think the gifted label to be about one upmanship?

All children are gifted, the role of the parent is to help the child to uncover their own gifts. The most important gift is the one of giving to others.