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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

AIBU to think if this many children round here are gifted we're a f***ing statistical anomaly?

75 replies

philbee · 28/12/2011 19:06

Gah! Am just fed up of people telling me in a hush hush way that their preschooler is massively intelligent and probably or definitely gifted. 'Such a concern for us to find the right environment in which to nurture their incredible skills.' AIBU for suspecting that we aren't on the dawn of a big-brained new era, and they are just delusional and loved up?

OP posts:

MrsMuddyPuddles · 29/12/2011 00:10

PMSL about that poor cat :o
It's interesting to see the different definitions of "gifted", btw ranging from "must be doing the impossible by puberty" to "top 10%" to "my child, naturally "... but I could just be bitter because I'm one of those labelled G&T who only learned how to coast through life with it and regrets not applying herself at Uni.

themightyfandango · 29/12/2011 00:33

Ime doing well at school rarely has anything to do with raw genius. It's more a steady aptitude and a good memory. Many people who are clever also have poor memories (my dh is one) which tends to lead to poor exam performance. The most sucessful people in life are not always those who did well at school.

exoticfruits · 29/12/2011 08:37

There was Sufiah Yusof who won a maths place at Oxford at 13yrs and was later found working as a prostitute, she had run away from Oxford, aged 15, claiming that her family had put her under intolerable pressure to succeed.

exoticfruits · 29/12/2011 08:49

I think that it is insecure parenting-somehow the fact that your DC is brighter than the norm means that it is down to brilliant parenting skills.

Lizcat · 29/12/2011 08:55

The latest thing around here is profoundly gifted - whatever that might mean .

DedalusDigglesPocketWatch · 29/12/2011 09:05

I think it is hard to look at your child from an outside perspective iyswin?

DD is quite bright, doesn't miss a thing and amazes me at how quickly she picks things up. But, her being my first, I couldn't tell you if she is genuinely a bright child or just that I am just very impressed with how children learn in general. Obviously your child is going to look brighter than her peers if you read and converse with her and the others don't have that. But that is not G&T that is opportunity surely?

I wonder how many second and subsequent children are labelled G&T by their parents? :o

ledkr · 29/12/2011 09:05

I am 44 and was put in got my english o level at 12 as i was g and t. I failed and at 13 too.I took it at the normal time and got a d.I was obviously misdiagnosed

My dd repeatedly gets "not achieving as expected" on her school report but the school seem happier to provide private lessons for the so called g and t kids. I have queried this and been fobbed off.

KittyFane · 29/12/2011 09:05

Perfectly possible to be G+T in a specific area (maths, music etc)
but to label as G+T all round is a bit .

Dh was a fucking academic genius at school and university but can he play a musical instrument, draw, paint, change a bloody lightbulb? No he can't.

Can't be good at everything.

ledkr · 29/12/2011 09:09

Oh and my baby has been clearly saying her sisters name since she was 6 months and can sign for milk,more,eat and drink at 11months.She also crawls towards the phone when it rings shouting hiya! Gifted? No just very funny

Hollyfoot · 29/12/2011 09:12

My DD, who is now at Uni, got a bit worse for wear the other night and lost one shoe. She came home wearing the other party shoe and a plimsoll she had found.

Now that's gifted and talented.

pommedenoel · 29/12/2011 09:14

I wonder why people are so anxious for their child to be g and t? As someone who was singled out a lot at school for 'achievements' it's embarrassing and doesn't mean anything in the long run.

I want my daughters to be normal and happy and that is it!

msbaublestwinkle · 29/12/2011 09:25

I was labelled G&T at school, I'm not. I just have a very good memory, which means I perform very well at exams.

I got into a Russell group university, but would have found it much less stressful to have gone to a less prestigious one and I would probably have got a better degree too!

marriedandwreathedinholly · 29/12/2011 09:27

I think this is a bit unkind. Our ds is very bright (17). Was reading fluently at five and was very clearly ahead of the others. Up until Y3 he thrived and was extended by his teachers. Generally an all rounder although exceptional linguistically. In Y4 he hit a wall - the teacher refused to extend and he was used instead to help some of the other children. Great for them and for him from a helping perspective but not from an intellectual perspective. He got bored, he got into trouble. A meeting with the teacher concerned was not helpful.

At short notice and with no tutoring he sat the entrance for one of the most competitive London day schools (about which there is much chatter on here on the education boards - how shall I get him in, which tutor do I use etc.).

We never banged on that he was gifted and it was not until he was 8 and we had given notice to the school that the lady who ran the SEN provision had a little word and said we were doing the right thing because she had assessed him in reception as g&t.

He was always very demanding and exhausting (still is) a very different kettle of fish indeed from dd who is top average and much much easier.

OTH I don't think we every actually mentioned to another parent that he was g&t - ever. Although a few raised an eyebrow when he had a very adult discussion, shoved his nose into a book with several 100 pages and refused to watch Disney Dinosaurs with their dc because it was rubbish because the dinosaurs were from different ages and would never have been alive at the same time.

Just saying -- it's tough having a really bright one and a bit of support wouldn't go amiss but you can't have that because to say why is bragging in rl. It's still tough.

CailinDana · 29/12/2011 09:31

I suppose I was "gifted and talented" at school, although we didn't have those labels - I found exams very easy and always got between 90-100% in everything. I got a first class degree and first class postgrad, the top university in Ireland gave me a job and tried their damndest to keep me when I tried to quit, even allowing me to work from home in another county so I could live with my DH (then fiance). It was only when I was about 27 that I realised I just couldn't give a shit about all the academic stuff, I'd performed for all those years because that's what everyone expected of me and I was hoping to win my mother's approval (which I am still yet to receive). I got an offer to do a PhD in Cambridge with one of the top researchers in my field, and I turned it down. I just have no interest. I now stay at home with my DS and I'm happier than I've ever been.

It doesn't matter how gifted a person is, it's not what defines them. Pushing a child to prove themselves academically can be hugely damaging. Besides, passing exams is an utterly useless skill in the real world.

quirrelquarrel · 29/12/2011 09:33

The thing is- you can say your child is incredibly advanced because he's reading Roald Dahl at five- but he would be positively backward a century ago if that's all he could do. We are no way close to identifying the average child's upper limit in modern standardised tests.
Look at the Aubrey trilogy- the girls reading Shakespeare when they were little. They saw themselves as in the know, not geniuses.

CailinDana · 29/12/2011 09:36

To add, my DH can't spell simple words like "before," and "identify," didn't get the points needed for his choice at university and has no grasp of grammar. In spite of all that he got where he wanted through perseverance (and an obliging wife who spellchecked and grammarchecked his PhD thesis) and is well on track to being a very respected researcher in his field. He has the motivation to do it, and that's what counts in the long run.

KittyFane · 29/12/2011 09:43

married - ...Y3 he thrived and was extended by his teachers. Generally an all rounder although exceptional linguistically.

Bathsheba · 29/12/2011 09:44

We don't have "Gifted And Talented" registers in Scotland....

We clearly just have a normal range of children....

Cyclebump · 29/12/2011 09:53

I teach music and I am besieged by parents telling me their children are 'very advanced'. The last one was the mum of a two-year-old who spent the lesson drop kicking the shakers til one of them broke (she did nothing to stop him and it's hard to enforce discipline with the parent in the class). Sigh, he won't be coming back.

It gets very tiresome as often we get children whose parents think they're fabulous at music and tell them that all the time so they won't listen. They can sing a couple of tunes but struggle with technical stuff because 'i'm already good at music' so they don't listen.

When we do come across a talented child we generally approach the parents and suggest the child is offered the chance to try instruments and/or join a choir.

Original poster

philbee · 29/12/2011 09:56

marriedandwreathed - I didn't mean it to be unkind, I'm sorry. I know there are children who find school frustrating and who can do things well ahead of the rest o their age group. It sounds like you have handled it in a sensitive way and it's clearly an important concern. My issue is with parents of 3 and 4 yr olds who aren't doing things which are that exceptional, and the parents are really just proud of them and maybe worried about them fitting in at school, which all parents are.

I'm definitely not gifted, but I was fairly good at school and better at university. All my life I've felt pressure to be good at academic things, and when I have been I've felt a pressure to follow that as a career. But, like the pp, I just am not that interested in them. I've been my happiest looking after DD and am now hoping to retrain in a more practical career. I think part of that is that, like other pps, I have been taught that academic failure is not acceptable, so I just shy away from that whole area.

I really believe that children just need to be accepted for who they are. Those who, like your DS, aren't getting what they need, should be supported and if they're not that's just really cr*p. But until there's a problem, in that the child is struggling or bored or whatever, why would you seek to label your child, to them and to others, and encourage them to think they were different, and that there were high expectations of them? It just seems like a lot of pressure when there's no real practical change that needs to take place. If the people I know were actually talking about a situation like yours of course I'd be sympathetic, and happy to talk it through, but they're not.

OP posts:

FellatioNelson · 29/12/2011 10:01

I feel a bit sorry for people who are told their child has been put on the G&T register at school and they go 'Wow! I never knew we had a genius in the family - how could I not have noticed that he was so special?'

Er....well, they are probably not actually, but don't let me burst your bubble.

Yellowstone · 29/12/2011 10:11

The whole concept of G&T is absurd.

gazzalw · 29/12/2011 10:19

Personally think that G&T is a massively over-used expression - think that truly gifted and talented children are as rare as they are as adults.....would be very surprised if most schools (unless highly selective) have more than a couple at once.....

Sure most children are gifted at something - it's just finding out what it is!

valiumredhead · 29/12/2011 10:32

MissMerrynder Interesting. I have 2 friends who have G and T kids and they are master manipulators too - they run rings round their parents and have awful social skills.

valiumredhead · 29/12/2011 10:33

Sad really.

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