To think my friend's toddler is a genius

[flowerpowerr]

I went to visit a friend yesterday. I was shocked and impressed to hear her 26 month old DD already counting to 20 and identifying different colours! Is that normal at such an early age or is the child a genius? My friend and her DH are both bright.

At 2 both my kids were talking in full conversations, ds could name and classify all his favourite dinosaurs- it was frequently a shock for strangers to hear him talking about dinosaurs that most adults couldn’t pronounce. He was a little cherub too- golden ringlets, chubby cheeks and big blue eyes framed by enormous eyelashes. It was funny as you just wouldn’t expect a little one of that age to talk like that. Like a previous poster my little professor was (and still is) autistic and advanced verbally and intellectually- despite being socially and emotionally immature.

My ds is still very intelligent and miles ahead in most areas (his current special interest is politics which is quite unusual for a 12 year old boy), despite being socially and emotionally behind his peers.

To be honest, I believe all children learn at different speeds. Some may be early, some may be late but eventually it all levels out!

Ah I remember my DD at her 2yr health clinic check up (this was 16 years ago so they probably don’t exist now)...one of the tests was colours and the HV showed DD coloured wooden blocks. They were all well used and a bit faded. When shown the worse for wear orange one DD happily identified it as ‘peach’ and the faded purple one as ‘lilac’.

The HV was amazed and tested her on numbers and she could count well beyond 50. She was having very high vocabulary conversations from a very young age.

Is she a genius? No, she’s bright and did well in her exams (upper end of her cohort) but definitely not exceptional (except to us of course
!).

In 15 years I’ve probably known of 3 kids (out of many, many hundreds) that have grown into true Mensa level geniuses.

Children pick up all sorts of weird things, and once someone notices, they might keep asking the child to repeat the clever trick for their amusement, so they end up able to do it really well. Humans are just really clever. Children learn thousands of words within just a few years, starting out from a basis of not even knowing that anything exists at all in the world. Think about it; could you explain the difference between a cat and a dog? It's pretty hard. But show a 1-year-old a dog and they pick it up apparently instantly.

At 2yo my daughter recognised the numbers 1-8 by sight, as we lived on the 8th floor. She is now almost 22 and has not yet turned out to be a genius :)

My son didn't learn to read until he was nearly 7 as we live in Germany, and that's when children are supposed to learn to read :)

This thread is ridiculous. Yes, it is above average. Most two year olds in the real world cannot count to 20.
Most of the posters here seem to want to put the op down for boasting, while simultaneously boasting about how much smarter their own child is.

2.5 year old's brains are at peak wiring. My DD comes out with some genius things but Ive worked long enough with kids to know that all 2.5 year olds are like this too.
They're great company when they're not having a tantrum about something silly.

Christ DD must be a bloody prodigy then...

Most of the posters here seem to want to put the op down for boasting, while simultaneously boasting about how much smarter their own child is.

Yup.

Funny how counting to 20 is a target for 5 years olds at school. But obviously pretty much all Mumsnet babies can count far higher than that before they are 2.

It sounds pretty good to me! I’d have been impressed too. Reading all the posts has made me realise that my 3.5 year old is quite behind in comparison. He can count up to ten and knows some colours. He can’t read at all. I haven’t tried to teach him though, on my days off we just focus on having fun, catching up with family and being active outside.

Most two year olds in the real world cannot count to 20.
However, many of them could, if someone taught them. People don't usually bother, as they are too young to actually count or use the words. But children that age can pick up all sorts of stuff.

My DMum claims I was that child genius - could write 2 years old etc - I am certainly nothing special now so it certainly does even itself out. I guess it is just what the child is exposed to and when.

When my DS was 2 he could sing almost every single song on The Killers first album totally word perfect even without the songs playing.

He can't remember any now he is 7.

I think it depends on what they've been taught ir had drilled into them. (Not talking Tiger Mum type driling)

Some parents teach their children as the way of communicating with them.

Reciting or regurgitating numbers and colours to the extend you describng at 26 months isn't as ordinary overall as many on this thread are making it out to be. Though 26-month old with a parent who's put effort into it, I dont think it's unusual. It does need some intelligence- the child has to have good recall

If she understand the concept (can transpose the word 18 into getting 18 things) or do sums (know to take 2 things from 6 leaves 4) then that's different to repeating counting.

To put this into perspective, my ds was doing all that and more at 2. At 3 he could read a book independently of me.
At 5 he could read and comprehend what he had read well.
He's now 8 and is still *top table/sets for everything but his friends are all catching him up.
I should imagine by 15 it'll be impossible to tell who was reading/doing maths etc, early.

• I'm told his school don't stream the kids but they do. They just don't tell them that's what they're doing.

Then say 2 years and 2 months. 35 months is sheer madness

Yeah why use 2 words when 4 will do!

Whether a 2-year-old learns to recite "1, 2, 3, 4..." or "Twinkle, twinkle little star", it's is all the same to the child. One is not harder than the other. To the child it's "Wuntoofreefo" and "Twinkatwinkaittasta".

It's impressive to me. My 27 month old can't do any of that and has only in the past 6 weeks or so started trying to talk.

My DS same age can identify colours,though red is always blue! Can only count to 10 though. Seems quite average to me. 20 seems advanced to me for that age,but according to this thread maybe not!

I used to sing my daughter a Norwegian lullaby (she had no other experience of the language). After I had sung it to her about half a dozen times over the course of a week or so, I was shocked to hear her sing it back to me, word perfect, a short while later.

I thought this about my daughter when she came back from the childminder's and sang the Neighbours' theme song all the way through.

Mumsnetters tend to be pretty well-educated as a whole, I can believe lots of their 2 year olds could recite numbers to 20.

When I first started working as an EYP I had pretty optimistic expectations of what the average 3/4 year old could do...because I was working in leafy Kingston. My course mates working in different settings had different ideas of what was an 'average' 3/4 year olds.

@PivotPivotPivottt There's certainly a wide range of abilities. My daughter was one of the last to learn to walk among her little friends, and one of the first to read. Didn't make any of them special.

Oh actually she's just turned 28 months and after reading these posts I'm now feeling worried

Funny how counting to 20 is a target for 5 years olds at school. But obviously pretty much all Mumsnet babies can count far higher than that before they are 2.

Would the target for 5 year old be to be able to count out 20 objects, so to understand the meaning of the numbers whereas most of the posters on here are refering to chanting numbers to 20 with no understanding at all of what the words mean, or even if they are separate words.

Aw thank you I know deep down all children develop differently but it's hard to think rationally when she seems so far behind other children her ages . She was slow to walk too.

That was to ravenmum