To think there’s something special about my child?

[FallDayAllDay]

I will begin by saying my child can be a real challenge to parent. She is strong willed, determined, likes to be in control of her own day etc. All can be qualities, but can be really tricky in a world where we have places to be and a schedule to stick to. And when she is unhappy, she can be quite turbulent.

DD is 8, and much though she is tricky, she amazes me in equal measure. For example. She got given some wool and knitting needles from a family member when she was 6. She asked me if I would teach her to use them. I said I would but that first I would need to learn how to use them myself. Within a week, she had grown impatient. She took the iPad and searched for tutorials. She came downstairs and had knitted about 15 rows of a scarf, pretty perfectly. This is one of many stories. She has taught herself to play two instruments. She has determination like I have never seen. She will sit for hours until she masters something. Her stamina is incredible, but that’s when it’s something of her own choosing.

At school, she moves between expected and greater depth. By no means the smartest kid in the class, but she is the youngest in her class and each year, seems to move higher. She completes her homework each week, as soon as she gets home on the day the homework is handed out. She has written books of multiple chapters in length. She loves to perform and has carried out solo performances in front of around 250 people, without so much as a butterfly in her stomach. She is funny and sensitive, she has fire in her belly and never gives up.

I know this post sounds braggy, I really don’t mean for it to be. I just sometimes worry that I don’t quite know how to nurture her best. I feel like she always wants to do more, learn more and know more and I’m somehow limiting her by my lack of knowledge, skills and finances to give her all the tuition that she would just revel in. I feel like the life I give her is quite a dull one when she is so vibrant.

Maybe I just see her as exceptional because she’s my child, and I’m programmed to feel that way. I just think the sky could be the limit for her, but I am somehow not going to be able to give her the opportunities that she could have if I were smarter, or more financially secure.

As a kid I was always writing poetry. I’d get top marks for essay and composition writing at school. I remember my mum saying “she’ll be a writer when she grows up”. Grown up and can barely string a sentence together. 🫣

Sorry OP If she’s not even the smartest in her class, she doesn’t sound exceptional at all
Having said that, I don’t think it does a child much harm growing up with parents who think they is exceptional. Much better for self esteem than the alternative.

These theads always go the same way on MN 'she sounds perfectly average to me'

'They all catch up in the end.'

Well, no they don't (of course they don't! surely no-one thinks we all end up on the same intellectual level?)

I had one little girl who read very early, played the violin to an unusual degree of abiliity, got scholarships to multiple private schools; she ended up studying violin at the Guildhall and still plays in various orchestras today, while being very content in her job as a nurse.

Then came DD2 - clearly unusually bright from an early age, very quick to everything, ended up getting a first at Oxford for BioSciences, top scholarship at her college in the second year, then won a prestigious studentship for a DPhil at one of the best labs in Oxford. I never did a thing to push this, just relied on her teachers, gave her opportunities, etc,

(if anyone thinks this is very braggy, I will complete the story by saying that brilliant DD2 gave up on her DPhil and went to work with horses at a local stable, then took a job at a local farm planting stuff. Now a happy SAHM, who plays in a local brass band.)

So you won't know the path that lies ahead for your daughter, but it's a myth that 'all children even out', and it's also a myth that academic/creative ability guarantees a glittering future. Steer a middle course, make sure she's happy and not pressured, and support her in whatever she chooses to do.

But... do make sure she has music lessons, if you can. Not just intellectually enriching, but also lasts long into later life, even if it's just playing in a local band, or playing the piano at Christmas for the family.

Oh, you know many children who can teach themselves to knit and play two instruments?

Why is everyone so keen to tell this woman her child is average when she clearly isn’t. We don’t all need to develop an inferiority complex because our children haven’t taught themselves the trombone 😂

She sounds gifted, and very special.

It's a balance. It's essential to have supportive parents, but parents blindly believing - and pushing the idea on their child - that their normal child is "exceptional" is not great.

Facing reality will hurt, or they will accuse everyone to be jealous and treat them unfairly, and they will grow up very lonely.

Most schools will have very brilliant children, an exceptional sport child, or an astonishing artist, or a genius mathematician.. one or many. They will have however a majority of parents believing theirs are "gifted" and exceptional, when they are just.. bright, smart and lively normal children.

you are missing the point.. yes, most of us will know such a child, and most of us know that half the class is "talented" one way or another. No one is pretending it's THEIR child.

So define "average". It's normal or common for kids to be talented.

They really don't like it when you brag about your kids on here, so hardhat on OP.
My kids are naturally really bright (but a bit lazy) but I would prefer if they were determined to succeed like your DD. She does sound amazing.

Half of the class is not teaching themselves knitting and musical instruments for fun. That’s not average. If they are, your children are in some very specific, very high achieving, circles.

Is what you’re saying that OP’s child is talented but so are other children so she’s still not special?

That just seems unnecessary to even say. A simple “yes she sounds talented” would suffice.

My DD must be totally backwards then, because she was nothing like this.

I think the OP’s child does sound pretty exceptional but perhaps that’s just me.

I would agree with this.
Not gifted, but certainly bright. Encouragement support and nurturing

no, they're not all teaching themselves knitting because most of the ones I know have 0 interest in knitting 😂

It might be outing (to them) but one little girl I know did secretly make a quilt out of a relative clothes after their death, with no training or lessons. She just figured it out.

It's really depressing if you really believe it's not "average" to have the majority of children shining in one or several areas, and to have such low expectations on kids.

My kids are in perfectly bog-standard average environments. No one is putting down the OP's child, nothing wrong with being a bright and driven child, but the question was "is my child SPECIAL" ?

Answer is: special to YOU of course, but special compared to other children of the same age? No.

As long as a child is smart, bright, successful, and happy, who cares if they are special anyway?

I don’t have low expectations of children, I’m just aware that most of them are too busy watching K Pop Whatever It Is to be knitting scarves, writing books and learning instruments independently.

I just took special to mean “outside of the norm,” and from my experience what OP describes is just that.

I don't have smart or bright kids, and they won’t be conventionally successful. I’m also not really bothered if the internet thinks they’re special, but I still don’t believe OP is wrong for thinking her daughter might just be above average in some areas.

She sounds lovely. I don’t think you have to do anything other than let her enjoy doing things her way and be ready for when the hormones hit.

I think the point is that lots of children at that age so some degree of precociousness but not necessarily in the same area. So maybe not writing little mini books with chapters but maybe doing maths at a level way beyond average. Or teaching themselves some maths topic or knowing everything about a topic. Butterflies or the solar system. Or being unusually gifted with a football or golf club. Or having weirdly developed social skills

I was a bit like that as a child. I would write, illustrate and direct plays for my cousins to act in. They weren’t children’s story lines either. Quite adult themes. I was about 7/8. I would also write and illustrate full length comics and tried to teach myself French out of some old fashioned text book we had lying around the house.

I was distinctly average by the time I left secondary school and now I’m in a shit job with no discernible talent. Any imagination or creativity I had back then has completely evaporated. I peaked far too early sadly.

To be honest, all my children have had teachers say at their recent parents' evening that if they had a class full of DD1, DD2 and DS, they would be the best... (I am sounding incredibly bragging now, which is dreadful, I know!) God knows what they do at school- behave in very angelic ways, unlike all the disorder at home lol 😆

I'm not sure what i do to make my children so good at school, I literally am the most laid back mum who tries being kind but supportive. I guess it must be working as apparently I am doing a great job 😅😳 DD1 teaches herself crocheting, making bracelets, and is grade 6 at bass guitar after 18 months 🫠 I have no input into any of her learning - some people are truly driven, like the OP's DD.

Seriously though OP, enjoy your brilliantly talented DD, she sounds wonderful. You sound a kind, lovely mum ❤️

@ContinuewithGoogle That's why it's so sad when lazy posters complain about parents who give activities to their children everyday, saying they should just stay at home and learn to be bored.

Did you read the OP? Her daughter learnt how to knit, play instruments and wrote a book! If OP had taken her to fixed activities every day she would never have found her inner creativity and strength. All child psychiatrists will tell you that children need free playtime where they can use their imagination and creativity. I think some parents are anxious about not scheduling every waking hour for their children to take part in a structured activity.

To say that parents are lazy because their children don't have an activity planned everyday is just plain stupid. Lazy is to not think about what is good for your child's physical and psychological wellbeing and just put them in activities everyday so you feel that they are occupied and you don't have to interact with them.

She sounds a bright determined child who will do well no matter what situation she is in. I don't think she sounds autistic or gifted as she is too well rounded. If she is happy and doing well making friends at her own age level I would say you have nothing to worry about. BTW, lots of children these days learn stuff off YouTube. I know mine did. It's just a generational thing.

You are spectacularly missing my point, and it doesn't help you are taking my sentence out of the context of the post.

but to clarify

OP had taken her to fixed activities every day she would never have found her inner creativity and strength.
as my kids and all their friends managed - and are still managing - to do both, I am sure the OP's child would have been just fine.

I was also discussing how to ENCOURAGE and support finding interests and existing interests, using resources around you, library, museum, holidays etc...

Which was the OP's question, if you had bothered reading.

All child psychiatrists will tell you that children need free playtime where they can use their imagination and creativity.
and it's pretty lazy to translate that as not encouraging your children to be active and do sports and activities every day because you can't be bothered 😂

In England, kids finish school at 3pm.

How anyone could not have active children who need to burn some energy every day after school is beyond me, lazy parenting no doubt.

really? I’ve not come across an 8 year old who has that kind of attention and can write chapter books.

OP is continue to praise and guide but avoid becoming pushy. I’m sure you wouldn’t. But it would be tempting to push more. Try to treat her like a child and allow her time to play and just be. It sounds like she is clever and you’re right to be proud.

most parents will feel pride for various reasons.

If she continues on this trajectory you could always try for a local grammar or selective school or maybe even see how the land lies with private education and bursaries etc when it comes to secondary school as those types of places and really give them a bigger push and give them a leg up when it comes to university places
But for now, while she is still a young child carry on with normal primary education and just what you are doing as she seems to be thriving
My only question would be regarding that she is strong willed etc - can she be bossy to friends and what are her friendships like, it’s important she a) has good friendships and not be isolated and b) understands as she gets older being a bossy boots will get her nowhere as there is a time and a place to assert yourself

She sounds very much like my daughter. She was very bright, but no more special than some of the other children in her class.

Yes, she does sound exceptional.

Has she taken an IQ test?

i do think that it’s impressive that OP’s child has taught themselves how to knit and how to play instruments - although I’m not sure if she’s learnt how to actually play or just play nice tunes on eg the piano. I’d love to know about the musical instruments. I’ll be very impressed if she’s playing violin well for example.

I don’t think writing chapter books at 8 is particularly unusual though. I used to write them as a child. My daughter writes short stories more than chapter books but my niece writes chapter books and she’s just turned 9. Some kids just love writing and have a huge imagination for stories. I’m shite at writing now sadly, but I loved writing and reading books when I was little.