Am I being PFB, or do I actually have a bright toddler?

[megonthemoon]

I'm a bit nervous about posting this, as I know when people say that their DCs are very clever, when they're still just a baby or toddler, that it is usually just the parents being a bit too PFB and that it all evens out when DCs are school age anyway, and that other mums/dads rightly end up rolling their eyes

But recently I've realised that some of the things I've read on here about what 2 year olds can do and what friends DCs can do, versus what DS can do, just seem quite different.

So DH and I have started to realise that maybe our DS, aged 2.3, is actually quite bright and are just wondering if we need to be doing anything to actively help him develop at his own pace, but not pressurise him into doing anything he doesn't want to, and we want to try and get this right. Anyway, just a few examples:

• he speaks in full grammatically correct sentences that he forms himself (rather than just copying what I say) e.g. this morning we had DS: "Oh dear" Me: "Did you drop some cornflakes DS?" "No mummy. I spilt some milk"
• his nursery manager says that his language skills are at least a year ahead of his actual age and she hasn't known anyone this young speak like this before
• friends always comment on how he is doing things that their DCs couldn't do or aren't doing
• he can do various 20-30 piece jigsaw puzzles on his own without any help from us
• he has memorised his favourite stories, e.g. Tiger who came to tea, such that he likes to 'read' them to us by looking at the picture and using several of the specific words on the page that he has remembered
• he can talk about events in the past, including a month or two ago
• last week he saw the road atlas in the car and asked what it was. I said "it's a map. It shows you which way to go when you are out walking or driving" and then we moved on to something else. Three days later, having not talked about maps since, he saw a different map in a guidebook and started pointing at it saying "This is our house. This is the road to nursery. This is where Harry lives and this road is where Jesse's house is".

I don't know. Maybe I am being really PFB (please tell me if so) but I wasn't expecting this sort of stuff until he was 3 or 4 to be honest. Did I just have unrealistic expectations of what a 2.3 year old could do, or does this seem bright? And if he does seem bright, should I be doing anything to help/encourage him or just bumbling along as normal anyway?

I'll slink away quietly if the consensus is that I am being PFB (please roll your eyes at me if you feel the need!), but if not I'd love to hear from anyone who has had a bright toddler and if you did anything in particular to encourage it or just let them be.

He does sound quite advanced to me, cos my 2.0 does not seem so near to that kind of thing and he is pretty much on the average, so i would say he does seem to be doing more than average definitely

Development varies between children. It is cruel to label children as gifted or less able before juniors. Sometimes progress plateus or sometimes the child with developmental delays catches up or even over takes. Simple things like glue ear or excessive hot housing (which I am sure doesn't apply to the OP child) can affect how a children appears.

One of my son's school friends was labelled gifted at three years old. He did well in his key stage 1 SATs but not exceptionally well. His parents made it very clear that they were incredibly disappointed in their seven year old. The poor thing had worked hard and scored 2As. His best was not good enough. It can be a curse for a child to be labelled gifted and talented and cannot reach high expectations.

Any the OP and her son sounnd lovely. Its great he is doing so well. He does sound very bright, but its too soon to say if he is gifted.

Whether it's a prediction for the future or not, it's good fun now- so enjoy!

I loved talking to dd at this age, because she was so bright and cute and funny. If she fails her GCSEs it won't make my memories any less enjoyable.

Your ds sounds absolutely lovely, OP.

cantonese? pshaw

mine was rapping in mandarin on the 20 week scan

Quite bright yes but not way out beyond normal.
At 2.3 my dgs spoke in full sentences with quite complex vocabulary eg.'This cup is very delicate grandma so hold it with two hands'.He spoke early.Jigsaws not so soon 3ish for 24+ pieces.Reading as in following words on page and recognising some words on flash cards by 2.6.But the boy's no genius-just a normal toddler whose speech 'switched on' early.
Your ds sounds delightful-enjoy him

Pah to cantonese and mandarin. DD scratched a definitive retranslation of the rosetta stone on the placenta. It was sore, but worth it, I think.

v similar to ds1 (our neighbours used to call him 'golden wonder-boy' because of his speech etc ) - but well within the bounds of normal i think. he could recite the entirety of 'room on the broom'from memory. nursery did get all excited about ds1 and wanted to get him assessed (they discovered that if you gave him a handful of loose change, he could work out how many different ways you could get 20p, etc), but fortunately the LEA just laughed at them. he's 8 now.

(the week before his second birthday he asked me 'mummy, why are you wiping my goolies?' when i was changing his nappy - it's sort of gone downhill from there, really... now we get evolution v creation. be careful what you wish for. shame he hasn't quite got the hang of the whole toilet training thing...)

ps, i'm up for any of the benign neglect courses on offer, hully, esp if they come with free plonk. do i get a bottle per child?

My Ds is bright - ish, but cannot hardly speak! So you wouldn't necessarily know it. His is more in understanding concepts and retaining info he has heard once and knowing things I have never taught him, like seasons and that yellow is a bright colour (as in he doesn't want those yellow crocs becuase they are too bright) - but obviously he can't just come and tell you so it takes an ask first he is 2.9 btw

He sounds very similar to my dd3 who, of course, is a genius

I don't know what the average is, but he sounds like my ds - the only thing ds couldn't do off that list at that age is the jigsaw thing.

Your ds sounds very cute! I love it when little kids talk in perfect sentences - my ds comes out with all kinds of things, like telling me "Mummy, that is totally unacceptable, I am absolutely horrified!". It makes me laugh.

Well, he's way ahead of my less-than-genius sprog

My ds was much like this. He's now 12 and above averagly bright and doing well at school. There is no G&T system locally so can't say if he'd be on it. We didn't hot house him at all, just went with the flow - encouraging whatever he showed an interest in. And enjoyed his quirkiness.

The only mistake we did make was when dd arrived and was much less obviously bright we just assumed she wouldn't ever be. We felt so bad this year at school (she's 9) when her teacher was telling us how bright she is and we were all . Proved that the benign neglect she endured did no harm though

It sounds as though he's bright, but I would avoid hot housing him. It will just make school boring when he gets there, which could turn him off formal education for life. He seems to enjoy learning about the world, just encourage his natural curiosity and he'll be fine

I have to say he sounds delightful it's wonderful when they really get going with their speech and getting to grips with the world. Very rewarding, especially when you have a toddler who doesn't sleep well it's the upside, I keep telling myself.

My daughter started speaking at 9 months and had a vocabulary in the hundreds by 12 months and started speaking in 6-7 word grammatically correct sentences at around 14 months. She talks about things in the past and has been playing with her toys imaginatively for ages and talking about abstract constructs.

I do realise her speech is early and everyone who meets her comments on it. She's very voluble as well and it can be a bit embarrassing in certain situations with mothers I know who are worried about their own kids' speech, just because she's SO talkative and the range of words is SO

Although her speech and motor skills seem to be early, she wasn't an early walker at 12 months and although is nimble on her feet and a little runner, she's just not as physical as some toddlers her age (she's now 20 months)

As far as I'm concerned, this is early language acquisition -- yes I'd like to think she's on the bright end of the spectrum (we're two Oxbridge graduates and hope we've passed a love of learning on) but really, honestly? I think it all evens out and so much from now will depend on letting her learn at her own pace and finding the right sort of school and how we teach her by example

But I'm resisting the urge to push her on and have decided I'm not going to teach her to read -- even though she's picking out words now. I don't want her to feel pressured and I don't want her to feel isolated and bored (I was when I was taken out of English classes)

Just enjoy the chat

I think just leave him be, dont worry about encouraging him in any other way than playing like normal at this age.

Ds was quite forward for his age for teh first 3 years of his life I would say but now he is 3y6m and I'd say he is levelling out.

It's so lovely to hear of other bright (or at least vocal ) toddlers! The comments I get from people are just a bit embarassing because they're comparing DS to their own DCs and I don't ever really know what to say in return, and then would feel really boastful if I started saying "you'll never guess what he said today" to the same people while they're worrying about language acquisition or potty training or a non-walking 20 month old etc. And he is so obviously ahead of most other children we see that I just spend my time wondering if he is off the scale! So nice to know he is normal, as I really don't want another genius in the house - I'm quite enough for one family

I shall just carry on with my policy of benign neglect as it seems to be the easiest best approach from all your experiences. TBH I'm loving it - I thought it would be another year or two before we had a sensible conversation, but it is lots of fun at the moment, and I feel I'm learning a lot from him too!

This has been really helpful for me. I shan't mention DS and the word genius in the same sentence on MN again. Until he uses some purple megabloks, 2 stickle bricks and his Cinderella stickers to solve the Israeli-Palestine question, which I'm imagining on current progress will be some time next Thursday

In terms of what to say to anyone, I personally never remark on it, and just mumble about it all levelling out if someone is direct.

I don't FB really and so would never draw attention to it IRL or on there anyway. In fact you'd never know I'd given birth on FB.

I can shamelessly boast with my mother and MIL though. And I've talked about it with one or two friends who have early talkers as I had worries that her chronic bad sleeping and still frequent night feeds were affecting her development. It was reassuring that she's FOR NOW steaming ahead.

I really do expect some kind of slowdown and levelling out. And I'm not going down the kumon/early reading route. But she IS going to learn the piano when she's three!

My ds does the same as you described in the post and yes I think he is very bright but definitely not more than that.

The other thing i've noticed is that people always say "wow hes doing that" but then I find myself doing it with other babies its just that unless your child is the same age you don't really remember, so I take what other people say with a grain of salt now.

I grew up with an exceptionally intelligent older sister but she was labelled as that her whole childhood, she now finds it difficult now to accept rejection (redundancy etc) I think, because of this whereas because I was always the "not so intelligent" one I don't feel I have to live up to a specific standard. I'm just saying that i'm aware that being labelled can cause issues later on. However, being able to speak at 12 months (as one poster said) is pretty amazing.

Ah, potty training... The Dashing Duo has politely refused all my attempts to lure them near said device.
Was told in no uncertain terms that 'No Mummy, I shall not sit on the potty today. Perhaps Wednesday, after Daddy comes home from work.'
How do you argue with that?
I'm sure, though, that they'll be familiar with the loo by the time they graduate so taking it easy in the potty department, I iz

at Meg

My DS usually only took 24 hours to sort out ancient political and religious disputes when he was that age - and only ever one stickle brick. Two is just cheating.

Just develop wafty indifference. It covers a multitude. You know how well he is doing and that is all that matters. That way you avoid jealousy etc.

My friend decided her child was very bright early on. He is 7 now and just averagely bright but the pressure that has piled up by the weight of my friends expectation... She is never overt and never talks to him about beingclever . But he is only ever asked about academic stuff at school, hears her voice emit pride and joy when talking about his reading, maths etc. She only engages with him with any degree of real animation when she is referencing his intelligence - even tellings off are 'you are clever enough to know not to do such silly things'
He is now talking with faux enthusiam about uni and glory ... It is sad not least because she has no idea at all. She loves him, she wants what is best and she simply can't see the unspoken weight she has laid upon him.

Write things down, meg- it will be great to have his funny little sayings on file in 10 years time. And then he can enjoy them too. (Wish I had been more diligent in this department).

Just to say enjoy those conversations now. DS was a chatty, articulate 2 year old and we used to have brilliant, engaging conversations about life, the universe and everything. Now he is 15 he seems to have forgotten all his words. He grunts quite well though.

YY to writing then down.
You think you won't forget but you do.

The only one I can remember from DS1 was when asked if he liked girls ( at age three) he said

" I regard them with the very deepest suspicion"

In fairness, he does have his visit to Oxford on Thursday as he hopes to do English there....

Good luck to him pagwatch. My husband read English there and loved it (as did I, though I read Russian and Polish). My best friend is a tutor there. Any tips I can pass on, feel free to ask!