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Gifted and talented

Talk to other parents about parenting a gifted child on this forum.

What were the very first signs of your child being G&T?

63 replies

PoseyFossil · 06/01/2011 11:43

If you have a G&T child . . . if you look back at their babyhood were there any early signs?

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PixieOnaLeaf · 06/01/2011 12:41

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lovecheese · 06/01/2011 12:53

Nope. Walked late, talked late, not potty-trained till 4 Blush. But was a very happy, contented toddler/young child who could concentrate and LOVED books.

PixieOnaLeaf · 06/01/2011 12:53

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nobodyisasomebody · 06/01/2011 12:54

What Pixie said.

Held his head up at less than a week old, never slept, very alert from birth. Watched and paid attention from birth.

Talked in complex sentences at a year, walked and ran at eight months.

He did everything very very early and was very hard work.

PoseyFossil · 06/01/2011 13:11

A bit of a mix then!

I'm just trying to make myself feel better TBH - DD is a, um, challenging baby Grin so I was trying to cheer myself up before by the thought that she will clearly develop into a child genius!

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PixieOnaLeaf · 06/01/2011 13:15

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moogalicious · 06/01/2011 13:19

What pixie said. Dd1 reached all the milestones before her peers, but boy has she been challenging at times! She is 8 now, but seems to be unhappy a lot of the time - an old head on young shoulders Sad.

squidgy12 · 06/01/2011 13:19

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Lynli · 06/01/2011 13:22

Strangely it was the moment he was born, he looked at me and then the midwife and was turning his head looking at the lights. The midwife said she had never seen a newborn do that.

All of his physical mile stones were late, but his reading ability and mathematics were freakily advanced.

He has never misbehaved or made a mess, he is now 10. He is a weird one.

lovecheese · 06/01/2011 13:22

Pixie - mine had, in fact still has, poor fine motor skills too; I think she was using all her energy in developing an academic brain!

lovecheese · 06/01/2011 13:23

She also didn't sleep.....

pagwatch · 06/01/2011 13:27

Op i have an extremely bright child and a child with special needs. I also have an average child

average is very underrated. Average is where quite a lot of the happy and relaxed goes on.

having interesting challnging children is great and all that and I wouldn't swop any of them. But i wouldn't swop any of them. My average dc is kind, thoughtful, imaginative, caring, intuitive - all good yet under rated things. My average child is also very happy in a way that child with thoughts too big for his bloomin head and child with sn can't aspire to.

Don't waste a second wishing your child different. it is truly 'be careful what you wish for' territory.

sorry - that is a bit lectury. i don't mean to be so but the endless assessment of our children at all ends of the ability spectrum is a bit frustrating.

strandednomore · 06/01/2011 13:28

I have no idea whether my dd is "G&T" (sorry that still makes me think of Gin and Tonic) - probably not but she is exceptionally good at reading and probably well ahead on writing, maths etc. She is 5 and in reception. Anyway a lot of what others have said here resonates. Held her head up from birth; very alert and "difficult" baby, reached a lot of milestones early (although not an excpetionally early walker, unlike her sister who walked at 9 months); is never messy, eats well and is interested in things like nutrition; behaves very well in public and at school, in fact everywhere but with us which is when she lets of steam!

belledechocchipcookie · 06/01/2011 13:30

It took him 2 weeks to learn how to read the letters of the alphabet and count to ten. Not quite normal for a 1 year old. I could have real conversations with him aswell, no one word answers. He also appeared to understand a lot but I think many children can do this. I swear he was smiling at 2 weeks aswell.

notnowbernard · 06/01/2011 13:31

Wise word from Pag, there (againSmile)

The GP at DS's 6w check repeatedly stated how DS was very "physically advanced". Seriously, he really went on about it

It's a good job DS is my 3rd else I would have sailed out of the surgery and signed him up for MENSA straight away Grin

As it happens DS seems like a very lovely normal baby to me Smile

PoseyFossil · 06/01/2011 13:37

Sorry pagwatch, I didn't mean to trivialise the subject Blush

I have posted a few times in Parenting and Sleep (under my regular username) as I am having a difficult with DD (8 months) - it's tempting to look for reasons as to why I'm finding it hard. I'm sure she will turn into a very normal child!

I was just wondering if early crawling, walking combined with no sleeping meant anything significant.

I didn't mean to sound flippant with "child genius"

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pagwatch · 06/01/2011 13:40

god no, don't apologise op
i should.

you were just wondering around a difficult time and i came across as really sdanctemonious. sorry

but these things are such a mix. my dcs did not turn out as things seemed at 10 months ish. The one with sn was much brighter than the bright one at that age.
Smile

JemimaMop · 06/01/2011 13:41

DS2 has extra help in school as he is "G&T". However he was late to walk, late to talk, late to potty train, never slept as a baby and tantrummed constantly from the age of about 18 months to 4 years. He is now 6 and puts his shoes on the wrong feet and can't ride a bike without stabilisers. He did however teach himself to read in 2 languages and has an encyclopaedic knowledge of Roman history.

DS1 and DD are just "bright" rather than "G&T", they both walked and talked far earlier, slept well as babies and generally behaved far better.

sethstarkaddersmum · 06/01/2011 16:06

my dh was a G&T child and when he was in hospital having just been born the matron of the maternity hospital was going round the wards making comments on all the babies and when she got to MIL and DH she allegedly said 'And that one should be at university!'

it's funny, he doesn't look so intelligent now.

cory · 07/01/2011 18:38

Hard to know what this G&T stuff means anyway.

Dd was not an unusually early talker, but once she did start she seemed to understand far more complex ideas than other children, we were having quite involved discussions about the past and the future when she was only just two. At that age, she was constantly challenging me: every statement of mine was met by "How do you know? Have you read it in a book? Have you read it in the papers?" She was not an abnormally badly behaved child, but she did not take things on trust: you had to argue your case.

She also seemed to have very good concentration skills and understand complex stories early: she sat through my reading of the LOTR trilogy aged 6 (though not in one sitting!) and then made some rather thoughtful observations about the plot structure.

Otoh she was very slow with anything involving motor skills; didn't sit until 8 months and only walked at 19 months.

Unsurprisingly, she is now doing very well at history and English, but has lots of physical problems.

I was the same: poor motor skills, but good language skills. And the same attitude of not believing something just because I was told.

lovecheese · 07/01/2011 19:14

Hmmm Hmm seems to be a bit of a link developing here on the whole between children who were late walkers and physical developers and academia. Another Hmm

vegasmum · 07/01/2011 19:37

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horsemadmom · 08/01/2011 01:19

When I took my 4 month old DD out of the bath and began playing peek-a-boo with the towel. I stopped and she grabbed the towel, covered her face and took it away again laughing like a loon. Kept up the game until she got too cold.

Slow on physical milestones but full sentences at 1yr, could sing her abc's at 15 months (still not walking at that stage) and taught herself to read at 2yrs and 10 months. Potty trained herself at 19 months but began having accidents when she started nursery at 2. DD thought that picking clothes out of the 'accident bag' looked like fun.

Fivefingers · 08/01/2011 02:27

My 4 year old is going to be home-educated so I don't think she will get assessed for giftedness by any standard route, but she certainly fits most of the traits of giftedness. A striking thing about her birth was that she was born very very alert, her eyes were very expressive and when I held her for the first time, she actually pulled a real smile (not just a baby grimace - and I've had 3 babies!) at me and DH. Something we will never forget. She passed all the developmental milestones early, had a huge vocabulary by 18 months, spoke in fluent sentences by 2. Could count and do simple addition and subtraction by 3. People keep saying I hothoused her but honestly I don't even have the time. She just picks up things and concepts from daily life and she just "knows". Asks the most profound questions, gives us a really hard time as she will question us for hours until she gets the clearest and most precise answers from us. She has, from since she was about 6 months old, had excellent attention span and could sit through a half hour childrens' tv show without moving once from her seat and her eyes glued. She has a fantastic memory, can remember seemingly inane details from years ago when she was tiny, about events that nobody else really thinks about... though it is fab too for facts and just about anything she learns. She's like a virtual sponge. Very logical thinker, gets worried and concerned about things that would normally concern an adult and is like "an old head on young shoulders" like moogalicious mentioned. A bit obsessive about topics of interest du jour. Very sensitive, can feel people's pain, and very observant and watches people and learns from what she sees. She's also very good at drawing and dancing and is a mini-perfectionist at everything she does. She also has the most amazing temper displays, very very impatient, hot-tempered, feels things extremely intensely (she matched more than half of all the traits listed in the Highly Sensitive Child book), extremely stubborn and quite aggressive if riled. She was a sweetheart for the first 1 and a half years of her life... very placid. Then when her baby brother was born just before she turned 2, she just completely changed and started having the bad tempers, meltdowns, and rebellion, even though I loved her dearly and really tried to balance the time I spent with each of them to be fair. Her baby brother too has shown signs of giftedness since babyhood. Boy was he (and is he still) hard hard work. And even more ferocious than DD when riled. And did I mention he doesn't seem to need much sleep ever... not even when he was a wee baby.

bruxeur · 08/01/2011 02:45

Well mine were both delivered playing the violin. The second one was wearing a little embroidered vest as well.

/wins

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