Gifted with Maths at 4 years and 8 months.. Questions ?

[Tani20850]

My son is 4 years and 8 months old. He started slow, with speech delay but suddenly picked up around 3 years old. By age 4 he could do addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. Knew timetables up to 20. Can count numbers up to millions, knew the concept of bigger numbers like billion, trillion etc. Currently he knows, the concept of square and square root, basic fractions, decimals etc. He loves patterns.

Currently, can read very well. Can fluently read the Usborne beginner books, Daniel Tiger, Pepa Pig and similar books. He is fascinated with elements. Knows almost all the elements, the atomic numbers of the 1st 50 elements, learning about the common chemical compounds and trying to gasp the concept of chemical reactions. But it will take a while in my opinion.

1. We are trying to figure out the right steps to encourage him, without putting pressure on him. Any feedback will be much appreciated?
2. How to ensure he doesn't get bored in school? His pre-school experience is not that great.
3. Sometimes he can be a challenging child. He talks continuously and have an opinion in everything. This can disturb any class he is attending. How to deal with that?
4. How can we find like-minded kids who can be good friends? Should we reach out to MENSA or any other institution?

[Hercisback]

You need to focus on 3 the most when starting school. He's clearly bright and picks things up quickly. Now he needs his social skills to catch up with his ability. I would do a lot of work on social skills and let him pick up other stuff as he goes along.

School may not "challenge" him to begin with. He may need to re learn to read via phonics.

[extrastrongmints]

Mensa are a complete waste of time - they don't do anything for bright kids. Potential Plus (formerly NAGC UK) are more helpful.
The level of ability you describe is very unusual. It will take school a few weeks to assess the incoming kids. School may notice or not. Even if they notice, they may have very little resources to do anything within class. Subject acceleration to an older class for maths and/or literacy costs the school little and can alleviate boredom.
You may want to consider getting an independent assessment. Schools are not obliged to implement recommendations from an external report but you may find it helpful for your understanding.
Overall, prepare yourself to be very disappointed with what school can offer and possibly find ways to stretch him outside school. For maths, computer instruction can be a good option.

[User11010866]

Take him to the playgrounds and play with the same age kids will be much help for his growth.

[themonkeysnuts]

why do you need 'like minded' kids to be his friends , will you not let him mix /play with anyone. not all learning is book/computer based, real life is learning

[Hellocatshome]

He needs to learn to be able to play well with all children especially as you will have trouble finding a wide range of like minded 4 year olds.

There was a girl at my sons primary school who went to a few classes a week at the local university as he maths was so advanced. Its too early for that for your child but there are options out there when he is ready.

[Muu9]

See if his teachwr would be willing to let him work on advanced curriculum that you supply, like Beast Academy books or singapore math challenging word problems

[hiredandsqueak]

You should consider asking for a referral for ASD assessment and support him with the things he finds difficult by spending time with his peers doing anything other than academics rather than pushing the academics. You could fund an independent ed psych assessment to detrmine where his abilities lie and use this to ask LA to make a EHC needs assessment.

[Lindy2]

It sounds like he could improve his social skills. As he's bright the academics will probably come naturally but interacting appropriately with his peers is where he might need support.

His teacher will deal with his talking in class.

I'd be working on giving him opportunities to mix with other children. Look to join clubs like Beavers or do a sports activity like football, rugby, karate, gymnastics (whatever suits him best). Encourage going to the playground and developing friendships.

[Peaches212]

Finding the like minded peers has always been a challenge for us.

DS has many friends, but nobody who he can talk to about the beauty of prime factorisation or square numbers, fractions etc.

What OP is asking for is no more taboo than a passionate knitter seeking other passionate knitters to enjoy time with.

[Peaches212]

@hiredandsqueak

You should consider asking for a referral for ASD assessment and support him with the things he finds difficult by spending time with his peers doing anything other than academics rather than pushing the academics. You could fund an independent ed psych assessment to detrmine where his abilities lie and use this to ask LA to make a EHC needs assessment.

In my experience schools will only do this if it is very clear a child’s needs aren’t being met already. It is a very high barrier to overcome, especially when a child masks their emotions at school, and it seems like the child basically has to be distraught and broken before any LA funded outside help is given.

With kids like these, parents don’t push the academics, the kid gravitates towards it themselves. It’s a passion. Would you tell a kid who is passionate about football, music or art to stop doing what they love? Or tell a passionate musician to stay at grade 3 because there will be nothing left for them to learn? This is the argument I hear all the time and it makes no sense to me. A child can be passionate about learning AND have the ability to have a “regular” life. The issue is finding teachers who have expertise in this area/will give time to give to understand what the child needs. That is not easy when there are many other children who also need help in their own way and resources are stretched.

[hiredandsqueak]

The only criteria for a EHC needs assessment is that a child has or may have SEND and needs or may need the support of a plan. An Ed psych report detailing where abilities lie would substantiate very clearly that the child’s needs are extra to what might be reasonably expected to be met within regular teaching. Mine had theirs in place before they set foot in any educational establishment which in hindsight meant that they had support that they wouldn’t have got had I relied on school to document needs.
I have dc with ASD and ds who is profoundly gifted it was more important to encourage the dc with ASD to expand their interests and work on social interaction than it was ds who did it naturally. Ds may have had exceptional academic ability ( school nursery asked that they call in Ed psych within 3 days) but his friends, sports teams, chess teams were incredibly important to him at school and it was good for him to have these interests outside of the academics.

[sep135]

I don't know whether I'd describe my son as super talented in maths but it's a strength. His teacher gave him a GCSE maths paper in year 2 and he got 75% and he's occasionally solved maths questions his teachers couldn't.

He's been at good schools so I've had no issues on that front. He also liked the junior national maths challenges etc. I used to give him difficult maths questions but also tried to broaden his skills into reading and writing.

He's just done his GCSEs and, with the benefit of 10 years, his strength in maths has come at the expense of other skills. He is prone to rushing and not reading things properly, his writing is barely legible and he can be very disorganised. Socially he's found it more challenging than my older son and, thanks to some seriously overly competitive parents at his prep school, he felt there was always a target on his back. (One child was paid a sum of money for every exam he got a higher mark in than my son).

So I agree with the other posters that the social side is just as important as being the next maths genius.

[Quitelikeacatslife]

I'd just keep up with the interest at home and let school teach him the life lessons of how to interact with peers, follow rules and routine and discuss and be nice with wide variety of friends. Once he has those things sorted you may want to do more at school , but I'd get those things down first. School will guide you on that too . Develop his reading , or activities or imaginative play, he needs to have balanced skills if I were you if focus on the areas he is weaker. He will gravitate to his strengths later and it will not hamper him that he didn't do a level standard maths at 5, it will hamper him if he can't communicate etc

[unlimiteddilutingjuice]

Your son sounds like a great little guy and his abilities are certainly very unusual.
A couple of things jump out at me:
The early speech delay, the love of patterns, the excessive talking.
It may be nothing but I would have him assessed for giftedness and ASD.
If he is neurodiverse you will want both those things on the record.
The last thing you want is a situation where your child is achieving well below their ability because they are overwhelmed by sensory stimuli/exhausted by the social side of things/in a state of burnout.
And teachers are telling you everything's OK because he's "fine academically"

[Soontobe60]

@hiredandsqueak

The only criteria for a EHC needs assessment is that a child has or may have SEND and needs or may need the support of a plan. An Ed psych report detailing where abilities lie would substantiate very clearly that the child’s needs are extra to what might be reasonably expected to be met within regular teaching. Mine had theirs in place before they set foot in any educational establishment which in hindsight meant that they had support that they wouldn’t have got had I relied on school to document needs.
I have dc with ASD and ds who is profoundly gifted it was more important to encourage the dc with ASD to expand their interests and work on social interaction than it was ds who did it naturally. Ds may have had exceptional academic ability ( school nursery asked that they call in Ed psych within 3 days) but his friends, sports teams, chess teams were incredibly important to him at school and it was good for him to have these interests outside of the academics.

As a Senco with a very limited budget, I would not allocate it to have a higher ability child assessed unless they had clear signs of being neurodivergent.

[Dessertinthedesert]

He does sounds super intelligent in maths. As with all children you need to both encourage his interests and work on his weaknesses. I agree with @hiredandsqueak.

[hiredandsqueak]

@soontobe60 I don't find that unreasonable either. My dc's assessments didn't cost any nursery or school a penny as they had no placement before assessment. FWIW my profoundly gifted ds didn't have "extra support" it was even more important to encourage his participation in the extra curricular activities so that he had other things to focus on in school.

[Worldgonecrazy]

The ‘finding beauty in maths’ suggests he is neurodivergent so getting an assessment on this will help. It will also help with the social side as he grows older and has a better understanding of himself and how he may need to adapt when spending time with others.

Also, follow The Daily Epsilon of Math on Twitter. It’s great fun, useful learning and will challenge him.

unfortunately the world is not built for those who are maths genii. I work with someone with a PhD and they are in a junior role because they struggle with social / every day life due to their neurodivergence.

[Knivesandforks]

Definitely work on social skills, try to get friends round or to playground and show him how to listen to others etc. Role-playing social situation were he doesn't give his opinion/ correct others but shows interest in another person's opinion.

Look at asd as that may be relevant going forwards so be fully informed.

[christinarossetti19]

Are you in the UK? If so, your ds will have started reception, I think?

How's it going?

[jannier]

Does he have ASD?

[Syndulla]

He sounds awesome OP. I think you're going to have to lower your expectations on school a bit though, especially if going to a state school. They have 30 kids to get to a required standard and are going to want to focus more on the kids that are struggling to reach that standard. Can you afford to go private?

I definitely agree with PP that focusing on his social skills is a must. The good thing about reception is that it's play based learning so he will be able to develop skills such as negotiating, sharing, collaboration etc. These are just as important as his academic knowledge so don't dismiss what he will get out of attending school.

[Noramcf]

Any chance you’re in Dublin? I would love to introduce our boys, who seem pretty much the same. I don’t know what to do either. We’re getting our son tested for autism because his inability to relate to other kids and generally poor social skills, but his creative thinking and ability to grasp fairly complex things (algebra) is hard to just leave be. My son is June 20 birthday, so they sound like they’re about the same age too :)

[Muu9]

@Noramcf

Any chance you’re in Dublin? I would love to introduce our boys, who seem pretty much the same. I don’t know what to do either. We’re getting our son tested for autism because his inability to relate to other kids and generally poor social skills, but his creative thinking and ability to grasp fairly complex things (algebra) is hard to just leave be. My son is June 20 birthday, so they sound like they’re about the same age too :)

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