Is my 2yo gifted?

[MumofToddle]

I’ll be upfront, I‘ve only created this thread because I suspect I’m right and I’m looking for validation 😂I also know how insufferable that is and that I deserve to be taken down a peg, so please do feel free to disabuse me of my notions if I deserve it.

I think my 2.5yo son might be verging on ‘gifted’ (as opposed to merely clever, which I know he is without needed confirmation from anyone else). Here are some of the things he can do:

• complete verbal fluency - speaks in lengthy, complex sentences, for example ‘mummy, daddy said after we go swimming we are going to granny’s house because we need to borrow her car so you can go to London’. Has a good vocabulary - regularly and correctly uses words like ‘marvellous’, ‘surprising’, ‘mischievous’, ‘famished’.
• very good recall - for example he has a reference book of animals and can tell you the scientific names for about 60 animals, having been told them once or twice on previous readings
• can read simple words and some sentences. We didn’t teach him this so don’t know where it came from. For example today we drove past next and he said ‘N E X T, that says next’. He can read simple sentences in books he hasn’t seen before, such as ‘where is spot?’ (By sounding out the letters to work out the word)
• Can write his own name unassisted and copy letters if I write them first (imperfectly but recognisably)
• can name / discuss his feelings. Has basically never had a tantrum but will say ‘I’m disappointed because I don’t want to leave the park’.

What do you think - gifted, or just bright? It wouldn’t change anything either way as we don’t have any desire or intention to try and hot house him or interfere at all in his very relaxed, low pressure childhood, but I’m curious!

He sounds lovely. Enjoy every minute.

He does sound clever! Enjoy him!!
My first was like this, very bright. The second - thick as a brick!!

Thank you for all the comments, it’s so interesting to hear from people with children similar at this age and to get a wider perspective!

DD1 walked and talked by one. Potty trained by 18 months. Advanced reading and writing by 2. Sociable and confident, assertive, even to though July born and was only just 4 when she started school. NT and bright throughout schooling, and uni, but I wouldn't say gifted.

Can he play Go Fish? Just kidding!

My DD could play Go Fish perfectly at 2.5.

I think he sounds very bright but not sure about gifted. My kids would have been able to identify letters and “signs” made up of those letters at that age (shops and such). But they couldn’t actually read unfamiliar words in a book and couldn’t write their names until about 3.

They’re all very bright but I don’t think any would have been identified as gifted.

Certainly very bright, but the trajectory is unpredictable. I was a pretty thick kid as far as I can tell and completely changed at about 13/14, when all my school work was dead easy. So was uni, but I mostly got drunk because I was bored. Who knows how things turn out.

My DB was like this, super super bright. The early “spontaneous” reading is a big clue, my DB the same. Early brilliance with cryptic crosswords, chess, Rubiks cubes. Astonishing at computing and electronics and math and ended up at Oxbridge then had a technical career. He was extremely difficult to live with (found state primary a challenge and then as a teenager as his ability to mix with people was very poor). Struggled socially his entire life and is a tricky person to be around (managed to get married but he was so selfish she left, and he just doesn’t understand people eg didn’t come to his mum’s funeral because he “isn’t good at that kind of thing” etc).

Nevertheless I love my DB and I understand his difference is both his strength and his weakness. My mum loved bringing him up and nurturing his abilities - very rewarding if also sometimes very painful parenting a child like this.

One of my autistic children was the most chill kid you could ever meet. Never had social difficulties until the preteens. It's just not a guarantee. They were also highly gifted and hyperlexic.

Don't forget that gifted doesn't exclude them having learning difficulties in other areas, even full on learning disorders or other kinds of issues.

I was hyperlexic and diagnosed gifted but also have a degree of dyscalculia.

My DS was like this too. He had a habit of correcting adults who used more childlike words for things eg a friend once pointed to picture book and told DS to look at the tractor. DS very quickly advised them it was not a tractor but a combine harvester - at the age of 2.
He also taught himself to read. And like many PPs he was diagnosed as having ASD at 7.

I honestly don’t think you’re going to know until later. Very early starters like your child sometimes even out later and their peers catch up. I do know of one child who was reading chapter books at preschool and is now Carol Vorderman smart. So I’d say wait and see 😎

Oh and the suspicion is that this child is Autistic.

My experience of school was very mixed too - largely because of my ADHD which wasn’t diagnosed until adulthood. I was very gifted in literature and languages but abysmal at maths and certain sciences. Somehow scraped a C in GCSE maths and A*s and As (on no revision) in everything else, got into Oxford, crashed and burned. Took a year out, was diagnosed, got medication and therapy, went back and finished my degree (also met my husband after my year out so just as well it all fell apart when it did or he and I wouldn’t have met and my lovely boy wouldn’t exist!).

I definitely wouldn’t rule out neurodivergence, even if I don’t see signs of it yet. I’ve learned to accept mine as one facet of my mirrorball self, so if that’s his path too we will do what we can to find the right accommodations to help him thrive.

One of my autistic sons was very chilled, the other much less so.
I think as children develop, their ability to mask becomes more difficult.

My DS was similar to yours at 2. He was diagnosed with ASD aged 8. He's now the most chilled teenager you could imagine. Currently sitting next to me on the sofa watching a nature documentary and eating a cereal bar. He's a joy to parent. Still very bright and thriving at secondary school.

My DS was like this and he has been diagnosed ASD. He is still very smart now at 18

@Twitch45 how lovely ♥️♥️♥️ that’s how I feel too - I am so lucky I get to parent my little boy

My high school friend was like this. Got an ex in English SATs aged 14, developed anorexia and finally got an adult diagnosis of autism.

Not sure if this is interesting or not… but my younger brother just won an award for coming top of his entire year at Oxford Uni (so must be gifted to some extent) and he couldn’t do all this at two.

I think some kids develop earlier, some develop later and you probably can’t tell loads about intelligence that early on (wasn’t Einstein in nappies until he was eight?)

Either way, he certainly sounds clever for a two year old

My ds was similar. His knowledge of dinosaurs and all things construction/blacksmithing was amazing at that age. He is 6 now and excels at maths, but is bright not gifted, I would say.

I suspect asd, diagnosis pending.

I had some of these traits as a child - was reading and writing before the age of 3, used very advanced vocabulary from a very young age, have a very good memory, etc. I am 'gifted' at language (whatever gifted means) in that I can read a whole page in one glance, can 'see' words in my head as people say them, can spell any word even if I have never seen it and so on. But I'm dyscalculic and useless at maths and spatial awareness. Can't navigate my way out of a cardboard box! So it's swings and roundabouts. I do not have an ASD diagnosis but I would say I probably have mild undiagnosed ADHD.

As others have told you, a lot of what you describe are common traits of autism, so do just keep an eye on how he develops, particularly with his social skills.

This reminded me if my son. People would say "look, a digger" and he would say "it is not a digger, it is a long reach excavator/front loader/ skid steer loader etc

He sounds like my friend’s son and I always thought he was gifted. He was reading at two, could recognise many road signs and had an amazing vocabulary. When he started school, he went straight into Year 1. He loved Maths and was so far ahead in this subject that he took his Maths lessons alone with a tutor.

At five, as well as choosing to do Maths in his spare time, he started teaching himself German from public library resources. Later, he also taught himself some Russian.

Now aged 12, he is at a private grammar school, having aced the scholarship exam despite being a year younger than most of his peers.

My son was like this. At age 4 he announced that he knew FC wasn’t real as “he couldn’t possibly get to every house even if you consider the different time zones”. Made me laugh!

As someone who works with young children, I am seriously impressed! I have come across a gifted child occasionally, not gifted in all areas like your son usually, but I don't have any gifted adults in my life so I don't really know how they turn out!

He sounds lovely and definitely gifted to me. My kids were both exceptionally bright at school. Both top of the class by a country mile in maths. They're adults now and still outstandingly clever but neither showed that kind of smarts at 2.5. Your son sounds amazing. To all the other responders that say he just sounds quite bright and nothing more, please explain what would a gifted child be capable of at 2.5? Genuinely curious.