Do you think your children are brighter than you are?

[cyrene]

I went to a pretty crappy university and came out with a 2.2 after working really hard throughout school and coming from a council estate.

My three kids have done very well in school (not boasting before the inevitable), one at Oxbridge, another doing dentistry, and the other a medic.

So yes, I think they are brighter than me. Will anyone else admit it ?

You should wish your child to be more intelligent than you.

But as a PP has pointed out IQ reverts to the mean. So, if you have above average intelligence your children will probably be less bright than you. That's balanced by all the activities good parents do with their kids plus supporting their education and giving them as many opportunities as you can. The children of Nobel prize winners tend not to win Nobel prizes (unless they are called Curie!) but don't end up in insecure manual jobs either.

Can we ignore what I said last night? Shouldn't post after a couple of glasses of wine. Apparently it turns me boastful

OhYouBadBadKitten no you can be rightfully proud of your scrabbles skills

well, ok. They are pretty epic!

DS1 is brighter than me and I think will do really well (he's only 11 at the moment). DS2 has dyslexia (and I also suspect dyspraxia and ADD), and he struggles a lot with school work due to his inattention and difficulty with reading and writing. Intelligence-wise I think he's fairly average. He's only 7, so I hope he'll do okay at school, but at the moment I have no idea how he'll turn out.

Isn't there a difference between being academic and intelligent, clearly with varying degress of overlap?

I think potentially both DC are brighter than us but I think they had a mre enriched and less disrupted upbringing. However, both are rather lazy, so whether that translates into better academic results ultimately is another matter.

However, DS already trounces us in University Challenge (and we have very good general knowledge individually and collectively) which has come as a shock, particularly as he is rarely to be found reading the paper or a book!

It's been said that there's 9 different types of intellect that we all possess to one degree or another. That it's quite possible to be very intellectual in one or some types and much lower in others.

Nico, that's so true.

No probably not. I liked learning for the sake of it and they don’t . I know lots of people who went to Oxford or Cambridge university but their children are often quite normally average or some have special needs. A few dropped out of education altogether - nothing after GCSEs. Depends how you measure intelligence.

I reckon I'm still the cleverest person in the house.
On a good day the rest would all admit it, too.

DC2 has best people skills. DC3 has a huge responsibility streak. DC1 does his duty, DC4 is kind. DH has a big pile of skills I lack. But I'm still the clever clogs :).

My dd isn’t- but she has always had a fantastic work ethic. Ds is- his brain works so well and makes such brilliant leaps....

I don’t think there’s any straightforward correlation. My parents both left school at 12 and were functionally illiterate during my childhood — it’s hard to judge how their intelligence would have developed with better literacy. They weren’t able to help with homework, there was never anywhere quiet to do it at home, and I went to the local failing schools with demoralised teachers struggling with discipline.

Yet I have four degrees, two Oxbridge, all on scholarships, and work in a ‘clever’professional career, and my DH is similar. Our seven year old is curious, thoughtful, and working ‘at greater depth’ at school, but in a very different way to either parent. All I can guarantee is that he will have better support and more opportunity than I did.

OYBK - but what about Cluedo? That is the real test

hmmm, cluedo we are more even. Monopoly, I win except last time I played to go out first and despite best efforts couldn't manage it. Risk, we team up secretly against dh. Then I regret spending days trapped in a game that dd always wins.

I'm very even with my DC all of whom are almost exactly even in terms of intellect but with very different characters and skills.

Do I think my children are brighter than me? Yes.

But I think that's partly a result of the opportunities they have had growing up in a much more academic household than I did, with unlimited access to books.

I think my 4 year old is brighter than me. She is definitely better at reading and numbers than I was at her age. My husband is much brighter than me so I think she takes after him.

She seems more intelligent than me in some ways. She does very well in school and has a capacity for, maths and language, which I never had, but I feels she lacks a bit of common sense and sometimes will forget which is a lion and which is a tiger for example, Which is odd🤣

Probably. At age 3, DS borrowed MIL's car keys and tried to move the car so that he could play on the drive. He got as far as putting the keys in the ignition and putting it in gear... but he'd never spotted the turn of the key (thank God) so he didn't know how to start it!

Then again, he cracked an egg into the fish pond that same day 'to see if it would float'. So maybe not.

Not sure, my daughter may not be clever-er than I am but she's better at working. More confidence in her ability to learn something and use what she's learnt in an exam.

My son is very clever at maths/science but he doesn't have my language skills.

No. I don’t think they are brighter than me, although they might be brighter than DH. Nevertheless, I think they both have the ability to be successful in life. DD has a great work ethic, lots of confidence and excellent interpersonal skills. DS is musically gifted, good at languages and enjoys problem solving.

DS1 is definitely more academic than me and DH.

DS2 probably the same, but I suspect he's dyslexic, which makes school work and exams trickier for him.

DD, it's hard to tell. She probably is more intelligent than me, but is extremely dyslexic, but is very sharp about some things. She'll probably achieve average average GCSEs with a lot of work, but I think if she finds a job she can do verbally and that she loves she'll fly.

I was ambitious and always had to win at everything. I went to a decent uni (Reading) at undergrad and LSE at post grad. Ds1 is much brighter than me and seems to not need to try hard, the others are fairly bright but Ds1 outshines everyone. So yes he is brighter than me, naturally, the others could do with a bit more drive.

Hmm, dunno, she is definitely a ‘mini-me’ in looks and I think I sometimes expect her to be like me academically - not a genius but a strong all-rounder. She is v good at English but struggles a little more with maths but I am impressed at how she applies herself and I think what she is doing at primary we didn’t tackle until secondary.

Plus I actually think I did have some background advantages over her - one of the oldest in the year and my lovely mum who was always telling me how clever I was! I say this to DD too but she doesnt believe me! I grew up in the north in the 70s/80s and not everyone valued academic success so it was a bit easier to shine. We are in a north London suburb now with lots of middle-class parents pushing their kids, so probably DD’s achievements and talents (while fab) don’t make her stand out or seem exceptional.

She has other qualities too - more creative, musical, sporty and just generally more cool than I ever was. Ack, what can we say anyway apart from we want them to be happy, and all the brains in the world can’t guarantee that!

A fallacy that many parents fall into is the thinking of if their children go to the same university as them, then they are equally clever. This is usually regarding Oxbridge.

But the truth is, that Oxbridge is over twice as difficult to gain admittance to today than it was 10-20 years ago. That is to say, if you got into Oxbridge in 1992, there is at least a 50% chance you'd have been rejected if you were you applying today like your DC are. So give them credit if they get in, but don't necessarily discredit them if they don't get in!