Growing Pains of a Maths Genius, BBC 3 Tonight

[suburbandream]

www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-15482101
This looks interesting, about a teenage boy with Asperger's. My DS2 has Aspergers but is definitely not a maths genius - I'm hoping it will give us an interesting insight into the life of ASD adolescents though.

Thanks for that :)

Thanks. No geniuses here either.

very interesting that the professor from Cambridge said NOT to do courses and qualifications early but to do enrichment instead. Wonder what they'd make of that on the g&t board
My ds has a high IQ but is totally disengaged from formal education. I'll be happy with maths GCSE if he manages that!

Thanks sound interesting

it's started. seems a real sweetie

Thanks for that. Will have to view on iPlayer.

Just watched it on the iplayer here very good.

Thanks

I'm glad I stumbled upon that after I ifnished my University Challenge/Only Connectathon, last night. It was very interesting.

The support teacher in the ASD unit was so patient with the boys and the professor from Cambridge was great and very wise.

DS1 has a real gift for maths. He's not quite 8, yet, but finds most primary school maths concepts fairly straightforward. His weakness is language, too, so we're happy to do extended versions of what the rest of his class does at school, with lots of repetition and different ways around of doing things or asking the same question and we pick up on following his maths interest at home, using real situations to pique his interest in new ideas and giving him the resources to do his human calculator things when he needs to - he almost treats it like a stim!

(And most of the sensible people on the G&T board are very much into enrichment and acknowledge that it's important to have a balance between enrichment and pushing forwards)

He was a lovely wee boy, and I loved his cool, laid back parents, so positive.

It was very helpful for DP and I to watch, a week after our own DS1 (4.4) has been diagnosed with ASD.

Feel really kinda happy and content now, I have a warm glow!

Liked the Cambridge guy when he was recommending a summer camp talking about if there'd be anyone there with ASD / Aspergers "oh, they all do"

Agree about maths students being weird, too. There were two of them on my corridor in university halls and they were both very weird indeed!

I loved his friends comment about not needing a friend to get through school but an ak-47 . He is a lovely boy and I'm glad that the professor persuaded him that there is more to life than bits of paper, seemed silly to get a degree at that age when he was so stressed by it.

Just watched it on i player.Lovely programme. DS is definitely not a genius of any kind, but I saw a lot ofhis behaviour in both the boys.

We watched it too - thanks for the link.
DS liked the bit about the AK -47 too - it's the sort of comment he would make too!
Take my hat off to his parents helping him with degree level maths - I have spent the last 2 weeks struggling to help DS (14)with GCSE maths revision for his exam next week, and wondering if 'fast-track' maths was really worth the bother!!!
Thought the professors were all very lovely as well as open and honest - especially as it is probably unusual for them to be dealing with such a young student.

I watched it too, Cameron is a lovely boy but is doing too much too soon that he might end up with burnout at 20. I did feel that his parents were a bit pushy tbh, and at times did not see him as a 13 year old kid with his life ahead of him.

piglet mania I agree about his parents, they were rightly proud of his fantastic achievement but HE'S JUST A TEENAGER and needs a lot more "educational" input on the social side of his condition. I was thrilled to see he'd met a friend who clearly, was on the same wavelength.

Cameron was so stressed by his need to achieve that degree. He was pushing himself too, too hard and the Cambridge math guy put it beautifully to him and hopefully, at 18, he will go on to get that degree at Cambridge.

I could see so much of my boy in him. Mannerisms, the awkward gait, the speech patterns. My ds has ASD (high functioning) and OCD (from being pushed too far to achieve, IMO). He's ten.

yes I thought that same ... he wasn't emotionally ready for a degree.

I'm glad lots of you have seen it - I've had a manic week and haven't actually finished watching it yet. He is such a lovely boy and I felt so sad for him when he was getting really stressed about his OU assignments - really reminded me of how stressed DS2 gets . I love the head teacher, she has such a great way of dealing with the boys.

Oh I want to watch it. Has it already been on?

There's a link further up the discussion from me with a link to the iplayer to watch again. :)

Tbh if that degree was making my ds that stressed I would have told him to pack it in, and wait until he is 18-19. He is only a little boy, yes extremely intelligent and clever, but nevertheless a child. I just felt that his parents were hothousing him tbh and they did not ask him how he felt, whether he wanted to carry on.

I loved the bit when the dad said jokingly 'they want gifted not weird!' and Cameron said ' how about both?!!'

bless!

Yeah....I loved that bit. I've been criticised for saying to my ds "and quit with the weird stuff" when he CAN control it. Weird is a word my son's going to hear throughout his life!

Just caught up with it on iPlayer. I agree with LaDolche and pigletmania - I felt it was quite cruel to allow Cameron to put himself under so much pressure. I think there's always a temptation to allow children with AS to use their gift/special interest to build achievements to boost their self-esteem. But there's a lot of research to show that it's social skills, not academic skills/cognitive levels which predicts the future success of adults with AS (success in the sense of living independently, working and having good mental health). I'm not convinced that he was getting enough support in developing independence and social skills, and the academic demands prevented him from having enough time to focus on them.