WEDNESDAY
CHANNEL 4
AN UPDATE ON THE CHILDREN FROM LAST YEAR
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Documentary
Child Genius Wednesday 16 April
9:00pm - 10:00pm
Channel 4
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The subtitle of this series about megabrained children is "young and gifted", but by the end you half-wonder if it should be "young and cursed". We're catching up with kids we met in the last series - chess champ Peter (11), who wears a "genius in training" T-shirt, Adam (eight), who dissects rats in the kitchen, and Mikhail (five), who as Britain's youngest Mensa member has appeared on Oprah and Countdown. We also meet Georgia, who toppled Mikhail as Britain's youngest Mensa member. At two, she was measured with an IQ of 152 - impressive given that, being a toddler, she fell asleep halfway through the test. Her mother notes that "a lot of the pictures we take of Georgia have this white light around her . . ." That's the thing: inevitably, parents become caught up in making their gifted children into mini-celebrities, especially when TV crews get involved. It makes for fascinating TV; whether it's great for the pressure-cooker kids is another matter.
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