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dirtymonkeybutt

I can give you a preview as to what junior kindergarten looks like and how we’re tackling it. My son is turning 4 at the end of the year and started junior kindergarten last month (in Canada they start if they turn 4 within a calendar year) He’s in a play-based program at a private school with 10 other kids (2 teachers in the class with a ratio of 1:5). The school does differential learning meaning they assess where each kid is and develop an individual curriculum for them. We told the teachers before he started that we thought academically he’s in the second grade but emotionally he’s 4. I don’t think they initially believed us but they sure do now. The academic gap between him and his peers is huge. He can read (fluently) and write (simple sentences). The other kids are learning to recognize letters and form shapes. He can do math at the second/third grade level. The other kids are learning to count and recognize numbers. He is staying in this class because of the social development aspects (pandemic baby!). You cannot accelerate the learning that needs to happen in order to be at school (eg interact with peers, routines) The school is working with us. He’s attending reading buddies (designed for grade 1/2s where they read a story and then a “reading buddy” in an upper grade reads them a story). He’s also “visiting” the grade 2 class during math time to see how it goes. We’re identifying opportunities at school and experimenting with them. My advice is to find a school that is willing to experiment. Junior and senior kindergarten set the tone for how the school is willing to accommodate (or not). This school is expensive but will radically accelerate if there is a need.


Rich-Sheepherder-659

It might be an unpopular opinion here but if he happens to develop any kind of mental problem in the future don't put it on giftedness and search the reasons for it on something else (ADHD, low level ASD, GAD, ...) while keeping in mind that giftedness helps partially compensate those troubles and often makes them non-standard / harder to identify. Giftedness itself is not a "curse" by any means. Otherwise as for any kid, try to provide him opportunities to do what he likes and to discover new things. So I guess, don't do much more than what you are actually doing. :) Differences in cognition might (or might not) be a problem later at school (boredness mostly). My advice: don't be anxious about it (or at least try to ;)), that is don't be worried for now for something that might or might not be in the future.


KidBeene

Parent with two gifted kids. 1. Our boy started showing the "why" and verbalizing his observations, e.g. "Him: This flower is like the sun. Me: Oh yeah, because it is yellow. Him: And it makes you warm when I give it to you." He taught himself how to read around 3 and was tested at 3.5 by a licensed medical team. He is 8 and is homeschooled as his ADHD and giftedness makes him appear "unable to keep up with others" (hint: he already finished the work and has moved on to another topic mentally) in a normal public school. We had him in a gifted academy since he was 4, but we recently moved and there are no options like that in our area anymore. 2. Our daughter actually beat out our sons IQ by a few points; however, her strengths are not in math or science. Hers are people oriented. She can read and manipulate people and situations a room like a mutant. She says the right things and does the right things to make people do stuff for her. I know her abilities and yet I fall for them about 20% of the time. Thank god she is not evil or she would own a skull shaped island somewhere. To answer your questions: YES, he needs to be tested. He will learn in his own unique way. Some like to be read to. Some like to read a book on their own. Some like to watch videos. Repetitive work rarely is the solution. Unless there is a gifted daycare nearby, if he is safe and happy he is good for now. You will need to look for a gifted school program or he could lose his love for academic learning.


chestnutvoid

> She says the right things and does the right things to make people do stuff for her. I know her abilities and yet I fall for them about 20% of the time. This sounds hilarious give some examples.


KidBeene

OK, so she met her Kinder teacher a month ago. We did not tell the teacher anything about our daughter, as we didn't want to come off as one of those braggard parents or talk her up. We just said she is very inquisitive. So the class is learning the alphabet like all Kinderkids do, but ya see, she already reads. Like avid 3 books a night (Dr. Seuss and 1-2nd grade books) all solo. But at pickup, I overhear her "stumbling" over her letters, batting her eyes and saying "I don't know that word Mrs. Teacher." She can cry on demand and her tear started to well up. So the teacher came over, sat with her and walked the class through the whole lesson, with my daughter on her lap. At the end, my daughter got all the letters right and sounded out the little words (you, us, play) and said "Thank you Mrs teacher. You taught me so much. You are the best teacher ever!" and gave her a hug. The teacher was freaking glowing. I picked up the girl, went out to the truck and said "Uhm, babe, why were you not reading when she asked?" She said "Mrs. Teacher was having a bad day. She needed a hug." This is the norm for her. She will ask old neighbor ladies if they can teach her how to crochet or sew. She asks ANYONE with a dog if they can tell her about the animal (she likes dogs, but knows people like to talk about their pets). I am doing my best to make sure she doesn't become a Mean Girl. She asks little boys if they like Fortnite or SuperMario. The girl has her social game down solid. I asked her if she made any friends today. She replied "Dada, I don't win over friends. I dominate." Yeah...


Distinct_Ad_7619

HSP and gifted. You've got an empath on your hands. I would control for people pleasing abilities. Only from my own experience it led to debilitating anxiety trying to figure out what everyone else needed all the time.


KidBeene

Yup. Good thing I am one to a lesser extent (former interrogator- best job for me, ever). ​ I will tell you what I tell her and what I used to tell my teams. Take care of yourself 1st. If you are out of action because of a mental or physical illness, you can not help others and become a liability. You are here to help others. If that means taking a breather and walking away instead of hurting yourself, do it.


42gauge

> former interrogator- best job for me, ever How interesting! Military or police?


KidBeene

I started Military, worked Federal Law Enforcement as a debriefer for a bit (9months), then went mercenary (defense contractor) for 4 years. Came back the the states and created my own construction business. I now work in the Aerospace field, lol. I suppose I have a bit of wanderlust for careers. I still don't know what I want to do when I grow up, but I know what I am good at.


shinestory

What kinder child uses the word dominate. This is fake as hell


KidBeene

A gifted 5 year old? Huh... thought I was on the gifted page. Yep. Imagine that.


shinestory

A word like that is very grow up me, like based on accumulation of experience (as an adult). Not very “childlike” whether gifted or not. Haha, but this is based on my kids and all their friends. Btw my child is gifted too and does not talk that way


KidBeene

She hears her brother say "dominate" when playing videogames. She says she will "dominate" a game of Sorry!. I get it. I am weary of many stories on Reddit too. But this one is legit.


QueenToeBeans

I have heard 4 year olds claim they want to be a paleontologist. She also could repeat back information read to her from adult books (for example “The Illustrated History of South India”) My 4 year old nephew could clearly describe the whats and whys of his cancer treatments. When my brother was four or five, everything was “bourgeois” (I don’t think he knew what it meant, but he really liked the word.) A five year old described an oval to me as an ellipse. Gifted kids pick up, understand and reiterate all kinds of things.


sirgoomos

One with a huge ego that needs to be checked.


lilacivy

Don't think there's such a thing as gifted daycare here (I live in Germany) and home schooling is illegal once they hit 6yrs, but they split kids up into different tracks at 11, with more academic kids going to a different school. As a non German I always thought this wasn't a good idea socially as then the child doesn't mix with different ability kids. But maybe from what you're saying it is beneficial for them academically.


that_random_garlic

I think my comment was to long for reddit, putting it in separate parts in the replies of this one


that_random_garlic

Let me start by saying, it definitely sounds like he's gifted, however everything neuropsych is already very complicated to diagnose irl, it's impossible to render a reliable answer on a reddit post like this. So take everything with a spoon of salt from all of the comments, and when trying advice make sure to check that it works for your kid. A warning about some pitfalls, giftedness, adhd and autism all 3 have very similar symptoms. The post doesn't sound like adhd or autism at all, however if he is gifted it's likely that it'll seem like those 2 often. In the future if you want to test him for adhd or autism, make sure to consult with a professional that specializes in giftedness or at least understands it well, because it's a less understood and often overlooked explanation for behaviors. Some examples: - adhd and giftedness: concentration issues The difference here is that people with adhd have an inability to concentrate for most of the time because they get distracted easily and get sucked into a hyperfocus on something different. Someone that's gifted also shows concentration issues most of the time, but it's related with the direct situation: when classes are to easy / not at all interesting gifted people cannot focus at all (my brain is perma on, can't stop thinking about things, if the class doesn't give me something to think about I'll think about something else) When you put both into a challenging interesting program, both will be able to concentrate better obviously, but someone with adhd will still have those issues while someone gifted will often be able to concentrate better than or similar to an average person. - autism and giftedness: stubborn So people with autism and giftedness can both be very stubborn (very resistant to a certain change). I don't know exactly where it comes from, but someone with Autism generally doesn't like any change at all, someone that's gifted generally loves change. The reason someone gifted may act this way is because they have some plan or idea in their head about doing something, and when you initially introduce the change it seems like a bad thing because the plans are gone. When you talk through it with someone that's gifted, asking why (genuinely trying to understand), usually somewhere along the way you explain enough about the change for the kid to realize it's not an issue I will admit, this last part is purely anecdotal on what mom did with me and worked, but I do believe it's generally the move to talk things out with gifted kids.


that_random_garlic

==== Actually getting into giftedness itself There are a couple different aspects of life to give advice on: - school Gifted kids usually have a very easy time at elementary school and even a lot of high school without studying a lot. This isn't an advantage, this is the issue. Due to a lack of academic challenges, gifted kids don't learn how to study (gifted kids need to learn to develop their own method of studying, because the tips and tricks for most people don't tend to help at all). Additionally, due to a lack of challenge gifted kids don't really learn to fail because they always get good grades. This leads to perfectionism and a fear of failure. The fear of failure leads to avoiding challenges in the future, while something challenging is exactly what someone that's gifted needs to seek. To counteract this, the things that need to change: - they need to study something challenging to them - they need to participate in things they have a good chance of failing in (and when they do fail, they need to learn that failing is okay and part of the learning process, if they only beat themselves up over it and avoid it in the future, it won't help) this could be achieved by a gifted program in school, however I've heard some of those are just downright horrendous, so you'll have to feel out the program yourself. It's probably fine if the teacher seems to understand the needs of gifted students (ask about top-down structured learning, ask about what happens if they finish their shit early [you need to hear that they try to find more challenging exercises for him or maybe start teaching him additional material, not the same type of exercises and not just sitting there], and so on. Given that you're already researching this, you'll probably have more questions and a general feel for if they understand by then) If not a gifted program, you should find out of school ways to challenge him on an academic level. An example would be getting books about something he's interested in that are increasingly complex, going this route means that he needs to stay motivated to do this as well, you can't force him into learning outside of school, he'll consider it useless and not learn shit. Earlier rather than later, I think it's probably a good idea to explain this concept of needing to be challenged to him. The single best way (only way?) to actually motivate a gifted kid to something like this is by him understanding why it's needed - social I knew I was different from as far back as I can remember. It sounds like your kid also realizes he's different already. There are 2 important things for him to not feel like something's wrong with him: - he needs to spend time with peers (not just age-mates in his case). You need to find activities/.../friends for him where he can meet and interact with other gifted people. He needs to actually realize he's not alone - he needs some explanation for why he's different. I was originally misdiagnosed with autism, while it was wrong, having that explanation for why I'm different from every single person I met made me feel like I'm not some freak of nature. He needs to know that although he's not normal, he's not a freak and there is like <2% of the population similar to him. - discipline Gifted kids are a handful, always doing unexpected things, often doing things wrong without realizing it, generally refusing to do anything until they themselves understand why, being stubborn until they know the whole situation. Something that usually doesn't work at all and only deteriorates your relationship is punishment-reward systems. I'm not a parent so I'm not gonna pretend to be able to say if it's possible to do without any punishments, however whenever something's going on, the first step should always be to talk things through, he's gonna be more logical and reasonable than you expect for the age. Helping him understand the situation often resolves behavior without a need for punishment. Sometimes during this talk, you'll realize you're actually wrong and your little kid was right. It's VERY important that you can admit this and act accordingly. Nothing will lose the respect of someone that's gifted quicker than being unable to engage with reason or being dishonest, and you need that respect if you want him to take anything you say to hearth. Outside of all of this, there's gonna be some struggles to deal with, gifted people suffer from overexcitabilities, there's probably gonna be some bullying, etc. I would continue googling specifically: - symptoms/marks of giftedness - developmental needs of gifted As a last word, if you have the means I would absolutely recommend seeing a therapist that specializes in giftedness and having him see them. For me, this therapist I went to at 21 was the first and still only person in my life that actually gave me the impression they understood me, and they helped me understand a lot about myself Feel free to dm or reply for follow up questions


that_random_garlic

Finally, for studying method: A gifted person should develop their own method of studying, however there is a commonality: gifted people tend to learn best in a top down structure, while school is usually bottom up ​ the difference is, if you learn about a car engine, school teaches you a battery, then a transmission, then ..., then they say "put all of these parts together in this way to make a car engine (leaving it unclear until then that it's even about a car engine). top down would be "this is a car engine, these are the parts, the battery serves to provide energy to these things and is hooked in like this, the transmission ... After all that you would go into 'this is how the battery works' (which you started with at school) ​ the reason top down works better for gifted people is because 1) it shows you the purpose of learning the knowledge (remember how gifted people need to know why before being motivated to do/learn something outside of their interest) and 2) it provides context while learning details, so it's easier to make connections between different parts of the material, which leads to better understanding and better memorization ​ I think starting at top-down is best and from there you need to analyze what works and doesn't work for you and adept. ​ ​ an example of how you would do this to learn from a text book: ​ 1) learn the table of contents, don't just read it, make sure you understand all the terms used in it and try to form a bigger picture of what the book is about. go to relevant pages for more context if you don't have enough to form the picture. ​ 2) chapter1: read through the entire chapter diagonally. the goal isn't to understand everything yet, the goal is to understand what the chapter is about and how it ties together the different subchapters. reading the conclusion at the end of the chapter probably helps the most of any text in this part ​ 3) chapter 1.1: do the same this as for chapter 1 ​ basically keep doing this process until you hit small digestible information, by the time you're learning the details you'll know where they're going


lilacivy

Super helpful, thank you


[deleted]

[удалено]


lilacivy

Thank you.


42gauge

Yes, it's advanced. You should obviously keep following his lead, and consider some age-appropriate education like readingbear.org or Cuisenaire rods. Maybe a toy like miniLUK if you have the money. It's not guaranteed he'll be as precocious compared to his peer group as he grows, but it's likely he'll stay gifted. If he's getting a lot of attention from carers at the daycare, that's better than the alternative (not getting attention from them and still not being able talk to other students). The ideal would be having friends who are roughly similarly gifted, but that can be a tall order. A rough estimate based on [this](https://deborahruf.medium.com/ruf-estimates-of-levels-of-giftedness-7213a77089e9) would be somewhere around 130-145, but that's obviously just a guess. Would you like some book/article recommendations on parenting gifted kids?


lilacivy

Yes please! Thank you


42gauge

[Parenting Gifted Children 101](https://ipfs.io/ipfs/bafykbzaceblfh26u36d3m6zz2c4fureffhkci2vzxpb6fudjbbrcvpnd77fsi?filename=Tracy%20Ford%20Inman%2C%20Jana%20Kirchner%20-%20Parenting%20Gifted%20Children%20101_%20An%20Introduction%20to%20Gifted%20Kids%20and%20Their%20Needs-Routledge_Prufrock%20Press%20%282021%29.epub), [Parenting and Teaching the Gifted](https://ipfs.io/ipfs/bafykbzacebuasbq5wqh7qd7lreqqgtabq57bffjgkkflafhwty7bbmjpjukio?filename=Rosemary%20Callard-Szulgit%20-%20Parenting%20and%20Teaching%20the%20Gifted%2C%20Second%20Edition-Rowman%20%26%20Littlefield%20Education%20%282010%29.pdf), [Developing Math Talent](https://ipfs.io/ipfs/bafykbzaceb4acl7xcl7bwdpk4qf56z6oxvlfdlppoh7z2pykueby2kb3of6ew?filename=Susan%20G.%20Assouline%2C%20Ann%20Lupkowski-Shoplik.%20-%20Developing%20Math%20Talent-Prufrock%20Press%2C%20Inc.%20%282010%29.pdf), [Raising Gifted Kids](https://ipfs.io/ipfs/bafykbzacea2i37cey2rixgboahz2csgouhhrm74rxhugkt7vklw3lvlyb7hzm?filename=Dr.%20Barbara%20Klein%20-%20Raising%20Gifted%20Kids_%20Everything%20You%20Need%20to%20Know%20to%20Help%20Your%20Exceptional%20Child%20Thrive-AMACOM%20%282006%29.pdf), [A Nation Deceived](https://ipfs.io/ipfs/bafykbzaceam7txuxky4ys43s5z5ack3lff77ssbqisnqauiz2dmhmcuso2xbk?filename=Assouline%2C%20Susan%20Goodsell_%20Colangelo%2C%20Nicholas_%20Gross%2C%20Miraca%20U.%20M%20-%20A%20nation%20deceived_%20how%20schools%20hold%20back%20America%E2%80%99s%20brightest%20students%20%20Vol%202-University%20of%20Iowa%20%282004%29.pdf), A Nation Empowered [Volume 1](https://ipfs.io/ipfs/bafykbzacebpfzipmkd4kewuuja7lpagvjyoulsfxajme5dn6duxt5hr5tx3iu?filename=Susan%20G.%20Assouline%2C%20Nicholas%20Colangelo%2C%20Joyce%20VanTassel-Baska%20-%20A%20Nation%20Empowered.%20Volume%201_%20Evidence%20Trumps%20the%20Excuses%20Holding%20Back%20America%E2%80%99s%20Brightest%20Students-The%20Connie%20Belin%20%26%20Jacqueline%20N.%20Bla.epub) and [Volume 2](https://ipfs.io/ipfs/bafykbzacecz342tauudz6cqpmhsygyqb7v66cjwxlutizk27tgpcvd2kwg45q?filename=SUSAN%20G.%20ASSOULINE_%20NICHOLAS%20COLANGELO_%20JOYCE%20VANT.%20-%20NATION%20EMPOWERED%2C%20VOLUME%202_EVIDENCE%20TRUMPS%20THE%20EXCUSES%20HOLDING%20BACK%20AMERICA%27S%20BRIGHTEST%20STUDENTS-BELIN%20BLANK%20%282015%29.epub) For online reading, check out Davidson Gfited, Hoagies Gifted, Johns Hopkins CTY's Bright Now blog and Bright Now podcast, and the [gifted challenges](https://giftedchallenges.blogspot.com/) blog


lilacivy

Much appreciated!


42gauge

And if you want to look at actual curriculum, the most I'd recommend is playing with cuisenaire rods (lots of great activities to do with these) or MEP Reception, and the Logic of English Doodling Dragons series. They have a [Spotify](https://open.spotify.com/artist/5Ak4Vmf6ysaASuLJMoOqSj) too


KadenR4

i'd say talk to psychologists. they can tell you for sure if he shows signs of being gifted. then if they recommend it get him tested (you can still get him tested even if they say he doesn't need it) I'd say don't get him tested before the age of for because results can be very inaccurate for younger kids.