How to tell if a child is gifted?

[IJJ]

mummyloves:

creativethinkers:

Has any parent had kids who entered Pri 1 before age of 7? Any feedback?

This is the first time i heard that kids can enter P1 b4 age 7... Is this really true??

No. Not in Singapore. Not even skipping any grade when your child progress faster than peers.

If you want to assess your child, I recommend Ovspring. http://www.ovspring.com/

They assess kids in terms of various IQs, development progress and school readiness.

I also have a child who could sing the entire ABC song at 17 month, recite numerous tang shi around 2 and full of in-depth imagination. She completed the entire N1 syllabus when she was 2 and could make all phonic sounds from A-Z (taught by school).

As the sister is in Berries, I thot of placing her there, the tr assessed her and wanted to place her in a class with kids one year older than her. I decided against it, becos I think she will still get to learn these academic stuffs as she progresses in school.

We did not do anything special to her, just expose her to various books, to wide varieties of information in both english and mandarin and to cultivate her life skills. We did not and do not plan to go in depth in academic education lest bored her too much when she enters formal school.

[smurf]

wow,,,how come so many kids are so bright now? my 15 mth boy cannot even talk now! much less recite Tang shi or timetable.should I be worry?? :shock:

[IJJ]

smurf:

wow,,,how come so many kids are so bright now? my 15 mth boy cannot even talk now! much less recite Tang shi or timetable.should I be worry?? :shock:

Not to worry, my another child spoke as late at 3 yo, yet she is still doing alright in school.

tang shi and timetable will be taught in primary schools.

[smurf]

really ar?I scared by then, too late to learn leh...while he learns timetable, other children may be learning other more advanced things ..my 4.5 yr old boy cannot even recite Tang Shi, and doesn't speak mandarin.

[ChiefKiasu]

smurf:

really ar?I scared by then, too late to learn leh...while he learns timetable, other children may be learning other more advanced things ..my 4.5 yr old boy cannot even recite Tang Shi, and doesn't speak mandarin.

smurf, you kid is perfectly fine, just like the majority of kids of his age that could not even recognise the alphabets. Remember that kindies start teaching reading and writing when the child is 5 years old. There is no need to panic at this point. You can always start him on some of the beginning English/Chinese enrichment courses now, and they should be able to help.

Remember that people peak at different ages. A child that peak too early could be in danger of early burn-out. Do you want your child to be the top PSLE scholar in the country, or do you want him to thrive in the society of the future? While academic excellence opens doors, in the end, it is character, charisma and conviction that carry the person through. Let your child peak at his own time. Support him with the foundation of confidence by being there for him when he needs you.

[pea]

Well said, Chief.


I think it doesn’t matter how early a child can learn something, as long as he learns it by the time that he needs to. Age-appropriate development is the key.

And some of us are just late developers. In the end, these people may do better than the "early geniuses" who may lose steam along the way.

[sleepy]

May not necessarily lose momentum


I know a few \"early geniuses\", still geniuses in their chosen career

Perhaps due to the leap they had over late developers?


Not here to rub salt. Just sharing my observation :siam:

[ChiefKiasu]

sleepy:

May not necessarily lose momentum


I know a few \"early geniuses\", still geniuses in their chosen career

Perhaps due to the leap they had over late developers?


Not here to rub salt. Just sharing my observation :siam:

I do not imply that early developers will fare worse than late developers. What I'm saying that academic excellence is only a facet of the overall growth of a child, and it must be built on a foundation of strong moral and character fabric. A child who cannot read at the age of 4 is not a failure by any sense of that word. The child should be encouraged to grow at the pace he/she is most comfortable with.

[IJJ]

ChiefKiasu:

The child should be encouraged to grow at the pace he/she is most comfortable with.

Exactly. Even kids from same family develop in differently ways. Just have to let nature takes its course. I am not over zealous to make my children go through advance academic learning, I see no point. There are many things to learn other than those on the text books.

[tamarind]

Some kids have superb memory and are able to learn things effortlessly. You may only have to explain things to them once, and they will understand and always remember it. Some parents even claim that they have kids who learn to read on their own. These kids truly have a gift which makes learning so easy for them.


Many children, however, need many repetitions in order to learn something new. I think that these children are the \"normal\" children. Gifted children, as mentioned above, are actually not the normal ones.

There are also a whole range of children between the gifted and the normal range. These children can actually be trained to read very early, or do advance maths, if they were drilled for many hours every day by their parents, or if they were sent to many enrichment classes.

So if a child can recite mulitplication tables up to 10 at 4 years old, or if she can recite 30 tang poems, does it mean that she is really gifted ? It actually depends on how long she took to learn all those things. Has she been drilled for many hours a day ? Or did she simply spend a few mins to memorize each tangshi and then always remember it ? Has she been asked to do many pages of maths worksheets every day ? Only the parents know best. Those \"early geniuses\" who lost steam, could be these type of children who were \"trained geniuses\". A truly gifted child will always be gifted with high learning ability and they will never lose this ability.

Nowadays with so many kids going to so many enrichment classes, it is no wonder than many kids know a lot of advanced knowledge. That is why there is this belief that there are many gifted children, especially in Singapore. But I think that how much a child already knows is not indicative of whether he or she is really gifted or not.

The indication is how fast and how thoroughly can he or she learn new things.

I have 2 kids of very different learning abilities. Some children really need more repetitions to learn compared to others. But with hardwork and consistent learning, these children can also do reasonably well in school. But as parents we should not expect them to be able to perform as well as those kids of very high learning ability. Because if we do, that will mean many many hours of drilling and studying when kids should really be enjoying their childhood. Not getting perfect scores in school does not mean that the child is not going to have a future.

There is also a type of children who are actually of high learning ability. However, they may have difficulty focusing, or they simply have too many distractions. So they may seem to take very long to learn things. However, if parents or teachers are able to motivate, or train this child to focus for longer periods of time, then the child will seem to improve tremendously, like the Chinese say : 开窍 (kai1 qiao4).

I just saw this good article in Chinese.
http://space.univs.cn/?7573/viewspace-64235.html
人要通过不断开窍才能成材。开窍就像烧开水一样是要积累的，开窍过程好比把水不断加热最后烧开了，烧开了就相当于开窍了，开窍不够就好比没把水烧开。从客观上来说，确实有人早开窍有人迟开窍，但早开窍与迟开窍最终结果都是开了窍，开了窍的人不论迟早，都是人才。社会上也不会把早开窍的人永远排在前面，会随时按态度、能力与贡献重新排队（态度是前提，能力是基础，贡献是关键）。也就是说，不论大器早成，或是大器中成，还是大器晚成，只要你是“器”就成。

　　人的一生要开好多窍，这好比每个人一生中都要烧开很多壶“水”。应试教育的环境下规定的那几壶“水”（如语文、政治、数学、物理、化学、外语必修课程），是尽量要烧开的，这些是基础，也很重要。但光烧开这几壶“水”是远远不够的。现在我们还有哪几壶“水”没烧开呢？专业技能、职业道德、创新能力等这几壶“水”非常重要，偏偏我们很多大学生就没有烧开！就目前的情况而言，社会、用人单位却是哪壶不开就提哪壶。也要看到，这几壶重要的“水”，很多学校、很多学生是不把它当作一回事的！

部分迟开窍者可能没有把学校规定的几壶“水”烧开或烧得不够热，但在学校规定范畴以外的多壶“水”可能早就烧开了。也就是说，不一定精通理论，他的隐性知识、隐性能力（如合作能力、动手能力、创新能力等）以及职业道德等素质也许未通过传统的考试得到认可，但这几方面他们可能是开了窍的。在实际工作中，这几壶“开水”往往非常重要，企业和用人单位非常在意。教育者要善于察觉迟开窍者所烧开的另几壶“水”，给予指出并鼓励。迟开窍者既要看到自己的不足，今后要注意有所加强，但也要认识到自己在某些领域是领先的，无须自卑。早开窍者除要看到自身的优势外，还要提醒自己在很多领域尚未开窍！不要自傲。

　　只有极少数早慧者是少花时间开窍的，大多数人要花很多时间才能开窍，包括很多学生在小时候便是预支甚至透支了时间的。就正常情况而言，若总体学习时间成本不变，学生还在很小时就要用超出他能承受的压力来开窍，无疑是拔苗助长。每个人都有自身不同的条件，作为教师甚至是家长，哪怕在目前还未真正做到个性化教育的情况下，我们都应有针对性地制定措施，尽可能做到因材施教。

　　然而，光开窍也不能成事。开窍就是变聪明了，但要勤奋，要学以致用，否则一事无成。我们可以这样描述：设开窍度为横坐标，设勤奋度为纵坐标，某一单独事件的开窍度与勤奋度的积就是成功度，多次的积累，便构成成功。概括地说，成材要先开窍，成功就是勤奋在聪明轴上的积分。