How to tell if a child is gifted?
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I don’t think he is gifted and there should be many children are like that too. Can you all suggest how to motivate them to study at least?
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Haha, I had trouble getting my son to do his class work too! He has been good for the past 1 week though. Think he thrives on praise (not rewards, just verbal praising and star stickers). He didn’t like doing class work and had to stay back during recess very often to complete his work/ bring home to do. According to his form teacher, he takes 20 mins to lift the pencil and 5 mins to complete his work. But end up still not enough time. Very high inertia. He also did his maths without working. And it’s not like he got it correct all the time too! I am happy just by him finishing up his class/home work. Can’t even expect him to study.
He has finally put a short rest to his science obsessions. Now finally been reading fiction books but he will quote from the books in his conversations with me. I was pretty puzzled sometimes because he mispronounced some words and he would find the book to show me the sentence/word. -
Yes, my daughter too, but WHY!?
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mashy:
he takes 20 mins to lift the pencil and 5 mins to complete his work.
My dd also like that but only at home. I must keep chasing her to kickstart :frustrated: I need to nag till I'm :mad: before she can kickstart engine. Once she started her engine, then okay I can handsoff -
sleepy:
mashy:
he takes 20 mins to lift the pencil and 5 mins to complete his work.
My dd also like that but only at home. I must keep chasing her to kickstart :frustrated: I need to nag till I'm :mad: before she can kickstart engine. Once she started her engine, then okay I can handsoff
Me too. It became a vicious cycle till I'm constantly mad with him. It got to really unhealthy levels where I was caning him everyday for not doing his class work. Anyway, I decided to take a step back and told my hb he had to take over before I kill my ds. My hb's mtds suited my boy better and he has been so much better ever since. So I've been trying to refrain from using the cane now. Things are much happier at home now.
hope it lasts. :xedfingers:
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Mychildren:
I don't think he is gifted and there should be many children are like that too. Can you all suggest how to motivate them to study at least?
My boy is 3.5 years old, we're homeschooling. Some ideas for motivating a child to learn / practice that may be useful even for older children:
- create a high and positive energy level at home, make learning sound interesting, instead of a chore. Nagging tends to dampen the mood. Encourage, do some singing / dancing / light warm up exercises before homework time, and move to more serious learning
- identify the child's interest and link the learning to those interests. E.g. Child loves Thomas train, illustrate math concepts with trains, wheels, engines, etc.
- be a role model by learning, reading and doing serious work near the child. When the child asks, explain why learning, etc. is important in life. The child will model after the parent. Can set aside time to do this tasks side by side. E.g. Child practises math while parent tallies family expenses for the week. This is a great way to show the relevance of the subject to real life.
- create a conducive learning environment at home. For us, we encourage screen-free activities. Our TV is covered with a huge cloth, rarely turned on, except for watching the recent Olympic games for sports knowledge exposure. No iPad / iPhone, etc. unless I'm unable to prepare hands on learning materials. A big variety of books, puzzles, card games, stationery, Montessori hands on materials displayed on shelves, and rotated on a regular basis. The child helps himself to the materials and develops interest in learning. Tie in the activities to what's covered in books.
Toys are kept separately from more purposeful learning materials. The general idea is finish work then move to outdoor activities / indoor playing. Every day, there's time for work and for play, just need to prioritise.
E.g. When my child is playing and asks me to accompany him, and I'm washing dishes, I'd reply that Mummy needs to finish work then can play. He asks, \"Why?\" I'd paint the scenario where no one washes the dishes and only keeps playing. How? He'd understand the importance of working and learning, before play.
After using these method, my young child is generally self-motivated to learn, do work and practice. In my opinion, this is an important life skill. Hope this helps!
P.S. Btw, I recently started a blog to share our homeschooling journey for 0-6 years old. In case you're interested, it's MummysHomeschool.com. -
MieVee,
Thank you & will execute your advise. Interesting & will visit your website when my children in school on the weekdays. Cause currently, busy. Thanks for sharing. That's very kind of you.
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mashy:
Hi Marshy,
He has finally put a short rest to his science obsessions. Now finally been reading fiction books but he will quote from the books in his conversations with me. I was pretty puzzled sometimes because he mispronounced some words and he would find the book to show me the sentence/word.
Just wonder if you get \" Horrible Science\" \"for your boy. If you havent then I have gut feeling he would enjoy books in these series. -
Mychildren:
[/quote]It is interesting that many parents share the same encounter with their little ones not wanting to do things repeatedly. I am not sure why, but ALL my five kids are like that too. Thing is, most kids learn to be bored in school, any school and the more gifted or the faster a kid learns concept, the more bored he is.
My 2nd DS is like those highlighted in blue. My concern is how to deal with him? He can scored very high marks or can even near to fail for the same subject. So its kind of scared me. Don't really know how to handle him sometimes and his teacher always complain he cannot sit properly in class. In Singapore, the system is that you need to pass or get good marks so I kind of worried for him. :sick:linden2000:
[quote=\"Chenonceau\"]
Agree. They do not like drilling and can get very poor grades.
Especially in lower primary, when a lot of the focus is on handwriting and punctuation, they can get frustrated when many marks are deducted for punctuation mistakes or bad handwriting.
For Maths, they may be able to figure out the answers in their head but do not write down the workings or jump steps and hence, lose many marks though they get the final answers right. Similarly for Science, they may have the vast knowledge in their heads but when answering the questions do not write down the key words which the markers look out for and so still do not get the marks.
And for some gifted children, because they are so used to acquiring knowledge fast when they are younger, may give up more easily when stumped by difficult material when they are older. Some gifted children are underachievers.
I read an article once. Have you watched a movie in slow motion? It is ok if that lasts for just a few seconds, but imagine watching the whole movie in slow motion, then anyone of us will get bored, tired and unlisted. Now, imagine if you have a kid who simply cannot catch... the whole movie is like people talking like chipmunks. Schools are like this for most kids, either in slow motion, or everyone talking like chipmunks.
On the way from a uni class yesterday, I asked my 12 year old if he preferred the primary school he is attending or the university courses he attends. He pondered for a while and said that if he had to choose, then he'd prefer the primary school graduating class. He could buy rubbish, talk rots, and have fun during recess. In the uni, he only listens to lectures, do the tutorials and then go home. There's nothing to play. So, I asked if he would rather not go to uni. He said he wanted to go, because in his primary school class, his teacher puts up a question and he or one other kid will get the answer within seconds, but they will have to wait for the rest to finish it, wait for teacher to explain it, which sometimes takes another 30 minutes. He will see all the rest of the questions on the board and he would have solved all of them in 10 minutes, but the lesson lasts 40 minutes and they would have to do the homework. The good thing is, he just pencils down everything at the end of the class, and his homework time is less than 10 minutes.
He said he felt bad some of them are struggling, even though this is a classroom of gifted mathematics and at 12, they are already doing trigonometry and logorithms, which are covered only in Sec 3 or so in most sec schools in Singapore. But you see, he has to learn to slow down, tame his 'norms', so that he can blend in and be accepted during recess and PE.
In the uni, he is given all the topics at one go. When the lecturer is at chapter1.4, he is already reading 2.5. By the end of mid-term, he is already done with the whole year's work. And the beauty is, it is OK. The lecturer knows him and allows him to move at his own pace. He is allowed to contribute his own thoughts and weird ways of solving questions, (Without working) and explain them. They are never marked wrong, as long as they are right. Now here's the problem only in Singapore: once upon a time (when I was young), as long as you got the right answers, you got the marks, and if your answers were wrong, they would give you part marks for steps. Now, even if you get the answers right, and the steps are not shown, marks are deducted. I had thought that maybe my understanding got messed up along the way. Fortunately, having spoken to a few Math professors locally and overseas, I have confirmed that. Yes, steps are important, but only as important as it is to show your understanding, and how you get your answer. If you can get there within 2 steps and others 5, then you should never be penalized, as long as your 2 steps are logical and comprehensible.
You see, forcing a child to conform to a certain way of doing things is taking away his need to express his thoughts, even in math. We can all solve the question in multiple ways. So, yes, I do have a problem of us insisting giving marks for steps. Some people have ways to jump, especially kids, and they should never be penalized, especially if the adult does not understand. Adults are taught how to solve problems, kids use their intuition.. O well, I can dwell on this forever and will never win this argument with school teachers, so be it... :roll:
I guess, we are fortunate to find a balance. A lot of gifted kids would have lost their enthusiasm and joy of learning in the boring process. We are fortunate that DS managed to earn enough credentials and credibility for professors to listen to his ways of solving problems. Unfortunately, for every one of him, many thousands of children would have their creativity killed. :sad: I hope that you will find ways to make the boring process interesting for the child, and find a sweet balance somewhere. For us, it was a long, long journey, and I am not even sure we have already landed anywhere...
As for drilling... only for exams, and only for 10-30 minutes a day, if I don't want a jumping, temper throwing child and tons of reasoning from him why he need not do them as he has already mastered those things. But he has done well for tests, so why drill? I don't need 100 marks, and he really already knows his work. Besides, if I drill him, he will lose interest altogether and it will take so much more effort to get that back. -
Perhaps one of the best ways to stop complaining of repetitive is to make them learn a total NEW thing, such as filling up Pascal’s Triangle, create own number pattern, working out probability rate in that triangle, doing Pythagoras’s theorem, or even doing binomial expansion…I might be crazy and I don’t know if age has overtaken my intelligence or my brain’s function has been degenerating of late, BUT what I certainly notice is my daughter is capable of what I apprehend but not so for me in reverse…perhaps I have lost my mine!? Who knows? This is how I stop her from whining/complaining repetitive.
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