Hi autumnleaf,


My son is 6.5 years old, the first one out of the 3 boys I have. It’s never easy to be parents, whether they are gifted or not. I always refrain myself from labeling my children. In the past, sometimes I need to argue with my hubby not to label him or compare him with anyone else. I guess a lot of people tend to do that: compare them, label them, always think other children are better their own! But the truth?

It’s early to tell my son’s attitude towards school work and tests though he likes to do his P1 schoolwork so far. Last year I bought a few primary school workbook, math, vocab, comprehensions etc. I had a timetable of doing which subject on which day etc, plus his homework from abacus class. At times i needed to adjust the way in order for him to complete them when reminder and nagging did not seem to work: I would let him eat his snack in sofa and go through vocab workbook with me writing down the MCQ answers for him - being his PA; sometimes I wrote some activities in a few pieces of paper, fold it, and do lucky draw with him to decide what to do first; I tried to write down the plan of the day for him; later I got him to wrote his own plan for the day; sometimes I brought him to library or Macdonal to do his work; he particularly likes to go to his friend’s house and do work…Not forgetting ice creams etc as incentive sometimes. I guess there were many other little things I did in order to make it happen as PER SCHEDULE.

Executive skills? Never heard about it. I just thought that’s natural for a kid to behave this way unless no schedule and do as they like. This year I don’t have a schedule (but he has to play piano and finish abacus in the week). I just borrow books of specific interest and purposely scatter them around so he will just pick up and read. The only additional workbook I supply is maths Olympia. After being left in a corner for a few months, I moved it to places where he can see. Sometimes he day dreams (he will go to a room and close the door, or pick up a marker or a pen and talk and write things that nobody understands), sometimes he just pick up books and read or pick up maths Olympia and do. It’s all up to him. But one thing is quite fixed: after he wakes up and comes back from school, he will play 3 GO games in iPad, followed by 15-20mins of other games (educational games hopefully as I have not been checking on him).

Really lack of executive skills? Or really not interested in the subject? His abacus homework consists of 3 parts, mental, abacus and listening. And they are too easy (mental), too dry (abacus) or too fast (listening) for him. It takes many reminders for him to do just one or two pages of abacus each day And there are 4 or 5 pages every week just for that part. He cannot focus unless I get him into his room and stay there with him and lock the door. If he is not focused, he can give me 3,4 or even more mistakes on a page which consists of 10 questions each page. After taking the advice of no over scheduling, we decided to drop this and he also agreed. So we withdrew him. After two weeks, his teacher talked to me about him being very fast and that he is very soon going to the next level which is about divisions and decimal places etc. So I asked my son and he said he wants to continue. Why? He hates repetition and drilling, but he likes to learn new stuff.

Last year I got him a second piano teacher due to some reason. So has two until now. The first one will pass every pieces every two or three weeks; whereas for the second one it could take 4,5 even more weeks before passing each song. Guess what, he clearly prefers to play the first teacher’s songs. That again means I need to push him to start practicing and remind him to go back to his piano many times. He will literally play one song and get distracted by his brothers and leaves his piano. Another problem besides repetition is his attention to details. He will check the notebook for that week and just play the song, still missing some details that could be covered last few weeks or during his lesson this week. Both teachers commented that he is talented in piano. But I think he may not be able to play perfectly and efficiently. Recently I told the second teacher to lower her standard on him as I think it may kill his interest. Last week I was told that my son was very interested in one of the very tough song (he is playing grade 4-5 songs with the second teacher) and he played very well. Also Interestingly, he has an iPad app on piano and he would spend hours playing piano following songs in that app. Again, executive skills or interest? I would think they just have their likes and dislikes even within in each subject itself. We just need go find out what interest them and what does the opposite.

Hi autumn leaf,


My hubby recommended to me some online courses before \"learning how to learn\". It's really useful to understand the science about learning. I just searched in YouTube and found some vedio published by the same author Barbara. You may want to go through it and even let your son watch it as well.

From what I can see he seems quite busy, basically just schoolwork and dinner, shower and rest, not much time to explore or pursue his own interest or to day dreaming. One of the few advices I know about gifted children is: do not over schedule them. I wonder if his interest in origami can be expanded e.g., Lego, science projects, architecture structures etc. I guess he has good fine motor skills. You may want to explore with him along that line.

To do something he really likes is important to make him happy and look forward to everyday. And hopefully the interest can be developed into some useful skills. My son has finished grade 3 piano. I never let him sit in any test. Tests may kill interest and my son does not like repetitions and drilling. So I let him carry on playing new songs and to the next level. I notice he likes music theory, so I'm exploring with teacher to teach him composition. My son has good visual spacial sense, so I just think that he may be a good GO (Weiqi) player rather than a good piano player. There are so many things we are exploring and to be explored with him.

A lot times it seems that we do not know what is the exact root cause and what is the solution in our life. What I will do is do all what I can within my control and hopefully one or few things I did will make the positive effect and turn the whole thing around. Let us think out of the box if we want our children to do so. What can we do besides exploring his real interest? Brainstorming: I will make sure no distraction when the child is at home, meaning we patents first have to stop watching tv or playing any iPhone ipad games etc; I will make sure I do self reflection on my parenting styles and even do a checklist to monitor myself and even let the child review me; I will make plans for homeschooling when it's required activate that (why not? By doing so you can break his undesirable pattern in school and save him from all the negative perceptions from teachers and peers); I will search for suitable iPad apps and let him learn and practice on that, replacing some of his additional school work; I will break his shower pattern by combining tv and shower together and let him decide how much to allocate on showering and TV; I will bring him to eat his favorite food outside occasionally; I will try to speed up the curriculum based on his request and see what will be the difference in his interest and learning attitude; I will make sure the child calls me immediately if he can not fulfill teachers' any request in school so that you can work together with him, be it to negotiate with teachers; I will make sure I have enough sleep every night so that I will have sound mind and be in good control of my own emotions.

Hi autumnleaf


He plays piano and do any other activities besides what you listed above? Do you have free supply of TV or iPad for him? Does any of family member watch TV or play iPad games etc? What’s the surrounding like when he is doing his work? Any family member there? When he plays piano, do you also need to remind him every few minutes? What he likes to do for his free time?

Hi autumn leaf,


Things are getting more complex…he has a health condition and what’s more, I also see lack of respect to authority in him…

What is normal weekday and weekend like? What does he do? What do parents and others do on a typical weekday and weekends?

Crazy idea hor hmmm… Hopefully it will never happen.


My son never took taxi to school because he would make sure he is ready as told. If he could not, he would ask for help. I always tell him: if you don’t help yourself, nobody will help you. I will not. I also tell him: it’s okay to fail. It’s better to fail early than late. It’s okay to make mistakes. It’s good to lose. And I really mean it.

PS: if he is gifted and has no learning disability in those subjects, don't worry, he will catch up easily once he decides to do so.

Hi autumnleaf,


I couldn’t figure out the real cause of your son’s underperformance which happens to some gifted children to get acceptance from peers etc. Is it that he really not interested in school work or too easy, or lack of motivation or lack of sense of responsibility and independence because he is just so used to being pushed by parents?

There are so many things to talk about but I don’t know where to start. Sometimes I’m just amused by how different our parenting approaches can be. This morning I was again debating with a care giver that we should not spoon feed our children. I saw people feeding their 3 years olds, 4 years old, 5 years olds… To me, this is the easiest area to train them to be independent and self responsible. If they are not hungry, let them play. When they are hungry, let them tell you and eat by themselves. From there, we extend to other areas. I would tell my son that if he did not get ready by say 10 for schoolbus, I would give him 10 dollars to take taxi to school by himself. That was last year in k2. Now P1, beginning of the year, sometimes he forgot to bring this and that, I would make him go back and get it himself. Started from last week, he walks from home to school by himself. He is 6 and 5 months. My philosophy is they have to be independent and be responsible for themselves. Sometimes I made him to learn the lessons the hard way. If I were you, I will let him fail his exams. Let him choose to stay there or do home schooling. If home schooling, let him feel the pain of financial constrains. But slowly prepare him mentally for that before you really get your hands off.

Hi autumn leaf, did you try to find out why he is so called lazy? I just feel that we parents can positively influence our kids as long as we keep trying. Just need time, patience, love, and try different ways. That is why I quit my job two times to be with my children. I would rather spend the time and money (opportunity cost) now and make the positive influence early.


Mostly importantly, be positive. Be positive ourselves and be positive to our children. I will never use any physical punishment or verbally abuse them. Instead I am very careful of the words I choose when talking to them because the subconscious mind can do a lot of damage when they hear negative words. E.g., instead of saying "why you are so lazy?" (This is VERY negative), I will ask him "can you be more proactive?" Or "can you finish this work in 10 mins so that you can play afterwards?" Sometimes I set the time say by 7’o clock and let him decide how much time he spend on finish what he is supposed to do and how much he play. The faster he finishes his work, the more time he will have for playing!

Hi marmalade,


I’m mildly gifted I suppose and my hubby should be also. BUT it does not matter. My parents are not educated nor gifted. Check out on the gifted children as they can be really different and face more challenges than normal kids. If not handled properly, they are at much greater risk of mental issues later into their life.

http://giftedkids.about.com/od/gifted10 ... excite.htm


Dabrowski's Overexcitabilities or Supersensitivities in Gifted Children