The Gifted Child - part 1 | Raise Your Child . org

The Gifted Child - part 1

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By Theresa Willingham

What are the odds your child is “gifted?” Probably slim, if you believe psychologist and author Ellen Winner, who says, “Extraordinary abilities are mostly innate and occur in perhaps one in 10,000 children.” But probably quite high if you believe in your child!

Winner argues that only “profoundly gifted students, with IQs over 160 or prodigious talents in art or music should receive special services.” The other 9,999 - including the just “plain old smart kids” can, for all intents and purposes, go take a homogeneous hike in “high standards” classrooms (wherever those might be).

While that argument might make good fodder for public education policy, it’s a social setback of the most limiting kind. It’s a throwback to the days when IQs were (erroneously) considered the best measure of success and potential.

However great a blow it might be for the parents of the “profoundly gifted,” the fact is that the world is not run by the 1 in 10,000 Winner declares have “extraordinary abilities” or “prodigious talents.” The world is run by that neglected 9,999 who are being told they’re nothing special!

Those “plain old smart kids” who don’t qualify for accelerated learning programs or special science labs are the ones who will grow up to help out in soup kitchens, volunteer in nursing homes and homeless shelters. They will rally for clean water and healthy environments, read and appreciate good literature and often write it, work hard in jobs that strengthen our economy and raise new generations of ordinary, good people. They will be members of Doctors Without Borders and Green Peace and the Sierra Club. They will also probably be the ones with the surprising start up companies that wow Wall Street, who invent a new fuel source or rescue someone from a fire or an automobile accident.

I’m not the jaded parent of failed children saying this. I’m the mother of at least one gifted child, and probably three. When my oldest was six years old and her eccentric behavior was driving me nuts, and one of her grandmother’s was calling for a child psychologist to look into the matter, I took a chance and had her tested for giftedness. I figured she was probably no odder than Mozart as child, or Einstein, or Beatrix Potter boiling down fox carcasses in her backyard.

Click here for part 2 of the article.

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February 22 2008 01:47 pm | Child Development and Child Education and Homeschooling

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