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When I was writing a weekly column on child development for the
New York Times, I interviewed a professor of psychology who
was conducting a long-term study on academically gifted children.
She recalled feeling shocked a few years earlier when she received
a call from the principal of her 8-year-old son’s school saying
that the boy was failing arithmetic. How could this be happening,
she thought. The boy had started kindergarten two years early because
he was mature and generally academically gifted, with a special
talent in mathematics.
When the professor spoke to her son’s teacher, she discovered
that the boy was doing extremely well on his examinations, but wasn’t
bothering to do the homework assignments, which he found boring.
She solved the child’s (and the school’s) problem by using
a two-pronged approach. She persuaded her son to do his homework
to keep the school happy. She also hired a college student to teach
him algebra so that he’d feel challenged instead of bored.
Academically gifted children—who are usually defined as those
in the top two to five percent nationally on some measure, often
an intelligence or achievement test—face special problems.
So do their parents. Schools treat those children differently from
those whose talents lie in other areas, like music, art, and sports.
Being academically gifted is a topic laced with myths and fears,
many of which are unfounded.
Contrast what happens to academically gifted versus athletically
gifted children. Most of the athletes are allowed to develop their
special skills at whatever rate best suits them, and no one gives
it a second thought. No one tries to stop them from becoming much
better baseball players or swimmers than their classmates.
Yet if an academically gifted child tries to do two years of work
in one, that’s viewed as potentially harmful. Much of the concern
focuses on the nonacademic areas of these gifted children’s
development. Will they feel out of place among older children? Can
they handle the social pressure?
Researchers emphasize that for the vast majority of academically
gifted children those concerns are groundless. In fact, these children
are more likely to develop social and even academic problems if
they don’t feel intellectually challenged. But problems are
often overlooked because they can be working far below their potential
and still be at the tops of their classes.
This sometimes leads to another hidden problem, which can take years
to appear. If gifted children don’t go to challenging programs,
they may not learn how to learn. Eventually, in college or graduate
school, they feel emotionally overwhelmed when they can’t just
coast through their courses anymore.
For other children, the academic and emotional problems come earlier.
Boys in elementary school who are bored tend to act up in class
and be labeled as troublemakers, even though their grades are high.
Because their behavior annoys teachers, they’re more likely
to be referred for help.
Girls of that age in the same situation are likely to be highly
cooperative, even thought they’re putting very little effort
into their work. Teachers and parents assume that everything is
fine because they’re causing little trouble. But when they
reach high school and get their first "B" in a class,
they sometimes become depressed and may even stop working altogether.
(A colleague of mine who runs a clinic for underachieving students
tells me that 90 percent of the children she sees in elementary
school are boys. Among high school students, only 50 percent of
the children she sees are boys.)
There is no single best way to help gifted children achieve their
potential. In fact, the criteria for giftedness are somewhat arbitrary
and, according to many researchers, far too narrow. If you've been
told that your child is gifted, here are some things to keep in
mind:
- Make sure any program you’re considering meets your
child’s needs, not your own. While a child’s giftedness
does reflect well on his parents, that can turn into a problem
if those parents push their child so that they look good. This
is seldom done consciously, of course. But you should always ask
yourself if you’re enrolling your child in a special program
for his benefit or for other reasons.
- Recognize that you and your child have several options, even
if your school system doesn’t have special programs for gifted
children. These include early admission into kindergarten,
moving to a higher grade during the day to study a certain subject,
and skipping one or more grades entirely. Parents sometimes circumvent
the strict age requirements that many public schools have for
entry into kindergarten by enrolling children early in private
or parochial schools for a year or two, and then switching to
public schools.
- Remember that some children are reluctant at first to participate
in special programs. Encourage them to try. Children harbor
many of the same anxieties as adults about being academically
gifted. They may worry that the label will act as a barrier between
them and their friends. This problem tends to be worse with girls,
who will often hide their talents because they feel that if they
look too bright, they will find themselves lonely and socially
isolated. That fear is usually unwarranted. After a few weeks,
they often find themselves more comfortable with their new classmates
than with their old ones.
- Schedule regular meeting with the teachers in your child’s
gifted program. Make sure your discussions cover not only
the academic progress your child is making, but also how she’s
handling things emotionally.
- Don’t be surprised at how quickly your child can learn.
It’s not unusual for gifted students to learn an entire year
or even two of a subject during an intensive summer program. This
shows how inappropriate the standard curriculum is for these children.
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