At its core, giftedness is a brain-based difference that contributes to our vibrant and neurodiverse world. This neurological difference means that profoundly gifted students experience a different intellectual, academic, and social-emotional development trajectory than neurotypical individuals.
Gifted students learn differently than their peers. They master new material and remember it more easily, understand relationships between abstract and concrete concepts, and tend to be more focused and passionate about topics of interest.
Giftedness is often defined as an intellectual ability linked to an IQ score of 130 or more. However, not all gifted children excel in an academic area. Signs of a gifted child also include a high creative, artistic, musical and/or leadership ability relative to same-age peers.
Most gifted kids can learn and process information faster than kids their age and comprehend material several grade levels above their peers. But they are not always well-behaved, high-achieving students. In fact, neuroscience experts say that giftedness looks different in each child.
Without understanding and support, gifted kids face an increased risk of anxiety, depression, and low self-esteem, along with social and academic problems.
If you were a gifted child, chances are you've had some serious mental health struggles now that you're a gifted adult. Many of them may have stemmed from gift-specific traumas in your childhood, or even some that you're experiencing in your adult life.
Common Characteristics of Gifted Children:
Ability to comprehend material several grade levels above their age peers. Surprising emotional depth and sensitivity at a young age. Strong sense of curiosity. Enthusiastic about unique interests and topics.
Gifted children are born with natural abilities well above the average for their age. If your child is gifted, you might notice these natural abilities in the way they're learning and developing.
Kinesthetic learners make up just 5 percent of the population and are a bit more complex than other types of learners and communicators.
Giftedness falls into one or more of the following areas: intellectual, academic, creative, artistic and leadership. A student may be intellectually (cognitively) gifted if he or she uses advanced vocabulary, readily comprehends new ideas, thinks about information in complex ways, or likes to solve puzzles or problems.
An ideal classroom for gifted students has supplies to allow students to be creative and explore topics more deeply than in traditional classrooms. Designing, building and testing are important ways to differentiate lessons. Having a flexible classroom gives space to do so.
Gifted children are challenging to parent in many ways. The more gifted the child, the more often it seems the more the parent is frustrated with the discrepancy of someone able to do school several levels above age level but unable to remember to take their finished work to school.
One of the most common characteristics of gifted students is their ability to learn things early and rapidly. Many gifted students have excellent memorization skills, which aids in their ability to connect previous knowledge with new information, thus accelerating their acquisition of new concepts.
The most common mis-diagnoses are: Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), Oppositional Defiant Disorder (OD), Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD), and Mood Disorders such as Cyclothymic Disorder, Dysthymic Disorder, Depression, and Bi-Polar Disorder.
ADHD AND GIFTEDNESS are sometimes described as having the same or similar characteristics. However, one diagnosis is considered a disability and one, a gift. Neither assumption is ideal in supporting the child identified with either ADHD, giftedness, or both, often referred to as twice exceptional or 2e.
It may depend where you live. While we like to think everyone is special, some people have extraordinary abilities — intellectual, artistic, social, or athletic. Many experts believe only 3 to 5 percent of the population is gifted, though some estimates reach 20 percent.
Genetics do play a large part in being gifted, definitely. It has been thought that the brain of a gifted person can actually process information faster. However, one's surroundings are equally important. Nature and nurture are at work as some traits are genetic and others are learned.
Signs of Giftedness in Children Include:
an ability to learn and process complex information rapidly. a need to explore subjects in surprising depth. an insatiable curiosity, as demonstrated by endless questions and inquiries. ability to comprehend material several grade levels above their age peers.
Being gifted runs in families. If your gifted child has brothers or sisters, there's a bigger chance that they might be gifted too. But they might not be gifted in the same way. For example, one gifted child might be advanced in music and their gifted sibling might be passionate about spiritual learning.
Detailed Solution. The eagerness in repeating the same task multiple times is not the characteristic of the gifted child. Gifted children do not like to do the same thing multiple times as doing the same things multiple times make them feel unattracted towards the problem.
Gifted children are more prone to depression, self-harm, overexcitability, and learning deficits. A gifted student might be so paralyzed by her own perfectionism, say, that she refuses to hand in any assignments.
While gifted children may not be any more susceptible to mental health issues as other adolescents, there are certain aspects of giftedness that may influence or amplify a gifted child's experience of mental health issues.
Gifted children often set very high standards for themselves and get frustrated when they can't meet them. This can sometimes result in tantrums and other difficult behaviour.