Did anyone in the UK see that doc on C4 last night which is going to follow gifted kids over a 10 year period? I thought the young lad who is going for philosophical chit-chats at Oxford was especially interesting, and the one who can do A-level math aged 6 was soooo sweet.

Do we have any wee ones on the forum I wonder or were any of you labeled as gifted at school?

I was boxed labled and put on a plane to china as a gift Thats as close to being gifted as I got lol.

I saw a few snipets of that program.. It would be interesting to see what happens to them later in life

I was supposedly identified as gifted cos I could read when I was 18 months old. I was reading adult books when I was six. However it flattened out as I got older and by the time I was in high school I was pretty mediocre (and so it remains to this day...behold my 2:2

I think that happens quite a lot juno, which is why teachers (or those above them) are reluctant to teach children out of their cohort at school. There's a recent push from the govt to personalise learning though - that's gonna put a huge strain on teachers who've already got enough paperwork. Besides, good teachers differentiate their lessons as a matter of course.

I think it probably is best to stay in, or close to, your peer group simply because of the social development (and physical) that can't be rushed.

Thoughts?

I think people develop at different rates, but maybe parents are (understandably) very quick to label their child as gifted. I think it's probably better, as you say, to keep the child within their school peer group; but that may risk boredom for the child if they are ahead at every subject (for me it was just the reading).

That women with the 4 gifted children was really scarey, "my daughter could do a literature degree now, I know it".

Why would you send your poor child aged 12-13 to university with a load of 18 year olds. It's just wrong.

"In this house we reward achievement" hence the younger girl who passed her 11+ getting loads of tacky gifts.

That woman was just over the top. I reckon the Oxford Don had the right attitude. She said she wouldn't let her son (a published author) do his A-levels etc early as it would just make him an outcast for his age group.

I agree the mother of the gifted family was extremely odd. She kept doing over emphatic nodding and simpering smiling. She gave me the creeps. All that "we're developing doctors and world leaders" business. No pressure on the kids then !

I was never labeled as gifted by could read aged 3 and got stuck into some quite advanced books and used to read the newspaper with my Dad. I was placed 2 years ahead of my peer group at primary and then sent to a boarding school aged 9 ( which lasted all of about 6 months & my parents still feel hideous guilty about it). I did some GCSE's at 13, & 14 and started A-level at 15 but dropped out, when I discovered boys, & the fashion industry. Paradoxically I was placed in the bottom set for math ( but got an A) and was diagnosed as dyslexic during my masters aged 27!

Did you notice the mother of 4 refusing to test her children like all the other's had? Had they really reached saturation point with IQ tests? No, she didn't want to be humiliated on camera more like. I feel for those children, they are not being allowed to enjoy their childhoods. I loved the writer and his mother, she probably read Homer, Dante and Shakespeare to him while he was in the womb. I'm also insanely jealous. If only I had an IQ of 170, not a piddly 115. Oh well, shall just have to continue languishing in my mediocrity. Incidentally, anyone else care to divulge their IQ's? They've got to be higher than mine...hehehehehe FFxx

I learnt to read in the womb apparantly. I came out and spoke, saying "pass me that copy of jungle book please" in french. I have forgotten how to speak french now though...very strange.

Gifted child???? Far from it. My teachers and my parents tore their hair out over me for 11 years before I finally dropped out of high school. I pulled my socks up long enough to get into university only to do it all again a couple of years later by quitting six months before I should have graduated with a Pharmacy degree.

Six months being unemployed and on government benefits was enough to wisen me up (amazing what the influence and love of a good boy can do to a girl!) and I have been well behaved and studious since then.

Gifted? No chance. I did all the dumb-ass things parents pray their kids won't do. I am lucky my parents still talk to me.

At primary school and early high school I was really shy and didn't stand out. My mum was really determined that I would get a good education and helped me stick at it though. For some reason when it got to GCSE'S, A-levels,I guess the realisation that thigs started to count and affect my future, I started to develop academically and became a bit of a swot, in retrospect to an unhealthy degree!So got the good grades, been to the good uni's and here I am! Apparently my IQ is 133, so not doing too badly but nowhere near genuis boy! Additionally I have no common-sense and am completely ditzy!

I think my cat is gifted.

Piglet, you sound a lot like me: went from a promising start to an extended period of rebellion. I blame it on my Catholic education

I want to go throgh a rebellious stage! I went to a convent school and everything... so think I'm entitled to one, is there a manual as to how you go about it?

Don't know, but there should be. We could write one