Being Gifted

To be gifted means different things to different people. It does not have a specific definition. To some people, it means being very intelligent and having a high score on an intelligence test. To others, it means being very good at a specific sport or activity. Research says that many people think of gifted children as children that have the potential to achieve beyond what is expected of their same-age peers.

A child that is gifted may not have very good social development. For the first few years of their life, they will be able to socialize with their peers. If the child is intellectually gifted, they may skip grades (in school) and be in higher grades that their same-age peers. Because of this, they may not have great social development because they will not have many friends that are their own age.

Some parents think that their children are special needs children because they are gifted. They think that their children need to be isolated from the rest of the world because they are unlike everyone else, and that they cannot be bothered while they are studying. Other parents don’t think anything of their gifted children. They treat them like a normal child of their age, just a child that is a bit smarter than their peers.

Gifted children tend to be perceived as very smart children by their teachers, though their teachers may treat them unlike the rest of the children in their class because they are younger than the rest of the class. Teachers may give them a workload a little less than the rest of the class, because they do not think that they can handle how much work is being given to the rest of the students.

To help their child integrate socially out of school, parents can take their children to camps of other places where their children can meet new people. This may help their child acquire new friends and help their social development. Parents can take their children to places that their same-age peers would go to, so they might be able to see some of their old friends and maybe reconnect with them.

To help social development, teachers can encourage gifted children to join clubs at school or play sports for a sport team for the school. Joining a club would help the children find out what activities they like and connect with older children from the school.

When in pre-school, children don’t notice who is gifted and who is not. They just see everyone as their friend and that they are all in the same class. They know that every child is different, but they only notice small differences. However, children in high school notice these differences, and some kids are mean to the gifted children because they are not like everyone else.

There is nothing wrong with being gifted, and children should embrace it.