The classic 'praise a child for being intelligent and they will divide the world into things that are easy and they get lots of praise for and things which are hard and are therefore impossible, and then they will give up too easily for the rest of their life' thing happened to me.
As did the 'feeling really guilty that I haven't taken over the world yet' thing.
Mostly what parents (and teachers!) of gifted and talented youngsters need, from my perspective, is to know when to keep out of the way. Trying to get them to stop reading or writing novels or doing other classes' homework in your class will just piss them off.
Smart kids need good library access, good internet access, and access to peers who are as smart or smarter than them. Weekends etc away with the smartest kids from every school in the area are a godsend for the latter.
As is just letting them go and meet their friends off the internet, if the school can get the parents to put their paranoia about that down...
My parents were pretty good at all of these things really; it's only the classic 'praise for intelligence will screw your kid up' that they really got wrong in that respect, and no-one knew about that in the 80s. I had much more trouble from teachers / school staff who thought I ought to be paying attention (which I was, just not all of it... I was queen of that irritating trick where someone who blatantly was doing something else recites the last couple of sentences the teacher was saying).
I think scheduling the kid too much is also a mistake, although my parents never tried this one on me. Even though they're stupid because they're a kid and you might therefore have to do things like throw them out of the house for fresh air and exercise occasionally, mostly they are smart and know what they should be doing with their time. Really good computer games might have screwed this one up though.
TL;DR: reiterate to parents the 'praise for effort, not for success' thing; don't get in the kid's way; let them on the internet freely (most kids just find bad stuff on the internet much more boring than additional cool dinosaur facts anyway) and out to meet people who are on their wavelength.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2013-08-19 03:54 pm (UTC)As did the 'feeling really guilty that I haven't taken over the world yet' thing.
Mostly what parents (and teachers!) of gifted and talented youngsters need, from my perspective, is to know when to keep out of the way. Trying to get them to stop reading or writing novels or doing other classes' homework in your class will just piss them off.
Smart kids need good library access, good internet access, and access to peers who are as smart or smarter than them. Weekends etc away with the smartest kids from every school in the area are a godsend for the latter.
As is just letting them go and meet their friends off the internet, if the school can get the parents to put their paranoia about that down...
My parents were pretty good at all of these things really; it's only the classic 'praise for intelligence will screw your kid up' that they really got wrong in that respect, and no-one knew about that in the 80s. I had much more trouble from teachers / school staff who thought I ought to be paying attention (which I was, just not all of it... I was queen of that irritating trick where someone who blatantly was doing something else recites the last couple of sentences the teacher was saying).
I think scheduling the kid too much is also a mistake, although my parents never tried this one on me. Even though they're stupid because they're a kid and you might therefore have to do things like throw them out of the house for fresh air and exercise occasionally, mostly they are smart and know what they should be doing with their time. Really good computer games might have screwed this one up though.
TL;DR: reiterate to parents the 'praise for effort, not for success' thing; don't get in the kid's way; let them on the internet freely (most kids just find bad stuff on the internet much more boring than additional cool dinosaur facts anyway) and out to meet people who are on their wavelength.