Is Your Child Gifted?

by: Andrew Loh

I read with great interest an article in TimesAsia with titled "Superkids." It profiles seven of Asia's most gifted youngsters. Abigail Sin (10 years old) is Singapore's most celebrated young pianist; Chandra Sekar (12 years old) from India is the world's youngest Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer, Ai Fukuhara (14 years old) is now training for upcoming Olympics at Athens and is considered the Tiger Woods of Japanese table tennis. And the list go on..... these profoundly gifted young people come from all ethnic groups, races, economics levels and geographic areas. Many parents would wonder, are gifted children born or can be nurtured? 

The Merriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary defines the term "gifted" as:

1. Having great natural ability
2. Revealing a special gift.

"Gifted" children have been defined as those "who by nature of outstanding abilities are capable of high performance". The term "outstanding abilities" refers to general intellectual ability, specific academic aptitude, leadership ability, ability in the visual or performing arts, creative thinking, or athletic ability. 

Most gifted children display a higher rate of concentration and memory capacity. There is no typical gifted child, for particular talents and social environments give rise to varying personality patterns. Achievement patterns also vary. Differences among them will be found, even when they are grouped together. Some are very strong in one subject and weak in others. The gifted mathematician may be an average reader, the gifted artist may be poor in mathematic and the early reader may lack the ability to organize time and materials. 

Characteristics common in gifted children

In the business world, many management studies attempt to find the traits and characteristics of the successful company leaders, with believes that leaders can be nurtured and trained. Likewise, there are also qualities and characteristics that are frequently found among gifted children, although no child will possess them all. One way that parents can tell if their children might be gifted is to focus on a range of behaviors that occur in the daily conversations, activities, and responses to learning opportunities. Here is a list of characteristics common in gifted four-, five-, and six-year olds (Smutny, 2000): 

1. Express curiosity about many things 
2. Ask thoughtful questions 
3. Have extensive vocabularies and use complex sentence structure 
4. Are able to express themselves well 
5. Solve problems in unique ways 
6. Have good memories 
7. Exhibit unusual talent in art, music, or creative dramatics 
8. Exhibit especially original imaginations 
9. Use previously learned things in new contexts 
10. Are unusually able to order things in logical sequence 
11. Discuss and elaborate on ideas 
12. Are fast learners 
13. Desire to work independently and take initiative 
14. Exhibit wit and humor 
15. Have sustained attention spans and are willing to persist on challenging tasks 
16. Are very observant 
17. Show talent in making up stories and telling them 
18. Are interested in reading. 


A gifted child might not show all of the above characteristics all the time, but parents and professionals will generally see a pattern when observing over an extended period of time. 

There are many reasons to find out if the child is gifted
Many parents feel that there is little practical value to get their "potential" gifted child tested. But there are potential risks with putting off the testing, these include: 

1. Knowing the pattern of cognitive strengths and weaknesses that can help parents to plan the best learning experience. 

2. Waiting till the school tests the child can risk a ceiling effect on the tests, one that gets more pronounced each and every year. 

3. Many gifted students often appear to be troublemakers and often challenge authority figures by questioning classroom rules. The behavior of a gifted child is sometimes confused with attention disorders such as ADD (Attention Deficit Disorder) and ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder). Hence, the test would identify between a gifted child and a possible learning disorders kid such as ADHD, Asperger's Syndrome, and other problems as early as possible. Did you know that Asperger's children have some of the characteristics of autism but at the same time many Asperger's children are intelligent and insightful too? 

4. Children who are gifted are more comfortable with children and classes that deal with them at their own level. Research has shown that gifted students thrive when placed with students of similar ability. In the wrong learning setting, giftedness can be as paralyzing as a learning handicap. Unfortunately, these gifted children are terrible introverts, misunderstood by peers and parents, with their undiscovered exceptionality leading to a dead end. Bored and unchallenged at school, they may drop out and choose a direction that will never make use of their exceptional abilities.

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