Why I don't want my child to be "gifted"

A couple posts I saw on Babble this week have got me thinking about "gifted" kids, learning, and society. And, I'm convinced, I want my child to do well, but I'm not so sure about being "gifted."

That's such an odd term. Like "well-endowed" or something. It makes me laugh and wince a little bit at the same time. Especially when I think of the range that could cover, like the "idiot savant" (whatever that is) or the Rainman types or the autistic kids who can play Chopin flawlessly. I just kind of want my kid to be normal. Smart, but normal. See, I was what people might have thought of as "gifted". I seem to recall testing at a 135 150 IQ (I asked my my and she told me it was 135) when I was 8 or so and they skipped me out of 3rd grade at the beginning of the schoolyear into 4th grade (it's called being double-promoted). It was just weird. I liked getting away from my old classmates who made fun of me a lot and into a new class where they were nicer. But, I still never felt like I belonged. And, in the end, when it took me 10 years to finish a Bachelor's degree, that one year advantage ended up not really counting at all.

So, I look at my girl now and I see she is definitely smart. She's very verbal, she is curious, she makes interesting connections and likes to explore. She was an early walker. She's precocious, and yet shy around new people. We talk about letters and numbers and things, but casually. It's not like I'm teaching her anything. We're just living life, and life involves letters and numbers and things and making connections. I have magnetic letters, bathtub letters, flashcards with letters, and we have them out sometimes, but even if I think I am going to go through and do some kind of organized lesson, it always turns into something else. It's very organic. It's very "2-year-old" and it is so appropriate. I love it! We have an abacus. We count sometimes, but whenever it approaches being forced, it backfires. I think this is something I love about toddlers, these 2-year-olds, specifically. They are so free, so in-the-moment and so cool and open about the connections they make and they way they want to do things. Who am I to impose some false sense of order on the scene? I can set the stage, but if she wants to take it somewhere else, then I should see where it goes rather than hold her in. There will be a developmental stage where ordering things is part of what she wants. To some degree, there already is, it's just a different kind of order than what my mind would have. I have to sit back and learn as she learns, and respect the mind of the 2-year-old, and try to plant the seeds to remind myself to do this throughout her whole life. And let her be who she is.

So, getting back to being "gifted" versus being just regular. I am never going to hold anybody back and I am going to do all I can to nurture my girl's talents. But, I am not going to freakishly push her to be something out of touch with everybody else. I have always felt like an outsider and I don't know that I think that is so great. I want my girl to feel like she belongs, if she wants to. A person can excel and make something of themselves without being so above and beyond and different. Sometimes the sense of connectedness with peers can contribute to a person's wellbeing and achievement, too. And, with the strong likelihood that she will be an only child, I want to carefully guard against her being the lone, freak genius who nobody really knows or gets.

She already talks about her friends at preschool. When we go somewhere with kids playing, she often says, I love these kids. She wants to be part of something. Yet, when we are on the playground or in a playgroup, she often is on the sidelines or playing independently. Already. That might just be an age/development thing, though. I guess the bottom line is that my philosophy on the health of my child is to not nurture the "giftedness" to a the point that separates them from their peers or a healthy, social and cultural sense of community and belonging. I know they don't have to be mutually exclusive, but they often are. And, as much as being "misunderstood" can provide material for the artist or excuses for the genius, it can be a very lonely, sad place.