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Well, yeah! I already told you mine are both living under bridges. The oldest one does have a doctorate (which I have said before), so I guess she just likes the view of the Platte River. The younger has a master's (ditto), but she lives under a bridge on the Mississippi River in Minneapolis. She ice skated there this winter. They're both making minimum wage, too.
I've been thinking about this Kat.
Why shouldn't parents of successful adult children brag? Parents say, "My son got married." Why do we have a taboo on a parent saying something like, "My son is a rocket scientist." If that's what he is.... that's what he is. Why do we practically hide success that's been earned?
Last edited by DewDropInn; 05-18-2014 at 07:28 PM..
^^I'm not sure I can express it well. It's sort of like talking about how much you make. It just seems so gauche. It starts in the "Mommy and Me" groups: MY kid is crawling, walking, talking, running a 5K at age 3, constant comparisons. I remember once when my oldest was about a year, we had a Lamaze reunion. Shortly thereafter, I ran into a woman from that group and she said 'isn't your kid the one who wasn't doing much'? (This wasn't true, but of course, some were walking, some weren't. The ones whose kids were walking felt so superior.) It just keeps going on.
Sure, there's parental pride. I'm proud of my kids, too, even if they weren't walking at a year. But you don't have to constantly tell people how your kid was in a gifted program. The criteria for those programs is often nebulous. When they did reinstitute it in our district, if the parent asked for the kid to be placed in the program, the kid got in. As for the rest of it, how they're in med school, they're this, they're that, in a social setting, you might wait until someone asks, anyway.
But a parent has only so many prime bragging years. Then you're wondering where your keys are and you're soaking your teeth instead of brushing them, no one at your table in the assisted living home can hear you and before you know it your rocket scientist son is getting the benefit of Mom's pre-paid cremation plan.
I think parents should give themselves permission to brag.
I read an article recently where a study was conducted for a group of random people and they were asked whether they thought they had below average, average, or above average intelligence. Only 4% said they thought they had below average intelligence. Of course a full half of the group actually had below average intelligence. Our society is absolutely obsessed with being "smart." About the worst thing anyone can be and about the worst insult you can receive is to be considered "dumb." What's hilarious is that in 100 years, you, your kids, and anyone else who would have known anything about them will be dead and in the ground. Nobody on Earth will give a rat's behind what Johnny scored on an IQ test or whether he was "gifted." Focus on raising a child who is happy and has a good character instead of trying to raise superchildren.
And count me among the ones who thinks it doesn't matter *that* much in elementary school. No elementary school child, no matter how gifted, knows everything s/he will ever need to know. Let them move up to the next level in math, or reading. But they're not going to know everything about social studies, or science that they don't need the class b/c there's so much to know!
To think this all started because I said the above! Some people took such exception to the idea that maybe, just maybe, kids don't need all this "gifted" education in elementary school! By.middle school, the problem takes care of itself with honors classes, then AP/IB/college level classes in high school. We went down a strange road.
^^I'm not sure I can express it well. It's sort of like talking about how much you make. It just seems so gauche. It starts in the "Mommy and Me" groups: MY kid is crawling, walking, talking, running a 5K at age 3, constant comparisons. I remember once when my oldest was about a year, we had a Lamaze reunion. Shortly thereafter, I ran into a woman from that group and she said 'isn't your kid the one who wasn't doing much'? (This wasn't true, but of course, some were walking, some weren't. The ones whose kids were walking felt so superior.) It just keeps going on.
Sure, there's parental pride. I'm proud of my kids, too, even if they weren't walking at a year. But you don't have to constantly tell people how your kid was in a gifted program. The criteria for those programs is often nebulous. When they did reinstitute it in our district, if the parent asked for the kid to be placed in the program, the kid got in. As for the rest of it, how they're in med school, they're this, they're that, in a social setting, you might wait until someone asks, anyway.
Yes, it's gauche if you're coming up to random strangers at a party and start telling them about your gifted kids out of nowhere.
That's not quite the same as bringing up factual information on a thread about gifted children
To think this all started because I said the above! Some people took such exception to the idea that maybe, just maybe, kids don't need all this "gifted" education in elementary school! By.middle school, the problem takes care of itself with honors classes, then AP/IB/college level classes in high school. We went down a strange road.
It's just the amount of material; it's about being around kids who are on a similar level. There's already been discussion here, and if you research studies on gifted kids it's confirmed, that the truly gifted kids are different from the norm, not just academically. They're often more mature (or less mature in some ways), or they relate better to kids that are older. There are first graders out there that can discuss politics or science, and others are barely mastering the alphabet. Why wouldn't it make sense to group these students so they're with peers who are at a similar intellectual level?
And when that doesn't happen, these kids are often at a risk of problems, social alienation, they can start underachieving on purpose to 'blend in'. There's lots of literature on the topic.
To think this all started because I said the above! Some people took such exception to the idea that maybe, just maybe, kids don't need all this "gifted" education in elementary school! By.middle school, the problem takes care of itself with honors classes, then AP/IB/college level classes in high school. We went down a strange road.
It's been pointed out to you before that not all schools work the same way your kids' school worked. In many, many places, kids need the label in order to work above a level.
Why wouldn't it make sense to group these students so they're with peers who are at a similar intellectual level?
One of the problems is that removing the top students from a school means that everyone left ranges from way below average to slightly above average. What about those students? Don't they deserve to be with peers on a similar intellectual level?
I trust webMD and I DON'T believe that it has anything to do with being gifted. That's all hogwash.
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