There has been a lot of research on how parents deal with gifted children. There has also been research on how educational systems address the needs of children who show extreme intelligence or ability in some field of study.
Sometimes the system works. Sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes parents do the right thing, and sometimes they don’t.
How do you know you are really nurturing your child? How do you know if you are putting too much pressure on them?
Here are some things to be aware of as you consider how to support your gifted child and his or her advancement through the school system and beyond.
Hothousing and Tiger Parenting
Hothousing is a phrase to describe intense focus on an academic area. Your child exhibits a special talent in some field. You want to provide more exposure to that field so your child will get “smarter.”
You also want your child to be challenged at school, especially in that special field of expertise, whether it is math or science or languages, or art or music, or a high level of reading, or dinosaurs, or something else.
Hothousing is related to another concept, “tiger parenting,” where the focus is on achievement and performance. You want your child to perform well in school get high grades, master every test, and be number one in every class.
You can’t accept failure.
Note that these are your goals, not your child’s. This could be a sign of pushing too hard. These goals are adult-centered, not child-centered.
Hothousing and tiger parenting lead students to feel resistance and apathy or to high anxiety. Putting stress on your child to do better can lead to problems with self-esteem, restlessness and sleep problems. It can create a wider separation between you and your child.
Let your child provide the lead in what he or she wants to do. You should support that lead rather than create your own expectations. This is nurturing vs. pushing.
Acceleration can help or hurt
You want your school system to serve the educational needs of your gifted child. That might mean some form of acceleration – moving your child ahead of where he or she would be in the regular school curriculum.
There are many forms of acceleration. Early entrance gives a child the chance to enter kindergarten or first grade one or two years earlier than the usual age.
Subject acceleration recognizes mastery of some subject and allows a student to bypass the normal skill development lessons for that subject, focusing instead on the other subjects.
Grade skipping is a common practice for gifted students, allowing them to skip one or more grades. While this can be a benefit intellectually, it can be socially challenging.
An ungraded classroom is an option where students move through materials and curriculum without regard to grade level assignment
Curriculum compacting recognizes a student’s mastery of some subjects through previous testing and allows the student to bypass further study on those subjects, focusing instead on other subjects.
Grade telescoping allows a middle school student to complete his or her requirements in two years instead of three, and high school students to complete three years instead of four.
Concurrent enrollment allows the student to attend junior high during part of the day and senior high during a different part of the day.
Advanced placement is a practice in many schools allowing students to take courses with advanced content, usually for college credit.
Early admission to college is sometimes granted to students still in secondary school. And some college courses can be credited through Pre-course exams.
All of these accelerations are designed to accommodate highly intelligent students, especially those who are gifted. However, they are not without potential problems. For some gifted students, acceleration can be a great. It gives them the subject exposure and the learning challenges they need.
On the other hand, those gifted students who are socially and emotionally immature, academic acceleration can create a heavy burden.
It may save a child some time, but time is a valuable gift for child. Children need time to develop confidence and a healthy self-image. They need time to feel secure and to enjoy being young.
Educational toys can rob time
One of the first things parents of gifted children do is find educational toys, games and books to encourage their intellectual interest and development. This can be good or bad.
Parents feel that it is never too early to help their infants get smarter. They buy wind-up toys, puppets, musical toys, lava lamps, and educational videos.
Research has shown that there is very little academic advantage to providing educational toys for children. They can actually work against children by keeping them from exercising their imaginations.
Toys and games which stimulate creativity, imagination, and open-thinking can be helpful. How often do we see children open brightly wrapped gifts only to see them play with the wrapping, ribbons or box itself? We can’t tell what’s going to interest them.
Perhaps the best games are those played within the family where social interaction and family support are the real benefits.
You can avoid too much pressure
What are some of the things you can do to make sure you are nurturing and not pushing too hard? How can you be sure you are monitoring your child rather than manipulating?
Make your children feel they are part of a family that loves them. Have regular family meals and family time together. This will increase your children’s self-esteem.
Recognize your children’s progress. Show them how their handwriting has improved or their drawings got better. Talk about how they have become so much better at playing their favorite instrument – compared with earlier trials.
Try not to embarrass your child by bragging to teachers, school administrators, friends and neighbors. You should be an advocate of your child in particular and gifted children in general. Get involved with your child’s school, its teachers and programs. Make sure the school has the philosophy and capability to represent your child’s interests and unique skills.
Know your gifted child’s “Bill of Rights”– a list developed by the National Association for Gifted Children (NAGC). The list includes things like “know about your giftedness, feel good about your accomplishments, have friends and peer groups.”
Try to develop the whole child. Encourage interest in many things. Go outside the school curriculum. Pursue non-academic topics. Expect interests to change.
Acknowledge learning over awards. It’s about the process and hard work, not trophies or high scores.
Bring real-world experiences to your child and nurture their interests. If your child likes reading books about animals, take him or her to a zoo. If your children like to play an instrument, take them to a local concert.
If you allow your child to be a child first and just have fun as a child, you will be on the right track. If you follow his or her lead, you will be doing the right thing. If you recognize and celebrate the right kind of behavior rather than the results, you are being supportive, not pushy.
