Gifted children and their problems

Gifted Children ©: lassedesignen – Fotolia

When talking about highly gifted children, it is usually not meant to be a single phenomenon, such that someone can remember everything they have ever read. It’s about the IQ, the intelligence quotient. The IQ in Germany is around 85-115, i.e. an average of 100. People with an IQ of over 115 are already very talented. However, those who have an IQ of over 130 are considered highly gifted. In some cases, this is already recognized quite quickly and at a young age, for example, children already speak like two at the age of two like others at four and show faster development in other areas. However, it happens so often that an actually highly gifted child is wrongly classified as sick. They are diagnosed with ADH (S), for example, and they are immobilized with Ritalin or other pharmaceuticals.

On the one hand, we have to work on the recognition and, on the other hand, we have to better adapt our system to the highly gifted. Because the funding we currently offer is absolutely not good enough, there are neither enough schools nor enough teachers to teach these children appropriately. In addition to the misrecognition of their talent and the poor support measures, the highly gifted have to overcome several other individual hurdles. Even if a high level of intelligence can be an enormous advantage, especially in later private and professional life, there are many problems for these children, especially at a young age.

The hurdles of highly gifted children

In most cases, a gifted talent would have almost only advantages if the children were not automatically excluded in many ways. This is particularly evident in the social area, because a talent sometimes creates very large differences to the peers. Imagine a 10-year-old who has to sit in a class with 6-year-olds and is always bored. Everyone knows that this is not a good idea. But the same thing happens in our schools with regard to highly gifted children. If possible, they look for older friends, which in turn has consequences. Because this quickly excludes them from their class group and makes schooling a very ugly affair. In addition, our schools are not geared towards gifted children at all. Teachers usually do not know how to deal with such a child and how to properly support it. In the worst case, they do not recognize the talents and stamp the child as lazy. Or to put it another way: I don’t even need to notice this child, because they know the answer anyway – and as a teacher I may be able to anticipate all of the material (the learning objective). So it happens quickly, because such children are always bored and therefore little or not participate.

Our normal schools are naturally designed for normal children, because there are most of them. That’s right, but we also managed to create opportunities for less intelligent and disabled children. We have recognized that they need a learning environment that is tailored to them. What we have not yet managed to do is create a suitable learning environment for highly intelligent children. It is not that these are very few children, no, it is quite a lot. Around 2.2 percent of the population is currently classified as highly gifted. As a result, there are at least 11 highly gifted children in a school with 500 students. This is sometimes not a small number, but a damn high number for the whole country. Across Germany, around 300,000 of the almost 14 million under-18s are highly gifted. These children deserve to have a school adapted to their needs.

How we can recognize gifted children

Before we were a child right it is essential to know what the foundation looks like. It would be an advantage if an inventory were taken at school. It could be part of the normal school enrollment procedure that every child takes an intelligence test. This is a more than easy way to identify gifted people and prevent many false ADH (S) diagnoses. The state could solve the problem of recognition that easily, but the parents of a gifted child can find out much earlier. One possibility would be to do an intelligence test with your own child. On the other hand, you can find out by closely observing it. There are a few things to know about the signs of such a talent.

If you compare the child with other peers and the differences are very large, that’s a first sign. Is it much more developed, does it run before its first year of life, does it speak a lot at two years, or does it have special skills? All of these are such signs. One can say that if the child deviates far from the norm, then one should take a closer look. Other signs that can help are whether the child prefers to play with older children, reads a lot, prefers books for actually older children and is supernaturally curious. Overall, it is always important to see whether a child is developing particularly rapidly, quickly absorbing new knowledge and learning new skills particularly well. If the parents, the school or perhaps the kindergarten have recognized that a child is gifted, then this must be encouraged accordingly.

Highly gifted children: discovering, researching and asking holes in the stomach | ©: jogyx – Fotolia

Properly support the highly gifted

Of course, this starts with the parents reacting accordingly and, if possible, sending their child to a school for the highly gifted. Parents can also promote this by going to museums frequently go, allow access to many books and allow your child to quench their thirst for knowledge. In addition to support in the family, our state must also help highly gifted children to train their talents and skills accordingly. The state has not yet recognized that we need our own schools, just as we do for the disabled. If they are not their own schools, then at least their own classes. There must be teachers who know how to give gifted people the opportunity to use their talents and who also allow them to live them out.

It should not be the case that, as is often the case, these children are slowed down. It cannot be accepted that children are bored at school because they are under-challenged. More needs to be done in this area, even if a lot has already happened, it is not enough. Every gifted person, like every disabled person, must have the right to a school that suits them. We can’t just look halfway and allowed children with such a high intelligence quotient, don’t just send them to our high schools and get bored there. We have to recognize when children are too smart for our normal schools. We also have to be careful not to label them as sick and then try to normalize them with tablets. As long as we have compulsory schooling, we also have the obligation to create suitable schools for our children.

Again something about the topic of intelligence test:

One should not think that such a test always brings the necessary knowledge. One thing in particular should not be underestimated. If the test is not so good and the child knows about it, it will suffer from it and consider itself "stupid". This feeling of "being stupid" can shape his future life. In principle, all children are intelligent and eager to learn from birth, unless they have brain damage. Only in further development are the course set, which enables one or the other child to develop his inquisitiveness and ability to learn, or it is prevented or stopped.

Highly gifted children in our youth groups

As mentioned above, highly gifted children tend to orient themselves towards older children / adolescents or already adults, so that they can do less with their peers. In addition, there is a somewhat higher level of enthusiasm for discussion. These children are less at home in the sporting field than in the intellectual field. But it would be wrong to exclude here or to draw wrong conclusions. The youth leader should try to promote or use the children for one or the other challenging task depending on their abilities. This can be as a "helper", as a "team spokesman", as a "responsible person" etc..

It is also wrong if one stamps highly gifted children as unsportsmanlike or not capable of grouping. From my experience, I know that this is not true. And even if highly gifted children tend to feel more secure in the spiritual area, support and development in the sporting or physical area can help these children to develop accordingly in terms of teamwork and social behavior.

More messages and articles for youth leaders in youth work too.