Life as a gifted kid

From a parents point of view, having and raising a gifted child should overwhelm any parent with pride, but it is often is not as easy as that.  A parent has to play an active role in a gifted child’s development in order that the child thrive.  A gifted child can often feel as though they are ‘different’ from their piers and often have low self esteem due to this.  A gifted child can relate better to adults than a child of their own age, this is why a parent has to be involved in the child’s development and the development of their child’s giftedness, by way of encouraging and sharing experiences.  Practice makes perfect in this life and even a gifted child will need to practice and have bad times before all becomes good.  Challenging a gifted child is a good thing too, although a child is gifted in a certain area and often advanced beyond their years, giving a gifted child a challenge can only encourage them to do better.

If your child has a particular strength - such as music, then encourage this talent by providing them with a good teacher in music to enable them to develop this talent, there is a fine line between challenging your child and pressurising your child, so make sure that the goals are realistic and that your child is enjoying their experience.

Having a child whom has been labelled as gifted can not only be difficult for the parent but can also prove difficult for the child too.  All children want to fit in but some children especially ‘gifted’ children often find that fitting in to be an every day struggle. Picture yourself as a gifted child, you have the mental age of an adult, can understand adult conversations and jokes but just don’t get what children are doing or understand why they are playing silly games around you.  You don’t fit in quite the same as other children but don’t understand why?  Work within the classroom can be equally as hard, as a gifted child is far more advanced that his/her class mates school work is often boring and slow.  Bullying is a common finding with most kids that are gifted, as other kids their own age don’t understand them so instead they pick on them, making sure that everyone ones that they are different.  Because class work is often slow and uninteresting for a gifted child, the child gets bored and naughty resulting in bad behaviour, for this the child gets punished.