|
Possibly Advanced Child
By Inderbir Kaur Sandhu, Ph.D
Q: Hi, I have a 17 month old baby, he crawled late, sit by his own late, stand on his own late and walked late.. but what we are wondering about is that when he was 6 month old, he shows interest in books and turns the it's pages.. he's even interested with letters and numbers.. at 9 months he shows interest at computers.. by 6 month when he's watching a movie, he reacts and remember each parts and he used to cry or laugh when this part is showed.. at the age of 14 months, he can recite the alphabets from a-z.. at 16 months, he can recognize and say the sounds of the alphabet. at 17 months he can already count from 1-10.. and he can follow simple instructions.
I can see that he's different from the other kids because he shows more advance capability than the others.. he can also identify TV shows that he loves to watch.. he dances and sings even though it's out of the beat and tune.. he can easily catch up when i teach him something and memorize it right away.. is there a possibility that my child is gifted? I cant elaborate everything.. take note he can't talk yet but he is responding to us every time we talk to him but it's like baby talk and we can't understand it.. and he makes gestures like pointing his hands and waving it.
A: From your description, it is hard to tell for sure but he surely shows some signs of advanced development compared to children in his age group. Different children develop at a difference rate and some achieve milestones much later, yet once they start, they develop rapidly.
At this point, it is not important to determine if you child is gifted. The best is for you to follow his lead and keep giving him activities that stimulate him. These activities are the same ones for gifted or average children. If your child is gifted, he/she would learn at a much faster pace. Even if he is not talking yet, when he does, it could be in complete sentences. For now, the best thing to do is to nurture your child to develop with as much stimulation as possible as help him learn. For instance, introduce him to early reading, read to him, use flash cards to introduce him to words and pictures; if he enjoys music, get him some musical materials to play with and so on.
For more activities, please refer to the previous newsletter:
http://brainy-child.com/experts/nurturing-advanced-toddler.shtml
Wishing you all the best in this journey!
|
Checkout these other gifted children questions
