<p>I would like to know what becomes of these prodigies in followup. There are only 24/7 for all of us, and let’s face it, neither professional schools nor employers are going to take a 15 or 16 year old college grad.</p>
<p>Amen, Liz.</p>
<p>Off the top of my head (re prodigy follow-up) -Kathleen Holz was admitted to UCLA School of Law at 15. Sho Yano was admitted to University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine at age 12.</p>
<p>[Kathleen</a> Holtz - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathleen_Holtz]Kathleen”>http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kathleen_Holtz)</p>
<p>[Sho</a> Yano - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sho_Yano]Sho”>Sho Yano - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>Notice that Yano attended the American School of Correspondence for high school and Holtz attended a CSU for undergrad, both of which would probably be disparaged here as “not as rigorous” or “less selective”. I suppose Ms. Holtz could have waited until she was 18 and gone to a better school but instead she was starting her career and earning an income at that age. And Mr. Yano could have waited and enjoyed just being a kid and could have graduated with a bachelors at 22 instead of a medical degree.</p>
<p>On the subject of child prodigies later in life:</p>
<p>Terence Tao won bronze, silver, and gold International Math Olympiad medals at 10, 11, and 12, graduated with bachelor’s and master’s degrees at 16 (Flinders), graduated with a PhD at 20 (Princeton), joined a university faculty then (UCLA), reached full professor rank at 24 (UCLA), and was awarded the Fields medal at 31.</p>
<p>[Terence</a> Tao - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terence_Tao]Terence”>Terence Tao - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>Taylor Wilson built a fusion reactor at home at 14.</p>
<p>[Teen</a> nuclear scientist fights terror - CNN.com](<a href=“http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/01/living/teen-nuclear-scientist/index.html]Teen”>http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/01/living/teen-nuclear-scientist/index.html)</p>
<p>Even more:</p>
<p>[List</a> of child prodigies - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia](<a href=“http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_child_prodigies]List”>List of child prodigies - Wikipedia)</p>
<p>This discussion’s very interesting, and I’d like to give a somewhat different perspective about the young and talented. </p>
<p>I’m 14 and a high school freshman. Last year I scored a 2240 on the SAT and 33 on the ACT. I’m taking Honors Calculus, AP Lang, AP Chinese, AP Chem, and a boatload of other advanced courses, and was accepted (but chose not to go) into a dual enrollment program at our largest state university.</p>
<p>I’m neither a prodigy nor an especially focused student. When my parents noticed I was academically advanced in early elementary school, they took me to get my IQ tested. I scored a 124- a decent score but well below mensa level. And I am somewhat lazy with my homework and procrastinate a lot.</p>
<p>I believe “prodigies” and “academically advanced” are two somewhat overlapping but very different concepts- prodigies, on the whole, tend to be amazingly creative and naturally talented (think Mozart). Speaking from a personal perspective, I think that academically advanced students tend to understand and retain material very well: not necessarily have a good memory (hence the scatterbrained stereotype), but be able to connect learned concepts and apply them. </p>
<p>And then, of course, there are the super-motivated and hardworking students. Talent doesn’t always correlate with success. Hard work and, to a lesser degree, luck, are huge factors in overall success.</p>
<p>PS: Isn’t it funny how kids gifted in math, science, and music are much more quickly labeled prodigies than young writers and poets? And science is considered a field for geniuses but a liberal arts degree is often thought of as “fluffy”? I’m an English-type myself, and although I have no idea what I’m going to major in, I think both fields have their share of talented people. </p>
<p>About the kid- his SAT scores aren’t that impressive but the SAT certainly isn’t a method of predicting success or intelligence. Congratulations for what he’s achieved, though, and I wish him luck.</p>
<p>And sorry for the long and rambling comment.</p>
<p>Religion? History? Should be taking philosophy instead. After all, physics and calculus are by products of philosophy. Hope he learns that in history.</p>
<p>Philosophy could turn him away from his Christian (or any other) religion. Or, as in the case of Augustine, Anselm, Thomas Acquinas, and others, it could bring him closer.</p>
<p>Okay, I’m leaving this thread forever. It’s destroying my self-esteem.</p>
<p>There was a book a few years ago by a former child prodigy, Alissa Quart, called Hothouse Kids that focused on the dark side of early acceleration, on the Lindsey Lohan outcomes. Those are the results that haunt us, especially those of us with super bright kids. These children aren’t just one dimensional academic wonders who exist to exhalt their parents. They are going to grow up and stop being prodigies. Then what?</p>
<p>When I read articles like this, I’m glad I live in New York (City). The boy in the story would have been far from the best mathematician in 6th grade at my offspring’s public gifted and talented program. My own offspring didn’t take the SAT until 11th grade, but a lot of kids who wanted to go to CTY during the summer did–and the score the boy in the story got would not have been especially high for a 7th grader. (That’s the first year local kids took the SAT for CTY.)</p>
<p>I wish the boy the best. It may well be that this is his best option to get an education in his circumstances.</p>
<p>However, there are schools and programs for kids that keep them with other smart kids of the same age. Personally, I think that’s the best option. Some of these are held on college campuses. See, e.g., <a href=“https://depts.washington.edu/cscy/about-us/[/url]”>https://depts.washington.edu/cscy/about-us/</a></p>
<p>I was heavily involved as a parent in our districts GT program. There were some annual seminars for parents and teachers which I attended. I stand by my Bell curve comment about the differences between the extremes and the average. Fun facts- while 75% of the general population is extroverted (degree not specified) 75% of the highly gifted are introverted. Makes it hard to be even an averagely gifted extrovert- your friends who are your intellectual peers don’t want to go out and mingle as much while those who do aren’t as satisfying to hang out with often. College experiences eons ago- when I finally found people like me… I can also relate to being far out of my league in elementary school with one other girl- she had to have been highly gifted. It must have been frustrating for her to have only me to relate to in class, her at home world was far advanced from mine (she switched schools eventually and I lost track of her).</p>
<p>btw- reading the GT literature now available helps to understand things. The lists of characteristics do overlap those of ADD/ADHD.</p>
<p>Lizardly – Quart’s book was more about her own issues with her parents than anything else. It is not a book that sheds light on anything beyond the author.</p>
<p>As for this news story and others like it:</p>
<p>I wish they would stop. I would like to know who contacts the media in such cases – is it the parents? The grandparents? Certainly it is not the child.</p>
<p>As the parent of a child who scored several hundred points higher than this child on the SAT at that age, my thoughts are:</p>
<p>Some parents – maybe not these parents, but some parents – see SAT scores over the 50th percentile for a younger student and rush out to enroll them in college classes. I am not convinced that this is the best solution or even the first solution.</p>
<p>Maybe it’s just me, but if I expected my eleven- or twelve-year-old to obtain a similar score on the SAT, I would not bother having them take the test. That’s a long test for such a young person, and what would be the purpose of having them take it?</p>
<p>Radical acceleration is not a magical solution to the problem of meeting the needs of a very advanced learner. Extremely intelligent individuals learn much faster than the average person. Skipping a child ahead a year or two or five still puts them in a learning environment that is moving too slowly for their needs. Bluntly put, classes at TCU are not going to be moving at the same pace as classes at CalTech.</p>
<p>I am far more impressed when I hear of fifteen-year-olds being admitted to Harvard, Stanford, MIT. When I see stories of eleven-year-olds attending rather non-selective schools, I shrug and wonder, “why?” The child could learn far more on his/her own and s/he is not going to benefit from the media attention.</p>
<p>We don’t know much about this boy’s home life. If both parents need to work, he may not have many options or resources at his fingertips to learn on his own.</p>
<p>I’m puzzled by the fact many people on this thread are fixating on the SAT score. </p>
<p>Many people are speculating so I’ll speculate too: parents reached out to a variety of colleges within driving distance, asking for their criteria for admission and scholarship. Kid showed up to the test unprepared and took it for that sole purpose as his parents wanted him to focus his attention on something else than standardized testing. TCU proved the most generous with financial aid so he enrolled there.</p>
<p>As Bay said above, we don’t know anything about his home life, his parents’ resources, etc.
We certainly don’t know the parents called the news (it’d actually make more sense if it were the school. When we have children who enroll at my U, there’s always a news brief/clipping put out by the appropriate office. It takes very little for the local press to pick it up. Same thing about most students doing interesting things).</p>
<p>Happy Labor Day :)</p>
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<p>Being a kid is about going to grade school, learning, running, playing, socializing and just plain acting silly with other kids of the same age (6-7 ours a day, every day). Since he is in college I think it’s logical to assume that he’s not in grade school participating in such things. </p>
<p>Make no mistake. The kid is under the parent’s whip? The question is whether or not it is good or bad. I say bad. (My opinion)</p>
<p>There are kids who would do better if they were not forced to hang out with age peers 6-7 hours per day. Kids of all ages can be mean to age peers who are different. I don’t see any benefit to making kids go through that. Nature doesn’t require it. Putting children together with others of their age is a cultural thing only.</p>
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<p>He is the youngest student ever at TCU. I’m sure they alerted the news media to this, then had to get a release from the parents to do the story.</p>
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<p>Bingo! What we know about this boy’s eleven years of life is being summed up in a ten-paragraph story… ten paragraphs! What position are any of us to judge the decisions his parents made for him?</p>
<p>“Being a kid is about going to grade school, learning, running, playing, socializing and just plain acting silly with other kids of the same age (6-7 ours a day, every day).”</p>
<p>@sosomenza-</p>
<p>Don’t stereotype kids. This is the idyllic storybook childhood that few children have. Or want. And you do realize what most teenage year old boys talk about, right? And the peer pressure that exists among preteen and teenage girls? Ever wonder why so many teenagers seem to be taking their own lives? </p>
<p>Have you ever felt way out of place among your supposed “peers”? Have you ever wanted to just disappear to get away from people at school?</p>
<p>This isn’t just about advanced kids. Many kids feel isolated in public school environment. I’m not trying to say that he won’t do well or be happy in a public school, but it’s not our place to tell him what’s best for him.</p>
<p>Sosomenza, (ignoring your extremely narrow view of what constitutes a normal childhood) other than not attending grade school 6 hours a day you still don’t have any idea what this child’s life is and whether or not he does anyone those other activities. As someone above pointed out, all of our knowledge of this child is based on a ten paragraph article. Do you think you or your child’s life could be accurately summarized in 10 paragraphs? Do you think an outsider could read that ten paragraph article and make better parenting decisions for your children than you have?</p>