Bragging Time

"New York Jen" wrote,

Ok, so now I'm worried that he has Asperger's! OY!

Off to do research!

No, no, don't worry.

My oldest son could do all that at twenty months--identify lower and upper case
letters, numerals, shapes and colors. He could read by age three and a half.

He's now a very bright and totally normal little nine-year-old guy who gets
along so well with all types of other children that his teacher has commented
on it to me. He reads on a high-school level and is also notably gifted in
math and science.

BTW, my second son who is about as bright as his older brother (both boys
tested into the G/T program) was about a year behind Will on reading skills.
He has a different personality and just wasn't interested. He is now in first
grade, reading on a fifth-grade level. Matthew is also a very normal little
boy with lots of friends.

BTW, my stock answer when people ask me if I'd consider letting either boy skip
a grade is, "Over my dead body."

Sorry for the brag--usually I try to avoid this--but it really irks me when
people imply that very bright=socially maladjusted. In fact, the opposite is
more likely to be true.

Mary Ellen
William (9)
Matthew (6)
Margaret (2)

"DGoree" wrote in message
...
"New York Jen" wrote,

Ok, so now I'm worried that he has Asperger's! OY!

Off to do research!

No, no, don't worry.

My oldest son could do all that at twenty months--identify lower and upper
case
letters, numerals, shapes and colors. He could read by age three and a
half.

He's now a very bright and totally normal little nine-year-old guy who
gets
along so well with all types of other children that his teacher has
commented
on it to me. He reads on a high-school level and is also notably gifted
in
math and science.

BTW, my second son who is about as bright as his older brother (both boys
tested into the G/T program) was about a year behind Will on reading
skills.
He has a different personality and just wasn't interested. He is now in
first
grade, reading on a fifth-grade level. Matthew is also a very normal
little
boy with lots of friends.

BTW, my stock answer when people ask me if I'd consider letting either boy
skip
a grade is, "Over my dead body."

Sorry for the brag--usually I try to avoid this--but it really irks me
when
people imply that very bright=socially maladjusted. In fact, the opposite
is
more likely to be true.

Mary Ellen
William (9)
Matthew (6)
Margaret (2)


Thanks for your response! I just read a few pages on Asperger's and Laszlo
clearly does not have it. The only similarity is that he doesn't like
birthday parties, but plenty of 2 year olds don't like birthday parties! He
doesn't have any of the other "symptoms" and I'm feeling better now!

My nephew was just like this as was my oldest brother (not my nephew's dad)
so I guess smart lil boys run in my family! :-) My mother always says that
Josh (my bro) was reading the New York Times when he was 2 /12...we still
don't believe her!

- Jen

"New York Jen" wrote,

My nephew was just like this as was my oldest brother (not my nephew's dad)
so I guess smart lil boys run in my family! :-) My mother always says that
Josh (my bro) was reading the New York Times when he was 2 /12...we still
don't believe her!

Probably he was just trying to find the comics. ;-)

Enjoy your bright little boy, and keep a written record of cute things he
says--it will amaze you in years to come.

(Yes, I know the NY Times doesn't have comics)

Mary Ellen
William (9)
Matthew (6)
Margaret (2)

Oh, goodness I really wasn't clear. I was thinking that they were more like
*four* year old achievements than 3 year olds and it suprised me that the
doctor would be concerned with academic stuff anyway. To be even more clear,
I thought it sounded like the doctor had *high* expectations of 3 year olds.


Okay -- I *hoped* that was what you meant, but it wasn't clear. :-) No
offense taken in any event; I just wanted to clarify that in *my* opinion those
aren't all things to be expected of 3-year-olds. Glad to see we agree.

Holly
Mom to Camden, 3yo (recognizes only C and O consistently, though he will
*sometimes* correctly identify random other letters)
EDD #2 6/8/04

Ok, so now I'm worried that he has Asperger's! OY!

Off to do research!


I realized after I hit "post" that my comment could have been interpreted that
way, and of course I didn't mean that!

I'm sure it's something worth considering if you've got a brilliant-but-shy
kid, but often brilliant and shy is just brilliant and shy. :-)

Holly
Mom to Camden, 3yo
EDD #2 6/8/04

"New York Jen" wrote in message
et...
I took Laszlo for his 2 year well toddler check up today. He's just under
32 pounds and they couldn't get an accurate height reading because he
wouldn't cooperate, but the shorter end of what he measured was 34 1/4
inches and that puts him in the 50th percentile.

The pediatrician said that his behavior at parties and at Gymboree is
totally normal, which I already knew but it's nice to hear it from the
doctor. Laszlo prefers going to Target or Kohl's than to a party or gym
class. He really loves to sit down with a book or a puzzle or some
crayons - so we just know he's more cognitively stimulated than other
stuff...he gets very overstimulated in party places...especially when
people
get in his face. Gets that from me I guess. :-)

I told the doctor about how he knows his whole alphabet (not the song, he
knows all the letters, recognizes them all upper case and most lower
case -
since 20 months), how he knows all his shapes (including octagon -
although
if it has 5 or 6 or 7 sides it's still an octagon) and that he knows all
his
colors and numbers 1-10 and some after, but not in order. He said that he
already "passes" the *3* year old check up for that stuff.


i hate to be the one to say this
but he sounds very much like he may be somewhere on the autistic spectrum

Glad all is well there!

"HollyLewis" wrote in message
...
"New York Jen" wrote in message
. net...
I told the doctor about how he knows his whole alphabet (not the song,
he
knows all the letters, recognizes them all upper case and most lower
case -
since 20 months), how he knows all his shapes (including octagon -
although
if it has 5 or 6 or 7 sides it's still an octagon) and that he knows
all
his
colors and numbers 1-10 and some after, but not in order. He said that
he
already "passes" the *3* year old check up for that stuff.

Congrats to Lazlo, sincerely, and this isn't a flame to you, but your ped
thinks that all of that is three year old check up stuff? Hardly.
--
JennP.

mom to Matthew 10/11/00
remove "no........spam" to reply


Hardly in what sense? My three year old doesn't recognize more than a few
letters yet, nor does he have any idea what an octagon is as far as I
know, and
I don't consider him at all behind. (And neither do his preschool
teachers.)
Your comment only makes sense if you meant that doctors don't ordinarily
concern themselves with that sort of thing in such depth. (At our recent
3-year checkup, the doc evaluated DS' verbal skills -- which did involve
asking
him to identify the colors of various objects in the room -- but she
certainly
didn't ask whether he knew the alphabet or how high he can count.)

In fact, the only 2-year-old I know of who showed similar academic
achievement
was recently diagnosed with Asperger's. (He is, by all reports, a darling
and
extremely intelligent little boy who will undoubtedly be very successful
in
life, but he does need some extra help negotiating interpersonal and
social
relationships.)
yes
her son sounds exactly like my autistic son at that age
the hyperlexia,the overstimulation in social situations,the fascination
with puzzles and patterns
we diagnosed him, it took almost a year before the doctors noticed any
problems

"H Schinske" wrote in message
...
wrote:

In fact, the only 2-year-old I know of who showed similar academic
achievement
was recently diagnosed with Asperger's.

Some children who recognize letters and read early are wrongly diagnosed
with
Asperger's, hyperlexia, or non-verbal learning disorder, too, when there
isn't
a thing "wrong" with them except being good at stuff. Misdiagnosis in
either
direction can be damaging. As Meredith Warshaw put it (
http://2enewsletter.com/arch%20Warshaw%2012_03.htm )

"Although many gifted children do get misdiagnosed as having ADHD,
depression,
Asperger Syndrome, learning disabilities, and an alphabet soup of other
disorders, it is equally true that many gifted kids really do have these
special needs, often going undiagnosed. And while it is damaging for
children
to be erroneously labeled because of a mismatch between their giftedness
and
their school setting, it is also very damaging when twice-exceptional
children's special needs are not identified."

Twice-exceptional means both gifted and learning-disabled.

--Helen

my son is gifted and autistic
my daughter gifted with add
i was/am gifted with add
its pretty hard to deal with when the whole damn family had add,lol

"DGoree" wrote in message
...
"New York Jen" wrote,

Ok, so now I'm worried that he has Asperger's! OY!

Off to do research!

No, no, don't worry.

My oldest son could do all that at twenty months--identify lower and upper
case
letters, numerals, shapes and colors. He could read by age three and a
half.

He's now a very bright and totally normal little nine-year-old guy who
gets
along so well with all types of other children that his teacher has
commented
on it to me. He reads on a high-school level and is also notably gifted
in
math and science.

my son was the same as hers
hes autistic and very bright
i was similar,but fortunately "ok"
it seems that the traits that make me gifted are magnified in him and where
i'm
very gifted,he's autistic
sometimes the line is very fine

What are you basing your diagnosis on, doctor?

"nina" wrote in message
...

"New York Jen" wrote in message
et...
I took Laszlo for his 2 year well toddler check up today. He's just
under
32 pounds and they couldn't get an accurate height reading because he
wouldn't cooperate, but the shorter end of what he measured was 34 1/4
inches and that puts him in the 50th percentile.

The pediatrician said that his behavior at parties and at Gymboree is
totally normal, which I already knew but it's nice to hear it from the
doctor. Laszlo prefers going to Target or Kohl's than to a party or gym
class. He really loves to sit down with a book or a puzzle or some
crayons - so we just know he's more cognitively stimulated than other
stuff...he gets very overstimulated in party places...especially when
people
get in his face. Gets that from me I guess. :-)

I told the doctor about how he knows his whole alphabet (not the song,
he
knows all the letters, recognizes them all upper case and most lower
case -
since 20 months), how he knows all his shapes (including octagon -
although
if it has 5 or 6 or 7 sides it's still an octagon) and that he knows all
his
colors and numbers 1-10 and some after, but not in order. He said that
he
already "passes" the *3* year old check up for that stuff.


i hate to be the one to say this
but he sounds very much like he may be somewhere on the autistic spectrum

Glad all is well there!