gifted?

We're headed to the US in a few weeks, which means it's time for us to deliver a small pot of gold to Amazon's headquarters.  (We just bought 2 new bookshelves this week and we still have 2 layers of books on many shelves.)  Our luggage when returning to CZ is always heavy -- children's books can be especially unwieldy.  Anyway, I've been rummaging around online looking for book recommendations.  I searched for books for my young advanced reader and got off-topic, exploring gifted children sites for a long while.  As a parent of gifted kids, a former gifted child and wife of former gifted child, I wonder why I haven't looked at this body of literature before.  I don't know that I'll spend a lot of time with online gifted parenting communities or anything, but I definitely found some interesting info.  

1.  Vindication!!  Research indicates that acceleration is the best way to teach a gifted child.  Accelerate certain subjects, skip grades, do AP/IB classes, start college early, or best of all, early entry to kindergarten.  I already felt totally confident that we had made a correct choice in placing M in school early -- he's so happy, he's challenged, he's excelling.  But seeing official government studies showing that accelerated curriculum is the key item in gifted education makes me very happy.  Gives me the extra support I need to go ask about getting V in early, too.  And I need the support -- I have to tell you I did not at all like asking schools about accepting M early.  Made me feel so pushy.  "Our Dudders is such a special widdle boy."

2.  Lots of gifted kids are homeschooled, for obvious reasons, so the gifted sites tend to have some homeschooling info.  Interesting fact?  about 3% of US kids are homeschooled now, but a shocking 7% of kids with college-educated parents.  Can't remember where I saw it, but I'll run down the article if you're interested.  It just seemed like a lot to me.

3.  OK, I did know a lot of this info already, like kids have long attention spans, need less repetition, read early, large vocabulary.  But I was not expecting the info on temperament -- that gifted kids are often very sensitive and can have extremes of emotion.  (We have a niece who is the posterchild on this one.  And Nathan's the type they interview for studies like this.)  And I'd almost forgotten to look for perfectionist tendencies.  I laughed when I read that some gifted kids want others to do things perfectly as well.  I thought it was just bossiness.  Probably is; just because other kids do it doesn't make it right!  Maybe I need to stop reading the info on gifted kid characteristics and move on to how to raise them.   

Anyway, I don't know if anyone else even cares, but I had a fun time.  The best part of all my research is the list of gifted-friendly games on hoagiesgifted.org, probably the biggest of the sites.  They love some of our favorites (Apples to Apples, Set) and have lots of cool stuff listed.

Other news, V is interested in Barbie all of a sudden and I love them too!  V had to ask for her Barbie back because I was taking too long combing her hair.  LOL.  Barbie and Ken multitask at our house -- their legs make good swords and their feet are E's favorite teething toys.  Ken's kept E busy for *minutes* at a time for the last couple of days.  I don't have a sewing machine here, but I'm going to use Grammie's to make some Barbie clothes this summer (yes I'm crazy).  But not crazy enough to make needlepoint Barbie furniture (vintage patterns up on etsy now) or a Barbie house, although I saw a great idea for one.  You just use a small bookshelf as the frame, very clever.