Great info! I just love this site so much!
I wonder too if giftedness is not part of the mix my dd is coping with too. Some schools have on the web their criteria and some info about their GT program. Here's one with downloadable checklists:
http://blue1.emerson.u98.k12.me.us/gtprogram/stories/storyRe ader
If you look at the teacher checklist at the bottom there and some of the negatives, it looks very ADHDish to me. All of those criteria are subjective and probably make more sense when faced with a herd of kids rather than just your own handful.
the "experts" say that the giftedness trait, like ADHD trait and the height trait, are highly hereditary. so it's highly likely that those parents writing here about their gifted child are themselves gifted. here's another site: http://www.sengifted.org/articles_counseling/Webb_Misdiagnos isAndDualDiagnosisOfGiftedChildren.shtml
I have been doing a ton of research on ADD & came across an article about gifted children being misdiagnosed as having ADD.
My daughter hasn't had a formal diagnosis yet, we are waiting on an appointment with a neuropsychologist.
I don't believe that my daughter is gifted per se, it's just that while her teacher swears that she cannot focus or listen, she is still scoring in the 90th percentile of her class. How can she be getting past all this distraction to be learning so well? IF she is diagnosed with ADD, it is withOUT hyperactivity, she is more of a daydreamer. Don't get me wrong, I am not getting my hopes up. I was just wondering if anyone has found out later that they have a gifted child?
A good evaluation will help sort this out. If your daughter has similar scores in each of the subsets of the IQ test and they are all high, and the person doing the evaluation does not have any observations indicating ADHD, then you are looking at gifted.
If the subsets of the IQ test show some in the gifted range and some in the normal range (especially the timed parts) and the evaluator notes issues staying on task then you are probably looking at ADHD pulling down some of the scores, which should have been high as well. People should score similarly across the differnt subtests and large discrepancies indicate the posibility of a learning disorder, ADHD or processing problem.
My oldest is inattentive ADHD and her high inteligence helped her compensate for her poor attention and organization. We had years of the lack of organization comments from teachers. With diagnosis and meds, she says she can "hear" the teacher better and can now reach her full potential.
There are lots of similarities between the two- (able to function on little sleep, talkative, behaves as if driven by motor...) But of course, it is not an either/or situation- she could be both.
If this is the 1st time you have heard these complaints from a teacher, and your daughter is doing ok in school and socially, I would wait and see. If this is a pattern, other teachers have said the same thing, I would take her to the doctor. Even if she is gifted, she may need help with attentional issues.
If she is really smart and has attentional issues, the behaviors will be worse if she isn't challenged. I have a son (age 11) who has scored 99th%ile on every standardized test he has ever taken but still manages to get Cs on his report card. He could read before his 3rd birthday- and could read EVERYTHING (the newspaper, Harry Potter...) by his 4th birthday- but still with his adhd- school is a challenge everyday. Kindergarten was his worst year for behavior because it was so easy. The wonderful K teacher suggested the he go to the reading resource teacher for enrichment while the rest of the class did phonics. Once this change took place, his behavior improved greatly.
I would first make sure she is challenged and I would also request an observation and report so that you could get another opinion. If it comes back in agreement with the teacher, I would make an appointment with a child psych. Good luck!
It sounds like she very well cold have ADHD, ( it is all ADHD, there is no such thing as ADD)
My DD has ADHD /Innattentive, NO hyperness, and is also gifted, so it is possible to have both. ALOT of kids with ADHD are highly gifted.
My son has a similar story. It turns out he is extraordinarily gifted in some areas, above average in others. He also has ADHD.
You might try to get request a complete evaluation where they do the Wechsler &/or Stanford-Binet aptitude tests as well as something like the NEPSY for executive function, Asperger's evaluation, etc.
How old is your daughter? Our evaluator said that in the early years of school, the material is presented more than once, so if your child is really smart, it won't matter too much if s/he's daydreaming two out of three times something's said - s/he'll get it fine on one pass, so to speak. But as the years progress, there is less repetition of material, and the inattentive child will miss the information altogether if s/he's daydreaming.
Good luck, adn let us know how it turns out.