Genius Kids?

[+ Avalon]

Why is it always math and science like on "Young Sheldon"? Why is it never history, English, languages, literature etc.?

[+ FreshFluff]

Why is it always math and science like on "Young Sheldon"? Why is it never history, English, languages, literature etc.?

 

Talent in literature takes time to develop, while ability in math and science becomes evident much earlier. Mathematicians usually peak in their 20s. That said, many math and science prodigies don't live up to their initial promise.

[+ sniper]

There's also the issue that it takes a lot of physical time just to read history etc, while many math and science courses are really a couple of simple principles and everything follows from them, and if your brain is wired a certain way you're just going to find it all intuitive.

That said, there are musical prodigies, so it's not just math/science that applies to.

[+ sniper]

Talent in literature takes time to develop, while ability in math and science becomes evident much earlier. Mathematicians usually peak in their 20s. That said, many math and science prodigies don't live up to their initial promise.

Yes, I like to say I peaked at 16 when I took the SATs and it's been like "Flowers for Algernon" ever since... I think what it boiled down to is I am world-class smart at high school level material, but push to far beyond that and I seem to hit a wall. I would ace the test to get to the next level, then get to that level and have no idea what the hell anyone was talking about...

[+ Tarte Gogo]

Why is it never history, English, languages, literature etc.?

 

Your premise is not true.

 

This young genius is focused on geography and presidents of the US:

 

This girl proves that she speaks fluently 7 languages:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azcQZHthcKI

 

We all have also all heard about genius kids who could compose music extremely early.

[+ Avalon]

Your premise is not true.

 

This young genius is focused on geography and presidents of the US:

 

This girl proves that she speaks fluently 7 languages:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azcQZHthcKI

 

We all have also all heard about genius kids who could compose music extremely early.

 

Thanks! Those children were impressive!

[+ Tarte Gogo]

Thanks! Those children were impressive!

I know.

It is the one kind of YouTube videos that I can watch more than once: real genius kids.

[+ FreshFluff]

Yes, I like to say I peaked at 16 when I took the SATs and it's been like "Flowers for Algernon" ever since... I think what it boiled down to is I am world-class smart at high school level material, but push to far beyond that and I seem to hit a wall. I would ace the test to get to the next level, then get to that level and have no idea what the hell anyone was talking about...

 

That was exactly my situation too.

[+ quoththeraven]

Science and math are considered objective, useful and trendy. Everything else, less so. The idea that science and math ability is necessarily innate or that other disciplines take time is laughable, particularly as applied to the arts.

 

Google just did a study of its employees and their backgrounds and discovered expertise in STEM/technical prowess was the least important factor.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/12/20/the-surprising-thing-google-learned-about-its-employees-and-what-it-means-for-todays-students/?utm_term=.08d7bf88c764

[+ Avalon]

I'm not a math and science person. In college to my delight I discovered that I could take a foreign language instead of math and science. I took German (4 semesters), Latin (3 semesters), Italian (1 semester), Portuguese (1 semester) Swahili (1 semester), Russian (Summer class), Punjabi (Night class).

 

In high school I took 4 years of Spanish and 2 years of French.

 

It has been so many years, decades, I only know English my native tongue.

[+ Tarte Gogo]

I'm not a math and science person. In college to my delight I discovered that I could take a foreign language instead of math and science. I took German (4 semesters), Latin (3 semesters), Italian (1 semester), Portuguese (1 semester) Swahili (1 semester), Russian (Summer class), Punjabi (Night class).

 

In high school I took 4 years of Spanish and 2 years of French.

 

It has been so many years, decades, I only know English my native tongue.

I am not surprised Avalon, I found the only way to "absorbe" a language and make it stick inside my brain is complete immersion. Lessons were just a preparation for that immersion.

If I don't go there and am forced to speak the language, because no one speaks mine, nothing sticks at all. And I have tried to learn many languages too.

[+ nycman]

I always hated languages. I got pushed into advanced English classes in high school.

It wasn't my calling and you could tell the language dorks absolutely hated having a

science geek in their midsts.

 

It was an odd situation. I could ace all the standardized testing in English....in fact

I out scored almost all of the advanced English kids, but in everyday life I hated it

and stunk at it. I never could grasp why their essays were judged to be better than

mine, but they usually were.

 

I was always so happy when I was allowed to retreat to the Halls of Science where

it was clear than my answer of "44.5342 millimoles per liter" was simply the

"correct" answer.

 

As my overly kind college English professor once put it "it's obvious they don't let you write much"....lol

[+ Avalon]

The Punjabi language teacher was also my Freshman English teacher. Years later I went to the Diwali festival at the local Hindu temple. She remembered me. She is a Sikh.

 

Her uncle was a history teacher. I turned the same paper in for both the history class and the English class. It was on Subhas Chandra Bose.

 

I took a Shakespeare class. I got an "A".

[+ FreshFluff]

Science and math are considered objective, useful and trendy. Everything else, less so. The idea that science and math ability is necessarily innate or that other disciplines take time is laughable, particularly as applied to the arts.

 

Google just did a study of its employees and their backgrounds and discovered expertise in STEM/technical prowess was the least important factor.

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2017/12/20/the-surprising-thing-google-learned-about-its-employees-and-what-it-means-for-todays-students/?utm_term=.08d7bf88c764

 

Who said that STEM talent was more innate?

 

Why is it laughable that it takes more time to develop—and what part of the Google study disproves it? BTW, was the Google study about engineers only or about employees as a whole (UI designers, bus dev, executives, admins)? If the latter, why is the conclusion surprising?

[+ bashful]

I'm not a math and science person. In college to my delight I discovered that I could take a foreign language instead of math and science. I took German (4 semesters), Latin (3 semesters), Italian (1 semester), Portuguese (1 semester) Swahili (1 semester), Russian (Summer class), Punjabi (Night class).

 

In high school I took 4 years of Spanish and 2 years of French.

 

It has been so many years, decades, I only know English my native tongue.

 

I took a few languages in high school too. 3 years of Spanish, about a year of German, maybe more, then only a semester of Polish, and Russian. I enjoyed them. Could be that English was a 2nd language for both my parents. Can only really speak English today, but was barely proficient with Spanish while working in Houston over 30 years ago.

[+ FreshFluff]

Science and math are considered objective, useful and trendy. Everything else, less so.

 

This is true, but prodigies in STEM and music were more prevalent—or at least got more attention—even before Sputnik.

[+ sniper]

It's more obvious that someone isn't parroting in STEM. I'm not saying there aren't people as talented in those other areas, but it's simply harder to tell if these kids who recite all the presidents and stuff are really processing information or reciting it back. But you can give a kid a math or physics problem and watch them solve it.

 

It takes physical time to accumulate a working base of knowledge in language and literature that it simply doesn't in mathematics. Semester long math classes are often applications of a principle that can be summarized in one page or less - and if you grasp it immediately it's a piece of cake. I went to an engineering school and also had a talent for languages(my Spanish teacher said I was the best non-native speaker she had ever taught). I got As in my foreign language classes, and I didn't find them hard, but I still had to put in multiples of the time I spend on my math classes to yield similar results.

[+ WilliamM]

Semester long math classes are often applications of a principle that can be summarized in one page or less - and if you grasp it immediately it's a piece of cake.

 

How true. I did very well in math until the 7th grade when I could also take history courses. My dad was an engineer, but my interest in math ended in the 5th and 6th grades when I could still win math contests (like Trump ).

[+ Avalon]

In my German class one got extra credit if they spent time in the language lab. So I'd go to the language lab and sit in the very back row and turn the tape down as low as it would go and do my other homework.

 

One thing I especially liked about taking foreign languages was that there were no papers to write.