I was told recently about a school that was shamed into changing its school motto. The motto was “I hear, I see, I learn.” Nothing wrong with that per se. Unfortunately the motto was in Latin, and the Latin for “I hear, I see, I learn” is “audio, video, disco”.
What the fuck that’s the best school motto ever change it back
me: wow i cant wait to watch the Thor: Ragnarok (2017) director’s commentary and find out all the cool behind the scenes facts that went into the production of my movie of the year!!!!!
im still having to cope with the fact that sasuke never got a proper redemption arc and in the end he was forced to live and work under a government that never properly apologized or atoned for the genocide of his people and his brothers suffering, all on top of the fact that the problem of training literal children to kill and die for the government was never solved despite it being a major plot point for the over arching story of naruto. in this essay i will
shuri constantly teases peter about how much more advanced wakanda is and he usually can’t tell that she’s kidding. he’ll be like “i should get some sleep now” and she’s like “you still have to sleep? lmfao” and peter lays awake trying to figure out if that was a joke
When you die, you appear in a cinema with a number of other people who look like you. You find out that they are your previous reincarnations, and soon you all begin watching your next life on the big screen.
too much
My previous incarnations throwing popcorn at the screen and booing: thisbitch is fucking stupid!!!
is there a word for “i was instantly good at a lot of things as a quote-unquote gifted child, and, as a result, i was able to skate by without ever being taught how to actually learn a new skill, and now that i’m an adult trying to learn new things that i can’t be good at instantaneously, i don’t have the patience or knowledge to improve on them, because skills that don’t come naturally to me just make me angry because i lived off instant gratification my whole childhood due to not ever being challenged intellectually or taught basic learning skills?” asking for a friend
Yes–it’s called the Curse of the Gifted Child, and it’s overwhelmingly common in adults who were the “gifted and talented” kids, and it leads to disproportionate levels of anxiety is smart adults. It’s why all educators and family therapists who are current in the research try so hard to spread the word that parents and teachers should praise children for trying, for working hard, for persevering, for thinking for themselves, and NOT praise them for their inborn intelligence or talent.
Adults fuck kids up so hard by praising something that the kids a) have no control over, and b) won’t itself improve over time (i.e. the level of giftedness doesn’t go up as we age, and eventually we find ourselves coming up to its limits). And our (I’m assuming you’re American) education system is so broken that we can’t do right by our gifted students in entirely different ways than how we can’t do right by our struggling students, or our students with other needs. It’s a fucking miracle that students on either side of “average” learn anything useful at all, and if they do it is 100% guaranteed that it’s due to a spectacular teacher finding ways to get their students involved intellectually and creatively in spite of, not thanks to, the system.
If you have kids or work with kids, take a moment and think about whether you compliment them on their innate gifts–“You’re so smart/talented!” or on what they actually do–“That was good/hard work you did!” This applies to all kids who do anything that comes easily for them: playing the violin, learning a second language, throwing/hitting/fielding a ball, etc. Replace “Wow, you’re so talented!” with “Your practicing has really paid off! You should be proud of how hard you worked!”
Praise ALL kids for not giving up if something is hard, even if they don’t get an A (or a B or even a C for that matter). “I know this isn’t the grade you wanted, but I saw that you worked at it, and that’s what’s going to make the next assignment a little easier.”
For gifted and talented kids, praise them for stretching themselves. Help them find challenging things to do. START EARLY, because, as the original poster says (and so many more of us feel), if we can skate through our first 18 years of life without being intellectually challenged, the rest of our LIFE is going to be very, very anxiety-inducing, difficult, and intellectually and emotionally overwhelming.
In the grown-up world, self-respect gets you further than self-esteem. “I can probably do a good job at this if I work at it” is the result of focusing solely on a kid’s self-respect. “Everything is so easy for me because I’m gifted/talented wait this is hard and so is this and I can’t do anything and I’m afraid to try because what if I fail I’ve never failed and my entire understanding of my own worth as a human being is that I don’t fail” is what comes from focusing solely on a kid’s self-esteem. Self-respect, learned over time, will bring self-esteem with it naturally. Self-esteem, learned over time, is separate from self-respect and, without the balance, just brings pain and misery and mental breakdowns when the adult hits the hard limit of the gift or the talent.
Ask me how I know. Then ask me why I’ve become a full-time tutor.
things english speakers know, but don’t know we know.
WOAH WHAT?
That is profound. I noticed this by accident when asked about adjectives by a Japanese student. She translated something from Japanese like “Brown big cat” and I corrected her. When she asked me why, I bluescreened.
