Hi everyone, I was wondering if anyone in here personally knows a child prodigy or genius. I would like to know if any of the methods we are practicing have been used on any of these genius kids. I think talking to a parent of an actual genius (who is willing to talk about what they did) would be extremely insightful in understanding how the child came to be so intellegent. I do know of a couple parents who have remarkable children but when asked how they became so smart…The parents say “I have no idea, I guess its in his genes”. I have a really hard time believing that since a child can only learn for example algebra if it has been shown to the child. Has anyone talked to parents of exceptionally smart babies/kids. What did they do?
I do think they are born that way. You can’t teach someone to be that smart. They are able to learn and grasp concepts extremely fast and easily. I think most of those parents have to make sure they give their kids plenty of books and resources to expand their knowledge and keep them from getting bored.
People tend to think of geniuses or prodigies are some special “gift” from the gods or something, but after reading so much from Glenn Doman I know longer really believe in the term “gifted”. We have probably all heard his quote that “Every child has, at the instant of birth, a greater potential intelligence than Leonardo Di Vinci every used.†It’s really true. We all are born with a brain that has the potential to hold more than we could possibly fill it up with in TEN lifetimes. We are all born with a brain that can use knowledge to think creatively, solve problems, discover solutions. When we were born we had the potential to learn fifty languages perfectly, no matter how complex, without even trying.
We have tended to think of thinking as the result of intelligence. But the fact is that intelligence is the result of thinking. Says Doman, “We are born with the potential brain of all the human greats (and all the scoundrels); intelligence is a result of what we do with it. Intelligence is a result of thinking.â€
The whole concept of “bits of intelligence” is that, without knowledge there can be no intelligence. A common ignorance in education today is that “What is important is not accumulating a bunch of knowledge, but the application of knowledge.” One wonders how you can apply something you don’t have.
Knowledge really is the base of intelligence, which is why Doman teaches that a parent can multiply their baby’s intelligence.
On my blog I have an article written by John Piccone called “Where Every Child is a Prodigy” and it talks about the work of the IAHP. It is an interesting read. Doman has certainly changed the way I think about prodigies, gifted and talented, and intelligence in general.
http://worldsbesteducation.blogspot.com/2008/01/look-at-iahp.html
Most people would think that Hunter is some kind prodigy (if I told them - and I have told a few) because he can solve math equations, reads, is a master at world geography, loves history, and has perfect pitch. But all these things were developed in him, and can be developed in every child. He’s not an athletic prodigy because he can run a mile non-stop - he runs a mile each day because I take him to the running track and run with him every day. He understands math because I showed him the facts of math and he figured out the rules. Granted, I believe all children are geniuses, as ALL children can accomplish amazing things if only they are given the opportunity. God has given every child a brain that can learn anything about this wonderful world.
Of course, viewing geniuses this way puts a lot of people in confusion, when they wonder how most parents of genius kids don’t have a clue how they got that way. It seems that most of the time these kids were just a “happy accident”. But isn’t it nice to know that it doesn’t have to be an accident, that we can actually develop our kids’ minds on purpose?
“At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank thee, O Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father: for so it seemed good in thy sight.”
-Matthew 11:25-26
“Children and genius have the same master organ in common —inquisitiveness. Let childhood have its way and as it began where genius begins, it may find what genius finds.â€
—Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton
Thanks for your reply! I believe the same. I think that a baby that is considered a prodigy is one because the baby was TAUGHT by their parents at a very young age and exposed to a broad range of knowledge. A baby does not become exeptionally smart without any intervention. So my goal here is to discover the strategies and learning plan that the parents of known prodigies and genius used. I wonder if they used the Doman strategy or right brain methods or methods we have not heard about. Any feedback from parents who have succeeded in developing thier child to thier full potential would be great. Thank you.
This is going to be a subject of much debate. I do not agree that everyone can be “genius” or “exceptional” as the terms definition. Yes, all babies can be nurtured and taught from an early age, and what we do can influence their intelligence, learning habits and knowledge, but we cannot make them into something they are not. If you did the same exact things with a baby who was born “genius” or “exceptional” as you did with a “normal” child, the children would still grow up to have much different intelligence levels.
This is the ongoing nature vs nurture debate. I believe it is a mixture of both. While we can greatly influence our children to be smart, a lot of intelligence is already predetermined before birth. Every child is born with potential to be incredibly smart, but I wouldn’t go as far to say genius, as the terms true meaning. Just because we can teach a child to read or do math equations before the age of 3 doesn’t make them a genius, it just means we helped them maximize their potential.
This is all my opinion. I am not trying to offend anyone.
Whether or not some children are born more ‘gifted’ than others is actually quite irrelevant.
However much ‘nature’ (ie., genetics) plays a role, what I think everybody here acknowledges is that ‘nurture’ (ie., how we bring up a child) still plays HUGE role.
There’s nothing much we can do about genetics, so to me it’s pointless speculating how big a role it plays. We should focus on what we CAN do something about, which is ‘nurture’, because we can make a big difference.
And I’m talking not only about intelligence levels. Increasing IQ levels is great and can give our children a lot of advantages, but I believe what is ultimately more important in life is the “EQ”, making sure they grow up with a good set of values and have admirable personality traits (eg., integrity, compassion, self-reliance/independence, generousity, loving, etc. etc. etc.). In fact, if I were to choose IQ or EQ, I would choose EQ any day, hands down, as this is what gets you furthest in life, without any question.
Of course, thankfully it’s not an either-or scenario, which is why we should work hard on both IQ and EQ development. Just don’t forget either!
My 2 cents! 
karma to you domanmom
lots to say on this hot topic
but have a baby jumping on me lol
Just a quick note. My sister was recently telling me of a co-worker who has done one or some of these methods on both her children and did not get the same result. Her daughter now 2-3 years old knows how to alphabet, numbers and reads in 3 languages.(English, Chinese, Spanish) But their youngest son now about a year I believe has not picked up things so much or as quickly.
EQ IQ MQ whatever … its important to teach them how to be a human being … a good person from the heart … with love and compassion … our job as parents is to love them and teach or guide them and maximise whatever potential that they may subscribe to …
Anyway sometimes too much of a good thing or genes … may result in offsprings going off the tree …
why bother comparing … to qoute a character …“Life is like a box of chocolate, you …”
Love your child …, i am sure that is all your child ask of you …
well kids…
i do know of a genius. yes, his parents are smart, but not braniacs. he’s a finance guy and she is a former atty. both ivy league grads. but i know a lot of ivy league grads with average kids. so genes, maybe, but certainly not the whole thing.
they are BIG doman family. like they posted bits of intelligence all over the house so wherever he looked there they were. she was a frustrated musician, so the really started the music thing early. he is now a pianist trying to become professional. he went to city college at 6 (yes you read it right… i could not make that up!)
he is now 13 and just got into an ivy himself, but they won’t let him in until he’s 16 so now he’s traveling giving concerts all over the place.
the other side of this is he has NEVER been around other kids, never went to a normal school as he was completely home schooled. and this kid is WEIRD! college at 6? do you think he was invited to any parties? 
granted this is the extreme, but even if you just did a bit or some of all the things we talk about here all of our children are way ahead of the game. and isn’t that what we want in the end?
i believe it is up to the parent what kind of life they want for their child and take it from there. for them, this is what they wanted. i don’t agree with it but it’s not my business. it did prompt me to look into doman, and while i’m not quitting my day job to focus all of my attention on my child, it did open my eyes to a whole new world, of which i am very grateful.
food for thought,
ciao, the Doc :clown:
HIIIIIIIIIIII to all may be my reply cannt relate fully to this topic ,but still i have a question regarding this topic.may be its seems silly to u all but still what should be the correct definition of genius?
well i think only a child that is able to read alphabets numbers spellings etc alone cant be regarded as genius.
i think every child has a different longings like may be he is not good at languages but he is more interested in machineries.may be the girl likes to cook .the boy is playing a game extraordinarly .my point is that i feel the intelligence should not be calculated mere by bookish knowledge.
i feel that how a child approaches a particular task or problem makes him genius.the task may be os studying ,playing ,cooking ,art,etc. so a child born in any condition,envrmnt,can be made genius by giving him logical thinking ,positive direction.but here i again want to mention that fields or areas may be different .so i feel we should try to build a practicle ,positive ,and logical approach in our kids so that they can become masters in their respective fields javascript:void(0)
Interesting discussion. I agree with nhockaday that the true “geniuses,” meaning the people who are not just very smart but scary smart, are pretty much born that way. As I understand it, many studies have shown that IQ is primarily inherited, so while nurture can have an impact on IQ, mostly the child’s IQ is going to be fairly close to the parents’.
That said, I have known a few people who were extremely smart (smarter than me, IQ-wise), but also very lazy. They never got a very good education, or never made good use of the education they got. Consequently they didn’t make much of themselves, and I think they weren’t especially wise people.
I think you have to distinguish intelligence, on the one hand, from the ability and motivation to learn, on the other. Graduate schools are absolutely loaded with people who don’t seem especially bright, but who have the ability and motivation to learn. These people are more than able to make great careers for themselves and go on to be quite wise people with excellent judgment and deep knowledge, which in the long run is more important than raw intelligence.
I think that Doman parents are trying to improve their children’s long-term ability and motivation to learn, regardless of inherited intellectual ability, however we should understand that, exactly. I think of it as providing a sounder and deeper intellectual scaffolding on which all future mental attainments are built. In the long run, a child provided with this sort of scaffolding will be much better able to learn than he or she would without that training. That’s my working hypothesis anyway…
DomanMom, very well said and I completely agree… 
In the end all that matters is what you do with your life, what you end up achieving, who you impact, and the difference you make on this planet.
No one can deny that some people are born with super brain and special abilities that others don’t possess. ie- Mozart, Beethoven, and Einstein. No matter how hard you train someone in music, they will never be mozart. They can practice the piano all day and all night, and listen to only classical music from birth but never will they be able to compose brilliant Sonatas. You can train someone in math and they may be able to do calculus at 7 but they may never may discover an equation as important as e=mc2.
Also, different people have different abilities. Roger Federer may not be very good at Math. Picasso may not be a literary genius. Michael phelps may not be good at chemistry. Mariah Carey may not ever win the national spelling bee if she tried. But who cares right?
Also, some super accomplished people have uneducated and poor parents and ended up to be BRILLIANT successes. For example- Dr BEN CARSON. He grew up in poverty. His mom was illiterate and a single mom. He is now world top Brain surgeon at JOhns Hopkins who separated the siamese twins. Take PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA- leader of the free people and his command of the English language is impeccable. His speaking abilities is phenomenal. I am sure Barack Obama’s mother was not doing the doman math method or reading flash cards when he was 2 years old ! Yes, both of these men were born with innate ability, but it is how they cultivated this ability themselves through hard work and motivation. In their cases their parents were NOT the ones cultivating their brain. They had to do it themselves bc of their circumstances. They are of-course I believe the exception to the rules. Most kids do not have such discipline or motivation, hence parents have to do the work.
Take CHELSEA CLINTON…both parents are super brilliant. You would think that 2 super brains will equal a genius. I’m sure she is well-adjusted, well raised, smart and happy. But she is no genius in the literal sense.
Alot of geniuses in the literal sense are not happy people. I was reading about a child genius, whose dad pushed him so hard he was in Harvard at 9 and teaching his professor. He ended up being a clerk to spite his dad and died v. young at 40 years old. What’s the point of genius then???
No one can deny that NURTURE has alot to do with it. HELEN KELLER was born blind, deaf and dumb. She was a recalcitrant child and no nanny could handle her—until Anne Sullivan. The teacher that famously taught her her first word “water” by running her arm under a tap and writing the word W-A-T-E-R. Helen Keller would have been locked up in a dark world if not for Anne Sullivan.
I think you want to do as much as soon as possible so that your child can have an advantage in school and life. Esp in this age of ADHD, learning difficulties such as dyslexia, and children struggling in school and even college…it is soooo important to have a good foundation. It makes it easier for your child, and why won’t you want your child to have it easier in school and life? Also, each child has diffirent gifts. We must not be so focused as to lose sight of giftings that may not be academic…such as singing, sports, acting, etc.
As for me, I am doing my best to expose my child to as much as possible and to teach as much as possible BECAUSE…I want to know I have done everything possible to maximize his potential. I only have one child, so I only have one chance. I want to have no regrets for myself in the end! You only have ONE chance!
IN the end, genius is what genius does!
You know I have a blog about my son with the name “Infant prodidgy or his mommy secrets” (on http://infant-prodigy.blogspot.com/). I’ve just began to open and share my education materials and ideas (there is some difficulty to translate all in english -this is not my native language -but I will try).
But this is it. My son is not genius, he is not infant prodidgy (this is ironic name)! In his three years he has just begin to read have a strong logic ability, prefer to read history books and encyclopaedias but he doesn’t like math. I began to teach him with dots just he was 3 months. But he always turned his face away. I tried and tried but he didn’t like it at all. I don’t understand why. To the present moment his maths ability is not unusual. He can count from 1 to 20 and maybe more, but he doesn’t do + and - tasks . Also I showed him Doman cards on enciclopedic knowledge from 2 months till 7, then we used computer slides. I see that it was very very usefull. Most of the materials he forgot to the present moment but… It gives us very very big thirsty to knowledge. He like when I read him books about geography, history, all science book for children mixed with all other entertaining children literature. He likes to study foreign (for us it is english - he can understand simple foreign books).
Except Doman we used a lot of other materials to learn. And…I read him books with pictures from 3 months.
The genes are very important factor becouse one can use Doman and have a genius child another can use Doman and have good organised like-to-learn not genius child.
But it works.
Why do you need your child be genius?
P.S. The son of my friends (they begin to teach him after 1,5 year) in his almost 4 is keen on reading and math (he can seat and solve different tasks) and … he hate any history and geographic stories :))))
We can help to our children to realise their potential but potential and genes are different!
That genetics has a role that cannot be denied. But there is a lot to be said about nurture. If Mozart never learned music, he would never have been the genius that he was. If Tiger Woods did not pick up a golf club at the age of two, he may not be the world champion that he is today. The key is to start early and as young as possible because that’s when the true potential is available to be tapped.
What’s a genius? My definition is someone who is exceptional at something. It doesn’t matter what that something is. It could be Math, it could be golf, it could be music, it could be something else. Whether a person discovers his or her genius depends on whether his or her potential was tapped. I agree that no matter what you do, you may turn a person into a genius into an area he does not have the potential for. For example, if Mozart had been forced into sports, it is possible that we would not be regarding him as a genius today. If Tiger Woods had gone into basketball instead of golf, his name might not be the household name that it is today.
Achieving genius is part having the potential for something and part having the opportunity to realise that potential. What potential do our children have we don’t really know but as parents it is our duty to help them explore. The only way to discover that potential is through exposure. Give your child the opportunity to try everything and when you discover what he likes, home in on it like a heat-seeking missile.
I think that genius is probably a somewhat misleading term. Perhaps a better word to use would be “expert”. Tiger Woods is a genius in golf because he’s got years of experience in the game. If you played golf as much as he has, who’s to say you can’t be great at it if you had the potential for it? There was a study some time back that examined the genius in chess masters. They found that if you showed a chess master a chess board of a game in progress for just a few seconds, the chess master is able to recreate the chess board on a new board and with all the pieces in the right places. However, if you show that chess master a game board with chess pieces randomly placed on the board, the accuracy of recall is a lot less. This is because the chess remembers the chess board in chunks, not as individual chess pieces on a board. Chess genius is based on the sum of the chess master’s past experiences and it is the same for everything else. Geniuses are only geniuses in their field of expertise. Put Tiger Woods in a tennis match and while he may be able to play the game, his expertise in it drops dramatically.
In all early childhood development programs, the focus is on fun and enjoyment of the process. If your baby isn’t having fun - stop. That’s because we learn things a lot more quickly when we’re having fun. If we like something, we tend to do it more - doing it more helps us get better at it. The better we get at it, the more we like it and so the cycle continues. Know any geniuses who hate what they do? Having the potential for success is important but above all, there must be a passion and heart for it. Michael Jordon - one of the world’s best basketball players - didn’t make his high school basketball team. As a basketball player, he’s also considered short. Despite these setbacks, he still went on to become one of the world’s greatest basketball players of all time because he had the heart for it.
What works for one child doesn’t necessarily work for another. We’re individuals with our own distinct and unique personalities. Learning styles differ for different people. Some people need to be “hands on” to learn new things. Others are better able to grasp abstract ideas. I think a good example of how these differences are reflected can be seen with the Meyers-Briggs personality test. There is a reason why those who are “Intuitive”, “Thinking” and “Judging” score better on IQ tests compared to those who are “Sensory”, “Feeling” and “Perceptive”. That’s because IQ tests present information in a way that NTJs prefer. People who are more “sensory”-oriented prefer to be able to touch objects to learn and find it difficult to grasp the abstract nature of some of the questions in an IQ test. That’s not to say they’re stupid just because they can’t score well in an IQ test. They just have a different kind of intelligence. It is important to how your child learns so that you can present information to them more easily. For this reason, I believe the multi-sensorial approach is better than straight flashcards.
Then there is the effect of upbringing. DadDude mentioned knowing people who were smart but lazy or never made use of what they got. Some of it might be true, but I think Bronson and Merryman’s book “Nurture Shock” sheds some light on this. Children who were praised for being smart often felt afraid to try difficult things. Instead of taking the praise and building their confidence, it actually made them less confident. This is because they developed the idea that intelligence is innate - what you’re born with is all you have. They felt that since they’re supposed to be smart, they cannot make mistakes and everything has to come easily to them. When they run into difficulties, they would rather not try than to risk the possibility of failure and exposing themselves to be “less intelligent”. Children who were praised for their efforts were more willing to tackle difficult tasks and weren’t afraid of challenges. They weren’t afraid of making mistakes. In other words, the wrong kind of praise can prevent a child from reaching his full potential.
Okay, I realise I seem to be all over the place here (please excuse me - it’s extremely late, I’m tired, but I can’t sleep because my baby’s sick with a congested nose and can only sleep if I have him upright so he’s in the baby carrier while I type this) but basically what I’m trying to say is that there are so many variables that can affect whether a child becomes a genius. Yes, there must be some genetic potential, but I reckon nurture still rules. Without nurture, having the genetic potential is useless.
It’s exactly as jtsbaby says - at the end of the day, we’re just trying to give our children the best possible chance of maximising their potential.
(btw, I apologise if I keep referring to “he” and “him” but I have two boys…)
I am a genius, manual (IQ 145) and mental (IQ 155). I had the highest combined IQ ever tested at CORA in Philadelphia. I was taught by my mother, who had only a High School education using Doman flashcards. I will be teaching my baby the same way. I am 34 years old now. My email is realgirrrl@aol.com. I will answer any questions you may have as best I can.
realgirrl,
Have your mother taught you also math and physical programm and… or only reading?
Yeah, realgirrrl, tell us more about how you were educated in the early years!
And well, many parents of 34 year olds are very smart but never went to college…so, I’m guessing she (and/or your Dad) was very smart as well. Am I wrong?
Dear realgirrrl,
Very nice to find a grown-up Doman baby who can share her journey with us…There is so much to know from you/
- At what age did your mother start the program with you?
- As someone asked, we you also taught math the Doman way?
- How long were you taught with the Doman method?
- Was it combined with any other methods as you grew up?
- Could you share your academic journey with us?
- Apart from academics, what other areas of excellence do you have? Do you attribute that to the early education you recieved?
Sorry for asking you so many questions, but all of us here at Brillkids will be really elated to hear this from you.
Thanks,
Questers.