Has anyone had a child who was gifted artistically? It seems that my daughter, she's 4, is extremely artistic and is able to draw amazingly well for her age. I have no idea how to deal with a child who is gifted in the realms of art as I am not artistic and neither is my husband. I can deal with the child who is ahead in reading, writing and math but I have no idea what to do with a child who does art and lives for art. She even creates art with her leftover dinner! I am open to any and all suggestions people may have. Thank you for your time and knowledge.

Sticking my head in to say I'm in Quincy.

I'm watching this one carefully for replies. I am in the same boat as you are with my ds7. I feel like I am so behind because every time I give him something new he get's it in a day and then is promptly bored of it. I swear that I too feel like I'm not meeting his needs and am not challenging him enough. Just this monday, he's feeling a bit off we are all getting over colds, we took our school work pretty slowly (I still felt pretty bad) and lo and behold he spent most of the day writing out a list of oxides with their molecules next to them. I'm running to try to catch up with him. I feel like I'm doing it all the time. Does it reach a point where they slow a bit? Let me catch my breathe?

Oh my I could have written that!! I see that my son and yours are about the same age. Honestly, I think that age has something to do with what your experiencing right now. We have our good days, bad days and going half mad days (thanks Jimmy B.) all the time. One day he's hot to do school work and other days he just wants to sit and read or play games. It's so frustrating. I'm learning, albeit slowly, to deal with all of his attitudes. Some days I don't have the patience for it and I threaten to send him to PS or to Military school, we both know full well that neither are options but sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Where I live we have NO special programs for smart kids, none! The local PS cater's more to the developmentally disabled than those who are reasonably bright. They'd have no clue where to put my son who is really a second grader but is doing work from 3rd to 8th grade depending on the subject. He'd be bored to death. Okay, yes I am RANTING because you gave me the opportunity, thanks. I don't know about your boy but I've noticed that with mine he'll get interested in a topic and he'll run with it for weeks at a time,right now it's the sun. So we do things around that topic, math facts, writing, reading, science etc... Sometimes they are bored and they are having a hard time finding something to motivate them because they are in between interests. Just remember this too shall pass, it will I promise. It sucks to deal with. Warmly, Jen (who has been there done that and is often still there.):chillpill:

I forgot to mention that I highly recommend the "Element Chart" by United Nuclear (which also has tons of other cool science geek gear), this chart is great because it has all the elements shown in picture form (ie. hydrogen is shown as the horsehead nebula). My son has learned so much about the elements and asked so many questions since we hung up this chart over a year ago. Not to mention it is a great conversation piece. United Nuclear is also a great place to get labware, as is Edmund Scientific. Have fun.

I use this one for experiments. http://www.amazon.com/Fun-Mixing-Chemistry-Heidi-Gold-Dworkin/dp/0071348255 I also use the Usborne IL Science Encyclopedia and Kingfisher Science Encyclopedia as the main texts. My DS is 7 and he requested to study chemistry this year. "Fun with Mixing and Chemistry" is age appropriate for his bio-age. In fact I actually have loved all the experiments we have done out of it. Even his four year old sister enjoys them.