The first indication...

[StartingOver]

With my son it was much slower in coming, he was 3 and reading on his own. With my daughter she was walking and talking in complete sentences at 8 months. She has always been an old soul.

[MinivanMom]

Dd did this a lot too. I wrote about it at the time in my journal, speculating that the words were the tail that wagged the dog -- she would do some things just so she could narrate them repeatedly or in slightly varying versions as she played.

 

She would also say certain words over and over as she played because she liked their sound. I remember once when she was preschooler age, she was playing with playdough and for some reason got caught up in the word "saluki," and said things like "saluki hat, saluki shoes, saluki food" as she made little (unidentifiable) things from the playdough.

 

I didn't know anyone else's kids narrated their own actions in third-person format, and I'm really glad to know that dd isn't the only one!

 

I know exactly how you feel. It's nice to know that my kids aren't the only quirky kids out there.

[Satori]

I'm so sorry that the first four years of dd's life I was so busy with my career. :( She did teach herself sign language as a baby from watching the entire series of Signing Time videos and quickly surpassed DH and I. But once I started hanging out with her non-stop after selling my business she really started to blossom and/or I really started to notice.

 

She learns things quickly and effortlessly. DH and my jaw drops on a daily basis. She is really good at puzzles and it becomes apparent when we're with any other similar age children. At age 6 she helps me with my 1000-1500 piece puzzles and does her own very tough (same color, wrong pieces fitting together) 500 piece puzzles. She's amazing at memorizing things like poetry and geography. I do my best to challenge her like making all-white puzzle pieces of Africa which still doesn't faze her. She's writing non-stop and using impressive vocabulary and writing techniques that I haven't taught her yet. Her spelling is equally impressive. Combine all of those skills and her stories have taken a huge leap once again this summer.

 

I assumed she would be like me as a child and be gifted in math and reading, but it seems she has chosen other routes to show her talents. She's above average in math (loves the challenge) and reading (7th grade level now) but does nothing impressive like some of your children demonstrate.

[Alphabetika]

Someone said about eldest dd when she was about 6 months old, "She's an old soul." Sounds totally cheesy and I don't believe in that concept in the first place, but I knew what she meant. DD just had a look in her eyes that told me she would be deep, sometimes to a fault. And she is. ;)

[kochanyk]

These are so interesting and diverse! DS's first word was at 5 mo, phrases by 7 mo, sight reading and memorizing books at 12 mo. At 2 he created his own language (sounded a lot like Japanese mixed with French) and his words were consistent. At 3 we had him tested for speech (perpetual fluid on his ears) and his vocab was age 8 range. Those stand out for me as the big red flags. Of course perfectionism from the get-go and that's been a constant struggle.

[acurtis75]

I too kept downplaying all the comments from friends, family & strangers about how smart my daughter is for several years. When you only have one you assume everything is normal. Gradually over the last few years I've come to realize a lot of the same things mentioned here weren't "normal". She was using sign language to request milk, diaper changes and more food when she was 3 or 4 months old. Spoke in full sentences at one. Learned all letters and sounds in a weekend after watching a leap frog video. Extremely detailed imaginative play before age 2. (someone else mentioned the salt & pepper shakers....the first time I noticed it was at my parents house where there was a silver platter with a pattern that looked like grapes...she played and talked with those "grapes" for an hour). Ability to focus on a particular task for a very long time. (realized this was unusual when I started trying to teach the pre-k class at church and learned that other 3 year olds couldn't focus on a task for 2 minutes...lol). She has an incredible memory. Whether it's a Bible story we read 3 years ago or a movie she watched yesterday she can recall and recite specific details and/or dialogue. At 3 or 4 she asked me if she could read for a while before going to sleep. I said okay and stayed downstairs watching tv/doing housework for 4 hours and then went upstairs to find her sitting in the middle of her bed still reading. There are too many stories to even remember now (I wish I'd written some of them down!) but one of my favorites was when she was 3 or 4 and I was trying to convince her she should read chapter books (at that point she COULD read anything but was mostly interested in easier stuff) so I made a big deal out of going to the bookstore to buy the first Magic Tree House Book. She was not impressed but I insisted she at least try the first chapter. When we got home 20 minutes later she said "I'm done, where's the next one". Not wanting to discourage her my dad volunteered to take her to buy some more. He bought the next 3 books in the series to take with her for a visit at his house. An hour later he called and said she was done with all three and suggested I visit the library because we'd go broke trying to buy books for her.