Hatrack River Forum: Ender-like kids...

This is topic Ender-like kids... in forum Books, Films, Food and Culture at Hatrack River Forum.

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Posted by Sm34rZ (Member # 8609) on :

Just saw this in the news : smart kid story!

...and couldn't help but think of the book Ender's Game. I wonder how many kids like this are on the planet currently.

Man, I wish I could have been like this as a kid. Heck, I wish I were like this now. Am I just too lazy or what? What drives a kid to be so curious and ambitious?

Posted by JonHecht (Member # 9712) on :

Counting me? 27.

Posted by C3PO the Dragon Slayer (Member # 10416) on :

I don't see how he could be Ender. Ender was not ambitious, he was just determined to win. It wasn't even completely that he was amazingly genius, it was that he was superhumanly perceptive and quick-thinking. And it was mostly that he knew how to earn the trust and love of others.

I have had several experiences with kids who pick things up right away and are obsessed with learning about something specific to the point that their understanding of a subject is unrivaled. I myself was into astronomy and physics in elementary school, and I could tell my baffled third grade teacher about quantum mechanics and the Drake equation all I wanted. I have a close friend in high school who is omniscient about everything to do with the weather. He memorizes 5-day forecasts (for the whole country!), records detailed weather statistics in his journal, and can predict the weather without even watching any forecast, knowing only what happened yesterday.

I think it has a lot to do with where energy is pushed. Kids can spend hundreds of hours learning Yu-Gi-Oh! trivia that doesn't help them at all when trying to prove they're prodigious. It also has to do with attention span. If a kid views math as a chore he needs to do daily, whether he likes it or not, he'll tend to lean towards the "not" end of the spectrum. And when that happens, it's not hard to let the mind wander when the math teacher is explaining something, so the poor teacher will have to review a concept many times so everyone gets it.

IQ is only a small factor among many when you want to select college-going 10-year-olds. Ditto for young military minds destined to command fleets to fight off aliens.

Posted by scholarette (Member # 11540) on :

But why do that to yourself? Think about all the great things this kid is missing out on. High school is one of those things that both sucked and was awesome. I actually still have friends from junior high.

Posted by katharina (Member # 827) on :

If he loves it, then I'm all for it. There are many things to do in life, and they don't have to be done in a particular order.

Posted by C3PO the Dragon Slayer (Member # 10416) on :

quote:
Originally posted by scholarette:
But why do that to yourself? Think about all the great things this kid is missing out on. High school is one of those things that both sucked and was awesome. I actually still have friends from junior high.

That's one of the reasons I stopped poring over all the science books I could find and memorizing digits of pi... another reason was that I read Ender's Game. [Smile]

Edit to clarify who I'm responding to.

Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :

This kid looks like he has a bright future as a scientist. I think it's pretty neat that he'll be ready to enter the field before he's burned up his prime mental years.

I'm also sort of sad that he doesn't get a normal childhood. You do have to do some things in order - you can't go back and do middle school in your twenties. And he's almost certain to have difficulties relating socially to people his age. How much difficulty depends on a lot of things...maybe he'll be OK.

Posted by mr_porteiro_head (Member # 4644) on :

quote:
Originally posted by scholarette:
But why do that to yourself? Think about all the great things this kid is missing out on. High school is one of those things that both sucked and was awesome. I actually still have friends from junior high.

Think about all the great things you missed out by going to junior high and high school.

Everything has an opportunity cost.

Posted by C3PO the Dragon Slayer (Member # 10416) on :

Come to think of it, I do think middle school was quite a drag.

Scratch that. It is my core philosophy that middle school is evil.

Posted by T:man (Member # 11614) on :

this aint ender this bean

Posted by T:man (Member # 11614) on :

middle school is evil
[Frown]

Posted by C3PO the Dragon Slayer (Member # 10416) on :

T:man's suggestion is interesting. I'm going to have to think about that.

Posted by Launchywiggin (Member # 9116) on :

T:man is actually the child in the story. After karate, piano, and homework, he posts on hatrack.

Posted by Shawshank (Member # 8453) on :

That kid must be really burned out at the end of the day, just like lose the ability to like make coherent sense when he's all through.

Launchy- you make me laugh.

Posted by T:man (Member # 11614) on :

skip home work and pianp

Posted by T:man (Member # 11614) on :

oops piano an homework

Posted by Xann. (Member # 11482) on :

I don't know, they say they don't push him, maybe he is a basically normal kid.

Maybe when he is graduated at the age of 12 all his peers will think hes awesome.