Gifted Through the Lifespan

What to Look for When You Visit Your Child’s School

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 17 Jun 2026 11:50:54 GMT

Where Do You Begin?

You’ve already chosen the school. Maybe you followed the advice of others, or maybe you researched the neighborhood to see which school your children would attend. Maybe the school is working well for one of your children but not for another. That happens. Anyway, that choice is made for now and your dear child is starting a new school year.

Begin with the assumption that everything will be all right. It sets a good tone for your children. Get together all the materials the new teacher sent you, e.g., crayons, backpack, paper, the right kind of folders, etc.) and find out all you can from the school’s website and any other communications they send you. Depending on your children’s levels of giftedness and the “luck of the draw” when classrooms and teachers are assigned, you don’t know yet what’s good or wrong or not going to work. So stop worrying.

Talk to your children about how making new friends takes time. Depending on their grade level and whether the school is new to your family, there may be some students who are also new, while others may already have established friend groups.

Try not to use the word “bored” with your child, the school, or the teacher. It can come across as insulting and does not start a productive conversation about how you and the teacher can work together. Instead of stepping in too quickly, encourage your children to learn how to occupy themselves while you help create an environment that supports their interests. Parents do not need to direct everything. As long as safety is monitored, children can learn a great deal on their own when given the opportunity and the right setting.

Ask your child to keep a simple list—by writing, drawing, or telling you later at home so you can create it together—of what is and isn’t working. Talk about friendships, assigned work and lessons, whether they are interesting, how they feel about the classroom, whether they have enough time to do what they want, and what they would like to do but never get the chance to during the day.

Then let your child know that you will listen very carefully at the Back to School Night to learn more about what you all can expect and look forward to. Here is a good article that sums up how to approach that special evening:

Back-to-school night basics, by Marian Wilde, https://www.greatschools.org/gk/articles/back-to-school-night/

What I like best about this article’s advice, having been both an elementary school teacher and a parent myself, are these key points:

1. Find out if you can bring the kids.

2. Devise a strategy if you need to visit more than one child’s classroom.

3. Bring a pen and paper because internet connection may not work for you.

4. If other parents are there, don’t ask specific questions about your child.

5. Bring a note for the teacher about your child.

6. Be ready to volunteer.

Back to School Night is not the time to ask questions about your own child but to find out what the teacher has planned for the school year and how it will go. Figuring out a way to become a volunteer is an excellent way to learn more about the school, of course, but you will also get to know the teachers better.

Next Steps

Generally Back to School Night isn’t until the end of the third or fourth week of school. Try not to see it as a waste of academic time if your child or you suspect your child isn’t having their needs met or not learning anything new. In my life I’ve learned that it takes time to get the “lay of the land.” For anyone. Depending on their personalities and styles, some children will beg to stay there regardless of how little new they might be learning. We can work around that later.

Sit down again with your children to go over the lists so far. What’s working and what’s not working? Reach out to the teacher and whoever else you are supposed to include to ask if you can visit your child’s (or children’s) classroom for about 15 minutes someday soon. Set the date.

What Should Parents Look For When Visiting a School?

In my Substack chat group some people engaged in a conversation about what it was like when their children started school. At the time I was feeling their pain as the parents of highly gifted children, but I quickly thought back to my own teaching days and my own eventual ways of making it smoother for my own children. When I was a teacher, I had no idea what giftedness was. I’d had no training whatsoever in how much same-aged children in the typical classroom varied from one another. I made some mistakes. Yes, I remember clearly saying to a kind mother that I would allow her son to move ahead to something more interesting and that fit him better when he’d finish the work we were doing. Yes, I know now he didn’t need to do the work at all that I was insisting he do.

When you visit the school, be mostly like a fly on the wall. Sense the atmosphere. Look for what you might want to do to help or change anything. If the time period you are there is about math, ask if you can take a break and come back for another lesson or activity a bit later. The point is to get a feel for what works and doesn’t work. Then compare your visit’s findings with the list your child has made. Discuss whether your child would like you to talk to the teacher about anything.

Here Are Some of the “Anythings” You Can Do

When it comes to some learning and activities, intellectual levels don’t matter as much. Being a kid, interacting with others in an authentically fun or interesting environment, that’s what to look for. What kinds of activities do your children like to do when they are home or simply not in school? If they love to read, let the teacher know that you want—are okay with—letting your child have time to read what he wants when most of the class is working on learning to memorize letter sounds or flashcards/single words.

If your child loves puzzles or activity sheets—or anything else that can be turned into an activity center—advanced learners and others can earn time (by being p to date on assignments, for example) to go to and do their own thing. Volunteer to come in to help supervise or coordinate activities. See if the teacher would be comfortable with you or other parents setting up activities that combine what different children have been asking to do. If you need them, have fundraisers online or through the parents organization.

You can offer to share what you know and are learning. See if the teacher will accept the occasional print-out of something useful from some of the blogs you follow, for example. You can also ask the teacher if they would accept materials from you (like those activity booklets) so that other children in the classroom can enjoy those activities, as well. This approach frees the teacher up to focus on students who need a little extra help with the basics.

Go to the myriad gifted parent groups on Facebook and elsewhere and ask for suggestions for activities and materials. Think outside the box.

How rapidly could the child progress through grades K-6 lessons and objectives?

The following is an “on average” estimate. How long it would take the child to progress through the grade levels still depends on the relativity factor of who else is there. Schools and teachers do teach to the main body of students rather than any particular level. Consider this as you deal with the early grades and what you might need to weave in later:

Level One (Moderately Gifted) ~ 4 years

Level Two (Highly Gifted) ~ about 3 years

Level Three Exceptionally Gifted) ~ 2 years

Level 4 Exceptionally to Profoundly Gifted in one or more of their specialty areas) ~ 1–2 years or less

Level Five (across the board, Profoundly Gifted) ~ less than 1 year

What’s Next?

Depending on your child’s strengths, weaknesses and Level of Giftedness, their preschool and kindergarten years should be fine with these tweaks. A true Montessori School, in my seasoned opinion, is always the better option when available. Keep reading my posts and I will keep sharing options. If you are in a panicky hurry, though, (and believe me, I understand!) read my first book and the sequel listed and explained below. Also, the little book published in between is easy and helpful, too. I will continue to point you to ideas that you can implement.

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options in 2009. This is the original 5 Levels of Gifted book for parents and educators. Moderately Gifted, Highly Gifted, Exceptionally Gifted, and Profoundly Gifted children are the subjects of this book (78 of them) and their early milestones, behaviors, and parent journeys through how to raise and educate these children is a must-read. Parents who read this book can estimate their own children’s eventual IQs surprisingly accurately by the time they are age three to about six years old, before it is effective — or reliable — to have them professionally tested.

Here are links to the 5 Levels of Gifted book on Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/5-levels-of-gifted-deborah-ruf/1126358834 and Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-School-Educational-Options/dp/0910707987 or directly from the publisher: https://www.giftedunlimitedllc.com/store/p12/5_Levels_of_Gifted.html

The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (2023). This is a 20-year longitudinal study follow-up about the original gifted child subjects in 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options (2005, 2009). In it, Dr. Ruf covers every conceivable topic to ask the 60 of the original study group of 78. She also shows readers how it is that people of the same original promise to succeed have vastly different outcomes. https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-Children-Grown-Up/dp/B0C9SHFRLH or https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-5-levels-of-gifted-children-grown-up-phd-deborah-l-ruf/1143719859?ean=9798988323709.

Keys to Successfully Parenting the Gifted Child (2023). Need answers fast on what to do now? This is a short book — 80 pages including pictures — that is a great starter for parents just wanting some answers … fast! The content was originally from a PowerPoint I created for the parents of gifted children presentations around the country. The contents zero in on some of the most important things about raising gifted children that parents want to know. On Amazon, Keys to Successfully Parenting Gifted Children (2022, 2023) Print and ebook. The Nook version is also now on B&N.

Losing Our Minds: Too Many Gifted Children Left Behind (Oct. 2024). This is the first book in a Trilogy meant especially for educators, parents, adult gifted, and therapists. Questions for discussion are at the end of every chapter. The book provides a detailed analysis of the different levels of giftedness, the concept of “good fit” in educational settings, and the impact of various school environments on gifted children. It also includes personal stories and experiences of gifted children and adults, highlighting the challenges they face in finding appropriate educational and social environments. Available now on both Amazon and B&N. It is not the old purple book from 2005. Also, the Kindle and Nook versions are formatted so readers can click back and forth easily and find their place again. Follow this link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DL3BSC9X or this link: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/losing-our-minds-deborah-ruf/1146410968?ean=2940185888872

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Losing Our Minds: Too Many Gifted Children Left Behind

Deborah Ruf — Mon, 15 Jun 2026 01:24:51 GMT

First, I apologize for not letting you know enough about this book when I set the publication date of October 26, 2024. I was busy with life and growing older, but with my medical issues, multiple surgeries and medications that sapped the energy out of me over the past 6 years, I started to think about moving from my split level home after my second total hip replacement on October 30, 2024. In January of 2025 I had another surprise surgery, and this time it was to remove a very large cyst that I thought was causing my tummy troubles. No such luck. As happens slowly for many people over their lifetime, that tummy issue was IBS-C. I needed to change the way I was eating! What?

I started looking at retirement settings and wanted a group of fellow residents to be engaged, intellectually active, and — as you already know about me — I wanted a “good fit.” At the same time, I called for a realty group I’d planned to use when the time came, and they said my house was going to sell fast and maybe have a bidding war before there was even an open house (except for the other realtors). Still limping and occasionally using a cane because of my very recent second hip replacement, I was told by the realtor that making the house perfect inside and out required my moving out in April. Plus, I had to move into the retirement community right away to avoid both monthly rent and mortgage. The apartments I picked out in the 13 floor building were not available. I agreed to a unit that was available and totally different from my first “asks.” My house sold in June 2025 when four families immediately bid on it. Whew. All the packing, unpacking, asking for help, donating things, auctioning off other things, worrying, feeling free, etc. wore me out. My grown children live in 3 different time zones from mine. One helped for a week and tossed a lot of stuff out because I couldn’t make up my mind and didn’t have the brawn anyway. He found a large album of Magic the Gathering cards and took it with him.

Fourteen months later I am so grateful for this apartment that was going to be temporary. It is on the ground floor not facing the park and ponds, but it is only 1 apartment off the main entrance. I see and hear everything! It’s perfect for my need for some social interactions while I can easily go right back into my quiet apartment when I’ve had enough socializing. I’m outgoing for only so long. The people are great. I’m back to walking at least 1.5 miles each day and have gone past 3 miles often! There is great walkability, groomed and nature trails everywhere right out my door, and lots of activities and programs that are included. Yay!

So, what’s the book about?

Key Themes and Outcomes

Giftedness is relative and contextual
Intelligence is experienced differently depending on the surrounding peer group and environment.
Missing gifted-program cutoffs can have lifelong consequences
Students just below identification thresholds may still require advanced educational support.
Early educational fit strongly shapes adult outcomes
The quality of K–12 experiences influences later confidence, ambition, resilience, and career choices.
Challenge and peer connection are essential needs
Gifted learners require intellectual peers and meaningful academic stimulation, not just good grades.
Most schools are structured around average learners
Age-based grouping and whole-class instruction often underserve advanced students.
Underchallenge can create poor habits and disengagement
Students who are never required to struggle with their curriculum may fail to develop discipline, persistence, or study skills. Grade level work is simply too easy and leaves no incentive for somehow “trying harder.”
Success depends on more than raw intelligence
Emotional support, finances, mentorship, family expectations, and opportunity all shape outcomes.
“Good fit” extends beyond school into adulthood
The search for intellectually and emotionally compatible environments continues into careers and relationships.

What is Giftedness?
Do you ever wonder if you’d recognize it? How do we enable each gifted person to embark on a positive, authentic life trajectory that fosters their individual development?

Losing Our Minds: Too Many Gifted Children Left Behind explores how background experiences and opportunities during childhood shape the adult lives of the gifted children in 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options (2009) as they reach adulthood. Especially for the exceptionally and profoundly gifted children, the importance of a “good fit” in the home, community, and educational environments matter greatly and play a significant role in their futures.

The book offers insight, as well as a practical metric — the Five Levels of Gifted — allowing readers to compare people of equal promise and differing levels of high ability as they progress on their educational paths. The book describes how deeply postsecondary and career choices diverge related to the gifted children’s quality of good fit throughout their childhood years.

Here’s the twist: This newest book is a focused view of the school years of the now adult children from both the 2009 and 2023 books. How did their school years go? How did the parents and schools deal with the varying needs of children in the gifted ranges? After all, they don’t each need the same things during their journey through schools and other options.

Losing Our Minds: Too Many Gifted Children Left Behind (2024) is a detailed follow-up on 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options (2009). It is the first in a three-part series, based on The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (2023), which centered on the experiences and insights gained from a 20-year longitudinal study of client families. The author, Deborah Ruf (me), continues to revisit the grown-up gifted children of the initial study, offering unique, first person reports on how their lives and experiences have evolved over the two decades following the initial study.

This book is re-edited and updated, and each chapter now also contains Questions for Discussion, allowing readers to reflect on the insights gained.

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Does Everyone Doing It Make It Okay?

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 10 Jun 2026 11:56:57 GMT

I’m talking about going to traditional schools. Back in my active speaking, consulting, and test evaluation days, I started many of my speeches by asking my audiences to repeat after me as I stated, “School is not real life!” They usually chuckle and don’t say anything, and I then lean forward and say, “I’m not kidding. Let’s all say it together. School is not real life!”

Everywhere we turn we are led to believe that school — and school success — is absolutely the most important thing during our children’s childhood years. We are judged as parents according to how well our children perform in school, how well they behave, the grades they get, and whether or not we have taught our children how to “fit in” and do the work of getting good grades.

How many people recognize that “Best Practices” and “Standards” imply a one-size-fits-all approach to instruction that assumes that all children pretty much learn the same way, at the same speed, and at the same ages? How many of you are guilty of accepting and believing that one early task of the school years is to learn to get along with the other children their age? To whom does it occur that we really don’t learn social skills from fellow 6-year-olds, especially those who may be the same age but are otherwise quite different from us?

When we grow up, do we choose jobs that hire only people our age? Do we rule out possible friendships because someone is a different age from us? I assert that teaching children by age makes about as much pedagogical sense as teaching children by height.

Also, learning to follow directions and do what someone else tells you to do for 12 or more years does not lead to creative thinking or entrepreneurship, and yet our educational system is set up to allow teachers to grade our children on how well they comply, sit still, do the assigned work and turn it in, whether or not it makes any intrinsic sense for the individual child.

So, from time to time I will address many of the ways students vary from one another and how a good educational system would allow for these differences. It is my strongly held opinion that tweaking the current system is not the answer. Let’s see if I make arguments and points that change more than a few minds.

What Is School Choice?

… and what do I think of it?

The rules for School Choice vary in every single state and district around the country. There is no Federal Mandate for Gifted Education. In my state of Minnesota, we have lots of school choice within school districts and between school districts. Parents can also receive vouchers for private and religious schools. Keep in mind, though, that the student funding follows the student. Schools have little incentive to notify parents of their options. The topic of school choice is not my specialty area because I’ve mostly focused on giftedness in children and adults; I haven’t focused on what all the schools and laws provide so that I can make great recommendations no matter where you live. But here is my stab at it for you.

From what I understand, even when laws exist in a state, or even at the national level, access to both public and private schools depends on their openings, what they are looking for in their students (private schools), and perhaps a lottery for those applying. And, of course, parents need to know the schools and options exist and that you may not be stuck after all with a school that isn’t working for your child.

If it makes you feel any better, many countries are so top-down that families have absolutely no say in where — and sometimes “if” — their children will go to school. Gifted programming or opportunities for the brightest students are not routinely available anywhere. Not here; not there. No guarantees.

I am a proponent of both school choice and competition in the marketplace. Public educational school systems are supposedly supported by the taxpayers. Unfortunately, the primary source of revenue for public schools is property taxes on homes and businesses. This is a terrible system and I think it should be changed everywhere. We need a new system. If enough of you want me to weigh in about my views for politically changing things like school funding and public school mandates, let me know.

It would be ideal if parents and their children could have a legal right to choose the school what will deliver what they need. This is not the same as parents dictating what the school should do. That makes little sense because not every family’s needs are the same and the educators in the nearby — or district-assigned — school may already be meeting the needs of most of their students.

Families need either school programs — typically best for the most common gifted ranges (Levels One and Two, the moderately to highly gifted) — and gifted flexibility procedures for those who are outliers at the Level Three, Four and Five range (Exceptionally and Profoundly Gifted). Sometimes the need for another option — school choice — becomes necessary if the setting your child is in doesn’t fit or work for your child. The learning needs are not routinely addressed in the school to which their family is assigned. Families benefit from “free market” competition. When a school sees it’s losing students to another school, the school often makes changes. Families need the right to try out something that would be better for one or more of their children — a different school with a different student base with more “true peers” or a faster, deeper pace of instruction, etc.

Only when they have access to their “best fit” environment and school setting can children develop to their fullest potential academically, socially, and emotionally. And, as with the families in the book from which I am quoting (The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us, 2023), sometimes it takes some time to figure out what is needed. There should not be rules that dictate that we only get one chance.

About half of my clientele have come from outside my state; some client families are from other countries, are military families, ex-pats, or from other cultural and language backgrounds, too. I will release another post about school choice, vouchers, and what I think of all of that.

Districts seen as “good” districts receive more requests from parents who want their children to attend schools that have the highest graduation rates, test scores, and college-bound students. Some of those more desirable districts may also have “good” gifted programs.

As you read my books and posts, though, you see that most of these statements — and assessments of what “good” means — are relative. There is no best school as much as the fit between the bright child and the other children who attend the school who are similar; the other students in the school make a difference. Teachers tend to teach to a level that is slightly below the top middle third of their students. If I could get a pointer arrow to work, I would put it on the right side of the two dark blue sections in the middle of the bell curve and have it hover on the halfway point there. I got an arrow to work elsewhere, but it didn’t translate here.

Readers who read my posts and books become aware of further consequences to student and family outcomes directly related to the family’s access to a social safety net and options. As it now stands, it remains common for society, policy, laws, and educational institutions to continue to maintain an agreement for systems and practices that do not meet the needs of a substantially large portion of the overall population. Sadly, almost anyone who doesn’t naturally fit the mainstream without additional assistance or adaptations is destined to become less of an emotionally and psychologically healthy member of society (See the longitudinal study in The 5 Levels of Gifted Grown Up, 2023).

Here are links with explanations about some of what’s available around the United States as far as School Choice and vouchers go. This partial list to get you started is for laws, state options, and some public and private school options, too:

As of Jan. 31, 2024, 29 states and the District of Columbia have at least one private school choice program, according to an Education Week analysis. Of those, 11 states have at least one private school choice program that’s universally accessible to K-12 students in the state. As of Jan 31, 2024: https://www.house.mn.gov/hrd/pubs/vouchers.pdf

Which States Have Private School Choice? — Education Week
https://www.edweek.org/policy-politics/which-states-have-private-school-choice/2024/01
Jul 11, 2023 — Currently, 14 states and Washington D.C. provide vouchers for this purpose. This year we saw dramatic increases to Ohio and Indiana’s voucher …
‎ESA and Scholarship… · ‎Charter School Expansions · ‎Charter School Expansion
More States Go “All in” on School Choice in 2023
National School Choice Awareness Foundation
https://schoolchoiceawareness.org
› more-states-go-all…
2023–2024 Trends
National School Choice Week
https://schoolchoiceweek.com › trends
Jan 18, 2024 — States that recently passed new ESA programs for students include Utah, South Carolina, Iowa, Arkansas, and Montana. States that recently …
Every state that passed or expanded school choice in 2023
Washington Examiner
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com › news › every-…
Jul 16, 2023 — These are the states that have passed school choice programs in 2023: Iowa. After securing a larger Republican majority in both houses of the …
What School Choice Is and How it Works | K-12 Schools
U.S. News & World Report
https://www.usnews.com › Education › K12
Apr 14, 2023 — Currently 32 states plus Washington, D.C., offer some type of school choice program, according to EdChoice, a nonprofit that advocates for …
Greatest number of state legislatures pass school choice …
The Georgia Virtue
https://www.thegeorgiavirtue.com › national-politics

Dec 2, 2023 — Fourteen states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico offer 25 voucher programs to give parents “the freedom to choose a private school for …

From Forbes
Oh, What A Year (For School Choice): Dec 19, 2023 — The ten states that now have universal or near-universal private school choice, either in the form of education savings accounts, voucher …
https://www.forbes.com
› mikemcshane › 2023/12/19

Google also suggests these search terms:

· How many states have passed school choice?
· What is the school choice policy in the US?
· Which states have vouchers?
· Do Democrats oppose school choice?

I tested all the links, and even if they don’t continue to work, these sources give you a start. Jump in with more information yourself to share with others.

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

If you’re an adult who wonders if you’re gifted or who wonders what went wrong in your life (so far), this is the dissertation made for you!

Website: https://fivelevelsofgifted.com/

What Happens When a Smart Youngster Misses the Gifted “Cut-off”?

Deborah Ruf — Mon, 08 Jun 2026 01:46:27 GMT

Level One people are in the moderately to gifted range of advanced learners.

Where any individual fits in their setting or environment depends, to a significant extent, on who else is there. That’s called the relativity of intelligence, of high giftedness. Having — or not having — access to true peers with whom they can share their ideas and easily understand each other can be a detriment to their progress. It can lead to other long-term issues, as well, so the goal is to help readers see what some of these less-than-ideal outcomes are for the different Levels of Gifted.

Level One: The Conventionally Gifted

Level One people are in what I call the Conventionally Gifted range. I chose this term when I wrote my follow-up longitudinal study, The Five Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (2023, linked below) to describe the first three Levels (of Five Levels of Gifted from my somewhat viewpoint changing first book, 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options (2005/2009) because most teachers and most students have had such gifted students in their classes. These are the people others think of as smart, maybe gifted. Within the Conventionally range are Levels One, Two and Three.

Post-High School Education and “Good Fit”

The idea is that a “good fit” extends past the regular school years in our lives. With the background on what a good post-high school fit looks like, we can continue to explore what really happens for any cross-section of gifted people — not just the ones in this study — and some typical, real, and recurring reasons behind the school and educational choices different people of similar abilities make.

And please remember, someone, including you, does not need to have been identified as gifted or told by some authority figure that they are gifted. When you read my material, you will figure yourself out as far as whether or not you’re pretty darned smart, too.

One purpose of this post is to demonstrate that it is the social-emotional — the sense of well-being — plus the reveling-or-not in the challenge and wonder of engaging, comprehensive learning and work that give our lives meaning.

How Smart or Advanced Are People in Each Level of Gifted?

People within each Level of Gifted are capable of learning more than the typical, or average, learner during the K-12 school years when the conditions are good for them. How much more?

How rapidly could the child progress through the academics grades of K-6 lessons and objectives?

Level One (moderately gifted) ~ 4 years (or about 2/3 of the standard time)

Level Two (highly gifted) ~ about 3 years (or about ½ the standard time)

Level Three (exceptionally gifted) ~ 2 years (or about 1/3 the standard time)

Level 4 (exceptionally to profoundly gifted) ~ 1–2 years or less (or about 1/6 the standard time) particularly in their strength areas

Level Five (profoundly gifted) ~ less than 1 year

For the Level One student, what stands out most is that parents and teachers alike expect good grades and cooperation and yet the student realizes the pace is too slow … almost always. Right now, we will look just at what people in my study did as they left high school and started their careers.

How can years of sitting through inappropriate schooling affect people long-term?

“Being ahead” is generally about the gifted child’s ability to understand and maintain the learning before they officially start any formal schooling. When the parents of gifted children describe their children as being like sponges who simply absorb everything, this is why their children are ahead when the regular school years start. They start learning and using what they learned much younger than typical children, and that means they’ve already experienced enough repetitions to master many topics. How much more than typical depends on their Level and profile of intelligence, but it also has something to do with their access to toys and books and other people and walks around the neighborhood and trips to the park. In order to “show their stuff” they usually need a certain lack of any overwhelming trauma in their lives.

The K-12 path (kindergarten through grade 12 school years) is strongly related — and usually impacts — the post-high school education and career choice options and outcomes for most study participants. Look for my free blog posts that start with this title: Are Schools Set Up for Gifted Children? to see what happened to people in all five levels of high intelligence.

To assure the anonymity of participants, rather than identify the post-high school institution by name, I created tables that use a number to indicate how competitive it is as far as the percentage of applicants who apply compared to those who are accepted. 1 means most competitive/ elite and 5 means it’s something other than regular college or university.

US News and College Simply ratings were used to establish the selectivity factor and the standardized ACT/SAT score ranges. The main point to this is to give us a metric for whether each study participant found a way to attend an institution of post-secondary learning that would likely have true peers and appropriate coursework depth and pacing for their intellectual ability level. And as readers may have noticed, doing away with such standardized testing didn’t help the elite institutions select students who had the ability to handle their curriculum and intellectual expectations. I have known for a long time that grades are a poor predictor of college or life success.

It is likely a good fit when the student’s ACT/SAT score is not too high above or below that of the range posted by the institution as representing the average student who matriculates there.

For example, if someone in Level Three attends an Elite University (and many did), anyone from Level Three could have done well — both in performance and in their social and emotional connections — in such an institution. But not all of the Level Three study subjects had the option of attending an elite school and the different reasons are laid out here.

In the entire study group, there is no one who attended a school that was above their ability to do well.

Many, however, did get their post-high school training and education in places and institutions — not the traditional college path — that were more of the same poor fit they experienced during their earlier school years. As they reached adulthood, many of the study subjects found themselves again involved in institutions or on paths that were not a good fit for them emotionally, socially, academically, or competitively.

In the series of post-secondary results and fit, I add slightly expanded tables that include summary results of what each young person experienced (Unsatisfactory, Acceptable, Satisfactory, and Excellent) during their kindergarten through high school years. I’ve added categories to the Levels’ tables connected to their post-secondary environments and choices. The intention is to illustrate that a poor school fit can have repercussions well beyond one’s grade school years because it continues to affect the self-concept, goals, ability to compete or keep up, and a sense of belonging — fitting in — of the individuals.

As you read through the tables in each post about post-secondary life and training and the Levels of Gifted study subjects, consider that each table represents a Level of Giftedness that indicates, within it, a similar range of abilities among the study participants.

Readers will see that an earlier “good fit” generally leads to later good fits and options, options that support the development of their talents, careers, social, and emotional needs.

Conversely, it becomes clear that lack of an early “good fit” can have negative repercussions far into the future of people who are every bit as capable as those gifted students whose needs were met. Although you may have only looked at the K-12th grade education environment fit so far, readers can see here that subsequent training options and choices are related to the book subjects’ earlier experiences.

Level One Post-High School Fit Summary

Why This Matters

We start with some general information about Level One students. For instance, if they are in public or private schools which draw from a working class, rural, or “unsettled” population that experiences lots of moving or poverty, a Type I school, there are likely to be one to three Level One students in each classroom. Double the number estimate for a Type II school setting. If a district has a high socioeconomic population or if there are schools in a district where most of the parents are highly educated professionals, Level One children are high average learners and constitute at least a third of the students in their schools. In such settings Level One students are rarely included in the gifted programs because their assessed IQ scores are slightly below the school’s gifted acceptance or cut-off score.

The American professional class is predominantly from the Level One ability range.

For the four people in Level One, there is a significant range of educational outcomes.

All four people here in this study had Unsatisfactory learning and social “fit” in their kindergarten through Grade 3 (K-3rd in the Chapter 3 tables) school years. Notice that the first four years of typical schooling have likely set many gifted learners on a path of frustration and underachievement.

Most gifted identification and programming — if there is any — begins during third grade.

The achievement range within a typical middle school mixed ability seventh-grade class ranges from approximately third-grade equivalency to post-graduate college level (Lohman, D., 1999).

Middle schools are different from elementary schools primarily because the students move from class to class for their different subjects instead of being taught by the same teacher all or most of the day. Because of this class and schedule structure, middle school teachers see many more students in one day than elementary teachers. This means it takes longer for the teacher to know the students well enough to respond effectively to their individual or unique learning profiles until further into the school year. And middle schools, like elementary schools, almost always group students primarily by age rather than ability profile. Since the achievement gap between the slowest and fastest learners gets larger every year, the gap between the classroom instructional level and the gifted child’s achievement and ability level is large by the time a child reaches middle school. It also depends on “how gifted” the child is compared to classmates. And just to complicate matters a bit more, at every age and grade level, each school year’s population will differ. This means the teacher may have an entirely different group of students with different personalities and needs the next year, so what worked for one year’s students won’t work for the next year’s.

Since the late 1970s, these school years have continued to practice “whole-class instruction” with little to no ability grouping. The curriculum and pacing are designed for the abilities of the average child in the classroom. For the four children in this study who are in Types I and II schools, though, the pace and depth of coursework are below their abilities and interests because it is designed for a lower range of classroom abilities than that of the Level One student. It also means there are too few like-minded classmates with whom to effectively compete, joke around, and befriend.

The Level One Subjects’ Post-Secondary Choices

Kirk

Kirk Peterson described himself as mostly on his own to cover his high school material at home and online. Here is how Kirk described his situation as a homeschooler:

I was mostly homeschooled. My mother let us go at our own pace (it was different for each of us) and only paid attention to our finishing what we should finish our work on time. There wasn’t much instructional interaction. We basically did public school at home, and my mother used a state-run, tuition free online program. I would wait until the last minute to do everything. My parents’ encouragement to me to get it done was that I could only be in honors math if I did the homework. Of course, that worked in my favor, too, because instead of taking the bait, I chose to drop down a level in the math courses to avoid homework at all.

Kirk’s pre-college years did not present him with enough challenge or structure to require study or organizational skills. Although he did fine in both his first two post-secondary schools, he found real peers in the professors for whom he worked on projects, and intellectual challenge. After a one-year break from school before job-hunting, Kirk, in his mid-twenties, found a software engineering position. He received a major promotion and pay increase recently. His post-secondary tuition and expenses were paid for by family money, and it included a trust fund from grandparents for just that purpose.

Henry

Henry’s intellectual profile was stronger in the verbal domains than in the math and qualitative reasoning domains, so he was more comfortable in writing and discussion groups than in advanced math classes. His intellectual profile is stronger in the verbal domains than in the math and qualitative reasoning domains, so he was more comfortable in writing and discussion groups than in advanced math classes. Henry, who went into military service after high school, said this:

I always enjoyed the classes in the gifted student program where we would get together in a small group outside of normal class and learn about interesting things, and think about larger, more complicated topics and issues stimulating intellectual conversation. It was the other classes — like accelerated math courses, for example — that I never liked. But, by association, I was always placed in in those advanced math classes due to my involvement with other accelerated programs. In retrospect, I feel that I had a hard time liking these classes because they held me to a standard that I was then too lazy to work for. Things had always been easy for me to learn up until I hit middle school math, at which point I realized that I would have to actually work for good grades.

Henry applied and went to a Tier 2 post-secondary institution. It was what his parents expected of him, but he dropped out due to a complete lack of interest before finishing his freshman year. He knew his interests lay in “hands on” activities and learning, so he went into the military where he earned an associate degree. Henry is the least satisfied of the four people in this Level, but he has found his own intrinsic motivation and now is halfway through a four-year program in manufacturing engineering at a Tier 3 institution. He was briefly married, lives in an apartment near school, and is in his mid-twenties. His college costs are covered by the GI Bill. He continues his service with the Air National Guard and works at a job that covers his basic living costs.

Albena and Ronald

Both Albena and Ronald got to experience an Excellent fit for themselves. Interviewed while still in their twenties, they both reported that their school was a good fit for them. They both completed a four-year degree in four years. Albena’s academic focus was geological engineering and global developmental partnerships. Recently married and in her mid-twenties, she is a civil engineer and environmental specialist at a worldwide company. About her wedding, she stated:

We recently bought a condo, which we could not have done without help from [my husband’s] family. His grandma had saved money to help us with the down payment, which we could still only do 3.5% down. Our wedding was very cheap as weddings go. Our families made all the food/dessert and it was at a family friend’s house.

When asked how her university expenses were paid, she said:

I had a mix of scholarships, governmental and private loans. My parents took out a parent loan for me (and my sister) to cover up to a certain amount for us both. My dad also co-signed on all my private student loans. I still have a lot of debt; I graduated with over $100k in student loans. While in school, I lived at a women’s ministry house, which was a lot cheaper than on campus. I was able to take classes over the summer because I could take out student loans and live in the women’s house more cheaply. As I was going into engineering and had a job right out of college, it is much more manageable than it otherwise would be. My husband is also in an engineering field, and while he has some debt from school, it was less than half of mine. When asked to describe their payoff plan, Albena replied: Right now, all of our loans are set to be repaid in a max of 15 years (mortgage is longer). Our plan is to start paying them off more rapidly now that we have some savings built up, but I have not calculated how long it will take us to pay them all off yet. About 35% of our monthly income is going toward student loans and about 23% to the mortgage.

Ronald’s Type I high school had some advanced courses, and he chose to take several, so this was an improvement over the first nine years of his schooling. Generally, when there are advanced courses, the students must first prove that they can succeed in them. This means that classmates are likely to be bright enough to do so, as well. These classes were likely the first experiences that Ronald had of being in a group comprised of mostly bright students as classmates, and most of them were probably as bright as he. So it was a good fit for him by then.

He majored in broadcast journalism. In his first post-college job, he said this:

I’m not entirely happy at my job and not making the money I want. I’m looking at maybe account management.

In his late twenties, he was promoted to an executive producer and project manager position at the same growing, international company where he was previously unsatisfied. Shortly thereafter, he was laid off.

My job (and most of my department) was … laid off, which kind of sucked but that’s the way startups with no established revenue stream work. I was on unemployment for a while trying to figure out what to do with my life and then landed a seasonal job through my college internship boss with the in-house production department for athletics. I was hired on to shoot/edit/produce promo content for the men’s hockey team, so I spent most weekends last winter either working the games at the arena or traveling with the team to produce on the road/behind the scenes content, mainly for social media. Shortly after I committed to working there, I was hired on full-time as the video producer at a full-service real estate centered photo, video, and imaging company.

He, his longtime girlfriend, and their dog moved in together three years ago. When describing how he managed to get through a Tier 2 university without any continuing loans he said,

I don’t have any school loans now. I got some minor scholarships — I applied for a couple and I got them. Got one through the marching band, and I was in the marching band in college all four years. My grandparents and some other relatives, my uncle, also contributed. They all wanted me to be able to do marching band, etc., and I didn’t take it for granted and still worked as a valet through school.

Takeaways From the Level One Post-Secondary Fit

Early background, including one’s educational options and choices, continues to affect the social, emotional, educational and career attainment throughout one’s life. It affects confidence and self-esteem, too. It affects resilience. I explain more — and go into more depth — in other posts and books.

The details of this part of the longitudinal study can be found in Ruf, D. (2023). The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us, 2023.

See this search result for more information about using the SAT and ACT: https://www.google.com/search?q=the+SAt+and+ACT+are+being+reinstated&oq=the+SAt+and+ACT+are+being+reinstated&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOTIHCAEQIRigATIHCAIQIRigAdIBCTE4NTMzajBqN6gCALACAA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8

One source that may interest readers: Dr. Fred Zhang of PrepScholar explains the relationship to IQ of results on ACT and SAT tests https://blog.prepscholar.com/act-vs-sat-in-iq-intelligence

An “Elite” university refers to one category of the ratio of how many students are accepted compared to how many people applied to an institution. This is also commonly referred to as the “competitive” factor — how “competitive” it is to gain entrance.

Ruf, D. (2023). Chapters 4 and 5. See: https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-Children-Grown-Up/dp/B0C9SHFRLH or https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-5-levels-of-gifted-children-grown-up-phd-deborah-l-ruf/1143719859?ean=9798988323709

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Finding the “Right” School for Your Young Child

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 03 Jun 2026 12:04:29 GMT

I retired from my consultancy in 2018 because I wanted to write follow-up books to my first book, 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options (2005/2009).

Part of my consulting with parents of bright (possibly gifted) young children is to help them know how to look for the “best fit” environment for their children. We want our children to fit in and be comfortable. We want them to find others with whom to play, have a meaningful conversation, and to have teachers regularly address the differing needs of their students throughout each school day. After all, in schools that group children by age, the spread of abilities—intellectual and physical—in each class is generally large.

I encourage parents to set up an appointment for their child to try out the school in whatever way the school does that. Usually this calls for about a half day visit with the child being partnered up with another student while participating in the normal activities of that classroom.

Sometimes it makes sense for the parents to set up their own appointment first to visit several classrooms in their child’s age-range to see what it is like there. Again, almost all schools will allow this. The truth is that you don’t need a lot of time to get a sense of the student body and the classrooms. Do you feel comfortable there? My recommendation is that you try to visit at least two or three classrooms. Because you yourself will get rather antsy or bored yourself, I suggest 15 minutes in each classroom is absolutely enough to get a sense of each place.

You may wish to let the person in charge of setting up your visit know that the reason you want to see more than one classroom is that you know your own personality might click better with one teacher than another and it would be fairer to get a sampling rather than judge the school on only one teacher’s methods or behaviors. At the same time, if you think there’s a good chance you want to enroll your child in that school, ask during that visit if it’s okay to let them know when you’ve spotted a good teacher-child fit and if they would honor that request.

Don’t interfere. Stand on the sidelines of the class. If you wish, ask the teacher when you first enter the classroom if it is okay to wander around a little bit. That way you can quietly observe what the children are working on and what the level of the lesson is compared to what you think your child would be either ready for or way past the skill and interest levels of your child.

Keep in mind that not everything has to be highly intellectual or academic. The balance of topics and activities should allow for movement, talking to others, and reading or otherwise doing something on their own.

You need a short interview, too, with the principal, if possible, to ask questions about just how much they differentiate and modify lessons and activities to accommodate children who are at different academic levels than others. If the school has a gifted program, the head of the program should be in on the interview between the parents and the school. Also, because many schools don’t officially identify their students for giftedness or start their gifted program until the 2nd or 3rd grades, you need to ask what they are willing to do for your child prior to that time. You should use language like this (in your own voice and ways of talking),

“When you know a child is already reading or doing math at higher levels, how does your school address those differences?”

Keep emphasizing that you are not just interested in the academic; you are interested in how likely it is your child would find some “true peers,” some others who are likely to share interests, a sense of humor, or even quirks that we know might be “called out” as nerdy. Personally, nerdy people are my peeps. They need access to true peers, too.

Finally, think about whether or not you feel as though these are people who are simply like the people you prefer to spend time with yourself. You don’t want to be an outlier either, so keep looking until you find a place — if this is an option for you — where you and your family will fit well, too.

Depending upon the Level of Giftedness — just how gifted the child is compared to others — the extent of the underachievement and the “wrong fit” vary. When under-challenged and not kept suitably interested, busy, and engaged, gifted children can’t learn study skills, time management skills, or how to rebound when they encounter something truly difficult. The risk of arrogance, perfectionism, or inattentiveness can soar under such circumstances (Ruf, D. Keys to Successfully Parenting the Gifted Child (2023).

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

How a Seasoned Educator Sets Up a Final Exam

Deborah Ruf — Mon, 01 Jun 2026 00:07:09 GMT

In keeping with my theme of “Through the Lifespan,” (I’ve learned that considering giftedness alone isn’t as important for most of life’s experiences!), I am delighted to include an example of a seasoned educator’s approach to making her students’ final exam go well. For them and for her.

Pam became my friend in 5th grade and we’ve been friends ever since. After a career of teaching math in every grade level, or training teachers who teach math, she now teaches adult students math. In this case, it’s a group of students who needed to fill-in-some deficits before moving into higher level classes. This particular class is Pre-Algebra. In case readers here don’t know this, I first experienced this system myself when I was a student at Ohio Wesleyan in the late 1960s. I was mystified that many freshman around me had to take such classes while I was moved to sophomore level classes I hadn’t asked for. Personally, I like transparency. And as you can see, so does Pam. My own summary comments follow her email to her students.

PREPARE for Zoom PROCTORING OF EXAM

Hi Debbie,

I sent this (attached) on Monday to my 2.5 hr. zoom class that I teach on Tuesdays 6–9:30, in anticipation of — and to head off — another exam night of putting out fires and students’ non-compliance with the rules.

I was amazed at the positive response: Only one student had their camera off at a short point of time, and she sent me a chat right away and fixed it before I could eject her from the exam. Well, well…they all came through. We started the exam at 6:35 and the last student finished before 8:00. Not a single tech issue. One man actually drove to the Newtown (near us) campus to take the exam on a school desktop because he still hasn’t been able to resolve his tech problems, and he thanked me for not letting him give up. Sweet.

Anyway, I had fun with this and wanted to share it with you.

Hi everyone,
Please read carefully. Note that failure to read does not excuse anyone from the information/content.
I. PREPARE for Zoom PROCTORING OF EXAM
1) Tomorrow about 5:00PM: close out and shut down to restart your FULLY CHARGED laptop/desktop computer. DO NOT JOIN THE CLASS ZOOM ON YOUR COMPUTER! SEE #2
2) With your FULLY CHARGED SMART PHONE, you will join the class Zoom as follows: (a) go to Canvas to ZoomPro, and (b) click on the link there. I will admit you from the waiting room.
3) Position your SMART PHONE’S camera to show your profile, your laptop keyboard, and your workspace/table/desk space.
NOTE: Your smartphone must be propped up so the camera shows your keyboard, desk or table work area, and your work space.
*Showing the top of your head is not enough to meet that requirement. Practice to get it right.*
4) DO this before 6:30 tomorrow.
5) Have blank notebook paper and a pencil or pen for writing out your work.
EXAM PROCEDURES:
1) Your smartphone camera MUST BE ON AT ALL TIMES showing your profile and workspace: laptop, desk or table area. Practice to get it right. Don’t wait until Tuesday at 6 to set up your space.
2) If your camera is turned off at any time once we start, I will NOT send you a chat to turn it on. You will be removed immediately from the Zoom AND the final exam. You will not be able to re-enter the Zoom or to continue with your exam. I will close your exam. There are no recovery options for that. Don’t let that be you!
3) Do NOT send me a chat msg that your “camera isn’t working” or “I’m eating dinner” or “I have to run to the bathroom.” or “My cat or kids or guests keep bothering me so I turned off my camera.” or “My internet is down.” or “I can’t make it tonight.” That’s why you plan ahead for worst case: Starbucks, Barnes & Noble, a friend’s place, or the public library all have internet access.
5) You’ve had plenty of time to take care of your tech issues and have known since January that your final exam is May 12. (See Faculty Syllabus.) If you can’t access ALEKS you can’t take the exam.
There is no time or rationale for do-overs due to your unresolved tech issues.
LAST POINT:
1) Feeling ill is not an excuse; it’s likely an avoidance technique. Tough it out; you can do it. I’ve been there: have taught two classes and held office hours on Zoom throughout a prolonged bout with COVID, accompanied by extremely bad headaches, while feeling like pond scum. If you’re feeling poorly, tough it out for the 90+ minutes or so that the exam takes. You can do it and you’ll be glad you did.
Questions about content? Get them to me tonight or tomorrow. I’m opening class at 5:45 for questions. If you have any, please join at any time.
Do yourself proud tomorrow.
Pamela
Professor Tice

Aside from laughing every time I read this, there are important lessons here:

· Experienced teachers learn how to be clear, helpful, compassionate, and flexible. At some point they “own” their mistakes by improving their systems.

“Only one student had their camera off at a short point of time, and she sent me a chat right away and fixed it before I could eject her from the exam.”

I have my own samples of growing on the job. When I was teaching 6th grade in Alexandria, VA, in the 1970s, and in my fourth year of teaching, I spent an entire weekend setting up a three-week lesson plan for a science project. It was one of those lesson plans that was handed down by the higher-ups with their latest ideas for education. The materials were provided (batteries, bulbs, wires, etc.) and the teacher had to make it all work. Well, for this particular class, it wasn’t working. Classes and their students vary from year-to-year. A majority part of this group was clearly bored, didn’t “get it,” and got pretty squirmy pretty quickly. I wanted to yell and scold (because I felt like all my time had been wasted) but just like that particular lesson, a bulb went on in my head, I started to laugh and smile, and said, “This isn’t working for you, is it?” to the children on the classroom floor surrounding by materials they weren’t enjoying. Their faces lit up with relief. I told them I would rework this topic and for now, we’d all go outside and play for a while.

Other thoughts. I now live in a dynamic senior living apartment building. Most of the residents are older than I am at this point. Many of them are from the pre-Women’s-Liberation generation. And they mostly lived and taught school in the Heartland that is Minnesota and the states around it. Through the years I realized that modernization started on the East Coast and slowly moved west. The ways that it impacted educational systems and educational opportunities is amazing. I moved to Fargo, ND, in the late 1970s and some incredibly bight and capable people here didn’t finish school beyond 8th grade because there wasn’t any school beyond 8th grade. In many cases, I discovered that their 8th grade educations were superior to the full high school experiences we have now.

What Professor Pam shows us is that no matter where our students live, they need teachers who meet them where they are in their readiness to learn. It doesn’t mean such students aren’t smart enough. It shows us that when we meet them where they are, they thrive. They step up.

Please feel free to share Pam’s “PREPARE for Zoom PROCTORING OF EXAM.”

Aside from being funny, it’s a lesson for us all.

All that techie stuff she has to deal with is mind-boggling to me!

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Essential Guidelines for Teachers of Gifted Learners

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 27 May 2026 14:49:51 GMT

Photo by CDC on Unsplash

This advice is relevant for teachers at any grade level. It’s original title was The Do’s and Don’ts for Teachers of Gifted Students. And, if you’re the parent of a gifted child, feel free to share this with your child’s teacher(s). That said, here’s some of my advice after years of studying giftedness and what gifted school children need in order to thrive.

First, do familiarize yourselves with gifted behaviors and characteristics.

Then, don’t hesitate to ask other teachers and your principal for their ideas and advice. In the earliest grade levels, most parents of gifted children are just starting their own journeys to understand what giftedness is and what their really smart child needs and likes, so although you should listen to them, try to develop a collaboration of some sort.

Do Provide Intellectual Challenge

…during each day in school from the beginning of your time with the student. Gifted children learn to underachieve in the early grades. Accomplishing what their classmates accomplish is done with no effort, no practice, and great speed. Test anxiety, perfectionism, and fear of failure may all be associated with this early conditioning and lack of challenge in school. A child who has had no opportunity to practice, to develop organizational and study skills — because nothing asked of her requires any thought or effort — is the child who is likely to crumble in confusion and self-disappointment when she runs into a challenge for which she had no opportunity to prepare!

Do give the child many opportunities to read books, even textbooks, beyond grade level.

Find materials that cover the same topic you are covering with the entire class but that are at a higher difficulty level and see if the child can read, understand, and discuss from that material. Announce what you are doing via sending notes home and also invite parents to find and share materials. Try to arrange this opportunity as often as possible in the school setting.

Do give the brightest few students in your class time

… to read alone, or build something, or listen or watch something from the huge range of possible videos available while you work with the majority of the class and ask those few students to summarize what they read by writing or recording at home later for homework. It will make it even better for you and them, if you allow the brightest students to work together on some of these assignments and activities.

If you are feeling very energetic, read the material yourself and develop summary, synthesis, and interpretation questions for these students to guide their responses to the material. Don’t try to do it all by yourself, either. Find other teachers who have students who are ready for higher level materials and instruction so that you can share the planning and teaching. Invite parents or community volunteers to help you with this task.

Do use alternate materials from the regular curriculum, like library books, for example, whenever possible.

And there are some fantastic work sheets available that are brain teasers, problem solvers, etc., so look for those as good ways to keep bright and gifted students engaged while the rest of the class is going through typical grade-level material.

Don’t ask your gifted student to do all tasks and assignments that fit the whole class.

Is there really any learning to be gained from every worksheet or end of chapter assignment that is available? If a 1st grader is reading chapter books from the 3rd grade level or beyond, why would you have that same child go through a 1st grade reader or workbook with children for whom the grade level material is more appropriately paced? Don’t stop the student’s forward progress by worrying about them running out of things to learn.

Do look at the information about all your students’ ability profiles.

Almost all children take ability and achievement tests multiple times in school during their school years. Talk to whomever you need to so you can see the results and get any of your questions answered about what the test scores mean. This will help you know if there are any quiet or hiding gifted children in your class. You may discover the trouble-maker or class clown is just trying to keep himself amused! Work with those students to discover what is going to work. Not every child is the same and whatever you have available to keep the child meaningfully engaged, provide it. Keep in mind: these children are going to meet all the expected standards even if you don’t drill them on it.

Don’t expect that gifted children’s talents are even.

If you have an incredibly math-able or reading-able child in your class, performance at the same level in both subjects may be expecting too much. There are highly gifted children who are evenly talented but be alert to those who are unevenly talented and don’t assume they are being difficult with you by not performing equally high in all areas.

Don’t focus the challenge on either the child’s strengths or weaknesses.

Allow the child to really pursue her highest interests and abilities. Help the child recognize which skills and knowledge will still be important for a normally functioning adult citizen. A child who is ready to do math several years beyond grade level may not be reading at that same level. Help the child see why being a good reader and writer will still be important. In other words, recognize the necessary “hoops.” But don’t expect you can make an area for which the child has less talent “catch up” with the strength area. Sometimes leaving the child less time and energy to continue in the strength area — by concentrating only on weaknesses — does lessen the gap, but this certainly is not progress!

Do give compliments to the gifted child for her abilities and efforts.

Gifted children need recognition for their abilities from people whose opinion matters most to them just as much as anyone else. Try to be particularly aware of when a child really has put a great deal of thought or effort into something and needs encouragement. If the child has talent in an area (art, music, games, anything) acknowledge it. Look for ways to help the child know himself. Point out when the child’s effort has resulted in improvement.

Don’t expect effort when no effort is required.

In order to successfully teach gifted children, the teacher must provide frequent opportunities to learn material appropriate to the child’s ability level. If you can already tie your shoes, for example, how do you show more effort at shoe tying and do it better? Complimenting children for the completion of activities that require little effort and no real learning only teaches conformity and people-pleasing skills. It does not advance the child’s knowledge or academic skills. Children intuitively know this and do not value compliments or good grades “awarded” for pointless work.

Don’t hold the gifted child up as an example

… for other children to emulate, compete with, or follow. Remember that most classes are deliberately set up to have students with a wide variety of talents and abilities. When less able children are already trying their best, it is hurtful to imply that they could compete with the highly gifted child if they only tried harder! Each person is unique and abilities affect interests and goals as much — and often more — than effort. Comparisons might make the gifted child tone down her abilities so as not to feel freakish or disliked. Comparisons can put all the children in an untenable, unfair position.

Do demonstrate how to prioritize, schedule, and let go.

Many gifted individuals discover early that they have many interests and can get more done than most other people. Sometimes they get over-involved and can’t decide how to lower their stress and their commitments. Many gifted children are perfectionists. They obsess over the correctness of an assignment or they can’t even get started because they are not sure they understand fully what the teacher wants. Often the gifted child thinks the assignment requires more than it does or that the teacher ever intended. Listen carefully to see if this is your student’s issue. Sometimes you have to help the student do less!

Gifted people need down time and processing time, so they must learn how to pick and choose carefully in order to allow the time necessary for emotional growth and self-discovery. Help them learn to recognize the difference between their own goals and someone else’s. Teachers can be especially helpful in this task when they allow the gifted student to omit or greatly shorten exercises and homework that constitute unnecessary review of already known or learned skills. The saved time frees the energy of the child for more meaningful reading and activities. Help them learn that some assignments are necessary “hoops.” For example, breaking down a major writing or research project into smaller parts keeps it from being overwhelming later. This approach assumes the teacher already knows that the overall project is appropriate for the ability and readiness level of the student.

Do give the gifted child the information

… that you are aware of their relative ability level. If you don’t know how to do this or don’t feel comfortable, get professional help to prepare yourself. This is not the same as saying, “I know you’re smart so I expect more of you.” Instead, “I know you are very capable and I am trying to give you materials and instruction that challenge your thinking and fit your abilities. I also am aware that sometimes you feel this makes you stand out and look too different. Let’s be sure to work together on this so we can help you learn and feel as though you fit in.” Children who are within a normal, average range can certainly handle that they “fit in” and are normal. Children who differ from the norm — and who therefore experience many things in life differently for that reason — need help in understanding why. I believe the specifics can be shared by the time the child’s mental age is about 12. Take the time to learn about levels of giftedness and the differing abilities and needs of children within the brightest segments of your classes. See 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options (Ruf, 2009).

Don’t worry that helping gifted students know themselves better

… will lead to a “big head,” a know-it-all attitude, or undo vanity. True giftedness that is understood by the possessor leads to a more open understanding and acceptance of others (if it has been explained well). The more intellectually gifted a person is, the more likely they will know how much they don’t know yet. Don’t worry that the child will feel superior to you; children need to look up to adults and you are better equipped than you may realize.

www.fivelevelsofgifted.com

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Gifted Adults from the Baby Boomer Generation Talk About Social Skills

Deborah Ruf — Mon, 25 May 2026 01:19:54 GMT

Many highly intelligent people of all ages struggle to feel they fit in or belong.

I have long been interested in what makes people feel like they don’t belong. This feeling of not quite “getting it” myself led to my actively exploring the topic in graduate school — and the selection of my coursework — and in most of the writing I have done for the last 40 years or so.

I developed a theory, probably not unique to me, that emotional intelligence, or EQ (1) rather than being an inborn ability, is a skill that needs to be taught and facilitated in individuals who deviate significantly from the norm in their intellectual intelligence (IQ). Emotional Intelligence is also part of what we mean when we refer to “social skills.”

As I studied and learned more about what high intelligence is, I saw that when children’s mental ages (2) are considerably different from those with whom they must spend the majority of their time, their opportunities for effective and rewarding social interaction are minimized. If interventions, purposeful or serendipitous, are not available, effective communication and interpretation of social cues cannot easily be developed.

The unofficial theory holds that highly intelligent individuals who are not made aware of this source of their emotional and social difficulties enter adulthood with weak self-esteem and defensive behavior designed to ward off uncomfortable and unrewarding personal interactions. Loneliness and feelings of isolation are common features of highly gifted people who have not been facilitated in bridging the emotional and social gulf between themselves and the majority population.

As part of my doctoral dissertation final paper (3), I explored examples from my sample group of highly gifted adults and of positive and negative experiences related to the learning of social and emotional interactions that are popularly considered to indicate people’s emotional intelligence (EQ). My initial study included 125 highly gifted adults between the ages of 20 and 83 years old during the early 1990s. I used an evaluation of item responses from the childhood and adulthood questionnaires I’d developed and asked the subjects to complete. Most of the questions related to their social connections and interactions in the family, school, and workplace.

For my doctoral dissertation final paper (3), I examined instances from my sample group of highly gifted adults, focusing on both positive and negative experiences in learning social and emotional interactions—experiences commonly believed to reflect a person’s emotional intelligence (EQ).

Subjects were further evaluated for emotional maturity based on the theories of Maslow, Erikson, and Dabrowski. My analysis suggested that subjects who showed the most self-actualization and emotional maturity had either found a way to cultivate and increase their emotional quotients (EQs) or had been raised with the opportunities to do so. This post features excerpts from the case studies to illustrate and support the topic here.

My conclusions following my first case study research back in the ’90s are that — for most people — there is often the opportunity to practice and hone social skills in an environment where the individual’s vocabulary, sense of humor, complexity of thought and interests are similar to others around him or her. Children who are very different, by virtue of their intellectual level from their same-age classmates, often experience that their comments, observations, and questions annoy classmates. Others may possibly view the highly gifted person as inappropriate or odd. If such a child is seldom with like-minded others, social and emotional adjustment are often more difficult to attain.

And, it must be admitted here, I have always bristled at the idea that children should be in same-aged classrooms to learn social skills. If the other children think you’re weird and routinely marginalize you, this is not a good situation for developing or learning good social skills.

The following selected excerpts from the 1998 case studies reveal how often the highly gifted subjects did not receive helpful input about the way they naturally were.

____________________________________________________________________________

Gene, a 56-year old scientist with an IQ of about 175 (4) on the old deviation ratio IQ test (the equivalent of about a 140 on modern tests whose scales only go up to ~150) described what others thought of him:

“They thought I was ok, but somewhat off-beat, if not strange. Likeable, cheerful, smart. Popular? No. I was friendly enough, and sociable, but never part of the ‘in crowd.’ Somewhat of a loner, by choice.”

In my 5 Levels of Gifted system, which I developed and published in 2005 (5), Gene would be described as a Level Four. In more familiar terms, he would be considered exceptionally gifted, definitely an outlier in most environments.

Gene had two close friends, one at a time, throughout his childhood. He felt loved and encouraged by his parents although they did not verbalize their love or support. When asked if he “fit in” he responded:

“I was aware, but thought it more of a strangeness than a qualitative difference, thus I thought of myself as not fitting in. Nevertheless, it was not an extreme isolation, just a sense of being peripheral to the mainstream…felt not ahead or smarter, just different.”

Gene said that no one ever took a personal interest in him and he wishes now that they had. He had no idea that he was intellectually so different from most other people and no one ever gave him that information. He continued,

“I took the Mensa (6) test when I was 25 and for the first time knew my IQ. That gave me confidence. I had previously flunked out of the Naval Academy, although I returned and finished the following year. Now I know why I’m “different!”

Sandra, age 43, remembered having an IQ result in the low 140s on a group ability test during elementary school. The group tests used in the 1950s and 1960s had a top score of 150, so the low 140s translates into an old scale SB-LM (7) test, for example, to a score in the 170s. Interestingly, when Sandra volunteered to participate in this study, she had to take the Miller Analogies Test — at age 43 — to demonstrate proof of high giftedness, and her overall demonstrated ability level on that test correlated well with her earlier scores. [The Miller Analogies Test – MAT – is no longer being published].

She experienced an extremely abusive and difficult childhood that included her mother’s death when Sandra was 3, living in an orphanage for a few years when her father’s drinking was too bad to allow him to raise his children, and then an abusive step-mother who resented her.

“I was aware of not fitting in, especially in the early grades. At the Home, they quickly squelched any sense of pride in my unusual achievements by frowns at my mention of getting better grades, also that I was always showing off by writing and reading my poetry [author note, she was an extremely talented writer]. I received lots of mixed and conflicting messages. In upper elementary and secondary school there were a large number of high ability kids in my class … I felt like I fit in.”

In Sandra’s case, her being an exceptionally gifted Level Four was a problem in some of her social environments but not in others. She experienced a school path, as she mentions above, that put her in close proximity to many others at her large public schools because the school tracked and “ability grouped” their students. Putting students in such learning environments restricts the range to which teachers have to teach a classroom full of youngsters. Although Sandra didn’t have that during the elementary school years, she was simply fortunate to have at least three to four fellow outliers in her classes the last three years, and that enabled all of them to feel more “normal.”

Candace, a 47 year old woman whose old-test scale IQ is above 150 (slightly above a 130 on a modern test), and highly gifted at Level Two to Level Three, also came from a very abusive home. She started school early and had teachers who wanted to skip her further in her middle elementary years, but her mother said no. Her case study makes it quite clear that her parents really did not like her. While Candace was in junior high her mother and teacher had a big fight over some issue related to Candace’s sister. The mother pulled Candace out of any classes this teacher taught and that meant Candace was no longer in classes with her gifted peers. She experienced tremendous confusion over her value, her abilities, and over what people would think of her. It isn’t too difficult to conclude that her emotional intelligence was tremendously impacted by the way her parents and teachers treated her.

“I was nothing but a disappointment. I was a girl. I was supposed to be a boy. I was inquisitive, which both parents interpreted as rude and challenging to their authority. I was smart so they confused my ability to learn with a capacity for understanding my actions in a greater context. Therefore, they attached adult motivations to even the simplest question of a 4-year old. By the time I was 7 or 8, my life had become a painful existence. I knew God had made me wrong and I could never be right.”

Fortunately, Candace had two different friends in her late teens and in her 30s who helped her find herself. She also devoted herself to counseling for a number of years. She evolved into one of the most evolved, self-actualized people in my study who now has a select number of close friends and a number of comfortable, but casual, acquaintances. She is also very happily married to her second husband.

Arnie, a 43-year old man with an estimated IQ of about 150 on the old SB-LM or its equivalent, said that he was not aware of being exceptional, and knew he didn’t fit in, and he said he has never been able to make friends.

“My father always called me ‘stupid.’ Taking the Mensa test in 1975 finally ended the confusion. It turns out I’m not stupid, at least.”

I tend to think that Arnie’s inability to make friends may have started with the poor, emotionally abusive parenting he received at home. Often children who are emotionally abused have difficulty at school and do not engender tender feelings from those who might come to their rescue at school. In my study there were more boys than girls who, unfortunately, found little solace at school.

An unusually successful businesswoman, 45-year old Marlene had an IQ of over 180 (over 140 to 145 on a modern test), exceptionally to profoundly gifted at probably Level Four. Although she, too, came from an emotionally abusive family (about half my subjects reported high levels of emotional abuse), she described her own confusion over why she did not feel comfortable with herself or others as follows:

“I was thought of as bright and a loner. I think everyone just thought I was different. I remember people saying ‘she’s smart’ when they thought I wasn’t listening. I was always listening. My reputation was as one who is quiet. Yes, people knew I was smart. My family could not deal with it. The schools were shocked and I don’t think knew how to deal with me. College was wonderful. At last freedom and people I could talk to.”

Ben, a 46-year old with an IQ near 150 (modern score of about 130, highly gifted, and at least Level Two), wrote,

“I never fit in. I thought I was stupid.”

He also was the object of much bullying and wondered in his study survey responses why nothing ever seemed to be done about it. Despite the bad and confusing treatment he experienced, he wrote,

“For a brief time (weeks, perhaps) I discovered I could hit smaller kids and get away with it. Shortly after I discovered that I felt like shit when I thought about it. End of my bully phase. I tend to find myself in arguments and debates when I have strong feelings about a subject. When I don’t have a stake in something I tend to be a peacemaker and have developed a modest skill at achieving compromise.”

Personally, I find it amazing how many of these subjects have found their way into being at least modestly emotionally intelligent. Most of them have achieved far more. In fact, there were only about 5 people from my core study of 41 subjects who remained hostile and bitter as adults and who still had no friends. I could go on and on about how little helpful feedback highly gifted people get about how they are different and how they are still good and valuable people.

I recommend implementing an identification system that acknowledges the genuine differences experienced by individuals across varying levels of giftedness. Such a system would support their self-understanding and facilitate early development of emotional intelligence, potentially reducing confusion and emotional distress later in life.

Notes:

[1] A good, current source can be found here: Cherry, K. (2022) on Very Well Mind. What is Emotional Intelligence?

[2] Mental age is a way of comparing the intellectual abilities of one person to another and is obtained through intelligence testing and observation. It is generally used with school-aged children, not adults, because year-to-year changes in adults are no longer a good way of comparing different individual’s abilities. It looks at how a specific individual, at a specific age, performs intellectually, compared to average intellectual performance for that individual’s actual chronological age. The “actual” chronological age is taken from the average of a large number of other tested children the same age-range — usually within 3 months — as the child in question.

[3] Ruf, D. (1998) Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies. Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

[4] The IQs quoted in this paper are from the older versions of IQ tests that had scales that went up to and beyond 200. No current tests use that scale and the vast majority of individual and group ability tests utilize a 50 to 150 scale.

[5] Mensa is “The High IQ Society,” a social organization that requires scores at or above the 98th percentile on an intellectual ability test for membership. https://www.us.mensa.org/

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

How Do Schools Take Care of Moderately Gifted Students?

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 20 May 2026 11:06:53 GMT

In this post, you will start to see yourself, and even if you don’t know your IQ, you’ll start to be able to guess more accurately!

If a child is clearly advanced, surely the school will recognize the child’s advanced speaking and counting and reading abilities, right? A frequent comeback from teachers and principals has been, “We find they all level out by about 4th grade.” And this very typical reaction from the schools has been going on for decades.

“What do you recommend we do for our children?” asked a father who’d just heard me speak at the local gifted conference. I told him that I would need to know more about his family, the school, and any other options they have before I could recommend what would be best for them. He accused me of trying to make money off him rather than give him an answer.

What Should People Do to Support Gifted School Children?

Find the expert and your problems will be solved. Ha! Not necessarily. Human beings are very complex, so recommendations and explanations are rarely simple or easy. Yes, an expert helps, but ultimately, you are the one who has to learn about what will fit your family, your child, and yourself best.

If you choose to take that journey of what works best for you or your child, you’ll find others traveling the same road, which is nice.

The gifted journey is a little bit like what parents of athletes experience as they work together on fundraisers, shuttle kids to events, get all the gear and coaching they need, and cheer their children on. The children make friends with their team mates. The adults, too, make new friends with the other parents.

High intelligence and the needs of the highly intelligent are not well-understood issues. Over the years, I saw many others in the gifted field respond with words meant to acknowledge the question and satisfy the recipient, e.g., “Children like yours need to be placed in stimulating environments and challenged by the subject matter in their classrooms.” It’s an easy way to make people happy for the moment.

Let’s look at my longitudinal research results for Level One children

To understand how school and educational experiences impact the ways gifted children approach higher-level education and careers, we look at what the participants and their parents report about the years leading up to high school graduation. Here we focus on what the school settings were for the participants at Level One.

The most common school options — School Types — that I described are as follows (the numbering is my own):

• Type I School — A school, usually public, that serves the general population with a wide range of student socioeconomic backgrounds, including recent immigrants still learning English, residents who may be highly mobile (i.e., they change schools often), and sometimes a high proportion of poverty-level students.

• Type II School — This type of school usually draws from a strongly middle-class population with few students from families in either poverty or wealth. It can be public or private.

• Type III School — This type of school is usually either a private college preparatory school or a wealthy district with a reputation for high standardized test scores, a high percentage of students who eventually go to colleges and universities, and a virtually non-existent dropout rate. Students in this setting rarely experience poverty.

• Type IV School — This is a magnet school, public or private, for highly gifted students where admissions are based primarily on standardized test scores and demonstrated achievement.

• Type V School — This is any school, anywhere, which facilitates continuous progress throughout the subject levels without regard for the children’s ages. Examples are schools based on the Montessori method or the old one-room schoolhouses. In an ideal world, we would have only Type V schools.

What I call a Type II school is the kind most of us are familiar with — sort of the stereotypical school environment. A Type III school setting is generally a school in a high socioeconomic public-school system or a private college preparatory school. The main difference between the Type II and Type III schools is usually one of socioeconomics. Settings that have many college bound individual and family expectations make it more likely the student will aim for higher education, as well.

How Many Gifted Children are Likely to be in Each Type of School?

If gifted children are in public or private schools which draw from a working class, rural, or “unsettled” population that experiences lots of moving or poverty, it is a Type I school, and there are likely to be one to three Level One students in each classroom. Double the frequency estimate for a Type II school setting.

If a district has a high socioeconomic population or if there are schools in a district where most of the parents are highly educated professionals, Level One children are high average learners and constitute at least a third of the students in their schools. In a Type III school, Level One students are rarely included in the gifted programs because their assessed IQ scores are slightly below the school’s gifted acceptance or cut-off score. However, the American professional class is predominantly from a Level One ability range.

For your reference, every Level One study participant was born between 1990 and 1995, which means they are from the Millennial generation. According to Pew, these people — and those parenting them — experienced these critical events:

The Pew Research Center defines millennials as the people born from 1981 to 1996, choosing these dates for “key political, economic and social factors”, including the September 11 terrorist attacks, the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Great Recession, and Internet explosion.

How to Interpret the Table

The table below summarizes what participants experienced during their regular school years, kindergarten through 12th grade. Each table breaks the school years into a range of grade levels. We can evaluate and report the effectiveness of the school and any modifications for each child by using the School Types.

When the grade range includes some change of situation for the individual student, e.g., a change of schools or entering a different program, then a hyphen is used. The last column for “Fit Quality” uses one of four adjectives — Unsatisfactory, Acceptable, Satisfactory, and Excellent — to describe each grade range and how well it supported the child’s growth in all areas, e.g., intellectual, academic, social, and emotional. My subjective analysis of “fit” is based on a comparison of standardized scores, Level of Giftedness, what each Level needs and whether each setting provided it. The subjects are sorted in the general order of the least to the best good fit within each Level of Gifted in the study.

Level One Summary of the Kindergarten Through High School Years

Results for Level One in Kindergarten Through Grade 12

All four of the Level One people in this study had Unsatisfactory learning and social “fit” in their kindergarten through Grade 3 school years (K-3rd in the summary table). Notice that the first four years of typical schooling have likely set many gifted learners on a path of frustration and underachievement. Most gifted identification and programming — if there is any — begins during third grade.

The achievement range within a typical middle school mixed ability seventh-grade class ranges from approximately third-grade equivalency to post-graduate college level (Lohman, D., 1999). Lohman, co-author of both the Cognitive Abilities Test and the Iowa Tests of basic skills, both widely used by public schools for their elementary school students, states,

“The typical public school first-grade classroom already has 12-grade equivalencies of achievement in it.”

And middle schools, like elementary schools, almost always group students by age rather than ability profile. Since the achievement gap between the slowest and fastest learners gets larger every year, the gap between the classroom instructional level and the gifted child’s achievement and ability level is large by the time a child reaches middle school. It also depends on how gifted the child is compared to classmates.

And just to complicate matters a bit more, at every age and grade level, each school year’s population will differ. This means the teacher may have an entirely different group of students with different personalities and needs the next year, so what worked for one year’s students won’t work for the next year’s. To underscore the above explanation, during a workshop I conducted about differentiated instruction some years ago when I was a sixth-grade teacher:

One year I had a dream class, the best and most cooperative students I ever had. I created learning centers, brought in a bean bag “chair” for students to lounge on, and gave the students lots of freedom to select what they were ready to do throughout the day based on my list of lessons and activities. I was shocked the next year when the bean bag was almost immediately destroyed (slashed with scissors) within the first week, the learning centers stood unused, and freedom to move about and create one’s own schedule was a totally unfamiliar concept to them and an opportunity to misbehave and ignore assignments. I still had some gifted students in the classroom, but I had a larger percentage of students with less experience in, shall we say, cooperative learning behaviors?

How the Level One longitudinal study group experienced during their school years

By fourth through eighth grade, the school environment for one of these youngsters, Albena Brosch, shows an Acceptable rating because she started to receive some subject acceleration, which she enjoyed.

Henry Ruggles started this time period in Unsatisfactory circumstances when he changed schools temporarily, but things improved to Satisfactory when his old school placed him in an “accelerated learner” program, a program that provided differentiated instruction for the more rapid learners.

Ronald Cooper continued in his Type I school with the Unsatisfactory fit where there were no adjustments made for his higher ability.

Since the late 1970s, these school years have continued the practice of whole-class instruction with little to no ability grouping. The curriculum and pacing are designed for the abilities of the average child in the classroom. For the four children in this study who are in Types I and II schools, though, the pace and depth of coursework are below their abilities and interests because it is designed for a lower range of classroom abilities than that of the Level One student. It also means there are too few like-minded classmates with whom to effectively compete, joke around, and befriend.

Kirk Peterson’s home and online schooling was not well-supervised and left him too much on his own to follow the assignments. That can work for some youngsters, but Kirk was not one of them. Homeschooling can be an excellent option for some, but for it to work well, the students’ and the parents’ personalities and abilities must fit each other. This is discussed in more detail elsewhere.

By Grades 9 through 12, typical high school years, two of the four participants, Albena and Henry, experienced the options and environment that were excellent for them. High school is usually the only part of the grade school experience where the students are ability grouped.

Although the Fit Quality for Henry Ruggles during the high school years indicates Excellent, in his case this means that the conditions for having an excellent experience are there. Henry, however, did not take advantage of most of these better options. In his case, and in most cases that look like Henry’s, a personality profile is part of the problem. However, that can be overcome if the schools adjust teaching and goals for such students. When that doesn’t happen, though, by the time students like Henry are in high school, many have lost any belief that things will ever be worthwhile at school. They lack study and time management skills because none were required for most of the years leading up to high school. Henry’s actual ability profile is higher than the typical Level One person, but early input about his early milestones led to my placing him in Level One for the book. What is reported here wouldn’t change if we moved him to Level Two or even Three, because the school’s offerings wouldn’t have changed.

These Level designations are designed to help with planning, and it is not an exact science. Additionally, Henry’s intellectual profile was stronger in the verbal domains than in the math and qualitative reasoning domains, so he was more comfortable in writing and discussion groups than in advanced math classes. This is what Henry said at age 20 about his high school choices:

I stayed involved/enrolled in accelerated learning programs throughout my time at [middle and high] school. I mostly enjoyed the extra push I received through those classes. I always enjoyed the classes like [gifted student program] where we would get together in a small group outside of normal class and learn about interesting things, and think about larger, more complicated topics and issues stimulating intellectual conversation. It was the other classes — like accelerated math courses, for example — that I never liked. But, by association, I was always placed in [them] due to my involvement with other accelerated programs. In retrospect, I feel that I had a hard time liking these classes because they held me to a standard that I was then too lazy to work for. Things had always been easy for me to learn up until I hit middle school math, at which point I realized that I would have to actually work for good grades.

The two remaining youngsters in Level One, Kirk Peterson and Ronald Cooper, fared less well. Kirk continued to be left mostly on his own to cover his high school material at home and online. Here is how Kirk described his situation as a homeschooler:

I was mostly homeschooled. Public school at home, and [a state-run, tuition free] online program. I would wait until the last minute to do everything, parents’ encouragement to get it done was that I could only be in honors math if I did the homework. Instead, I dropped down [in level of math course] to avoid homework.

Ronald Cooper’s Type I high school had some advanced courses, and he chose to take several, so this was an improvement over the first nine years of his schooling. Generally, when there are advanced courses, the students must first prove that they can succeed in them. This means that classmates are likely to be bright enough to do so, as well. These classes were likely the first experiences that Ronald had of being in a group comprised of mostly bright students as classmates, and most of them were probably as bright as he.

Sources and Resources

This post, Kindergarten — 12th Grade Years, is about the Level One longitudinal study subjects from my 2023 book, The Five Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us. https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-Children-Grown-Up/dp/B0C9SHFRLH

In this post, I introduce you to the variety of educational environments the now adult gifted from the 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options (Ruf, 2005, 2009) book study experienced. A “best fit” for one Level is not necessarily a good fit for children at other Levels, because even within the gifted range, children’s needs differ.

Level One gifted. I coined the 5 Levels of Gifted term in the early 2000s when developing my first book with that name. Level One is the first tier of the rubric and compromises the bright to moderately gifted who, when tested, are in the 90th to 97th percentile range. I gathered early childhood milestones and behaviors from at least 3,000 children’s parents from 1999 into 2023. Specific early milestones correlate as well as actual standardized test results do between different tests when the children and adults are tested later. A 74% correlation is considered the best outcome for such things. They are not perfect because people are so complex. Their entire essence cannot be captured by tests or brain scans. You’ll only find certain strengths and weaknesses. The average IQ of people who become physicians, attorneys, and many others in the professions is about 125.

Pew Research Center. Retrieved 13 March 2019. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/01/17/where-millennials-end-and-generation-z-begins/

See Oakes, J. (1986). Beyond tracking. Educational Horizons, 65(1), 32–35.

http://www.jstor.org/stable/42926852

See Kulik, J. A., & Kulik, C.-L. C. (1992). Meta-analytic findings on grouping programs. Gifted Child Quarterly, 36(2), 73–77. https://doi.org/10.1177/001698629203600204

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

When Gifted People Walk That Humility Line—or Not

Deborah Ruf — Mon, 18 May 2026 01:42:49 GMT

First of all, most intellectually gifted adults don’t think of themselves as gifted. Smart enough maybe, but not so special as to be gifted. After all, they were lucky, or worked hard, or didn’t get the best grades, or … whatever. Because of this reality, this tendency, it is that much harder for advocates to get the systems in place that might help gifted children thrive and turn into gifted adults who thrive. And by thrive, I mean they will be able not only to intellectually “fire on all cylinders” but to be emotionally and socially healthy, too.

Few Gifted People Walk Around Trying to Act Gifted

Because people generally don’t like people who are vain or “full of themselves,” many children are taught very early that it is bad manners and poor behavior to brag or show off. So, from early on, many gifted people may have received confusing comments from parents and others around them about their cleverness, talking too much, always jumping in with their own thoughts and ideas, etc. And, at best, these comments were couched in how or why it isn’t good if you don’t give others a chance to talk or win or be the best, or — at its worst — these messages were as clear as, “Who do you think you are?”

And for people who are highly intelligent, giftedness is not, as some seem to believe, a ticket to knowing everything or understanding the reactions and behaviors of others to them. And there’s a whole lumpy continuum of what gifted — aka, highly intelligent — people do with their “trying to fit in” approaches. Some show off, compete endlessly, diminish others, avoid others, hide themselves, lose confidence, refuse to perform in public, drop out of the game or sport or activity, etc., or they try to please everyone, fit in, and play down any of their talents so others feel better.

So, sometimes, the messages about giftedness and being smart are brushed off by the gifted person so as not to offend others or make the gifted person feel weird or too different in the different environments they find themselves in, e.g. family, school, faith community, neighborhood, career role, and extended family. In fact, it seems to be the polite response to deny one’s own cleverness.

Most of This is About Fitting in or Not

My role as a High Intelligence Specialist (my “elevator speech” answer to what I do for a living) has been one of helping people understand giftedness and the affects is has on a person’s life. There are some things that simply affect how we navigate in life, and these differences between and among us start at the very beginning.

Our differences are related to how people — and society’s norms, perhaps — see us and react to us at some level. Are we male, female, nonbinary? Do we catch on quickly or are we slow to learn? Are we extra tall, or skinny, or heavy? Is our skin color or ethnicity unusual in the environments we find ourselves? Do we attract a lot of attention for some of our talents or for being physically beautiful or unattractive? Are we acceptable to others? Did the messages from our parents, neighbors, other relatives, siblings, teachers or peers leave us confused about who we are? Are we emotionally and socially okay or is something wrong with us? How on earth does anyone sort this out?

Well, it’s complex, isn’t it? The thing is that if we are an outlier — different from others in any way — we attract attention. The attention can be good, bad or at least noticeable. And we tend to interpret ourselves in the context of what others seem to think and how they seem to like or not like us.

And if we are intellectually very distinct from the different groups of people that we find ourselves in, it can add another layer of confusion. Most adults can think of times when they simply felt unwelcome or not so special. And you don’t have to be gifted for that to happen; it can happen to anyone. My message in this article is about how you might consider the effects of your unusually high ability or talent as part of this confusing mix. I give you three examples from some exceptionally gifted adults I’ve worked with.

A teacher who was in graduate school shared a house with half a dozen other women one summer on the university’s campus. One of the women brought out her guitar and the women started to join in singing songs. The teacher was having a wonderful time and felt comfortable and part of the group when another stood up, glared at the teacher, and before stomping out of the room, said, “Oh, great! And she can sing, too!” Imagine the teacher’s confusion and pain. The group slowly drifted away and no group activities occurred among them for the rest of the summer semester. In fact, this highly gifted teacher was socially marginalized by the other graduate students. And she wasn’t sure what she’d done wrong.

Another client, and a member of an intellectually elite group invited on a political tour overseas for a month, was very tall and handsome. One evening the group attended an event that lasted well into the night and their only way back to their accommodations was by train. There were no other passengers waiting at this time of night, and the group felt vulnerable in the unfamiliar land at a train station. Several of the men and women singled him out as the one — because of his size — who would save them if anyone appeared and started trouble. He told the group not to count on him because, in his experience, ruffians deliberately picked out the big guy to attack so they could show how brave they were. How is this related to denying giftedness? The man’s size was part of what was different about him, and it added to different confusing episodes in his figuring out who he is and what parts of him are sometimes good and sometimes not as far as other people’s view of him.

In another example, a family of highly gifted individuals had one member who was the accepted smartest one. The family, two young adults and their parent, was in a foreign country on vacation and the family members clearly had certain assumptions about the “smartest” one, the one who seemed to know the most about well, everything. He was an expert in geography and history and maps, and they expected him to respond to the rest of them any time they had a question about where they were or what they were seeing. Of course, no one knows everything, and he wasn’t an experienced tour guide for the area they were visiting, so he didn’t have all the answers. They teased him and were clearly surprised that he didn’t know the answers, but to him it seemed like they were making fun of him, and he was angry and hurt.

The point is, what part of each individual caused the problem? And was it their problem or the problem of what others expected? We don’t know. But the individuals themselves end up tossing these episodes around and around in their minds — sometimes for years — and can make decisions not to let this or that happen to them again by withdrawing and becoming a smaller part of their natural selves.

Confusion About Giftedness Creates Difficulties Discovering Who We Are

I remind readers that there are multiple definitions of giftedness. And, as I’ve said before in other writings, I believe and view giftedness as being about how you “be.” Yes, the gifted person is smart and probably does well in many things, but it shows up in the way one talks, thinks, sees things, and makes connections that seem out-of-the-blue to others. It isn’t only about scores or achievement or high income, although there is often a correlation to those factors. In many cases, though, highly intelligent people don’t have access to good testing or interpretation of results, or don’t have support systems that allow them to thrive in their educational settings. So, they may come across to others — among many options — as either smart or a smart-aleck. Sometimes we call it “book smart” or “street smart.” What smart children and adults have available (or not) to them, like emotionally healthy parents, stable living arrangements, financial stability, and excellent educational settings with like-ability and like-minded classmates, plays a big role in people even showing up — seeming to be — as gifted. Sadly, there are many under-identified and underserved gifted people in the world. And, as James Flynn discovered, when the basics of access to the above-mentioned socioeconomic and emotional needs are met, giftedness shows up in higher numbers across every population.

There are the cases of gifted people who think getting good grades and going to college is what makes a person gifted. They deny they’re gifted by saying things like, “I wasn’t a good student.” “I didn’t get the best grades.” “I skipped school and dropped out before high school graduation.” “I was identified as gifted but I didn’t like school and was too lazy to do the work, so … I might have been gifted, but I’m not now.”

And, when a highly intelligent person doesn’t see or understand they have an intellectual advantage, they may interpret others’ behaviors as “stupid” or “lazy.” Or they might see others as slackers because they interpret slower learning or just not “getting it” behaviors this way: “They don’t even try to do it right!”

Did I mention this is complex? Conversely, many people who don’t understand or recognize their own unearned advantages at least sense they are smarter or “better” and become arrogant and smug. Some even become unethical and unfair to others because they think they are simply being smart when they dupe less clever people. Something is missing from a person’s background when they use this advantage in such a way. And that kind of thinking and reasoning also tends to run in families because those viewpoints can be passed from one generation to the next by granting approval or disapproval for certain behaviors and so-called “successes.”

And if the highly intelligent person hasn’t learned how to handle their intellectual power and advantage in a suitably humble way, and their achievements may or may not rise up to meet the expectations others have of how a gifted person looks and behaves, the gifted person is going to cause problems for him- or herself. Like, maybe others will work to “take them down a notch or two.”

Humility or Denial Can Get in the Way of Owning One’s Talents

But sometimes it’s appropriate. How are we to know?

Before I ever got into studying high intelligence, in the early 1980s, I already had two children who were clearly very smart. One was sweet, attentive, attuned to others, and advanced of others his age. His brother was advanced of people well beyond his age and was seemingly too busy to work at relating to others the way his older brother did. I hadn’t thought of myself as gifted, although I knew I was smart enough, until I started to read books about gifted children to see what I was dealing with as a parent. I was already seeing that as a former 4th- 6th grade teacher, I may not have met the needs of some of my former students very well because I didn’t “get it” about giftedness before I had my children.

One morning, my kids and I were in the kitchen and the TV was on, tuned to the Today Show. The host interviewed Steve Allen, a famous television entertainer, comedian, musician, and co-founder and early host of the Tonight Show, who was on the morning program to promote meeting the needs of the nation’s gifted children. My ears perked up, and I paid close attention. As the interview was ending, the host sweetly asked him, “Well, Mr. Allen, are you gifted?”

Mr. Allen stumbled a bit, apparently looking for the right way to answer, when he said, “Oh, not me. I’m not gifted.”

I don’t know how I found the address to write to him, but I did find it and I did write to him. I told him that he should find a way to honestly answer the question, a humble, not bragging way, but some way, because he added to the confusion of his audience by denying he is gifted. After all, many observers might have concluded, “If Steve Allen isn’t gifted, I’m certainly not!”

There is a fine, nearly invisible line, between being confident and being a pain in the neck. We try to build people up when we see they are insecure or doubt themselves, but we can be fairly merciless to those who are too sure of themselves or clearly believe they are really something! Humility is greatly valued pretty much all over the world. Even our leaders are viewed more favorably if they have found that humble “sweet spot.”

So, here is a possible approach to weave into your own way of dealing with the “gifted” issue: “Thank you. That’s kind of you to say.” And let it go at that.

If someone directly asks the questions “Are you gifted?” you can respond with something like this: “I do know I’ve had advantages in some ways in that regard. Whether it’s genetics, hard work, whatever, I know I can get pretty passionate about what interests me and it leads to my getting pretty good at it!” And, if they push the topic more than that, try to find that balance that makes it clear you don’t see yourself as an amazing whiz kid but do acknowledge you do seem to have strong abilities in some areas. And pat yourself internally on the back for whatever your talents and hard work have brought your way.

Additional Information

As I was learning about giftedness, I took a similar path to James Flynn’s path in looking for the environmental effects on IQ. Neither of us knew that’s where our research would take us. He reached out to me in 2015, (he died in 2020), and he wanted to possibly work together on something, but I wasn’t ready and clear on what I thought at that time. Here’s a good synopsis of his views and theories. https://scottbarrykaufman.com/podcast/nature-nurture-and-human-autonomy-with-james-flynn/

High intelligence comes from many places, but the overwhelmingly strong factor is genetics. You get it from your parents who got it from their parents and so on. Whether you develop it further or not doesn’t keep you from thinking differently than most people in the world. It is largely an unearned advantage to be “gifted” or intelligent at higher than average levels than others.

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Are Schools Prepared to Meet the Needs of the Highly Gifted?

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 13 May 2026 11:25:23 GMT

Level Two children and their parents also experienced difficulties finding a good school fit. Level Two children and adults are highly gifted. One might think that school personnel would notice the advanced abilities of the students and help to adjust the material and pacing for them. As readers will see, that is certainly not the case in the early grade levels.

Let’s look at the longitudinal research results for Level Two children

How to Interpret the Table

The table here summarizes what participants experienced during their regular school years, kindergarten through 12th grade. Each table breaks the school years into a range of grade levels. We can evaluate and report the effectiveness of the school and any modifications for each child by using the School Types.

When the grade range includes some change of situation for the individual student, e.g., a change of schools or entering a different program, then a hyphen is used. The last column for “Fit Quality” uses one of four adjectives — Unsatisfactory, Acceptable, Satisfactory, and Excellent — to describe each grade range and how well it supported the child’s growth in all areas, e.g., intellectual, academic, social, and emotional. My subjective analysis of “fit” is based on a comparison of standardized scores, Level of Giftedness, what each Level needs and whether each setting provided it. The longitudinal study subjects are sorted in the general order of the least to the best good fit within each Level of Gifted in the study.

Types of School Options

• Type II School — This type of school usually draws from a strongly middle-class population with few students from families in either poverty or wealth. It can be public or private.

• Type IV School — This is a magnet school, public or private, for highly gifted students where admissions are based primarily on standardized test scores and demonstrated achievement.

There are 13 people listed in the Level Two table. Level Two learners are generally highly gifted students in the 98th and 99th percentile on standardized tests and who learn more quickly, especially in their strength areas, compared to most students with whom they are typically placed when they start their school years.

Kindergarten through 3^rd grade

For seven of these children, their K-3rd grade placement gives an Unsatisfactory result. Despite their high abilities, these seven Level Two students received no obvious adjustments to their school placement or academic expectations during their first four years of school. As the original 5 Levels of Gifted (2005, 2009) book illustrates, their parents tried to work with the schools to get appropriate support but rarely made much progress during these school years.

For Chuck Arnesen, his school days started in a Type II school that provided no adjustments and was Unsatisfactory for him. His family moved to a different city when he finished second grade and placed him in a Type III school that worked very well; the fit there was Excellent for him.

For Boyd Updoff, his Acceptable — rather than Satisfactory — placement rating came even though his family homeschooled him. Homeschooling for these years is typically a good option, but Boyd’s family lived in a rural area, wanted their large family to experience a faith-based curriculum and influence, and the father had a debilitating medical issue during that time. The parents followed a grade-level based curriculum and Boyd did not appear to experience as much acceleration as he could have handled. As he matured, he could contribute more to how his homeschool days would go, and his father’s health situation improved, it became Satisfactory. [The ratings from negative to positive are Unsatisfactory, Acceptable, Satisfactory, Excellent].

The continuing downside, though, was lack of age-mate true peers for Boyd, and it became an issue for him as he went out into the greater world to begin his career.

What Else Should Be Considered When Determining a Good Fit?

By the time we consider what a good fit is for Levels Two and higher, I first consider whether the student has been able to spend time with a smart older tutor or mentor. It is a great social and emotional option when same-aged true peers aren’t available, or even if there are agemate options.

Another issue I consider is whether or not students have the opportunity to experience real challenge and encounter actual new material in their educational setting. For highly to exceptionally gifted students, because there is rarely challenging work or learning to do in most regular classrooms, they can get many misleading ideas about the relativity of how smart and capable they are. And, at some point in their lives, they may be either overwhelmed with things being harder than they’d expected, or they can develop lifelong habits of underachieving or giving minimal efforts, doing only enough to get by.

I often refer to the irony of how some “good” students participate in their own learning to underachieve by going along with what is presented in a system that doesn’t fit them.

Circumstances and results like these listed in the Table make it clear that the need for services and opportunities require that the school or district or state or federal government — at least one or more of these entities! — provide targeted financial support — not just money to do more and more of the same with fancier equipment — to the schools so that no student is left behind due to either lack of appropriate instructional level and pacing or background socioeconomic issues and hardships.

Two book study subjects from the Level Two group experienced Satisfactory learning conditions during their kindergarten through third-grade years. Both Glenn Richards and Seth Cannon were homeschooled in a way that worked for them.

Three children had Excellent academic and social placement.

Cory Engum’s parents homeschooled him. Beyond just textbook lessons, they joined a homeschooling group and took advantage of 4-H and other classes and activities in their vicinity so that Cory got to play and learn with a range of age groups, including other adults, and remain active with lots of real-world, hands-on activities. This set-up was additionally especially good for Cory because he has dyslexia and prefers hands-on learning activities.

Tony Matthews and Hans Fletcher attended a Type III school where there were not only many students as bright as they, but the school also provided some differentiation for their learners, including some subject acceleration.

A Type III school, by its definition, already contains a higher number of college-bound students, so even if there is no differentiation of instruction, a Level Two student in a Type III school is often near the average of the students in the class and surrounded by others with similar post-secondary education and career goals.

The 4th through 8th grade

Only one Level Two student was still in an Unsatisfactory setting during his fourth-through eighth-grade years, middle school. Donald Wolsfeld still attended a Type I school with no adjustments.

For three students who fared better during the next four years of school, two children, Noa and Nicholas Collins, had Acceptable placement because their mother was ceaselessly involved in advocating for her children. Finding the right fit can become a full-time job for many parents.

Kristin Miller’s Type II school added a weekly gifted class, and although not a significant improvement, it did make things better because it made her feel less overlooked and she enjoyed the social aspects of being with other bright students.

Four of the Level Two students were in Satisfactory environments during the middle school stage of their schooling. Chrissy Quan, Greg Cooper, and Glenn Richards experienced some in-school adjustments and conditions that are typical — good but not as much as they need — for highly gifted children in Type II schools.

Boyd Updoff remained home with his homeschooling family throughout his school years. His parents pushed somewhat beyond his grade-level based curriculum, so although Boyd’s instruction continued at a level that was below what he could have handled, he had time and opportunity to learn beyond the curriculum. He was encouraged to do so and followed his interests and curiosity after the regular lessons were finished.

Seth Cannon went from a good homeschool group into a Type II school that made no adjustments and was merely Acceptable for his needs. Homeschooler Cory Engum and Type III school students Tony Matthews, Chuck Arnesen, and Hans Fletcher continued to be in what appeared to be ideal-for-them environments during this period, the so-called middle school years.

The high school years, 9th through 12 grade

Things got better for most Level Two students when they reached high school. Most high schools work fairly well socially for Level Two, and these are the students who are often likely to enjoy taking on leadership roles (Antonakis, J., House, R. J., & Simonton, D. K. (2017).

A possible downside to watch for is that by the time Level Two students are ability grouped for challenging courses, they will meet more students who are smarter than they are — Level Three and Four students in a large high school, or maybe even one Level Five student. Someone needs to explain this to them, and maybe to their parents, so that they don’t assume they aren’t good enough or aren’t trying hard enough when they encounter this new level of competition and “relativity” comparison. As Pam Tice, math teacher and consultant, noted:

I see it all the time with gifted students who encounter profoundly gifted classmates in math class and begin to feel like frauds who don’t belong in these high-level classes just because they have to work harder. Maybe for the first time!

Most Level Two gifted participants had most of their social and emotional needs met in their high school years — 11 of the 13. Nine had an Excellent fit and two had Satisfactory fits.

High schools, for the most part, are the one part of the K-12 school years that continues to group students by ability.

Most high schools, especially in metropolitan areas, offer Advanced Placement (AP) and Honors classes that attract students whose interests and intellect are similar to each other. Also, many states have a post-secondary option available to students who are ready to move on academically.

One could argue Donald Wolsfeld remained in an Unsatisfactory environment for his Level Two needs. Donald was still in a Type I school and there were only modest options available to students like him. Also, his rather small, rural school had a low number of college-bound students and the likelihood of finding true soulmate friends was possible, but not high.

For Boyd Updoff, by the high school years of ninth or tenth grade, he was still homeschooled and finished his K-12 coursework by age 16. In his state, homeschoolers were required to take annual standardized tests to make sure they are learning and on track. His scores were always at the 99th percentile level. Unfortunately, this can be misleading. The tests Boyd was required to take and pass each year were normed against — compared to — other children in his state who were his age and grade-level for the age.

A Level Two learner who is exposed to any reasonable academic schooling is highly likely to score at the 99th percentile on a nationally normed test that compares performance to others at the same age and grade level. But this score does not tell us how he would score compared to the average achievement of students in the state who are four and five years older than he, students who are “average” for their grade level, the ones with whom his achievement should be compared to see if his learning needs are being met as a Level Two student. At this juncture, Boyd took advantage of a program that allowed him the opportunity to avail himself of cost-free post-secondary courses. So, overall, his high school years were a Satisfactory fit.

Tony Matthews, Chuck Arnesen, and Hans Fletcher continued to be in ideal-for-them environments in Type III schools during this period. All three of them came from families with the financial ability to provide the Type III school option afforded people either living in wealthy districts or attending college preparatory private schools.

Again, this is the Level that is most common in gifted programs.

More Information

Post-secondary educational options, PSEO, and other names, is a form of concurrent enrollment where advanced students can college courses free in their state and earn both high school and college credit at the same time.

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

If a Gifted Child is Getting Poor Grades, Does this Mean They’re Underachieving?

Deborah Ruf — Mon, 11 May 2026 01:17:56 GMT

First, when a child is clearly capable and smart — possibly gifted — it is common for both teachers and parents to see “bad grades” as either underachievement or maybe they have a disability. But is it that simple?

Interestingly enough, a great proportion of gifted adults who didn’t get good grades come to believe they aren’t all that smart. Or if they didn’t go to college, they must not be that smart. They couldn’t be gifted. Well, that’s simply not necessarily true and not a great way to evaluate whether or not a person might be gifted.

I started to see this issue of collapsing “grade getting” behaviors with intelligence during the time I was in my doctoral program. My first major writing project ever was my PhD dissertation. I invited many people from near and far whom I either knew or suspected were highly intelligent. At least half the people I asked denied that they were gifted and cited they’re not doing well in school as the reason they knew this about themselves. Their responses were not usually correlated with their adult failures or successes, either.

In case readers here are interested and not sure about their intelligence level, look into taking the qualifying test with American Mensa Test yourself. It’s a good and accessible proxy for an actual IQ test. They only let you know if you are at or above the 98th percentile and would qualify for admission to Mensa, but at least you know whether you are at the 98th percentile on their test or not. Also, school children all take ability tests (with rare exception) and if you aren’t sure, ask your child’s school to show you your child’s results by the time your child is in 2nd or 3rd grade.

Often others in our lives judge and evaluate us and leave a lasting impression on us. Two of the people who challenged me about any “being gifted” notions I might personally have about myself as a smart person were my father and his aunt — my favorite aunt, by the way — Aunt Helen.

My father thought I only got good grades (some of the time) because I studied so hard. My mother disavowed him of that notion by pointing out I was simply escaping to my room to be alone, write letters to my boyfriend, read what I wanted, etc. She was right. Dad also knew Mom didn’t get stellar grades in school, either, and he didn’t think of her as all that smart, either. As she was a housewife, it was hard to prove otherwise, I guess. She was wicked smart. She died in 2006 and Dad still hasn’t (by his own age of nearly 102) discovered or believed her intelligence was unusual. To say he wasn’t exactly kind and supportive of her would be an understatement.

My father hadn’t been a good student for most of his school years but found out he’d tested well when he entered the Marine Corps after high school graduation in June of 1942. As he’s still alive and reasonably cogent as he nears 102^nd birthday, (and is still quick-minded, lives on his own, etc.), I’ve been able to watch how he still tries to fit in and “prove himself” as being a smart person when he is around “successful” people who he assumes — for some reason foreign to me — are smarter than he is because they made a lot of money or have grand titles. Dad is, by the way, brilliant. People can sort-of-know that about themselves, but — at the same time — if when they were younger they get the wrong information about grades and test scores proving who is smart and who isn’t — their perceptions about themselves can still remain skewed.

As I was sharing with Aunt Helen back in the 1990s at the time I was working on my dissertation, somehow our conversation got to where she made the comment, “Well, you weren’t that smart.” Now, Aunt Helen was also smart and she knew it, and she’d been a good, dutiful student. My dear mother told me early and often that I shouldn’t focus too much on grades. Getting “good enough” grades was truly good enough because having a social life and activities and fitting in was just as important. Anyway, I chuckled — not derisively, of course — at Aunt Helen for saying that (I was in my forties and not insecure about my intellectual abilities) and she started to see that what I was talking about was true.

Okay, one more story: when I met my first adviser for my doctorate, Dr. Jack Merwin (who retired before I finished the dissertation), he looked at my transcripts from college and my master’s program and asked, “What did you major in during your undergraduate studies, getting an MRS?” I quickly quipped, “No, bridge,” which is true. He was sexist, I played a lot of bridge during college, and we moved on.

So, why is there such a range of cooperation and behavior among the gifted when it comes to grade getting? Girls are more likely than boys — as a group — to cooperate and be “good students” even when the work is repetitive, uninteresting, or well below their intellectual ability to deal with it. Many “good students,” girls and boys who are gifted, coast, get awards and kudos, and may wonder later in life what they did all that for because it seldom predicts career success or happiness. (See Arnold, K., A View From the Top: The Illinois Valedictorian Project. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED368304

So, what is underachievement in school? The answer to that question is more complex than most people think. Although it is common to see underachievement as being about getting bad grades, someone who gets good grades may also be underachieving compared to what they could have learned if their schooling and other environments were a better “fit” for them.

Here’s the issue for “good students” who did what they were told, figured out how to please the teacher, and rarely got into any kind of trouble: they didn’t learn as much about how to think for themselves or “think outside the box” as they might have learned because they followed the rules so well that as adults they kept waiting for someone to tell them what to do!

In my book The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (2023), most of the subjects in my longitudinal study who didn’t “do well” in school had varying interpretations of their poor school performance. Among those interpretations are these:

I’m not as smart as my parents think.
Something is wrong with me.
School was a waste of time and I only cooperated when I liked or respected the teacher.
I didn’t want to stand out as being the nerdy one so I worked to fit in and just enjoy myself with friends and other activities like sports, music, drama, etc.

Surely we need to look at how to find a better fit and environment for our smartest students rather than expect them to go along with what is provided regardless of their abilities.

Arnold, K. D. (1993). Academic achievement: A view from the top. The Illinois Valedictorian Project (Peer reviewed monograph and executive summary). North Central Regional Education Laboratory. https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED368304

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Are Schools Prepared for Gifted Children? (Highly to Exceptionally Gifted)

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 06 May 2026 12:24:48 GMT

The school options families have available to them play a role in how good the eventual “fit” is for the Level Three student. Level Three children and adults are Exceptionally gifted. One might think that school personnel would notice the advanced abilities of the students and help to adjust the material and pacing for them. As readers will see, that is often not the case in the early grade levels. This table shows the pseudonyms of the 13 adults in in the study and who were in their late teens to mid-forties when the study ended. This is what their school years were like for them. “No Adjustments” means the child was given the same pacing and curriculum as the other students. No changes or accommodations were made. The most common school options are described as follows:

· Type I School – A school, usually public, that serves the general population with a wide range of student socioeconomic backgrounds, including recent immigrants still learning English, residents who may be highly mobile (i.e., they change schools often), and sometimes a high proportion of poverty-level students.
· Type II School – This type of school usually draws from a strongly middle-class population with few students from families in either poverty or wealth. It can be public or private.
· Type III School – This type of school is usually either a private college preparatory school or a wealthy district with a reputation for high standardized test scores, a high percentage of students who eventually go to colleges and universities, and a virtually non-existent dropout rate. Students rarely have experience with poverty.
· Type IV School – This is a magnet school, public or private, for highly gifted students where admissions are based primarily on standardized test scores and demonstrated achievement.
· Type V School – This is any school, anywhere, which facilitates continuous progress throughout the subject levels without regard for the children’s ages. Examples are schools based on the Montessori method or the old one-room schoolhouses. In an ideal world, we would have only Type V schools.

The asterisk * in the above table indicates that the student does not take advantage of an Excellent environment. These kinds of social aspects are covered in the full book The Five Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (linked below).

There are 13 Level Three gifted people from the my original 5 Levels book.

At Level Three, the first four years of school, kindergarten through 3rd grade, are generally problematic. At this ability Level, the School Type is not as certain a solution as it is for Levels One and Two learners. This means that if Level Three children attend a Type I or II school, they absolutely need most of their curriculum and ability grouping tailored to their needs or it will be mostly unsuitable for them socially, emotionally, and academically. A Level Three youngster would usually be the only one who is this intellectually advanced in either type of school.

How Different Are They?

If they could travel through the elementary material at their own pace, most Level Three children could complete all six grades in about two years. Even in a Type III school setting, the student’s highest academic strength areas will need acceleration with classmates who have the same strengths if they are to make good academic progress.

At this point, readers, including parents and teachers, need some specifics on what Level Three children can already do academically and intellectually by the time they start school. Here are the brief early milestones of these gifted youngsters.

Level Three Gifted Early Milestones:

Approximately 98–99th percentiles on standardized tests
Terms Highly to Exceptionally Gifted or Very Advanced on IQ tests
IQ scores of about 130 to 140
One or two per grade level; more in high socioeconomic Type III schools
Qualify for gifted programs — but will often still be above the level of most other participants and material. Unless the program includes more than one grade level, student may be the only student of the same high ability in even the gifted class.
Master majority of kindergarten skills by age 3 or 4
Most spontaneously read with or w/o previous instruction before kindergarten
Most read simple chapter books by age 5–6
Most intuitively use numbers for all operations before kindergarten

Let’s look at the longitudinal research results for Level Three children

Seven children started and stayed in their Unsatisfactory school environments throughout the first four years: Li Bartrom, who attended a Type I school, and then Bernie Walker, Peter Koos, Betsy Dunkirk, Harry Vassar, and Gary Lundquist, who attended Type II schools.

Janet Lewis, who attended a Type III school, was not allowed any adjustments to her environment by her school and it was, therefore, Unsatisfactory for her needs during those four years.

All of these children had parents who tried to work with the schools to obtain more advanced curriculum and pacing for their children, but to no avail.

Four children left their local schools during the kindergarten through third grade years and were homeschooled when their parents could not persuade their schools to provide suitable, appropriate learning opportunities for their children. It is often a financial and career hardship for families to make such a choice, too, so few parents make this choice lightly. Andrea and Gina’s parents made this choice to homeschool their daughters when it was clear that their Type I schools were not going to be able to meet their needs. Both had a shift from Unsatisfactory to Satisfactory during this period.

The family of Arthur Richards removed him from his Type II school to homeschool him after none of their requests or advocacy bore fruit. Brennan Ahlers attended a Type III school for his first two years, until educators at the expensive private school told his frustrated parents, “All our children are gifted,” and refused to make any adjustments for him. Brennan’s parents, too, started to homeschool.

Only two Level Three children were off to a good start during the kindergarten through the third grade years. Tiana Bardy attended a Type V Montessori school that worked quite well for him, Excellent. Bradley Ruhl attended a Type III school that added subject acceleration for him.

Keep in mind that the quality of schools was not worse for the Level Three children in this sample; it’s that their needs are different than most schoolchildren’s needs. These were all good schools for most students.

During middle school, their fourth- through eighth-grade years, Bernie Walker was still in an Unsatisfactory learning situation, and Peter Koos had an Acceptable fit in his Type II school where he enjoyed the social aspects of school but remained unchallenged. For those whose fit is Satisfactory or less, a school that might look good on the surface does not necessarily work for each Level Three student or qualify as an Excellent fit.

Li Bartrom did not fit her Type I school despite her parents trying to secure good options for her. Brennan Ahlers attended a Type III school that had rigorous academics which did work well, but the social life did not fit him. Betsy Dunkirk craved more challenges in her Type II school. Even when there were more options through these years, she received fewer that were stimulating and challenging than she would have liked, and she says she was left frustrated and unfulfilled.

Gina Oliver started each grade level period needing to re-establish that she needed more than regular grade-level learning opportunities. Her school responded with a few more options for her as she progressed through the grade levels. Gina is a friendly and sociable person, so she made the best of it and appeared to be okay. Unfortunately, when exceptionally gifted students appear to be okay, there is less pressure to supply alternative, more suitable, learning options.

As Gary Lundquist entered 5th grade, his school district implemented a full-time immersion program for highly gifted students that Gary attended in both the fifth and sixth grades. It was perfect for him.

He loved school and said, “It couldn’t have been better!”

Then the district dropped the full-day immersion gifted program for several years and Gary’s academic path, and attitude toward school, shifted radically for the worse. He lost all academic motivation in both middle and high school. Therefore, his fourth- through eighth-grade experience went from Excellent to Unsatisfactory.

Tiana Bardy attended Montessori school until seventh grade when he asked to be homeschooled. Tiana recognized that he needed to explore his gender identity and continuing his education at home was a safe and good alternative to attending regular school. This was a Satisfactory environment for many reasons.

During the traditional high school years, as in the earlier Levels, more Level Three students — six — experienced an Excellent fit. One, Gary Lundquist, was in an ideal academic and friendship environment in his large, suburban Type II school district. The friendship part worked well, but his willingness to fully engage with the academic opportunities was simply gone after the gifted immersion program ended in his middle school years. For these reasons, he has an Excellent Fit Quality designation with an asterisk.

Four more people experienced Satisfactory fits, although one of those, Peter Koos, like Gary Lundquist, was simply not interested in taking advantage of all that was available. Li Bartrom and Gina Oliver both still attended a Type I school in a rural area and experienced only an Acceptable fit. They combined online courses with social and extracurricular activities in high school.

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Are Schools Prepared for Gifted Children? (Exceptionally to Profoundly Gifted, Level Four)

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 29 Apr 2026 11:50:49 GMT

Level Four children and their parents in my first book (5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options, 2009) generally had considerable difficulty finding a good school fit. My second book, my longitudinal study (The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us, 2023), shows us how the outcomes of this high level of giftedness depend on the parenting and the access to good solutions. Here is the link to the detailed description of the book: https://a.co/d/0bCVTcfC. Be sure to read down far enough for the editorial reviews because they can help you to understand what’s going on.

The school options families have available to them play a role in how good the eventual “fit” is for the Level Four student. Level Four children and adults are Exceptionally to Profoundly gifted.

One might think that school personnel would notice the advanced abilities of the students and help to adjust the material and pacing for them. As readers will see, that is often not the case in the early grade levels.

Level Four Gifted Score Range and Early Milestones:

Keep in mind that the Levels are my rubric for helping to describe the ways gifted children differ from each other and what their differing needs requires. IQ scores are but one means of evaluating children’s abilities.

· They score primarily 99th percentile on standardized tests, although this understates the person’s ability; it is qualitatively different from a Level Three 99th percentile, for example.

· A person in the Level Four range is exceptionally to profoundly gifted.

· They have IQ score results of about 135 to 141+ or a 145+ on either verbal or nonverbal or a specific domain, e.g., spatial, or quantitative reasoning. I use the term “about” because a “cut-off” score makes very little sense when one considers the best IQ tests available only correlate with each other about 75%.

· There will usually be only one or two Level Four children across two grade levels; two or three per grade level in high socioeconomic Type III schools (e.g., with 100 students in grade level). School types are listed in the first book and you can discern them by reviewing the tables I’ve provided here.

Achievement behaviors and indications:

· Master a majority of kindergarten skills by age 3

· Question the concept of Santa or Tooth Fairy (or some similar concept) by age 4 to 5

· Majority at 2nd-3rd grade equivalency in academic subjects by early kindergarten

· Majority at upper high school grade equivalencies by 4th-5th grades

· Show concern (or interest) for existential topics and life’s purpose by early elementary school age

Level Four Grade School Years Summary

When I say No Adjustments in the tables, it means the child needed adjustments in that school but didn’t get them.

There are 27 Level Four gifted people from the original 5 Levels book.

Level Four includes exceptionally to profoundly gifted children and adults. The original 5 Levels book identified 19 subjects within its sample. Considering the smaller numbers of people who are in the highest intellectual levels — the number of people in the overall population who are extremely gifted gets smaller and smaller as their ability level gets higher and higher — readers might ask where this large group came from.

There are two explanations. One, the present list includes people whose eventual combinations of scores, behaviors, and attainments were not yet available for the first book because the subjects were still quite young when their parents submitted the information. More information for the follow-up study led to moving them from Levels Two and Three to Level Four. But even so, the number 19 seemed high, and 27 might seem extraordinary.

Early on I focused on studying the very highest degrees of intelligence because of my own family “issues.” I needed help! For this reason, more exceptionally and profoundly gifted families than any random sampling would predict sought professional evaluation with me and volunteered for the study because I viscerally “got it” — what they were dealing with — and the parents felt that. In fact, clients and volunteers came from dozens of other states and several countries for evaluation and guidance.

Additionally, my Myers-Briggs personality type is ENTP and although it’s waffled a little bit from time to time, it helps to explain the ways that I’ve done my research and writing. I’ve been driven to find answers about high intelligence and outcomes of the individual who are highly intelligent. ENTP is a rare personality type for a woman.

Let’s look at the longitudinal research results for Level Four gifted children during their K-12 grade school years

The first four years of school, in particular, are highly problematic for Level Four children. As we move up the giftedness continuum, there is a difference in what will work for these exceptionally and profoundly intelligent children compared to the earlier Levels. For example, from earlier descriptions, it is evident that Level One and Two children tend to thrive in Type III schools. Level Three learners appear to do well in most cases when at a Type III school, and yet such a school frequently is not enough for a Level Four gifted child — not academically, socially, or emotionally. Not only will the curriculum’s pace and depth be unsatisfactory for them, but exceptionally gifted Level Four children are too different from most other children of their age and grade level to find a good social fit, either. This will help you decode the tables and were first created for my first book, 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options (2005/2009) and linked below.

The most common school options are described as follows:
· Type I School – A school, usually public, that serves the general population with a wide range of student socioeconomic backgrounds, including recent immigrants still learning English, residents who may be highly mobile (i.e., they change schools often), and sometimes a high proportion of poverty-level students.
· Type II School – This type of school usually draws from a strongly middle-class population with few students from families in either poverty or wealth. It can be public or private.
· Type III School – This type of school is usually either a private college preparatory school or a wealthy district with a reputation for high standardized test scores, a high percentage of students who eventually go to colleges and universities, and a virtually non-existent dropout rate. Students rarely have experience with poverty.
· Type IV School – This is a magnet school, public or private, for highly gifted students where admissions are based primarily on standardized test scores and demonstrated achievement.
· Type V School – This is any school, anywhere, which facilitates continuous progress throughout the subject levels without regard for the children’s ages. Examples are schools based on the Montessori method or the old one-room schoolhouses. In an ideal world, we would have only Type V schools.

There are proportionally fewer ratings of an Excellent fit in the Level Four table at the beginning of this section compared to earlier Levels because what was Excellent for earlier Levels simply is not enough for most of these Level Four youngsters.

Staying at age and grade level leaves Level Four students always waiting for something new to be taught and often does not prepare them to seek and participate in the post-secondary institutions and careers later that would fit them best.

Almost half of the Level Four group — 13 of these exceptionally to profoundly gifted children — stayed in their Unsatisfactory school environments for all four years of kindergarten through third grade. They represent three Type I schools (two of which allowed a one-year grade skip), nine Type II schools, and one Type III school.

Almost all the children in this study were evaluated for their ability and achievement — at their parents’ initiative and expense — during these early school years. Parents are indeed the best identifiers of giftedness and the lack of educator awareness or training about the needs of exceptionally gifted children leads many educators to dismiss the concerns of the parents.

Educators do not normally have coursework in their teacher training classes related to gifted children or the variability of intelligence in general. Most people, including educators, have no idea that social and emotional health are integrally connected to both an intellectual level and profile, e.g., extremely high in one or two ability domains but not as much so in other domains, and the individual student’s social and emotional needs.

Additionally, schools are not set up structurally to allow students to “flow” into the classrooms and environments that will meet their needs based on their ability and readiness to learn new material. For example, if a child is already beyond sixth-grade coursework and curriculum, and the school building itself only has classrooms and grade levels through the sixth grade, what is the school supposed to do? Typically, the reaction to that issue is to slow down any forward progress for advanced students so that they don’t experience too much repetition as they sit through lessons they learned ahead of time on their own. Most gifted adults remember getting in trouble with the teacher if they tried to “read ahead” (Ruf, 1998, https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf) and that issue is still all too common in schools today.

Some results

During the first four years of school — kindergarten through third grade — only one student experienced an Excellent school environment right away: Kayla Bardy. Kayla attended a Type V Montessori school.

Six other children had a Satisfactory start. Patricia Walker’s parents got an Early Entrance option for her which made her kindergarten and first grade years Satisfactory. A new Type IV public school opened in the area within a year, and Patricia attended Grades 2, 3, and 4 there. It was specifically designed for exceptionally and profoundly gifted children and it was Excellent for Patricia.

Earl Langer’s experience was Satisfactory because he was in a Type II school that had a modest gifted program throughout his grade school years. Both Adam Schaefer and Samantha Forrest started in a Type II school that was Unsatisfactory for them, and they, too, were enrolled in the same Type IV school for their third- through fifth-grade years and found it an Excellent fit.

Both Kyle Amundson and Tamara Lundquist had parents who managed to find ways to make their school situations work for them, Kyle with partial homeschooling and Tamara with numerous in — and after — school options.

Daniel Schmidt and Bill Arnesen attended Type III schools with some moderate adjustments for them. This made the environment Satisfactory, but not Excellent.

Bill attended a Type V Montessori school for two years of preschool and advanced through third-grade material, but when he moved to a Type III school, the school would not consider a kindergarten grade-skip.

The school administered a group ability test to incoming students, including Bill, and when the proctor told Bill to skip anything he did not understand, he took her literally. What he had not understood was the directions, so he skipped an entire section and scored as a Level One Level rather than Level Four. The school concluded at that time that his advanced achievement had been “pushed” by his parents and held him at age and grade level.

Six additional students started with Unsatisfactory school environments but received adjustments that improved the suitability of their environments for them. For example, Angelica Plomin started at a Type II school and it was immediately clear that it did not fit her. The school was willing to give her a two-grade skip within the first several weeks of the school year. It worked until Angelica quickly breezed past her two-years-older classmates. Her parents moved her to a Type V Montessori school where she flourished for the time being. A new job for the father had them move to a different state and start the process again with Angelica’s new school. Her educational experience rating for those years is Unsatisfactory to Excellent for each time she changed schools.

There are no examples of schools responding (i.e., taking any actions to adjust the child’s classroom environment), to recommendations either from past schools or the child’s parents.

Two of the children, Derek Fondow and Rose Engum, were removed by their parents for homeschooling, which was Satisfactory for the time being.

Emily Newton transferred to a Type III school and was expected to “fit in” because, as the school administration told them, “All of our students are gifted,” so it was a better placement for her, but not more than Satisfactory.

Finally, Jerrod Engquist and Colton Schultz, students at Type II schools, were both allowed a one-year grade-skip which made their environments Acceptable for a short time.

As we look at what the Level Four youngsters experienced during fourth through eighth grade, we see that things are still far from ideal for most of them. Four of the students remained in an Unsatisfactory fit: William Jones, Layne Freeman, Zachary Hackner, and Rebecca Resnick. Three more started that time period in an Unsatisfactory fit but were able to move into an Acceptable fit before the finish of their Grade 8 year. Michael and Sophie Fuller, for example, moved from a Type II school to a Type III. It was better, but still not Satisfactory.

Justin Janacek’s parents tried one thing after another as they struggled to find what would meet their son’s needs. He commented during one interview that it made it difficult to form friendships when he so frequently changed schools. Again, Level Four students are extremely unusual and exceptionally rapid, deft learners. There is no child or family in this study who experienced outside sources finding them, funding them, or otherwise coming to their rescue.

Six Level Four youngsters experienced a completely Satisfactory fit throughout the middle school years. That group includes Stephen Williams, Jerrod Engquist, Emily Newton, Rose Engum, Candace Richardson, and Earl Langer.

Four of the subjects, Tamara Lundquist, Kayla Bardy, Derek Fondow, and Daniel Schmidt, all appear to have an Excellent fit during this time. One, Derek, with support from his family for the process, left the traditional path of any regular school and took both online and in-person courses to complete high school via a concurrent enrollment option, which included university course credit, by the end of the Grade 4 through Grade 8 time frame. This means he completed his regular schooling by the time he was 14 years old.

For the children who experienced the previously mentioned Type IV (gifted immersion school) public school for exceptionally to profoundly gifted students for several years, it was an awful change for them to be sent for their middle school years into whole-class instruction with other seventh- and eighth-graders, and their school fit suffered greatly. For everyone else, there was still upheaval and change as families attempted to work out what would be best for their exceptionally to profoundly gifted child(ren). And, for many families, parents needed to consider what the rest of the family could deal with and manage, too.

The high school years looked better for most Level Four students because, as stated previously, high schools offered most of them access to ability-grouped classes, Advanced Placement courses, and options such as post-secondary school courses that gave them credit for both high school and college at the same time at no additional cost to the family. Nonetheless, Layne Freeman was still one for whom high school offered an Unsatisfactory fit academically and socially. In Layne’s case, this does not mean that she did not have friends. She did. But she lacked enough true peers, intellectual competition, and meaningful discussions. She remained unaware of that loss, however, because she knew nothing else. Her Type II schools are in a large city of a state with a low overall population. She took advantage of the options available to her, but they were restricted due to the small population and limited resources. Examples of such states include Alaska, the Dakotas, Montana, Idaho, and Maine.

Tamara Lundquist had a Satisfactory, not excellent, high school experience for several reasons. When she was still in her twenties, she said this:

I had a bad attitude in my high school years. When I was unable to be in accelerated classes … because of scheduling … I struggled not only to not be bored, but also to not feel some disdain for my classmates. Knowing I was gifted definitely inflated my ego some, but not to a point of not being able to make good friends or learn social skills. I have always been better at making friends with older people than many people my age, but that might be more a result of having older brothers than anything else … I knew that I was smart, but within the context of my family it didn’t feel unusual. I was arrogant in high school, felt way smarter than anyone around me. I had higher test scores and better grades. I eventually discovered I had areas that weren’t as good as others and I became aware of my shortcomings.

Nine of the students experienced a primarily Excellent setting for their needs during the 14- through 18-year-old age range of their lives. Derek Fondow finished his undergraduate degree at a main campus state university near his home during these years, and it was an excellent fit and option for him. Kayla Bardy finished high school and two years of concurrent enrollment university coursework by age 15 while homeschooling.

Fourteen more students found a Satisfactory situation, two were in merely Acceptable circumstances, and two — Layne Freeman and William Jones — were in Unsatisfactory conditions throughout their high school-aged years. Keith Sands’ family moved and changed schools several times during his primary and middle school years, but the setups were merely Acceptable and not Satisfactory. Like Angelica, all the school changing affected his friendship formation and focus. Keith, when in his late twenties, described the frequent changes:

Primary school took place in the US: two years in [a southern state], four years in a [northern state]. Once I started high school, the decision was made by my parents to move back to [mother’s country] and so we applied for a scholarship for a private school near my grandparents’ house. A half-scholarship was granted and so I commenced year 7 at the prestigious grammar school. The first few years went by swimmingly; with two languages and accelerated maths on offer, my attention was largely kept on studies for the time being. The social stuff never worked well. Teachers made me feel that I was disruptive (when asking questions) and there was something undesirable for that. My classmates didn’t make me feel bad, it was just lack of social conversation; I couldn’t relate to the kinds of stuff they talked about. Others were bullied; I was not.

As readers can see, Level Four gifted children and their families faced many issues they had not foreseen and were not sure how to tackle. The results among the 27 participants at this Level varied considerably because different families had different options or views about what to do than some of the other families had. At the same time, there simply were not easy-to-find, affordable resources to support families with their issues because there is rarely a critical mass in any one school or district of students with needs like theirs. Services exist by law for students with any disabilities, but there are very few laws that require schools to meet the needs of the most highly intelligent.

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

The Five Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (2023). This is a 20-year longitudinal study follow-up about the original gifted child subjects in 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options (2005, 2009). In it, Dr. Ruf covers every conceivable topic to ask the 60 of the original study group of 78. She also shows readers how it is that people of the same original promise to succeed have vastly different outcomes. https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-Children-Grown-Up/dp/B0C9SHFRLH or https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-5-levels-of-gifted-children-grown-up-phd-deborah-l-ruf/1143719859?ean=9798988323709.

The book provides a detailed analysis of the different levels of giftedness, the concept of “good fit” in educational settings, and the impact of various school environments on gifted children. It also includes personal stories and experiences of gifted children and adults, highlighting the challenges they face in finding appropriate educational and social environments. Available now on both Amazon and B&N. It is not the old purple book from 2005. Also, the Kindle and Nook versions are formatted so readers can click back and forth easily and find their place again. Follow this link: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DL3BSC9X or this link: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/losing-our-minds-deborah-ruf/1146410968?ean=2940185888872

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF copy: Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect The Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies

Scatterplots of Early Childhood Development in Gifted Children

Deborah Ruf — Mon, 27 Apr 2026 01:31:00 GMT

Scatterplots to illustrate some of the many ways gifted children are different (or not)

Early in my consulting career with gifted families, my natural inclination to explore, theorize, and try to figure things out about high intelligence and its effects, led me to do a fun little investigation. One of my focuses during my PhD doctoral training was Test & Measurement. I’ve always loved scatterplots. This first photo will help you “bone up” on what you used to know about deciphering scatterplots.

Design process for the Initial Ruf Estimates of Levels of Giftedness

In 1999 I developed an intake form called “Developmental Milestones.” Parents who came to my new consultancy gave me all the information I thought I might need to figure them and their children out so that I could help them with their schooling and other issues related to their child being ahead of most children in their age groups. I ended up later omitting many of the questions after I analyzed the usefulness — or not — of some of the questions. In the meantime, though, I used a scatterplot design to see what I was getting from the parents’ written responses to my intake form.

I Decided I Might As Well Share Some Results

I did a lot of public speaking. I needed a way to summarize what I was learning and these posts now come from that part of my sharing.

As I gathered early milestones and behaviors of gifted children for my first book, I did a little “side” study before the book was completed. My research for Losing Our Minds: Gifted Children Left Behind (2005), which is now called 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options—included asking parents every possible question I could think of about their families and children. This series of posts shows you what some of those questions were.

What Is the SB-LM?

Briefly, the SBLM is from the original Binet Scales that were developed by Terman and Merrill in the early 1900s. That earlier test used a scale not used at all today … and it used a still familiar formula to compare chronological age to mental age and then multiply by 100 to get a ratio IQ score. That’s why IQ is called Intelligence Quotient. But it is no longer true for modern tests. Thus the confusion. Anyway, I used the test often enough in my early years to get a good sampling of results that I could compare later to modern tests. I could also use its one-to-one correspondence to calculate score to behaviors and abilities in a scatterplot design. I love scatterplots! I mean, who doesn’t, right?

Getting Started on the Milestones Scatterplots

I used the results of the SBLM IQ test that has a scale based on comparisons of mental age to chronological age (no other tests do that; it’s why the SBLM appears to have a higher ceiling. It doesn’t; it just has a different use of numbers.) Although my PhD focus included a major in Test & Measurement, my personal goal was to be able to read primary research and get something useful out of it. I asked the parents of my gifted subjects to do my stats. The one who did the scatterplots probably gave me the “r-values,” but my own notes don’t show those. I assure readers, though, that the lines are accurate representations of the correlations between age and IQ.

The scatterplots I’ve posted here show the age of a child when the parents noticed the the child met that milestone on the left side, and the child’s SBLM IQ results on the bottom line.

The quick way to read a scatterplot is to look for the line. If it is relatively flat, it means there isn’t much correlation. If it slopes downward toward the right, it means the higher the IQ, the earlier the child did that or reached that milestone. If it slopes upward toward the right, it means a higher IQ slows down the child’s attaining that particular milestone. In the three cases where that occurs, it is a slight difference only. I call those milestones the “stubbornness milestones.” They could do it but they won’t. They’ve got choices and they know it.

Some surprising — to me — findings about physical and interest issues

Parents are very excited when their children start to reach common milestones such as walking and talking. But how many of these milestones are also related to intelligence levels? Here’s one that apparently is somewhat related:

Notice how many of the subjects are making good eye contact when they are born. The sample from which I drew had children whose parents thought they might be gifted and their scores ranged from about 110 to about 250 on the SBLM. Many parents of the gifted children recall the medical staff commenting on their newborn’s “aliveness” and eye contact as being unusual for an infant. The parents of most profoundly gifted children said that the intensity of the eye contact and staring in their infants was almost scary. One said, “If I believed in being “possessed” I’d swear my son was possessed when I’d put him down into his bed to sleep and he stared up at me like he understood everything that was going on. It was hauntingly weird!”

Waving bye-bye or its close cousin, making eye contact with strangers when your parents tell you to perform on cue — not so much. By about age two, most children become a bit more wary of people to whom they are not close.

There is only a slight correlation to IQ for starting to say words. Everyone in the sample said words before they turned two. Some children totally understand what’s going on but don’t start talking until they feel ready to do so.

Walking unassisted shows no big relationship to IQ. My own parental experience showed me that the first child in a family usually takes longer to walk simply because their parents hover and give them more assistance than later-born children. The biggest reason, though, isn’t the parents for the younger siblings: it’s the older siblings. It seems that the younger ones want to keep up with the older siblings in the family.

The next two are about toilet training.

There is a slight negative correlation with IQ. Toilet training for #2 (bowel movement) stood out as a topic that has concerned and embarrassed many parents. After every talk I gave using this group of scatterplots parents would come up to me and confess seeing this was comforting; it wasn’t just them.

It turns out that the higher the IQ, the more likely the child was to be a “stool holder,” someone who refused to go to the potty to poop. Perhaps they sensed their control over this issue and simply wouldn’t comply. Whatever the reason, feed such a child a lot of fresh fruit and leafy vegetables and roughage and at least they will poop overnight while sleeping. Also, since they are a very smart group, give them the info about what stool compaction is and how they risk hurting themselves if they continue to hold on too long. Play groups, cousins, friends, and schoolmates can start to comment, too. Yes, it might take that long. Sorry. Lots of fruits and veggies and water, water, water.

Notice there is one outlier who simply complied early on.

Information Gathering Behaviors

In both of these cases, there is a notable correlation between intelligence level and the behavior for these children. In fact, these two scatterplots support the explanation that some children are simply wired to pay attention earlier than others. I believe this contributes to gifted children absorbing more from their environments than less intelligent children without necessarily direct instruction. The children who express interest in having someone read to them, for example, is a different situation than a parent or caretaker sitting the child down and instructing them. Such children make their wishes known before they can talk. They develop ways of communicating that are nonverbal and effective. Some are receptive to learning sign language and using it sooner than they are capable of speaking.

It appears some children are simply wired to pay attention earlier than others. I believe this contributes to gifted children absorbing more from their environments than less intelligent children absorb without necessarily much—or maybe any—direct instruction.

In my books, I try to make it clear that there are children who already know how to read with good comprehension, and have a deep foundation of information, well before they start formal schooling of any kind. The typically acknowledged “7 or 8 repetitions to learn new material” applies to these children as well. But very little new material is provided to them in typical schools when they begin their official educational journeys. They’ve already absorbed the 7 or 8 repetitions before they start school.

This Means Something, Too

These next two show strong correlations between age in months and IQ.

Children who are read to and have access to adults who pay attention to them are more likely to demonstrate these early skills than similarly gifted children who are left alone a lot or who are seen by their caretakers as a nuisance. It doesn’t mean they aren’t absorbing and learning, though. They can catch up quickly if and when their environments improve. Also, caretakers who talk as much as their children do create gifted children with extensive vocabularies…not because they are coached but because they are absorbing it all. All the time.

These early signs show us a lot about eventual school needs.

The children who are already reading when they start school need a flexible learning environment and as much access to others who are “on the same page” as possible.

As an aside, many gifted youngsters from the Baby Boomer generation had parents who were told not to expose their children to too much reading for fear of confusing them when they started school. My children’s parents were raised that way and neither of us thought of ourselves as reading when we started to school. Gifted children learn to read from the context of the material, not phonics and “sounding out.” Reading “took off” for both of us when we stumbled over good things to read.

The earlier the “smarter?”

It’s harder to memorize colors for most people than it is to memorize numbers. The question I asked was not about recognizing numbers but about being able to count. Actual accurate counting is modestly correlated with intelligence. Color recognition is strongly related.

Recognizing and saying the letters of the alphabet is a higher skill than singing the alphabet song. But saying the alphabet in the correct order is a highly intellectual feat.

Unless you’re using Google that corrects everything, effective keyboarding requires both the ability to read and to spell. The connection between intelligence and keyboarding is among the strongest in these scatterplots.

Not everyone is interested.

Generally speaking, when given the option, people gravitate toward that which interests them. It usually means that they have some initial ability to do well at whatever it is, too.

Interest and skill at mazes and jigsaw type puzzles indicate a high spatial reasoning and sense of direction ability. It’s one of those things that you either have or you don’t. But, if you want to improve, you can learn rubrics to make you at least somewhat better at this sort of thing.

For this last scatterplot, the correlation is medium to strong between IQ level and age of interest and mastery. It’s pretty clear why the “nerd” label gets attached to gamers; you apparently need to be smart to play these games. I did find some gender differences but never broke it down along those lines for my scatterplots.

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Don’t Start Gifted Boys in School Too Early

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 22 Apr 2026 12:30:38 GMT

First, a reminder about reading my blog posts: The Gifted Through the Lifespan Substack is designed to acknowledge just that: giftedness shows up when we are born and until we die. Dementia and repressions (being female or a person of color, for example) and accidents of all sorts can make high intelligence not show up as much as it might have, and I am working to be more diligent about letting readers know from the beginning of each post, usually via the titles, which age range and time in people’s lives I am writing about. I will pay attention to including stories and information from all stages of gifted growth and development. The new website will also have tags to help you read only what you want to read.

Why Do I Caution Against starting School Too Early?

Is sitting still and doing exactly what the teacher tells you to do a prerequisite for a good life? Is there something wrong with some children (mostly visibly boys) or with the schools for expecting all children to sit still and be quiet for much of their school days?

Yes, gifted girls can get fidgety and try to pep things up in school. But today I want to focus on the young boys.

Back when I was evaluating giftedness and serving as a consultant for families, a client couple asked me to observe their nearly five-year-old son in his small private school K-1 classroom (that’s kindergarten through 1st grade). Their little boy was already tested and found to be exceptionally to profoundly gifted, so the small private school was willing to accept him into their program before he was five years old. But he hated school and wasn’t making the progress that anyone had envisioned. They told me that the teacher, a young woman in her first year of teaching, was interested in whatever recommendations I might make to “engage” this child in learning at school.

I went to his school to observe. First, I watched and noticed the eight little girls in the classroom vie for top spot by finishing all they were asked to do quickly and perfectly. The girls set to work immediately when the teacher told them what they were to do.

I watched the four little boys slide around in their seats — or fall off their seats completely — or get up and walk around, ask to go to the bathroom, rip holes in the paper with pencil and scissors, put their heads on their desks, and otherwise not even begin to do what they were asked to do. The boy I was asked to watch behaved in all the “wrong” ways just as his parents had been told, but absolutely the same way as the other boys in the class.

When schools tout their “developmentally appropriate” curriculums, do they talk about allowing active young boys to explore, handle objects, run around, and use their kinesthetic, visual and spatial abilities, the primary learning modes of males? We need to ask ourselves, what is “developmentally appropriate” — and in what ways — and for whom?

I am a high intelligence specialist, but when the parents of a bright boy come to me because they are considering early entrance to kindergarten (starting school before the usual age five), I almost always discourage it.

Instead, I point out that the home, preschool, and kindergarten environments are almost always more boy-friendly than grade school because they are more flexible and they allow more free choice for the children, much like a good Montessori school. It makes so much more sense to experience one more year at home or in preschool, go to kindergarten for another year of flexibility and playtime, and then skip 1st grade.

There are hardly any schools, though, that allow this sensible option for highly gifted children who are ahead already in their academic understandings and abilities.

If and when this were allowed, such children can still go through school somewhat faster, but they need to spend less time in the more structured grade school environment. One problem with this boy’s school placement is that it was more like a 1st grade than a kindergarten classroom, and he really didn’t need to be there yet.

What did I recommend? I told them he shouldn’t even be in school yet. A good daycare would fit his current needs better at this point. At the most, he should go half days or only two to three days a week at this age regardless of his intellectual abilities.

This post is a snippet from a podcast interview with Deborah Ruf (me) by Julia Krysztofiak-Szopa, for her podcast — Dzieci Zdolne — which is Polish for Gifted Children.

It’s 13 minutes and 7 seconds. I’ve seen a lot over the years and some readers will be relieved — sort of, maybe — to learn they aren’t imagining it when they wonder why their gifted, wonderful self or child struggled so much in school if they’re so smart. Schools simply aren’t usually set up for the ways boys are and what they need to thrive.

Julia lives with her family in Poland and it was such a delight to get to know her. Like me, she has lots of thoughts and ideas and she loves to talk! Me, too. While my own children have been out of the nest for more than twenty years, she still has children at home. Her questions to me are mostly related to those listeners who are still raising their gifted children.

Intrigued? Take a look and listen. I hope my answers here are useful to both readers and listeners.

I cover this point and many others from the full podcast in my little book here: Keys to Successfully Parenting the Gifted Child, 2023, by Deborah Ruf. Find on Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Keys-Successfully-Parenting-Gifted-Child/dp/B0C9GHSJ53

On this topic, I also recommend two to three books by Michael Gurian:

What Could He Be Thinking?: How a Man’s Mind Really Works: https://a.co/d/aTtxMwQ

The Wonder of Boys: What Parents, Mentors and Educators Can Do to Shape Boys into Exceptional Men: https://a.co/d/gv6jJ4J

The Wonder of Girls: Understanding the Hidden Nature of Our Daughters: https://a.co/d/6WaZ0re

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Neurodiversity? Huh? What’s That?

Deborah Ruf — Mon, 20 Apr 2026 01:16:39 GMT

One of my roles in life has been to be the one who asks the questions others wanted to ask but who were hesitant to ask themselves for fear of looking stupid. So they didn’t ask and sometimes pretended not to have a question even when the teacher or speech-giver asked, “Are there any questions?” People around me picked up on my willingness to take the chance I’d look foolish and would ask me to ask for all of us.

As an example, in a small seminar at the beginning of my doctoral studies in Educational Psychology at the University of Minnesota (1986), the word “zeitgeist” kept being bandied about by the professor and I had no idea what it meant. No one there at the school knew me at all yet. Their reactions to my asking the question did make me feel foolish, at first. The subtle smirks, and the knowing looks, kept me from even remembering if the professor answered my question. I don’t think he did. As more people got to know me and became aware of my propensity to ask embarrassing questions, more and more of them came to me during breaks and fed me the questions they wanted me to ask. My writing, too, is largely like that. Whenever I can, I write about and tell readers things that they didn’t even know they didn’t know. Or were afraid to ask.

Everybody has some combination of styles, views, and personalities. The combination of factors, different expectations, and the learning environment each gifted person has affects how they will turn out. Related to the topic of why we might see and react to the same things differently is a topic that comes up frequently, and that has something to do with neurodiversity.

What Do I Know About Neurodiversity?

More than a year before I published my 2023 book, The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (2023), https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-Children-Grown-Up/dp/B0C9SHFRLH, I started to share the draft with others in my field. Additionally, I especially wanted input from therapists and licensed psychologists about how the book was shaping up and if they had anything to add. A few people asked if I cover neurodiversity. At the time, I didn’t know what that was (is) because I was personally focused on how to help people understand giftedness and the range of needs gifted people (children and adults) have for finding a good environmental fit for themselves. But by the time I completed writing the book a year later, I knew I’d better learn what it — neurodiversity — is.

The chapters in Section III of the book begin to show and illustrate the different outcomes of the 65 gifted participants.

Because The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (2023) book is enormous, I’m updating and releasing three smaller volumes as part of a series: The 5 Levels of Gifted 20 Year Study Results (1 book series) Paperback Edition. Visit this link to learn more. Section III, Vol. 2 of 3, of the big book is nearly complete and will be released in late 2026.

Parenting style is related to outcomes, and so are other factors including viewpoints and personality type preferences. My viewpoints as this book’s author, for example, influence what I focus on in my writing and recommendations. My personality type preference, currently a Myers-Briggs E/INTP, indicates I am analytical, theoretical, and slightly emotionally detached from idealism (as a T-Thinker rather than an F-Feeler).

Neurodiversity and Twice-Exceptional Children

According to a post by Dona Matthews in Psychology Today, (2021), giftedness is a form of neurodiversity. Most often, however, the term is used as a descriptor for the condition of being twice-exceptional. Not too long ago, we called these learning disabilities, and they are described as impediments to learning in children who should be doing better in school. [See Endnotes for more explanation]. These learning difficulties themselves fall under a large umbrella in that the degree to which they are a problem varies, and parenting styles and views affect how the neurodiversity, the learning differences, etc., are identified and treated. It also sometimes affects teacher views and advice. It has come more and more into play among therapists, too.

My concern has been that many of the differences between “typical” children and children in the gifted population have often been pathologized and treated as problems with the child, not the environment the gifted child is in. ADHD is a big one. It drives me nuts to hear people say they understand themselves or their child now, what was wrong, and why they couldn’t focus or sit still. They have ADHD! Well, perhaps they do in certain parts of their lives. Perhaps they do because their brain is different, more active, craving the time and space to soak up and think about more things than most other people do. Do we want to tamp down that spark? But is it wrong? Does it somehow explain everything about the person and why they’ve struggled as being because they have a very active brain that needs to slow down or otherwise be “treated” or medicated? My view is that we’ve been treating more symptoms, e.g., not sitting still, not finishing one’s meaningless assignments, etc., than we have been reducing or limiting whatever it is that is negatively affecting the natural spark of the individual. Then I found this table and felt hope!

The left side of the table shows what too many gifted children and adults who have the wrong educational fit experience. The right side allows us to see that “different” or neurodiverse isn’t something to be cured. It is something to be understood, recognized, and treated by finding ways to set up the environments and expectations that the individual gifted learner or worker need to thrive.

You see, if a parent, teacher, or therapist sees noncompliance in school as an issue of needing to somehow change and manage the child, it can cause lifelong emotional damage and loss of self-esteem or confidence in the gifted person.

In the first edition of the Gifted Children Grown Up book, I don’t specifically cover the issue of “twice-exceptional” because I have always seen so-called disabilities or differences as simply different places on the continuum of how people are. Primarily, we need to provide the “best fit” environment and support children with the goal of becoming “good enough” in their areas of weakness and encourage them to soar in their domains of interest and passion. I’ve always believed the difficulties that keep some people from handling typical school well are also the features that allow them, in the right settings, to really focus on their own unique strengths.

I’ve only recently looked further into the growing field called “neurodiversity,” and it jibes well with what I already thought. This means that my overall recommendations throughout my books and other writing like this post apply to twice-exceptional children, too. And for any child who isn’t thriving in school. Consider that they may be gifted and simply cannot adequately thrive in the environment that has been created for them.

For additional background on the topics of parenting styles and neurodiversity, there are many resources available. It is recommended that anyone planning to rear, teach, or otherwise guide children should be able to learn everything they can ahead of time. And it still won’t be enough — don’t expect yourself to be perfect if you are currently parenting! — because all children are unique and you will still have to be flexible and play it by ear.

What About the Concept of Good Fit?

Have you ever heard someone say, “He has to learn that the world doesn’t revolve around him”? Or “If they don’t prove themselves by getting good grades, they’ll never amount to anything!” Or “She was such a good student and so smart, but what’s she doing now?” As it turns out, all of these viewpoints result in too many gifted children not turning out the ways their parents — and others — thought they should. But it’s not just the parents’ fault. Our schools continue to be set up for the natural cooperators. Some personality types and more girls-than-boys fit that description. In almost every instance of the “problem” child in the school setting, it is not the child but the expectations of those who are not like that child and don’t accurately understand that child. The overall environment in school and at home can exacerbate the issue of the gifted child getting the appropriate education.

Other Resources

The links for these resources are below. A good online resource for parenting is The Attached Family: Parenting for World Harmony. Another, Keys to Successfully Parenting the Gifted Child,” Another, Current Research on Parenting Styles, Dimensions, and Beliefs by Judith Smetana, (2017), can offer new insights and lead to other resources, as well. And a good starting place for the topic of neurodiversity is with these two recent articles: What is Neurodiversity? from the Harvard Medical School, and What Is Neurodiversity: And how can parents support kids who are neurodivergent? from the Child Mind Institute.

For background on the laws surrounding services to children in schools, I’ve provided a link in the endnotes.

Endnotes

[1] The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (2023).https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-Children-Grown-Up/dp/B0C9SHFRLH

[2] See Dona Matthews’ explanations about neurodiversity here: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/going-beyondintelligence/202107/neurodiversity-and-gifted-education#:~: text=Giftedness%20is%20a%20form%20of,are%20children’s%20resulting%20learning%20needs

[3] The term basically means a child is gifted with a learning disability; the child is exceptional in intelligence and has a learning problem. Both conditions need “treatment.”

[4] Different information and ideas on learning disabilities: https://ldaamerica.org/types-of-learning-disabilities/, https://ldaamerica.org/info/adults-with-learning-disabilities-an-overview/

[5] See http://theattachedfamily.com

[6] Ruf, D. (2023). Keys to Successfully Parenting Gifted Children. https://www.amazon.com/Keys-Successfully-Parenting-Gifted-Child/dp/B0C9GHSJ53

[7] See https://bit.ly/32BBv42 to read the entire Smetana article (scholarly paper). It’s in PDF format.

[8] For more information on neurodiversity see this link to the Harvard Medical School, and What Is Neurodiversity: And how can parents support kids who are neurodivergent? Institute. https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/what-is-neurodiversity-202111232645

[9] An additional piece that explains the relatively new field of neurodiversity is found here: https://childmind.org/article/what-is-neurodiversity/

[10] ASHA, American Speech-Language-Hearing Association explains much about the 1970s law IDEA, Individuals with Learning Disabilities Act, and how specific conditions or deficits are given mandated educational coverage is found here: https://www.asha.org/advocacy/idea/04-law-specific-ld/ At the time of the legislation, gifted proponents didn’t want to be included because being gifted isn’t a deficit or learning disability. Parents and others soon learned that if learning up to one’s inherent potential isn’t happening for their child, they might not be able to get flexible and adequate gifted education services, but they could get allowances or support for other learning deficits or issues.

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Does Early Genius Guarantee a Successful Life?

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 15 Apr 2026 11:45:56 GMT

That was the question I had that motivated me not only to study giftedness but to answer as many questions as possible about how their early giftedness affected their adult lives. I’d done a retrospective longitudinal study with highly gifted adults for my doctoral thesis. And I’ve completed an 18 year longitudinal study looking for outcomes of gifted youngsters with whose families I’d worked.

How did I become a nonfiction writer about giftedness?

My children surprised me with how advanced their milestones were compared to charts available when they were young. Long before I thought of creating my consultancy or my first book, I began to speak to parent and educator groups and visit scores of families as part of just doing what many parents tend to do with playgrounds, activities, etc., while also trying to see what others were doing with their own bright children. As other parents and I discussed motivation, problems, successes, personal interactions, and other areas of life, the dogging question that came to me would always revolve around discovering what intelligence really is and how it affects a person’s emotions, viewpoints, abilities, and social life. What’s true and what’s not true about the impact of high intelligence on any of these outcomes? I wrote articles, newsletter pieces, and handouts about what I was learning in all these areas.

My experiences with my own young children added to the richness of what I was learning. I finished my doctoral coursework and completed my dissertation: Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors that Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (Ruf, D., 1998). [If you want a free PDF copy, the link is at the end of this post]. The title brought me full circle personally and explained much about my journey in this field and what background I bring to writing books.

Not knowing for sure what I should be doing professionally at that point, I started a consultancy for gifted families. Five years into my consultancy, I decided to publish what I knew so far. I felt what I found during those years could help families navigate both their personal lives and the school systems’ complicated issues. Putting together my data, I wrote my first book and it was published in 2005. It was renamed 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options in 2009 and is still available on several book selling sites. That book presents information through the concept of the 5 Levels of Gifted — not just test scores — and is a study of 78 gifted children and their lives at home and in school.

Here’s what the first book looked like after it was renamed.

The second book, the longitudinal study, is this one:

How did I decide what was important to know?

As I continued to observe, read, speak, write, and work with at least 700 families over the next dozen years, I realized my earlier understanding of what gifted children need underestimated how complex the issue is. There are additional factors, apart from the schools and the school “fit,” e.g., how well the child fits in at school, that often have as great an impact on gifted children and how they turn out as adults as just “how they do in school.” I wanted to see how the 78 gifted children from the 5 Levels book study turned out. Their parents had provided the information for the first book, and for the second book, The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (2023). I interviewed more than 50 from the original group and had feedback and social media information from another 15. All of them are now adults. Many have families. The second book is about who they have become and how life has turned out for them so far.

I hadn’t planned to do a longitudinal study or to write about the gifted children from my 2005 book after they grew up.

However, I often received updates from parents of former subjects, and I became curious about how the children were doing now as adults. It wasn’t difficult to find and talk to most of them because I still had contact information for many of their parents. Almost all the parents were willing to approach their grown children about working with me again. Most surprising and enjoyable to discover was how many of the participants in the original study remembered being with me for their ability and achievement testing when they were younger. The follow-up book is about what I learned from the people who agreed to share the current state of their lives and views with me.

Why do so many equally intelligent people turn out so differently?

Much of the follow-up book — and my current writing goals — is about how people who are equally intelligent to each other — according to standardized intelligence tests — have a vast array of learning styles and preferences. These differences generally affect how well they do in school and what subjects and activities they choose to pursue during these years.

In the second book, The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us (2023), I laid out what factors appear most frequently in relation to grade-getting and “doing well in school.” I also lay out what factors appear to relate to poor school performance for some book study subjects. The study shows not only what parents and educational institutions already do, but what they should do also to meet both the learning and social-emotional needs of their gifted students.

What are these books about?

While the first 5 Levels book is primarily about gifted identification and what each Level of Gifted child needs to thrive in school — or alternative educational paths — the second book looks additionally at the social-emotional needs, relationships, career satisfaction, and overall mental and emotional well-being of the now grown study subjects. My purpose is to reveal what personal and background factors influenced and affected the gifted adults’ current self-esteem, self-concept, and overall well-being.

I don’t provide case studies for each person over their lifetimes

Because the subjects are real people, I’ve used pseudonyms for them. I use the same pseudonyms in both books. To honor their autonomy, I didn’t pull anyone’s story into a complete biography or individual case because it might expose people who don’t want to be exposed. The stories are spread out by topic.

The written and oral interviews from this group show there are many personal factors — their personality type and level or profile of intelligence, for example — at play. Furthermore, factors that are part of their environments impact outcome differences among them. Gifted people do not exist in a bubble, and the reactions of others around them as they grow up affect their developmental course in many different ways. Indeed, even though their degrees of giftedness are similar within each Level of Gifted, the study shows a wide range of outcomes among the study subjects and what’s going on in their adult lives so far.

Who is the audience for The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up?

· It is for concerned parents of gifted children who are struggling in school for unknown reasons or for reasons given by educators that seem unsatisfactory.
· It is for the parents and educators of gifted children who read the first book about the 5 Levels and want to know “what happened to those gifted children; how did they turn out?”
· The information is also for gifted specialists, psychologists, and therapists who work with the families of gifted children.
· It is for education program coordinators and designers.
· It is also for adults who know or suspect they are gifted themselves. My goal is that this latter group can find useful information about the confusing pieces from their own lives and outcomes now that they are adults.
· And, perhaps most important to me as I look back over my experiences in this field, this book is for policy-makers from local, state, and national levels. For without good policy and financial support, many gifted children and adults are slipping through the cracks.

For more information about Deborah Ruf, PhD, see www.fivelevelsofgifted.com

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Some Families of Profoundly Gifted Kids Worked With and Around the Schools

Deborah Ruf — Mon, 13 Apr 2026 01:30:43 GMT

Several Level Four and Five youngsters who lived in large metropolitan areas were able to attend the actual main campus universities for their post-secondary concurrent educations. Because they were still younger than most students, the environment provided good opportunities for interactions with others who were closer to their functioning ability levels. It was a very good option in many cases.

The two participants in an earlier post that introduced the Level Five group came from similar backgrounds and had on-and-off access to having their needs met. The examples from the additional five people illustrate other experiences.

Colin Richards was mostly homeschooled through the middle school years. His parents worked hard to provide outside-of-school experiences and interactions with other bright children, but Colin’s personality and extremely high intellectual abilities set him apart anyway. His family did not take advantage of concurrent enrollment or the radical acceleration math program available in the community, and after Colin tried to matriculate in a local magnet school for the arts and it did not meet his hopes and expectations, he withdrew socially and emotionally into his online coursework. The family moved to Britain and Colin matriculated at the high-level equivalent of high school in the United States and did exceptionally well. He graduated at age 18 and then left home and did not return except for occasional visits. By his late twenties he has not yet continued his formal education. The reasons are complex and presented elsewhere in The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us. https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-Children-Grown-Up/dp/B0C9SHFRLH). After some time away from his family, Colin returned home and was diagnosed with a severe mental health issue. He entered a mental health institution and received good care.

Rick Arnesen’s family, too, tried many different options to find what might work for their son. After an Unsatisfactory start in his Type II school (a public school where most students’ families are middle to upper middle class, Rick’s parents arranged to homeschool him part-time for first grade. He finished all curriculum and extra coursework through sixth or seventh grade before he turned seven, so his parents mistakenly thought his school would adjust for him when they moved to a Type III (college prep private school) school setting.

Instead, he experienced one more Unsatisfactory year followed by parent-paid tutoring with subject specialists for another year. Rick enjoyed acting and found an opportunity to act professionally. Free tutoring is often provided by law for children who are actors, athletes, or performers of any kind. This option was Excellent for most academic subjects, including five post-secondary options correspondence courses, and they were taught to him at an appropriately high level by a highly intelligent and capable professional, his studio teacher.

Rick’s favorite subjects, math and science, were beyond the training or scope of any of his tutors. He had been, by age eight, enrolled in a radically accelerated math program and had to leave it when he left home to act. When these children were growing up, there seemed to be no packaged options for a young Level Five student anywhere. By the time he was 13, Rick returned to his Level III school setting and found it Acceptable mostly for social reasons. He graduated just short of his 18th birthday.

The only time Victor Schultz’s school experiences were Unsatisfactory was when he started school. Only a few adjustments to the regular pacing and curriculum were provided. Fortunately for him, his parents’ advocacy worked to permit Victor to skip Grades 5 and 8, and he was also allowed subject acceleration in several subject strands. Still in a Type II setting, Victor signed up for simultaneous university coursework through post-secondary options at the main campus of the state’s university nearby, did radical acceleration in math while still younger than 10 years old, skipped 10th grade and graduated from high school at age 15. Without having to leave home, he attended that same university and graduated with a Bachelor of Science degree at age 18 and immediately began a PhD program at an elite, top-level university in another state.

Both Jon Crockett and Michael Cortez experienced a Satisfactory to Excellent educational fit from early on, a fit that continued throughout their educational years. In Jon’s case, it is straightforward. His parents used online and other resources to homeschool him until he was 8 years old and then lobbied to have him admitted to the main campus of his state’s university. He says it was academically Excellent for him at that time in his life and development but admits he is aware that he did not find the social fit that most people get to experience during undergraduate school. He was well-accepted and included by his older classmates when it was appropriate for them to do so. His mother went to school with him to supervise and keep him safe.

Michael Cortez went to school full or part-time, starting in a public Type IV school for the highly gifted. Even in that school for highly gifted children, he moved back and forth among different grade and subject levels within the school, eventually moving straight on to high school and concurrent university enrollment through state-paid post-secondary options. He was an active part of his public high school’s Math Team, for example, and yet he never took math there because he started a radical math acceleration at age eight through another university-connected program. He graduated from high school with two years of course credits from his state’s main campus university and entered an elite, top-level university in another state at age 15, graduating with a bachelor’s degree at age 18. He experienced a wide range of interactions with other students of different ages as part of academic competitions, coursework, online programs, etc. all through his educational journey.

Resources, Answers, Endnotes

Additional Resources

Davidson Gifted.org: https://www.davidsongifted.org/gifted-blog/gifted-education-in-the-u-s-state-policy-legislation/

National Association for Gifted Children: https://nagc.org/page/advocating-at-the-state-level

Ruf, D. (2023). The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us. https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-Children-Grown-Up/dp/B0C9SHFRLH

Post-secondary institutions are ranked in Chapter 4 of The 5 Levels of Gifted Grown Up and will also be discussed in some blog posts.

DECA is a high school club option that allows for non-college-prep experiences and courses. https://www.deca.org/high-school-programs/

Books and Writings by Deborah Ruf, PhD

Environmental, Familial, and Personal Factors That Affect the Self-Actualization of Highly Gifted Adults: Case Studies (D. Ruf, 1998) doctoral dissertation. Free PDF https://dabrowskicenter.org/ruf

Why Schools Miss the Mark for Profoundly Gifted Kids

Deborah Ruf — Wed, 08 Apr 2026 12:02:48 GMT

The Gifted Through the Lifespan Substack is designed to acknowledge just that: giftedness shows up when we are born and until we die. Dementia and repressions and accidents of all sorts can make high intelligence not show up as much as it might have, but I am working to be more diligent about letting subscribers and other readers know from the beginning of each post which age range and time in people’s lives I am writing about. I will pay attention to including stories and information from all stages of gifted growth and development.

____________________________________________________

The Level Five children and parents in my longitudinal study generally had considerable difficulty finding a good school fit. (Ruf, D. (2023). The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us. https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-Children-Grown-Up/dp/B0C9SHFRLH). Ever.

The school options families have available to them play a role in how good the eventual “fit” is for the Level Five student. Level Five children and adults are Profoundly gifted. They generally don’t have intellectual weaknesses and eventually have to choose how to use their abundant abilities. Yes, this young man might be profoundly gifted. Read on.

One might think that school personnel would notice the advanced abilities of these students and help to adjust the material and pacing for them. As readers will see, that is rarely the case when people leave such children in regular schools. Schools simply aren’t set up for it. And, due to many long-standing political machinations in most parts of the world, there are likely more unrecognized highly to profoundly gifted people who simply didn’t stand a chance.

Where does my information come from?

A lifelong tendency to need answers to everything that interested me. And I watched people. By the early 2000s I sat down and created the 5 Levels of Giftedness. I had my clients complete intake forms called Developmental Milestones. These results come from that group. And many from that group became the first book’s subjects, participants, 5 Levels of Gifted: School Issues and Educational Options (2009). Here are links to the 5 Levels of Gifted book on Barnes & Noble: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/5-levels-of-gifted-deborah-ruf/1126358834 and Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Levels-Gifted-School-Educational-Options/dp/0910707987 or directly from the publisher: https://www.giftedunlimitedllc.com/store/p12/5_Levels_of_Gifted.html

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Level Five Gifted Score Range and Early Milestones:

• Primarily 99.9th percentiles on standardized tests, if such differentiation is reported

• Profoundly gifted range or Highly Advanced on IQ tests

• Full scale and domain scores at 145+ (slightly lower if tested after mid-teenage years)

• High intellectual profile across all ability domains, great inner drive to learn across domains (although not necessarily demonstrated in the regular classroom)

• Nationally at least 1:250,000, a higher proportion in metropolitan areas and high socioeconomic background schools

• Majority have kindergarten skills by about 2½ years or sooner

• Question concept of Santa or Tooth Fairy (or some similar concept) by age 2 to 3

• Majority spontaneously read, understand fairly complex math, have existential concerns by age 4–5 with or without any instruction

• Majority have high school level grade equivalencies by age 7 or 8 years old, mostly through their own reading and question-asking

• It is rare that you would have such a child in your school or classroom after the first one or two years of kindergarten and perhaps grade 1. However, some do stay in the school, including some subjects in this book study. They can, after all, show up anywhere.

Table of K-12 “fit” for the Level Five Subjects

The seven Level Five people in this study experienced a profound range of educational environments during their childhood and adolescent years. Level Five children, and many Level Four children, as well, will not, cannot, expect a smooth, predictable path through any school system as school systems are designed. School systems are designed for the majority of the population and when being too different intellectually is one of those areas there are few good or easy solutions.

Children at Level Five are evenly intelligent; that is, they have no significant weak intellectual areas or domains and they are capable of easily completing all normal schooling through the 6th grade level (and often beyond) before the end of what would be their first-grade year. I spoke or corresponded with all seven of these men between 2015 and 2019, sometimes more than once, and to some as recently as 2021. The “fit” ratings are based upon a subjective assessment of what they told me about these years. Where I placed them in the Levels is certainly qualitative as well, but it is starting point to help readers understand how different the youngsters are and their outcomes are. And why, perhaps.

Every one of these subjects had parents who devoted considerable time and resources to doing whatever they could to make childhood work for their sons. There was originally one girl in the Level 5 group, but she could not be located for the follow-up. At least 8 Level Four subjects had the intellect to be in Level Five — four female and four male — but the original milestones weren’t as prominently described by the parents as those who were initially included. Neither test scores or early milestones are completely accurate. And there are not any real lines between Levels, either.

Readers should keep in mind that these Level Five children presented huge educational needs exceedingly early in their lives, as early as two or three years old! But existing schools did not — indeed, could not — provide solutions for those needs.

Not one of these people had a typical path through school. Every single one of these seven youngsters was brought to me by their parents for intellectual evaluation no later than age six. Despite the reality that the costs of such evaluations, especially early ones, usually fall completely to the family, all these families found a way to pay or otherwise make it happen. A couple families received their first round of evaluations (IQ testing) at no cost from their public schools, but that is not typical. Parents knew something was different and exceptional about their children and they actively sought guidance. So, rather than discuss each level of schooling, it makes sense to review their entire, and somewhat less traditional, educational journeys through age 18.

This information can be found in The 5 Levels of Gifted Children Grown Up: What They Tell Us, Section II: The School Years. My new series from the aforementioned book starts with Losing Our Minds: Too Many Gifted Children Left Behind (Oct. 2024). https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0DL3BSC9X, https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/losing-our-minds-deborah-ruf/1146410968?ean=2940185888872

The first book in the Trilogy is meant especially for educators, parents, adult gifted, and therapists. Questions for discussion are at the end of every chapter. It is Volume 1 of 3 and Part of series‎ The 5 Levels of Gifted 20 Year Study Results. I was unable to promote it at the time because I had a slew of medical issues and moved into a 55+ apartment community.

Two of the seven, Jacob Jones and Ross Oliver, had rocky educational starts that never significantly improved. In Jacob’s case, his family lived in a rural area where they had access only to a Type I public school. They sought professional guidance and worked with the school to allow Jacob to subject- and grade-accelerate. For Level Five students, there is no smooth path through twelve grades because nothing “fits” for more than about six months. For example, a pupil like Jacob could take science with eighth-graders — typically 13 years old — when only 8 himself, and he would still find himself at the head of his class in knowledge, understanding, and subject mastery. The pacing and the depth of the material for typical eighth-graders were too slow and shallow for Jacob. At the same time, he could not reach the laboratory equipment on the tall tables and posed an ego threat to some of his classmates. He never “fit” academically or socially in his school setting. Jacob graduated from his Type I high school and went to a four-year college — ranked as “very selective”— by age 15. Jacob’s education environment was Unsatisfactory for his Level of Giftedness and his associated needs until it transitioned to Acceptable in his college years.

Part of how Jacob emotionally survived his radical acceleration in his small, very rural school is that he had an unofficial mentor, the school’s media coordinator (librarian). Jacob explained it this way:

He was the one who made sure I was okay as an 11-year-old in high school, and we would have long talks about whatever. I had a few classes and self-guided learning and lots of unstructured time, and he always had time and interest for me when I’d show up.

Ross Oliver, too, lived with his family in a rural community where only a Type I public school was available. His parents took him out of school on and off and homeschooled him, tried the school again, and finally moved to a larger community that offered more options. He was again in and out of school with parent homeschooling and online learning until, by skipping eighth grade, he could take advantage of the free post-secondary educational options. Ross’s family lived in a mid-sized, somewhat remote community, and unless they relocated to a major city, what was available to them was at a nearby university “satellite” school. For young very gifted students like Ross, however, it is often not sufficiently challenging. While perhaps — and not necessarily — better than what their local high school can offer, it is often not a particularly good option.

Even with the post-secondary options, the road continued to be bumpy for Ross. Educators are rarely educated in the individual differences of students’ abilities to learn. When interviewed, Ross described an incident that occurred after his 7th-grade year:

Mom brought me to high school, and they decided to advance me to 11th grade. I needed to make the decision right then in the counselor’s office. I had to go into all AP classes to show that I could do it — it was one of the caveats. I took the opportunity. Spoiler alert: I still graduated high school in 4 years. I did pretty well, and that’s when some really shitty study habits took root. I didn’t want my family to think I had to study because I thought they’d think I really shouldn’t be in those classes. A poser, faking it. I wasn’t doing it to impress people at school, but my family … my parents were upset with my “no study or finish homework” skills. I didn’t let my parents know it at all when I started to struggle, and I didn’t know how actually to study. I passed the AP courses and was supposed to go to 12th grade. I did, but since I’d already passed all required courses, I took courses like pottery, drafting, marketing (big one for me, got into it in senior year), then DECA, which I loved.

Again, because Ross is a Level Five intellect, his school and his family were not ever quite sure what to do to support him. Here is another incident that shaped — and hurt — his self- image:

I’ve consciously or not blocked out a lot of memory from middle school. I did lots of homeschool before leaving [smaller town], so it was my first time back to real school in middle school. I’d liked homeschool better than actual school. I never had friends at school. It was an odd educational set-up, and with input from the Davidson Institute [Davidson Gifted.org: https://www.davidsongifted.org/gifted-blog/gifted-education-in-the-u-s-state-policy-legislation/],

I took three courses at the local University, in person, and then basic courses at middle school. Two of the professors were great. They really accepted me and helped me make some friends. The third, a chemistry professor, about a few months into the course, set me up with the registrar to withdraw me from the course. I didn’t see it coming. I still don’t know why he did this. It left me shattered. I still haven’t put the pieces back together totally. Whereas before I enjoyed learning and I may not have given a lot of thought to it, but that’s what kids do, I enjoyed what I was doing with the college, and then that! I remember getting home in tears. So, what ended up happening is I ended up dropping both my botany and my chemistry classes just because I didn’t have the courage, the will, the confidence in myself to continue to go on with that. And I would have dropped the third course, too, and my folks wanted me to continue with at least Japanese, and I got a “D” in that. It wasn’t pretty. Then my folks met with the school district, at the start of spring, and I was then brought back into the middle school environment. And I made some friends and I had good times.

Nonetheless, Ross graduated from high school at age 16 with half of college finished and paid for by the state. He then continued in the same satellite institution and completed his degree. His entire educational experience was completely Unsatisfactory for his academic, social, and emotional development and happiness.