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Tutoring A Child Prodigy?
FortKnox asks: "I have recently taken the opportunity to tutor a 9-year-old child prodigy. He almost has his electronics associates degree. He wants to get into programming (already asked me about Assembly and Java), and wants to design an OS (the next Linus Torvalds?). I'd like my teaching to steer towards cutting edge technology. My question is: what would be the appropriate things to teach him, and do you know of any books/teaching materials that would help? I'd like to eventually get into nanotechnology, but are there other fields that are starting to become edge-breaking that would be beneficial to learn?"
Teach him how to go outside and play and how to play with toys and video games and have a fun childhood.
Ask the real prodigy.
Now, with that, install any OS that comes with sources, and introduce him to the fine art of hardware programming. The world doesn't need many more programmers... we do need some good device programmers that will have 8 or so years of programming before they expect to be paid a bundle...
I demand a million helicopters and a DOLLAR!
Sit him in front of Star Trek for a couple hours and if he's really smart maybe he'll invent warp drive or teleporters.
Do i really need a sig?
Take him to a basketball game. Take him to the beach. Teach him to throw a football. Take him to some same-age playgroups. Rough-house with him.
I know that you're a tutor, not a big-brother, but I'm using this to make a slightly different point.
The kid is already far, far ahead in mental ability. How much faster does he need to be pushed? By all means, he should study what he's interested in, and move forward at his own pace.
But I've seen too many prodigys with adults around them who want to push them as far as possible, while neglecting other important attributes, like socialization, athletics, and other "non-mental" pursuits.
It's the opposite problem from the jock who's so great at athletics that everyone lets him slide on academics. Then he ends his athletic career, broke, stupid and becomes a bartender.
When kids have a gift (whether academic or athletic), it should be developed, no question. But other parts of life should not be neglected. Gifted kids have lots of time. At the end of their life, they're not going to regret failing to graduate from college at 18 rather than 17. Hopefully, they won't regret a lifetime of loneliness because of broken social skills.
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Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
The kid is nine years old and is a prodigy. He is able to learn what he want, but what is often the problem with these kids, is that when they reach their teens, they feel left out. Please, don't swamp him with technical stuff, he will have his whole life to read boring books on technology. But he will have only a couple of years to learn the basics that will help him get through life. The skills nescessary for social interaction.
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in my experience, at that age, while there are children who truly are extremely gifted in such ares, they don't really understand what goes along with 'designing an OS' or 'learning assembly.' chances are, that those are the most advanced software challenges that he/she could imagine. gifted children have no trouble learning things. in fact, they enjoy it to quite some degree, and in most cases, the greater the challenge, the more rewarding it is for them. however, i have to question whether jumping right into such advanced programming would be helpful. if it we me, i'd give the child a BASIC interpreter and a manual. chances are they'll have that figured out in a week. if you start simple, like with BASIC, and work your way up, the child will wire itself to think like a programmer. that's a good thing.
however, what's even more important than any of this, is getting the child into proper social interaction. entirely too many gifted children become social idiots because they were seperated from the 'normal kids' or were told from an early age that they were better than everybody else. i would also advise keeping said kids among kids of his/her own age, but it sounds like that isn't going to be a possibility.
the summary would probably be learn as much as possible, but keep it fun, and never expect the child to do more than a child should.
"I hope I don't make a mistake and manage to remain a virgin." - Britney Spears
The surest way to corrupt a youth is to instruct him to hold in higher esteem those who think alike than those who think differently. -- Nietzsche Seriously though, I think it's wrong to take children and make them be adults too soon. Let him be a child first. He's got enough time later on to be an adult, and he can learn how to be a programmer then.
However, "The Linux Kernel" is a very informative book and it is a good start to learning about operating systems.
I've found that with some of my cousins, that if I start out with stories about Linus Torvalds, or the kid who got arrested for DeCSS, then they become more interested in the source code and being able to play with it.
Keeping
Just let him wander through whatever he wants.
The big challenges will be social things, try scouts and things, interacting with your peers is realy important.
Despite the great intelligence few geniuses ever make it on their own, and they may not seek it out on their own. Face it at 9 you have a very naive world view.
If you want to help them the most, make them explore the other things they make overlook.
Open him up to all the available sources. I didn't have anyone to point me toward all the things that are out there when I was about twelve and I think that stifled my computer experience and knowledge by at least six years. If I had known I could learn to program something other than BASIC and actually install my own Unix server when I was a kid, I would be far beyond where I am now. Instead, I didn't find this stuff out until I hooked up with the right friends after highschoool.
Show him the people, groups, books, online guides and other resources are and offer to assist with anything that piques his curiosity. Help provide the hardware resources that he needs to tool around with things that he is intrigued by. He'll find his own path -- you need to be the machete he whacks the clutter away with -- not his compass. His natural intellect and insatiable desire for knowledge will be his compass.
Pushing a kid in math or technology is just as disasterous as pushing a kid in football or wrestling. They need a foundation and companion -- not a booster rocket strapped to their ass, shoving them toward things.
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seumas.com
He's smart, he's not superhuman. Just because he's very intelligent doesn't mean he's a god or something, it just means he's able to learn more quickly and remember better (I presume at least, from what you've said). I do have to agree with the one person, though. Be careful that he still has a childhood before he grows up and programs... and try to get him into something besides computing, so that he is not the one-track child prodigy who, once they've done everything there is to do in their field, he doesn't burn out like so many others have. As far as programming, I agree with the others, but let him choose what he wants to do. If he can pick things up really quickly, it might not be long before he knows more than you do. Don't worry about it, just guide him as best you can and let him osmose stuff, because it sounds like he can just about do that ;) Dunno about just slinging code at him, though... maybe if you sat and showed him what it all meant, but just giving it to him is like trying to teach him Ancient Greek by handing him the Illiad.
My own personal bigotry as far as future techs goes would be to try to get to to work in the mind-to-computer direct link, but that's just my own opinions. You're the tutor, not me.
Good luck, either way.
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If I had it to do all over again, I would have started with a relatively simple language with OO features such as Python or Java, studied OO patterns, data structures and algorithms, and then sharpen the focus and dig into C and assembler later.
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I believe you should forward your concerns to British Telecom. They have recently shown great interest in handling a prodigy.
"The good die first." "Most of us are morally ambiguous, which explains our random dying patterns." --- MST3K
The reasons is simple - socialization. Being a successful adult is as much a function of charisma as a function of intelligence.
Added to which, such children are typically treated as freakshow material by their peers, which will ultimately limit their endeavors.
My best advice is maybe bump the kid up a grade or two, keep him stimulated on the side, but don't let him be removed from his normal peer group, and don't let him avoid "mundane" tasks like physical labor.
Teach him about the ISO/OSI model of network layers. An understanding of abstraction layers can be applied to many things inside and outside the realm of computers and networking, including operating systems, markets, anthropology and (perhaps most importantly) lasagna.
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I'd like my teaching to steer towards cutting edge technology.
Don't.Anything 'cutting edge' you try to teach a nine year old will be useless by the time he starts shaving :-) (I'm assuming male).
I'm a final year student, at a very good, academic, university. In the first semester of our course we were taught SML (a functional programming language, a style quite unlike procedural languages such as C) and MIPS assembly. Throughout the course we have touched on lisp, c, java, sql, perl, uml, and many more on options that I didn't take. All the time we have been given a good foundation in hardware, networking protocols, algorithms, patterns, and software engineering.
Give the kid a strong academic education. Teach fun stuff, sure, but make sure you teach dull stuff like orders of complexity of algorithms. Give him as broad education as you can - introduce him to as many areas as possible, and if he is a hacker, he will sit up all night studying the key areas that interest him anyway. That's just my $0.02.
cheers,
G
Second, while he may be prodigal in a sense of what he can learn, despite occaisonal appearances to the contrary, he is still very much a child psychologically. You need to read some very good books on child development and psychology to try to determine what stages he is currently going through. Understanding his current emotional stages will help you a lot in dealing with him properly. Perhaps even an exploratory visit to a child psychologist would help even more to iron these things out, since they're especially hard to determine in children like these.
Third, here's my personal insight. I was a "child prodigy" type that never got pushed much at all. When I was 8-9 years old, I was already making post high school scores on standardized tests. Nobody pushed me into any advanced fields. My parents did a little in the form of tutoring me up to a few grade levels ahead of myself over the summers between school semesters. I also got my first basic interpreter around that time, and then quickly moved (on my own, no pushing) into assembly and later to C.
I feel that my life turned out very well, and that I have nurtured my own curiousity without any extra push. I can also see now in hindsight (not much, I'm still only 24, but whatever) that as much as I believed that I understood things at various ages, there are some things that no amount of raw intelligence can teach you. There are some things that must be learned over time. And these are not sappy things like true love, these are concepts important to creative processes and learning.
I would also note that of great benefit to me was a lot of overseas travel and living as a child. I believe now more than ever that immersing a any child in as wide an array of situations and experiences as you can helps to maximize them in a very natural and gentle way.
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'd like to eventually get into nanotechnology, but are there other fields that are starting to become edge-breaking that would be beneficial to learn?"
really though-don't try to live your life through this kid. if he wants to know about nanotechnology then thats what you should teach him. dont try to teach him what you would want to know.
he expressed an interest in java? then teach him java. if he just wants a good primer on computer programming i would look into the art of computer programming by donald knuth. this book is language neutral. it teaches how to be a good programmer. this can then be applied to any language.
use LaTeX? want an online reference manager that
-- john
Probably, the child prodigy (anyone, actually) should be able to
"It is a greater offense to steal men's labor, than their clothes"
Introduce him to Donald Knuth and Danny Hillis. Ask him to look at obvious objects and think of ways to employ them differently.
Ask him about what kinds of problems exist and how we solve them short term. How should we approach them for long term solutions?
In this way, you're exposing him to great thinkers that have contributed to our technological landscape, while asking him to think and potentially become one of these people.
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I grew up like the child you describe in that I was extremely gifted (probably not to the extent this child is) and have worked with gifted and talented children as well. With that in mind, I can relate a few things I enjoyed and how they might help you.
1. Begin with projects not just book learning. Make things into games and challenges not just straight out of the book. This is a child emotionally and they like to learn when it's fun. If you're studying something, put it in the form of game, challenge, or neat project.
2. Remember that this is a 9 year old no matter how intelligent he or she is. Unless the child has an incredibly high emotional age your still dealing with someone who is undergoing the rigors of pre-adolescence and is subject to things such as loss of attention, boredom, hyperactivity, among other things. Just do not forget child's age and be patient.
3. Take the advice of some of the early posters and make sure the child is adjusting and can interact with the rest of the children. Even though this may not be your job, it will help the child develop.
4. Have one-on-one and group time.
This is where I differ from the rest of the posters here. I went down both paths in two different schools. One, I was in class with rest of the children and the other I was brought together with other children at my own intellectual capacity. I can tell you flat out, I learned more and had more fun when I was with others that could think on my level but were still my age. So if he or she does have friends and they are gifted as well, try to get them all together and do things with one another intellectually stimulating. You don't need to dump massive amounts of knowledge just give them the right tools to problem solve. The kids will have a better time and learn more when they are all working together. Think about it, weren't projects more fun with a great group!
5. Care. Do not take on this challenge unless your 100% committed to the child. Dealing with a child who is gifted requires at least as much effort as one who has a disability. Where a child with a disability will challenge you emotionally and physically, the gifted child will challenge you intellectually and emotionally. Do not get frustrated with them if they do not perform to their intellectual capacity. Keep positive and urging then to explore the world around them. The child will progress at their own pace they feel comfortable and you are but a guide.
I am very happy you have chosen to work with a gifted and talented child and I wish you all the best. However, don't feel as though you have to cram every major new breakthrough into their brain, just show them the wonders that are out there and they will take care of the rest.
The ability to learn for himself. Find him a problem to solve, that you know he cannot solve with his current knowledge. Make sure he has enough books and other material to learn how to solve it. Make it interesting (building a robot or something :). And FFS make sure he doesn't burn out - teach him how to take time off.
First of all, I recommend you take the advice of the "throw a football" contingent with the proper seasoning. Yes, you don't want to raise this kid to be an outcast. But you also don't want to cheat him of the best developmental period he'll ever have. Being a preadolescent genius isn't just an opportunity to learn some stuff a few years before everyone else -- it's an opportunity to get that matertial into a brain that's still plastic and growing. People who learn math at that age have an opportunity to think in ways that come very hard to anyone older.
I would say absolutely push this kid to learn challenging material (I'll get to the content in a moment). Also do the big brother stuff, or find someone who can. I'm not sure about pushing peer-group interactions, because it would be hard to find a peer group. Dumping him with other kids his own age might just enforce the perspective that most people are dumb and not worth his time. Teaching him to look for information and answers from other people, online, might be a start. It would be nice to find others on his emotional and intellectual levels, but I can't tell you where to look.
As for material to study, I would stay away from the "bleeding edge." You never know what will collapse, or what will be radically reconceptualized. Anyway, the best programmers (just for example) aren't the ones who have been writing C since they were five; they're the ones who have a deep understanding of the mathematics that underly all programming and automatic systems. These are the people who will always be valuable, who can understand any new development. They'll still be advancing our understanding after the market-glutters who learned perl and java for two years in college are used up and discarded.
Rather than specific fields, then, look at the commonalities among the big trends in science and/or computers, and see what their basis is. Don't study nanotech, study physics. Don't study cloning; study cell biology. Aim for knowledge that won't become obsolete, and will create a firm foundation for whatever comes.
Apropos of the pop neurology above, I'd recommend the more arcane / symbolic fields like math and logic. It's a rare opportunity to be able to build those things into the brain on a low level, and should not be discarded. This is probably also a good time to teach music, even though the idea is somewhat tainted by prodigies who had their lives ruined by overbearing tutors.
I think my advice is good. But to put it to proper use, you'll need compassion and sensitivity. The most important thing is to foster a love of learning, not to crush it. So make sure that at every step, your charge is studying something he loves; make sure he knows why it's valuable and just how cool it is.
- Michael
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Go ahead, blame me... I voted for Nader!
However, if the prodigy doesn't grasp the social skills naturally, you can teach the technical side of social interaction, which is non-verbal communication.
Some information communicated non-verbally is obvious. Others are subtle and can be very valuable to someone with deficient social skills.
The one problem with the prodigy is that they must be constantly stimulated and be put on a real path with an achievable career. The "constantly stimulated" is important. Take a prodigy and send them to college for four years or so. They'll lose their edge and probably claim they were smarter before they went. Keep the process of discovery going. Stagnation kills the prodigy mind.
The reasons is simple - socialization. Being a successful adult is as much a function of charisma as a function of intelligence.
If your definition of a "successful adult" means "used car salesman/politician", then maybe. However, I've met a number of extremely successful scientists and none of them gave a damn about being charasmatic.
Get him creative toys. e.g., a computer instead of a Playstation. It'll do games *and* let him learn. Make sure there's a compiler(s) on that machine too. Or if he's younger, get him a large Lego set, and not the legos designed to make one thing (such as the phantom flyer). Get him the generic plain bricks of various shapes and sizes. Let him be a kid, but leave opportunities for him to *do* more if he *can* do more. Get him a telescpoe, or a chemistry set, or a microscope. And don't forget books real ones, made from dead trees. Kids will plow through an encyclopedia set on their own because the articles are all relatively short, not overly technical, encourage looking up other stuff, and result in your kid absorbing a waide and varied knowledge base. It did for me.
Don't forcibly bust him down into being "like everybody else". That's as stifling as forced tutoring.
I think it is as bad to force the child to "play with kiddie toys" as it is to force the child to learn academically beyound his desires. I got an impression that this particular child WANTED to learn advanced computer stuff. NOT to support such desires may amount to neglect, IMNSHO. That's how much of kids' creativity is being destroyed. Go to this page for much of your "gifted" needs (I am not affiliated with them): http://www.hoagiesgifted.org/
I was one of those child prodigies. I was already a solid programmer by the time I was that kid's age. One thing I wish I had learned before the double-digit years is psychology. I could make a computer do whatever I wanted, but people were a baffle for a number of years until I caught up on that front. Had I studied psychology on the side when I was that age, I think it might have gone differently.
Beyond that recommendation, follow two simple rules. Present him with ready access to core information that he wants and needs, such as programming information, mathematics, physics, chemistry, etc. And then just let his inherent curiosity drive him. If you feed curiosity, you will strengthen it, and THAT will make him great someday more than learning a particular aspect of technology.
As someone who works with gifted children on a regular basis (tutor, and residential counselor during the summer) and as someone who has studied gifted/talented education, I want to give some reccomendations:
1) Remember that while the child might be intelligent in some areas, this does not always mean that he is gifted in all areas. He might be capable of understanding quantum mechanics, but his understanding of biology might stop at "We are all made of cells." Literature and the arts are often left out of a true prodigy's education.
2) School is not so much to teach you *things*, but rather to teach you how to *learn*. As others have said, teach him how to research, and how to answer problems and questions on his own. Assign projects on things he knows nothing about that will be difficult to find (some obscure historical event, for example).
3) Social skills are important. Teach him how to be "friends" with somebody. Teach him how to have fun, and how to joke around. Make sure that he sees education as something fun (more difficult than it sounds)
4) Teach him how to relax. From the sounds of it, this kid is under quite a bit of pressure from somewhere (possibly from himself, but I would guess itis external). Teach him how to take a break from that, even if it is just for an hour.
5) Teach him how to motivate himself. One day that pressure is not going ot be there and he is going to have to know what to do without it.
6) Teach him why he should be learning these things. Show the results of string theory, of relativity, of in everyday life.
7) Teach him that he has limitations. Everyone does, his are just higher than others.
The last thing I can say is to be there for him. I have helped more gifted/talented children by doing that than anything else. I have received phone calls at 3 in the morning from children I have known that just need reassurance that what they are going through is normal, that someone else has gone through the same thing.
Note: I used the male gender in my examples, but know of more than enough gifted/talented females.
The other thing I would say is to do some research yourself. Do not push him into a field, let him decide for himself. And remember that the child will soon pass your own abilities in the field. Check out some books on gifted/talented methods and psychology. There are many out there.
Good luck!
- (c) 2018 Hank Zimmerman
The reasons is simple - socialization. Being a successful adult is as much a function of charisma as a function of intelligence
good point, basically. Still in my opinion intelligence is one part of being a charismatic person. But we could discuss something like that for hours
I agree with you, if the kid never develops sufficent "emotional" and "social" intelligence he will have it even harder a life than he is already going to have. As you have mentioned it is quite hard to fit into you peer group when you basically just don't fit in. It's basically a question of inerests, the kid will certainly be interested in a lot of things which others of his age won't even have heard about.
So as this post post mentions don't just concentrate on academical things, take him out, show him the world.
Teach him a instrument whatever, but don't just let him become focused on just one aspect of education.
After all he is just a young boy, just because he now is interested in computers that doesn't mean it's the only thing he is going to be interested in and if you don't show other interesting things he will never know what he has missed.
"Mommy, mommy! The garbage man is here!" "Well, tell him we don't want any!" -- Groucho Marx
I agree. Avoid 'cutting edge' and go for timeless, enduring lessons instead. Most 'cutting edge' technologies end up on the cutting room floor of history.
I would recommend a grounding in Algorithms, writing some 2D graphics to illustrate and visualize the problems and solutions.
Functional programming, which has heavily influenced much of programming language design and has been around for 40 years would be good. Toward this end, I recommend the TeachScheme! materials, which are tutorial, freely available and also emphasize timeless Computer Science lessons.
Once some proficiency has been gained in programming, go for 3D POV and other graphics which can help with learning mathematics.
Of course, technologies that are hear-to-stay, like Linux, C/C++ and Java should also be included at some point.
For socialization in an environment where this person can both excel and gain access to a peer group, you could do a lot worse than competitive scholatic chess. There's almost certainly something going on in your area, but you'll do a LOT better in a major metropolitan area with finding peers. You should be able to get some pointers on this here.
If electronics is the direction, then encourage complete programmable embedded projects. Avoid dabbling, go for palpable result oriented projects that have an end. Achievements that you can both be proud of rather than a lot of dead-ends. You might want to look into the FORTH programming language for flexible programming of small embedded systems.
These would be my choices, but of course, I don't know the 9-year old. You do. However, I do want to get back to the avoiding 'cutting edge' technologies. Would you be going cutting edge for this persons development, or for your ego?
If this person is interested in a particular technology, then by all means, investigate it. You would also do well to encourage Science Fiction and readings on Relativity and Cosmology to fire the imagination.
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This person's got it right.
I recently met a girl who's so amazingly well rounded I'm in awe. She talks about philosophy, history, math, music, and pretty much everything else with an understanding of how it all fits together. She's got knowledge and passion... and spending time with her gives me that rare feeling of humility.
If he resists non-technical things, introduce him to DaVinci.
As another poster has mentioned, intelligence is about making connections between and among things. Help him have an amazing variety of connected and disparate things with which to develop those connections.
-Nev
No.
Your IQ is your mental age divided by your actual age. If you got a 191 as a child and kept learning things, you could get a 191 as an adult. If, however, you burn out and stop learning things, your IQ goes down, as it should.
Children don't naturally get higher scores on an IQ test - the average child's IQ would be 100 just like the average adult's. The difference is that average children don't take IQ tests, so you don't see those scores.
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Obfuscated e-mail addresses won't stop sadistic 12-year-old ACs.
Win dain a lotica, en vai tu ri silota
Yes! Great idea! Make sure that you stifle him by making him do the one thing that smart children generally hate!
Imagine this the other way around. Consider the people who are "born athletes" - how would they have ended up if instead of practicing sports, they had been forced to solve differential equations?
Fitting the child into a mold is NOT the answer! If he _wants_ to play sports, of course, let him, but don't assume that throwing a football at him will make him "better" in the long run.
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Obfuscated e-mail addresses won't stop sadistic 12-year-old ACs.
Win dain a lotica, en vai tu ri silota
Sorry, but I can't let this one slide.
It's "usually" the smart kid's fault when he (or she) gets picked on? It was my fault that my high school French teacher couldn't control the class well enough to keep people from blatantly copying my tests, and the kids gave me trouble because I told them not to? It's my FAULT that I think academic dishonesty is inappropriate?! I think this is a good thing.
It's not a question of being a "ball hog" or having all the right answers. If someone asks me how I did on a test, am I supposed to lie for the sake of other people's self-esteem? Is that truly the message you want to be sending here?
Girls, in particular, have enough problems with being conditioned into believing that being intelligent is a negative thing. Bullshit comments like "smart kids who get picked on have only themselves to blame" make it worse.
Shall we then say that students of a different race deserve to be made fun of, that women who dare to walk alone at night or wear something more revealing than a nun's habit deserve to be treated as sex objects if not acutally threatened with rape, or that someone who has a physical or mental disability deserves to be harassed for it? And that objecting to this is "spoiling someone's fun"? Is this REALLY the message you want to send?
Think about it.
"Somebody exploded a letter-bomb today
The "P" word, of course, is potential.
.44 before he can ever reach his potential.
To a child prodigy, this becomes a more vulgar and profane word than damn, fuck, or Microsoft could ever be.
I was a child "prodigy," though probably not to the level of this child. However, I started to rebel because I started to be told how much potential I had.
The subtle meaning kids pick up on is: I would love you more if...
Affection becomes conditional, at least in the eyes of the child.
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Now, as for what to teach him, I saw a great suggestion below. Teach him communications! Teach him how to observe his classmates, and make it a game to be able to interact with them.
In the "bleeding edge" areas, teach him whatever you can connect to the basics. However, teach him what he is interested in. Pass subjects by him, and see what makes his eyes shine. Have him research the basics. Then start developing small projects that increase in complexity. Most importantly, make him complete the project. This will teach him the power to finish, something many people don't learn until much later in life.
However, above all, MAKE SURE that he understands you care about him, not his brain. This is the most important. Without this, all the training may not matter because that brain will be shattered with a
FortKnox said "He wants to get into programming..." not "I want him to get into programming..." It is great that everyone mentioned the social aspects of development, and that people are concerned about him being pushed. These are good points, but of all the highly moderated posts, not one answers the question!
The question is "what would be the appropriate things to teach him?"
I would recommend the same tools that an adult would use. Books, the internet, and lots of hands on experience "hacking." Take a loose path, lean it more in their areas of interest, and less toward the purely academic areas (unless they are into that). Most good CS people claim they learned mostly on their own, and liked it that way. Let him/her be more self-motivated than a normal child at that age.
I was homeschooled for four years, and many of the local homeschoolers where what my mother and I nicknamed the "homeschooling anarchists." They were so very big on this "don't push the kid!" stuff that they just assumed my mother had pushed me to learn to read when I was two years old.
She didn't push. She got out of my way, mostly.
There were moments I wished to be a "normal" kid, but most of the time I realized that I was actually having more fun and enjoying life more than most of my so-called peer group, and I was learning a more important socialization skill -- to get along with people in other than my immediate age bracket.
Let the kid follow his own interests, whatever they may happen to be, as long as they don't involve something that is likely to do him physical harm or get him (or you) locked up with the key thrown away for the rest of his life. For that matter, we should be doing that with even non-"prodigy" children.
"Somebody exploded a letter-bomb today
Cutting edge stuff is good (though I would say that Java as a core is not cutting edge anymore but more an industry standard).
However, I think it's perhaps better to start on general CS knowledge which serves as a wonderful base for whatever he wants to do with computers. Perhaps he'll want to be the next Linus, but he might also want to be the next Feynman and if that's so it's good to give him the best grounding in CS possible so he can exploit computers to the fullest in other fields of research.
My starting point? Look at the Teach Scheme! project. After Pascal, Scheme was my first language I spent a lot of time in while at college and I'm a lot better for it now using whatever langauge I choose. Scheme is a great way to start learning CS concepts and is quite powerful as well. I think Java is a great language and use it all the time at work, but Scheme is a better place to start an education in advanced CS concepts. The Java KVM on Palm is a good second place to go though as you can build small apps really fast (look around developer.java.sun.com to find the current beta KVM for the Palm).
As for the "go outside" people - that's great, if the kid wants to do that. But just as you don't want to push him technically where he doesn't want to go, you don't want to push him into outside activities he doesn't care about. As a tutor, you should help amplify what he is and wants to be, rather than shape him. If he gets really into a computer project and wants to spend a year doing just that, I personally think he should be able to and I do not think it will hurt his "socalization" skills in the slightest.
Also, consider this - he's probably getting some socalization skills just from the tutor being around! And better ones at that - why would you care if he can socalize well with a bunch of nine year olds when he'll end up interacting with adults? Far better he learns to deal with people in an adult manner. That's the final goal of socalizing kids anyway, to be able to work with other people well.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Judging from your post, it sounds like you're just making up having a rough childhood from things you've seen on TV.
If you're a smart kid in elementary- to middle-school today (or within the last 10 years), you most likely have problems unless you're also a natural social butterfly.
Sadly, part of school is dominance games. Some kids rise to the top of the pecking order. And to maintain that status, they have to show how much power they have over other kids. But they couldn't pick on anyone who's too high up on the social ladder, or they'd be seen as an asshole.
And guess who's usually lacking in social skills during those formative years? You got it....the different kids. I'm talking about anyone who's a little weird, in any way. And people with smarts are different.
Because of that, smart kids don't have to be smart-asses to be picked on. It doesn't take announcing the answer first to be targeted. All it takes is getting most of the answers right. You're right, it does sound like you were a smart-ass, by announcing the answer to a problem before anyone else had started working. But most smart kids, including me, werent. In fact, I never talked during class unless called upon by a teacher. However, the other kids started to catch on to the fact that I always knew the answer. And that's when trouble starts.
4-star general in a one-man army.
More likely, many really smart people figure out pretty quickly that a good life is not about taking the biggest risks, driving the biggest cars, or having the largest number of people grovel at your feet. They live just the way they like, doing what they enjoy, and they can easily figure out how to do it. And, you know, for some that means a pretty excentric life style. So what?
If you want a cutting edge field that will lead naturally to nanotechnology, I'd suggest molecular biology and genetics.
sigs are a waste of space
Hi.
I myself was/am a gifted child, with an IQ of 174 (Cattell). I think that i might be able to offer some help. The most important thing for the child at this moment is friends. Not sports or hobbies, or anything... just friends. They will develop in the child all the necessary social skills, etc, etc.
As to what to teach him, take him to a library all day for a week, and note what he reads (ask him first, not to go towards fiction). He will migrate towards what he loves to do. THAT is what to teach. I have hated all the times in my life where i know what i was being taught was important or whatnot (like your example of nanotechnology), but i really only had a slight interest in it. "Teaching" isnt really the right word, but if you help him learn (believe me, gifted children are never 'taught' something) what he loves, he will be following the best course available.
all you must to is to make available information, and he will learn. that is all that is important.
just my 2 cents
When I was in junior high school I was severely taunted, teased and picked on by certain people, for no good reason. Primarily, it was a function of the fact that I was in a lower-middle income area, and these people were uneducated, ignorant and had the wrong values instilled in them by their families. I was smarter than almost everyone in my school at the time. There were a handful of other particularly intelligent folks at my school (two of them ended up with me at Harvard, one at U Cal Berkeley).
Then I moved (twice actually) and ended up at a private school in New York, surrounded by upper-middle and upper class people who valued education and success. They still gave shit to kids who were smart-asses, people who were obnoxious were still disliked. But I wasn't hated for my intelligence and I DIDN'T HAVE TO HIDE IT. Not flaunting it is one thing. Actively concealing it is another entirely.
I went on to do quite well at this school, as at others before. I was still in the top 5% of this school intellectually, but I was accepted by a lot of people socially, and I tried to avoid being arrogant or obnoxious about it, but never had to nor wanted to hide it.
My point is this: being in a healthy environment where you can express yourself and not dumb yourself down is wonderful, and being arrogant will always make people dislike you. But being surrounded by morons who are themselves arrogant and obnoxious and project their frustration and anger onto you is a hostile environment which fosters the kind of arrogance you refer to (it's hard when your self-esteem is constantly shot down not to hold on to the one thing you KNOW you have over everybody around you).
In any case, a pleasant mix of arrogance and humility, and knowing when to use both in a maximally effective fashion has allowed me to get extremely far in the world, much farther than IQ alone would ever have carried me.
You said that most, but not all, of what smart kids go through, they bring on themselves. That their problem is that they are arrogant and condescending and act like they are better than everyone else. That other people don't want to be around them because they are no fun.
You're working with a stereotype here more than the reality. I have a problem with this. When I was in school, there was a long period of time that I specifically went out of my way not to contribute to class discussions etc. because I didn't want to be seen as the stereotyped obnoxious brain. And it didn't help worth a damn. I had skipped a grade, so I was the youngest one in my class, and people knew how old I was. The kids I had trouble with were STILL only friendly when they wanted to copy my homework, and nasty to me when they figured out I wasn't going to let them.
I had, and have, friends. Real friends. They don't treat me this way, and they don't consider me an obnoxious overbearing bitch.
I overstated my case, yes, but your advice is dangerously close to "pretend you don't have a brain and everything will be fine." And there is FAR too much of that going on as it is, especially for girls. And yes, it did hit a nerve, and I should have tried to be a bit more objective. But I still consider it irresponsible to tell a smart kid who's having trouble dealing with the cruelty that s/he's surrounded by "it's all your fault! Hide your intelligence! Pretend you are exactly like everyone else! It's more important to be liked than to be right!"
Hell, I still deal with that at work. I went to my boss about a mathematical error that the person who was training me was telling me to make, after first pointing it out to the person who was training me and getting screamed at for my trouble. Once my boss understood what I was talking about, she said "well, this won't be a popular decision..." WHO CARES if it's "popular" or not? We get audited, we have to follow basic mathematical and accounting principles, they were not being followed in this case, and the manager is reluctant to fix a major mathematical error because it's UNPOPULAR to do things correctly?!
I think this is absurd. If that makes me arrogant, so be it. And yes, I've strayed off topic a bit, but the point is that I don't think it does any good to tell bright kids that they need to play dumb to fit in, because all it does is reinforce the stereotype that "smart = social outcast," and makes kids and adults ashamed of their own intelligence.
"Somebody exploded a letter-bomb today
This is very important. Sometimes (and I work with people much like this) people actually become arrogant about their own lack of intelligence. It becomes something of a point of honor for them. I find this frightening.
And yes, being in that environment is incredibly frustrating. In general, being surrounded by people who don't share your own values is stressful, and tends to create one of two reactions: either an attempt to reject your own values for the sake of fitting in, or holding on to those values more strongly than ever, usually in an obnoxious way that makes everyone else dislike you. Or both reactions at once, and a nervous breakdown.
The best solution does seem to be to get out and find people who share your values, but that can be taken too far, and make you become narrow-minded. So there's no perfect answer. But at least there seem to be better ones than deliberately playing dumb!
"Somebody exploded a letter-bomb today
I'm closer to that age than probably anyone else here except other nine year old prodigies, so here's my two cents (or .0466 in Canadian).
First of all, give him a copy of Ender's Game. This is **the** book for genius kids. I've read it twelve times so far, making my uncle think I have OCD.
Second of all, at that age I was into C. C is fun. Especially gcc, which is free. Seeing as how he's getting his Electronics degree, show him how to play with the parallel port. Maybe he can design some cool toys (read: very useful).
Third, GET HIM INTERESTED IN SPACE! We absolutely need some sort of space drive, and the more collective brainpower applied, the faster it will go. As I said, my 4.66 cents.
Quid latine dictum sit, altum viditur.
Anything said in Latin, sounds profound.
In addition to all the other wisdom dumped into this thread I would let the kid have a good understanding/knowledge of the past few hundred years of learning. Ensure the kid knows where we've come from and what we've gone through to get here. Helps us to realise that we're standing on the shoulders of giants and to try to prevent us reinventing the mistakes of others :)
:) - I would definitely recommend a bit of social interaction in around the science/tech. Perhaps include "Emotional Intelligence" on the reading list :)
On the social skills - a person doesn't have to be charismatic or a jock but a good understanding of social interactions can *really* help
I left my body to science, but I'm afraid they've turned it down...
It sounds to me like this poor kid is getting a totally one-dimensional education.
I think it's silly to be teaching a 9-year old, prodigy or not, stuff like Java or any other applied technology, no matter how bright. These topics are transient, and will have little value 10 years from now. Teach him art,languages, literature, mathematics, history, economics and the sciences (at of course a level appropriate to his talents). Don't worry about the applied topics - he will choose those when he decides what he wants to do. Your job is to give him a solid foundation to generalize from.
You have a great opportunity here. A wonderful opportunity to help produce a kid and thence an adult who can make a contribution to the world being a slightly better place. Here are my views:
1. Don't neglect the arts. I hated english literature classes 'cause they suck but on the other hand I like to go and see plays. DO take the kid to see museums, art galleries, plays that you think are hard to understand.
2. Don't patronise him/her, maybe it's you who has completely missed the point. Be open minded.
3. Don't force the kid to learn too much but on the other hand make sure a minimum gets done on what would be normal schooldays.
4. Fun, don't neglect it. All kids like to go and watch ballgames/hang out at the mall etc... too.
5. Make sure he/she has a few hours a day playing with kids his/her own age. Musn't neglect those social skills.
6. Let the child lead their own education, don't prod them, poke them or grind down their ego by saying that something will be too hard for them.
7. Don't be afraid to tell the kid when he's wrong, but do it nicely. </RANTMODE>
Hope this is vaguely useful.
Elgon
Maybe it's just me. I've seen enough "child prodigies" who *also happens* to have an excellent social life within their peer groups, sports-loving etc.
It is not like - uh, if he's that intelligent, he must be some inert kid sitting alone in his room doing weird experiments or something.
The assumptions you people are making is stereotypical and very unfair. Please. Being extremely good at one aspect of life does not necessarily mean failures elsewhere.
Now there's a thought, get him interested in something artistic and apprentice him to some nice Laurel...:)
OK, I'm being silly.
On a more serious note: I have never much cared for the notion that the "peer group" is or should be decided on the basis of chronological age. Yes, it's probably a good thing if he has a few friends reasonably close in age -- he needs time to be a kid too. But being able to socialize with adults, or with older and younger kids, is a more valuable skill once you get out into the workforce and not everyone is the same age as you.
Let him form friendships based on his own interests and hobbies. Make sure he finds some other than one narrow field of academics, yes, but don't tell him that he MUST socialize exclusively with people he has very little in common with, except when he's busy being a child prodigy. That's not fair to him.
"Somebody exploded a letter-bomb today
Those "socially inept geniuses" are a stereotype, a true genius can find out rather easily how to be well integrated with society, and will find out that's important to have social contact with people. I think you are confusing true geniuses with "idiot savants", those people who have one very specific and limited ability, at the expense of general intelligence.
My user name is Latin and refers to the power of Fokker airplanes
"Kids are too small and immature to understand what's best for them."
Sometimes. Not always.
Yes, they will make mistakes -- that's why the presence of understanding adult mentors is so important. However, assuming that you know more about what's best for a person (even a child) than that person does is at least 90% of the time an act of insufferable arrogance.
Too many parents want their kids to be something they are not. I have had fewer problems with my parents in this regard than most people, but I've still had problems. Kids need at least some freedom to make their own decisions, their own (dare I say it?) mistakes.
As for me, the biggest mistake and the most wasted time of my life was TRYING to fit in with my so-called peer group as a young teenager.
"Somebody exploded a letter-bomb today
I realize most of this thread has addressed the greater issues of how to raise children and provide a balanced education and such, and that's really a more interesting topic.
:-)
But to address just the question asked, here's my suggestion: get a JameCo catalog or visit jameco.com, and see what educational kits and/or books they have involving the BASIC Stamp. (Or see the manufacturer's site, parallaxinc.com.) This is a puny little computer that's programmed in BASIC. If the kid likes electronics, it's a nice way of combining that with programming. You can start out with simple things (flashing LEDs), and build up to more complicated things, like insect robots...what 9 year old geek wouldn't enjoy that! There are many areas of programming to learn, and embedded microcontrollers like the Stamp avoid a lot like structured programming and operating systems, but they teach the basics, emphasize efficiency, and can just be a lot of fun.
Teach him some morals and higher ideals - show him the ills of the world.
The world needs another MLK or Ghandi a hell of alot more than another Linus or Bill Gates... do us all a favour..
Ladies and gentlemen, remember that this poster is a tutor, not a parent. The decisions about how much time to throw a basketball around the court and how much time to spend on studying metaphysics are not in this guy's hands, although he probably has some input.
I suggest the best we can do for him is to answer his damn question. I have my own answers to this, based on a 30-year perspective in the field.
Work on several things at once. Familiarize him with several different operating systems. How many you can do depends on the financial resources of the family. I don't know what those are: it may be all they can do to hire a tutor, or they may be super-rich. Without making good/bad judgements, show him Windows, MacOs, BeOS, and at least two flavors of UNIX, probably Linux and FreeBSD. Make clear the difference between window manager look'n'feel (twm vs. Enlightenment vs. KDE) and the underlying window system, as well as the difference between the window system and the underlying OS, when there is a difference.
For more straight-up academic study, C is the Fortran of today. But also throw in Knuth's volumes on The Art of Computer Programming, and shore up the academic underpinnings where he shows weakness reading Knuth. For academic purposes I'd show him C and Lisp, then, together, Java and Smalltalk (use the Squeak implementation), to give a perspective on OO concepts.
For academic study of operating systems, you couldn't do better than to use the reprinted edition of John Lyons's commentary on UNIX. You can let the kid play with the system covered in those listings by running a PDP-11 simulator and the V6 UNIX that are now available. This eliminates all of the latter-day cruft and exposes the bare bones. This is what you want to study if you want to know how an OS works. Networking is a whole separate thing which you may not want to cover right away. Andy Tanenbaum's book is still probably the best all-round introduction to that.
I am in my early 20's, and I am a dumb very guy. I have decided to enhance myself and upgrade to genius status, by taking all the advice you guys have given, thanks a lot slashdot!!!
------ Curiosity killed the cat. {satisfaction brought it back | it didn't die ignorant | lack of it is killing mankind
My uncle was best friends with someone who more or less, a child prodigy. They grew up in L.A in the fifties. This guy grew up to be probably one of the smartest businessmen and investors in the country. He is very low profile but has sucessfully turned around many different companies.
When he was growing up he would hang out with my uncle and would go play bridge after school with adults. He was an extremely fast reader, so fast that when he went to a speed reading course they sent him home because he could read faster than anyone who had ever been to the course before. My uncle, who later got a doctorate in economics was always very humble about his intelligence because he had spent his life growing up hanging out with someone who, according to all the people he knew who knew him was the smartest person that they had ever met.
So not all prodigies are scientists or nerds or are pushed extra hard by their parents. I would recommend that if his peer group is too difficult, hanging out with intelligent adults or a few brainy friends of the same age is always a good way to go about learning social skills. He might not end up being interested in science anyway. If he's pushed too hard he will think that the only way to gain acceptance by his parents is to excel in scientific fields where he might not have a deeper interest.
might be ;-)
I think there's a rogue moderator or two out there that took all of the comments relating to "Take the kid outside to socialize, don't lock him in the library" and modded them down as redundant.
:-P (just kidding) Frankly, I never found academic pursuits interesting enough to dedicate myself to them like some people would have liked. I have a much broader understanding of life because of that.
I find that very poor behavior. Most of the comments were, indeed, redundant, but not in the sense that they all needed to be modded down. Now, ALL such comments are below the +5 limit, and if I had mod points I'd put every one of them back up there. I have a feeling someone disagreed with the point being made and did that on purpose.
It's a very good point. I was never considered a child prodigy, per se, but I was regarded as highly gifted and I was given opportunities at many instances in my childhood to advance at the expense of me remaining a normal, happy-go-lucky kid with the rest of my peers. I refused all such opportunities, went on to complete a pretty normal education, and now I'm just as smart as I ever was, except I DO have charisma, charm, and friendliness to sit on top of my masked arrogance and impatience!
Plus, people can actually talk to me. No offense to the Slashdot crowd, but I'm a Comp Sci major about to graduate, and I HATE every one of my peers in my department because they're all arrogant snobbish assholes. They can sit around on Friday night formatting their hard drives and messing around with Linux, but I think they're missing out on life. (Note that my point is that they do that all the time... I've spent Friday nights home on my computer, but I can ALSO go out to a bar and have a good time, which I'd rather do... and they can't do that, they'd be out of place)
My only regret was pointed out in another post... because I never put a consistent effort into school, I find it hard applying my intelligence consistently in anything. I'm technically diagnosed with ADD, but I'm sure that I could have trained myself to focus a lot better early on - had I been treated for having ADD prior to two years ago. Perhaps a missed opportunity, but I think everything happens for a reason, so no big deal.
Mod the hell out of me but I just wanted to say that.
Oh, I think it's funny that almost no one gave answers that the person had in mind, about real subject materials to present to the kid... I think any kid at 9 years old who says he wants to make an operating system is perhaps a little loopy anyway. I mean, I played with Legos as a kid, but I didn't say I wanted to build an office building.
> and wants to design an OS (the next Linus Torvalds?)
AFAIK, Linus wasn't a child prodigy. Linux is the result of sharing and hard work, not genius.
But that's cool. Teach him the value of hard work and sharing, too. Lots of bright kids never learn to apply themselves, because everything is too easy along the way.
> I'd like my teaching to steer towards cutting edge technology
Please, steer him through the basics first. In IT, oldies like correctness and maintainability will never go out of style. (Erm, well, they shouldn't have gone out of style.)
In that regard, one field that has been around for a while and can never attract the attention of too many geniuses is the field of correctness proofs. Rather than steering him through all the glitzy overhyped toys on the current scene, steer him through discrete mathematics (along with the other basics), and then see whether you can get him interested in correctness proofs. If someday he designs a language and associated IDE that incorporates correctness as an essential part of the development process, then we will have a software revolution indeed.
Also, don't push him exclusively to CS/IT. Let him see the joys of the other sciences, and of language and literature and music. The world's a big place, and a big mind should suffer as few limitations as possible. Our species could use another Homer or Michaelangelo or Beethoven, just as much as we could use another Einstein or Turing.
--
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
However, that's not what the poster asked. The original question was, to paraphrase, "I am going to tutor this very gifted child for a limited amount of time, in a limited vartiety of subjects; he's already shown interest in computers and programming, and I would like to encourage that. What subjects and material would best allow me to do that?"
In answer to that question, I have a few suggestions:
Yes, I know this is not a complete education. Tutors aren't usually asked to provide one, however; their role is generally to provide extra assistance or encouragement in a few subjects, and let the kid's full-time teachers and parents worry about the rest of their education.
Anyway, good luck, and much good karma (the spiritual, as well as geek kind) for taking time to do one of the most important things humans can do: teach.
Here's my attempt. Show him Linux. Show him how C, C++, Java and Assembly (maybe show him assembly first). If he IS a prodigy, he'll run with it and we'll have another programmer working on Open Source. Teach him the VALUE of code and not that people will pay him lots of money for his programs. Teach him to do things right and to release code only when it's time. It's kids like this that can make computers better.
Gorkman
Whenever I hear of such children, I am always reminded of how I could have been like that. Not always are such child prodigies recognized, nor after recognition are they always permitted to learn at their own pace. I was one of those children.
I taught myself to read sometime around the age of five or six. When I was eight, I was given a Commodore 64 and learned to program. I quickly learned most of the basics of algebra, geometry, physics, and had almost stumbled upon calculus without realizing what it was. Did anyone notice? Somewhat. I was sent off to a class of gifted children once a week where we aimlessly explored nowhere in particular. Nothing really was learned there. I started hearing about these child prodigies who entered college at 13 and I wondered how they could possibly do such things. As time rolled on, I got more and more bored with school because there just wasn't anything new or unlearned there. I took to avoiding homework and acing tests and thus learned a bad habit of not doing homework. I still haven't broken myself of that.
A couple years after high school, I met a friend of a friend who actually was one of these child prodigies. He did, in fact, enter college at 12 or 13 and graduated at 17 or 18. When he described his experiences, I was shocked to realize they were precisely like mine. The only difference is that his parents had the wisdom to get his son the kind of schooling he so desperately craved. I realized that I was indeed a child prodigy: one that nobody cared to notice. I've always been very bitter about my school experiences and my discovery of what I might have been made me even more bitter. Now I wonder how many other children are kid geniuses and ignored or ridiculed because of it? How many others have wasted their childhoods making do with floor sweepings instead of the real stuff?
Look, I can't resist saying this - but you seem to be exactly the kind of person they should prevent a child prodigy becoming.
I was unpopular at school because I didnt fit in, but at the same time there were people who were intelligent and popular, because they had social skills! You have this arrogant attitude that everyone hates you because you are intelligent, well wake up friend its because your social skills blow.
Now I'm older I notice the difference - I still don't fit in and I know now that its not because I'm better than everyone else its because i'm worse - I'm a social animal with no social skills.....
no sig.
Um, this was ten years ago, first thing.
Ninth grade. Forty-minute class periods. Multiple-choice and short answer tests given by a teacher who really didn't care if we learned the subject properly beyond the minimum needed to pass the Regents exam at the end of our third year. Assigned seats by alphabetical order. Kids getting OUT of their seats to copy me. I asked if I could sit somewhere else and was told no.
This was the same classroom where one of the boys hit another one over the head with a chair, which resulted in a visible lump on the head of the one who got hit. Incidentally, the kid who swung the chair was one of the ones who was copying my tests. I was a lot smaller than him.
"You should get creative?" No, I shouldn't have had to deal with this sort of hostile environment to begin with. I have better things to be creative about.
"Somebody exploded a letter-bomb today
...of exceptionally bright kids (no, I'm not bragging on my genes, they were others' biological children), I have a few insights to offer.
First of all, there is some risk of burnout. Don't concentrate too much on beating academic milestones. This is apparently where this kid excels, but grades and proficiencies may be an inappropriate set of milestones. They can give a combination of a false sense of success and invincibility and a learning style fairly inappropriate to the real world. (I've never had an employer who paid me to take tests. But the daily work I looked down upon as a student was a much better preparation for real life than any test I ever studied for.)
One of the most difficult things for the talented to learn is how to try hard. It's one of the most important lessons around, but the gifted (in sports, intellect, whatever) often have difficulty learning it.
Just think of Ralph Sampson and Slick Watts (sorry about the sports analogies). Sampson was born with a body and coordination which gave him extraordinary opportunities. Slick Watts had the wrong body for basketball, under six foot and then he got some rare disease at 13 and lost all his hair.
But Watts learned something Sampson never did: how to try harder than everyone else he ever met. It's not that the talented cannot learn it (Bill Russell and Michael Jordan spring immediately to mind). It's just a little harder for them.
How should this translate into "tutoring a prodigy"? Many ways: throwing that football around might help, if he's interested; but the key is taking his interests to the nth degree.
Suppose he's asking questions about assembler. Show him how Alan Turing conceived of a programmable computer from mathematical concepts put forward by Goedel. Show him how machine-language derived from the precepts of Principia Mathematica and David Hilbert's famous problems for the 20th century. (If he likes fiction, The Crytonomicon is a good introduction to how Turing conceived of computers long before the technology to build them existed.) Tell him why compiler theory is emphasized in CS programs, despite the fact that so few of us end up designing compilers. Show him how Turing invented computability theory before there were computers or even transistors or microchips. Show him a simple problem he can understand which is NP-complete.
Suppose he's interested in JAVA. Get him started with some good tutorials. Then tell him what object-oriented programming is. Show him the UML. Explain why somebody would want to invent a whole new way of thinking about programming (procedures versus objects). Ask him what thinks might come after OO. Then point out that some languages have a static view of object-oriented-ness, while others are built to change if the theory changes. Ask him if he wants to accept somebody else's paradigm (Bill Joy is a good choice if you want to copy) or if he wants to define the new paradigm. Then tell him to type "aspect-oriented programming" (including the quotes) into Google. Show him Ruby. Ask him to make up a new paradigm just for fun. Then help him try to implement it in Perl (which has a dynamic OO model which forces you to redefine what you mean by "object-oriented" every time you write a program).
Suppose he's interested in physics. Have him read Aristotle's "Physics" and Newton's Principia,. Then give him Feynmann and Einstein. When he thinks that's too easy, show him Aristotle's "Metaphysics." Tell him who the Vienna Circle was and how they sought to complete science. Then give him Ludwig Wittgenstein's Tractatus. When he decides that's the cat's meow, show him how Wittgenstein renounced all that in Philosophical Investigations.
Suppose he's interested in AI. There's plenty of material on the current state of the art which tries to make it easy to understand for the beginner. Show him the Santa Fe Institute's web site (www.SantaFe.edu). Get the NOVA video on chaos theory. Then tell him not all chaos theorists are fully accepted by most scientists. Get him Complexity: The Emerging Science on the Edge of Chaos and Dynamic Memory. Teach him neural nets, then point out how it failed to live up to its promise. Ask him if he thinks that's an inherent limit of the theory or that it's caused by an inadequately developed idea. Then show him genetic programming. Then take him back to Descartes and show him the mind-body problem.
Suppose he's interested in games. Teach him to program them. There are plenty of open-source game-design projects (my web site is www.FaerieMUD.org) where he can find any level of challenge in any kind of game he likes.
Suppose he's interested in the election or social problems or whatever....
It doesn't matter. Whatever the interest, show him that he can take it to some limit which will probably exceed his grasp. Let him fail, even if you have to show him problems which have baffled mankind for millennia.
There are two keys: start with his interests and take it to his limits. Then bring him back and show him that by trying very hard he can make real progress in places where he will make a difference.
Good luck, to you and to him.
Eternal vigilance only works if you look in every direction.
What I miss in your comments is the joys that comes with the learning that you do. So you knew the differences between a Monet and a Manet and you played the guitar and the sax. But did you enjoy that? Were you able to tell what all the writers had written about the differences between the one and the other? Or did you know the difference because of the way the one and the other made you feel? Did you nicely follow the notes on the paper, or did you play music? You nicely followed what other people said, but did you understand what they said?
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Anyway, aside from the valid points of many others about proper socialization and the value of just being a normal kid sometimes, I want to recommend the a solid respect for the humanities. When I was younger, I wanted to be a physicist, because I thought it was cool. However, I have always read large numbers of books, and not denied the value of things other than science. After a charismatic eighth-grade history teacher, I decided I actually was interested in history and politics. I have not let this get in the way of being nerdy by any means: I run Linux, I just finished an upper-division math course at UCLA with an A-, and I have a web design business. However, I have not let myself be narrow. As C.P. Snow pointed out in The Third Culture, it's perfectly possible to be interested in both science and music, or math and literature, and in fact it is unhealthy for scientists to sneer at the humanities, or vice versa. It seems that the questioner is concentrating on feeding the prodigy's desire for technical sophistication, which is perfectly good, but I urge him to instill a respect and love for art, history, language, literature and music along with differential equations and flow charts. These other areas shouldn't be formal and stuffy, though. I would expose the kid to everything and let him explore for himself, too.
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The only advice I would give on this subject, is let the child steer the course of his own education. If he wants to learn about Java and Assembly, teach him every thing that you know, and point him towards other resources so that he can even learn some stuff that you don't know. Never try to force him to learn something that he isn't interested in. Chances are, sooner or later, he will realize a connection on his own, and have a genuine desire to study anything that you would want to 'steer' him towards. You cannot control the educational process. All you can do is to give him resources, and help him make connections to other areas. For instance, if his curiosity is pointing him towards Java, drop some information about the history of the language, or OOP in general, or the effect that Java has had on Sun's business, or anything else that you can think of that is even remotely connected. If he shows interest, help him find more information. If he doesn't show interest, DO NOT force it on him.
A child's natural hunger for learning is a far better motivator for his growing intellect than any tutor could ever be. Help him read between the lines of raw information, but do not try to choose for him what information he should learn. Do not look at the child as some sort of tool to be used ("Man, if I teach this kid about nanotechnology now, imagine what he could do to the field in 15 years!"), but as a person with a gift. And a great part of that gift is curiosity. The drive to learn is, I would argue, even more important than a raw capacity to retain knowledge. The best things you can teach this child are ways to search out the information he is looking for on his own, and to teach him more abstract things that are difficult to learn from books. Teach him how to see problems and situations from many angles, and teach him to see the connections between different fields of study. Feed his curiosity by showing him things that he doesn't yet have the broad knowledge base to see on his own, but never try to force his direction.
I'm just kidding of course. Well actually I'm not but I don't expect a real answer and for all I know she's old enough to be my mom.
Lee Reynolds
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It is far better to present sources of information and how to use these sources. From their intellectual curiousity will drive the student to areas that are stimulating. The teacher then becomes a guide to raise questions for consideration and to make sure there is some focus.
This is not the way to build a lasting empire.
My general advice for little kids and programming:
LOGO, for visual stimuli, for variables and procedures.
ToonTalk, for a graphical construction environment, teaching pattern-matching and declarative rule-based programming.
Prolog and Java, once the kid is ready to forego the graphical environment.
Why Prolog? ToonTalk is based on Prolog's inference concepts, and I advocate straight Prolog after that. I think too many kids start out with BASIC, Pascal and C, and are forever bent on the idea that procedural languages are all there is to programming.
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In its day, the Commodore 64 was a great machine for smart kids; it came with a book only an inch thick that described the machine and its software down to the metal. It really was an education in a box. I'm not sure what to suggest that's comprehensive, interesting, and self-contained. Programmable Lego systems, maybe, although they're rather limited.
A few years ago, I'd have suggested Smalltalk, but that's dead. Java is probably reasonable; it's a decent language and system, the tools are affordable, debugging is straightforward, and you can write games in it. It's also a good first language; if you start a kid off in assembler or C, it may take him years before he gets his thinking on design straight.
If he's interested, getting into the math behind 3D graphics is a good way to go. You actually use algebra, trig, and matrices, and you get to see what happens.
- Listen
- Understand
- Learn
- Masturbate.
That's all he'll ever need in life.--
Game over, 2000!
However, while you are not-lecturing, you need to pay attention to what the student is learning, what the student's interests and learning style are, etc.
The trick is to provide the right direction at the right moment that keep the student from becoming either bored or frustrated.
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Any nerd can write a piece of an OS kernal,
even reverse engineer the UNIX OS. However
it takes a skilled organizer to herd hundreds
of nerds to write a great OS like Linux.
Not that many children have that skill.
There are some things that are particulars, some that give you a different way to think, and most are somewhere in between. In terms of programming languages, I'd say java. Not because it is "the best" or bleeding edge. I haven't heard of any other language that does a better job of making you think clearly about what you're doing - and is ever used by more than 10 people
The most important things to teach young are those things that are harder to get there later. languages are terribly hard to learn later. I'm not near the level of this child, but always a few grades up. It is important to interact with a bunch of people who are peers... that isn't you, because it's your job to be "above" at least in an emotional sense. They don't have to be his/her age, but they have to include a fair top/bottom mix such that more than 1 makes contributions to what's going on.
I firmly believe that calculus should be taught to most children b4 the fifth grade. Gifted children sooner. If you think about it, you only need to have learned multiplication, functions, and very basic graphing to begin learning differentiation and integration. Basic algebra results in symbolic results. As they learn new things, they learn the calc part too. Trig, logs, geometry, most analytical algebra, etc are unecessary to establish the important, thought changing concepts about rate.
No, they won't learn eigenvectors until much later. who cares. Many "educated" people never get their minds around calculus because they weren't thinking about things well enough earlier. I derived a tiny example of calculus a year b4 I was supposed to take it. My teacher was not happy and told me it was only true in a specific case - I later discovered SHE didn't know calculus (this is NOT a bad school, either) it took me pages to prove a broadER case algebraically... and I never got her to understand. (She did let me site my algebraic proof on the test...) the calc proof is exactly two lines, verbosely.
I think this is why it isn't taught - teachers b4 college in the US usually have degrees in gened (this is PREFERRED by schools) as opposed to in their field of teaching. THEY don't know calc. My mother taught teachers and she certainly didn't - I ended doing her gradebook in jr high. Her grades were 15% whatever she wanted so she could lean whether she liked you or not. She did NOT make that number up independently, she modified it until she liked the result. And she is not alone.
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I think you should teach him how to fetch, roll over, and play dead. Then make sure to teach him how to heel. That way he won't stray far from the path of normality and thus can grow up to freely create the latest cutting edge technology and never have to think about the social ramifications. Seriously though, everyone's talking about htis kid as if they are some kinda pet. It's a human being not a science experiment. Let see how much junk we can cram in it's head before it explodes. Everyone must keep in mind that we are talking about a human being. While they are still a child, I think children have been extremely underestimated throughout history. The only thing seperating children from adults is experience. And experience is the ultimate tutor. There is nothing you can teach a child, they must learn everything for themselves. (for those who like to take things out of context... this doesn't mean that they must start from ground zero and re-invent everything) Think of the relation between a very young child and a flame. No matter how many times you tell them not to touch it they will (with the exception of severe physical repremand and disencouragement) eventually touch it. They will get burned. They will now know why not to touch it. The best you can hope to offer is to guide them into the experience slowly to reduce the pain. Help them move the hand slowly. Feel the heat. Then they can learn respect for those forces they can't yet understand before they bite them in the ass. I don't claim in the slightest to be a child prodigy or anywhere near this kids inteligence, but I was a gifted child, raised in a gifted program. And really we are just talking about levels of extreme. I was a social late bloomer. Even long before I was diagnosed gifted, I was very anti-social. I have always been, and still am a loner. Is there something wrong with me? maybe, but I don't think it has anything to do with my anti-social tendencies. Everyone is made different. Some more different then others, but we live in a world were everyone and everything are forced into these molds which no one quite fits. You don't need to teach kids how to think for themselves, they're born with it. You just need to recognize your own bias and not teach him to think like you. And while your at it maybe you can unlearn the rest of us so we can think for ourselves again. Kids, especially one as bright as this can figure out a lot more than you think. Though it's probably to late, you don't need to teach him anything, or guide him for that matter, just provide the resources, and try to expose him to as much of life as you can. He'll come up with the questions, you just need to point him in the direction of the answers. But if it is too late, and the bias of those around him have forced them in the direction of science (don't get me wrong, I love science. I myself am strange and unusual.... sorry, got caught in a movie quote.... I myself am a technophile, a cumputer geek) then you should at least make sure they understand the full consequences of their intelligence. In other words, hopefully they will realize that they have a social resposibility, not just a employee responsibility, and won't go and invent the next atom bomb or biological weapon. You may want to leave a copy of the book Eath by David Brin on the nightstand. In the book, a genius level scientist creates a quantum singularity (an ity bitty black hole) the lab gets recked and it falls into the earth were it begins slowly devoring the earths core and growing larger. The moral of the story folks is that all science has it's risks and far too few of our brilliant minds consider them. anyway... along with some good fiction books, classic lit and mythology.... you may want to leave some Chompsky or Zin (People's History of the US) laying around. Don't force them to read anything. Just make it available. Their natural curiousity will direct them. But remember, they can't learn something that's not available to them. Recognise your own bias as a tutor. Realize that even if you aren't a natural parent (which is unknown and irrelevant) you still hold a parental role and thus responsibility. Make sure you aren't their only sourse of knowledge. You're raising a child, not a clone. All that said... I bid you ado... kevin "Being the same is easy"
I just skimmed through the 709 comments on this page. The odd thing is that most or all of the ones that got modded up centered around the idea of "forget programming, teach him to be a good human being." It's good to know there are people out there with their priorities straight, but it does completely miss the question at a hand. How would you feel if took a Java course and the instructor just lectured you about morality all day long? Personally, I'd be pretty frustrated.
:)
From reading the story into, it seems very clear to me that this person has an opportunity to tutor this child prodigy in technology, not humanity 101. That appears to be why the kid came to this individual in the first place. His parents are responsible for raising him. This person's responsibility is teaching him about programming. If other life lessons come up along the way, so be it. But he probably wouldn't be asking for advice on that at Slashdot.
- Scott
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Scott Stevenson
Scott Stevenson
Tree House Ideas
D'oh. :-) I should have but I forgot (the link). One interesting /.-esque tidbit about her is that she doesn't use a regular, stand-alone machine, instead having one of the last X-Terminals (19", color) in the dept. becuase she didn't like the noise level of an ordinary machine. (<-- from the pwr supply fan, hard disk(s), cpu fan, etc. etc.) I worked in the math dept. as an assistant systems dude for ~9 months in '99, and one of the things I remember us talking about was trying to find a more powerful system for her that was zero or near zero noise.
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