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Building Social Skills in Gifted Youths?
UNOStudent asks: "I'm currently a Biotech undergrad at the University of Nebraska-Omaha and have spent the past several semesters mentoring gifted youngsters and have been presented with a challenge this semester. My student is unbelievably smart, however has very limited social skills, is unable to cooperate with peers, doesn't understand why they make fun of his uncombed hair, etc. Since many of us may have grown up in a similar circumstance, I'm looking for suggestions from my fellow geeks on ideas for how to challenge him mentally, while building essential social skills." How would you build social skills in someone more concerned with math, science and computers?
Then he wont need social skills - he can kick the bully's asses and get back to doing what he loves.
There'll be time for girlfriends later (when he's rich), and who the hell said we all *have* to be open, loving marketing types anyway?
You can't expect to wield supreme executive power, just because some watery tart threw a sword at you
Incoming a million "This is slashdot, what's a social skill" jokes....
asking slashdot on social skill questions is like asking a factory worker which distribution of Linux is better.
This is a joke, laugh.
Bored? Why not join a decent mess
You need incentinves. Simply explain that better social skills lead to more sex.
Help save the critically endangered Blue Iguana
Divide up the project so that he only has a piece of the puzzle and will fail unless he is able to interact with the other team members to get it to work. Also play lots of games where social interaction is involved to solve the problem, human knots, simple ball games, you know those group building games we all hate.
Visit BobtheKing.com it's perhaps the best thing I've ever made to waste your time with.
This did wonders for my social skills.
Get him into dungeons and dragons. Find a group at a local shop or a campus club that will allow him to join as a newbie.
Most experienced DM's enjoy seeing new players grown and mature while learning and playing the game.
Get him a job dealing with people, and offer some sort of deal for him to get new tech toys to play with as a result. I was once much the same way but after working with people, and being able to reap the rewards, I am now a lot more functional in public than my peers. I've come so far as to hold a fairly decent sales job for my age and location, where I deal face to face with people constantly. Just like getting over your fears of anything else, confrontation is the easiest way to solve the problem. Granted, your student isn't AFRAID of social situations exactly, but I think more interaction would have the desired results.
I mean it. Tell him he might have to wind up running human emotions under emulation if necessary.
Not knowing what the hell is wrong with him will stress him a lot more than having something, anything, he can deal with.
Good luck with this.
It's Christmas everyday with BitTorrent.
There's the natural course of geek development and we should mess with it as little as possible.
New young geeks should have to wait for beer to develop social skills just like we did.
Comic Book Guy : Someone has mixed an "Amazing Spiderman" in with the "Peter Parker - The Spectacular Spiderman" series. This will not stand.
Woman: Pardon me, but I wish to tender a serious cash offer for this stack of water damaged Little Lulus.
CBG: Huh, "A" that is not water, it is Diet Mr. Pib, and "B" I... (CBG turns to look at the woman) Ohh... Err... Tell me, how do you feel about 45 year old virgins who still live with their parents?
Woman: Comb the Sweet Tarts out of your beard and you're on.
CBG: Don't try to change me baby.
"There is no time, sir, at which ties do not matter," Jeeves, (Jeeves and the Impending Doom)
of course. And the poster above is right about D&D or other role playing games. Heck, there were THOUSANDS of people to socialize with at GenCon!
Don't blame me, I voted for Kodos
Give the kid a copy of "Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman."
He comes across as an arrogant bastard, but I sure did enjoy the chapter about the intellectual challenge presented by learning how to pick up chicks.
N.b.: Feynman's technique was probably valid in the 50s, and is definitely not useful now. The valuable part is getting this kid to treat "learning social skills" as an intellectual exercise.
I.e., what makes these stupid apes TICK?
Tell him he's just fine the way he is and that the rest of the students will be working for him in 15 years. Those of us on Slashdot with jobs realize that it's more important to be comfortable as yourself than meet someone else's perception of who we should be. In fact, it also works for dating...confidence in yourself is a bigger turn on than a flashy car, big wallet, or "social skills". So, leave the kid alone you schmuck...stop pushing your skewed world view on this poor impressionable youngster.
Get him interested in the booty and he'll clean up his act...or become a mass murderer.
Acting lessons, especially improvisation (comedy or drama).
Acting teaches how to communicate intentions and how to show interest when listening.
Acting can also provide a second social network (with people just as interested in role playing as you, except without silly costumes), with few social interconnections to the tech social networks (so you get to be a social hub.)
Have him play a team sport! Get him outside and away from the text books for a change.
Mod point free since 2001
Being a genius is one thing and it can get you ahead in life, but it's nothing if you can't deal with people (look at Jobs and the Woz, for example).
Even in modern programming, no one man can tackle enormous projects - we break things into functions and into parts and put them together.
Being ethnically different, "smart" (so said my K-12 schools, but college makes me doubt it), and by nature and culture alternately shy and arrogant, I've had to work to A) get to know people and B) work with them instead of going off on my own.
I say you give him group assignments where he has to work with other people (programming seperate functions in a larger program). Also, for kids, the great equalizer is video games - I've been playing Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles for a while and that game really emphasizes team work and people talking together.
"There is no time, sir, at which ties do not matter," Jeeves, (Jeeves and the Impending Doom)
...because ultimately it's up to him to do the learning. Unless he's asking you for help (which I doubt; this isn't an episode of "Saved by the bell") he's going to have to figure it out for himself, which includes him figuring out that there's something to figure out in the first place.
:)
Ultimately, the motivator for him to learn social skills will be other kids interacting with him in a positive way, and you can't force that. What you CAN do, however, is get him in social situations where his brains will be considered an asset.
For instance, set up class lab activities that require teams of four, and make sure these activities require serious brains to complete. Sometimes, he should be in charge of picking people for his team; sometimes he shouldn't. Does this mean he might get chosen last? Sure, until a lazy and popular kid decides it's better to have this smart kid doing his work for him. Once your smart kid is selected by the popular kid, and they get an 'A' AND get done early because of it, he'll be considered an asset.
The flipside to that, of course, is that the other kids will initially be using him. The thing is, learing that you're being used and learning how to deal with it is as important a social skill as any other, so while it's painful in the short term it's beneficial in the long term.
Also, you'll be giving popular and lazy kids a reason to view him in a more positive light, which is a good lesson for them.
The best way to build social skills is to get them involved in a group of people who actually -care- for them as a friend. The rest is easy.
(sad story, warning)
When I was a kid, I was the fat, alkward kid who nobody liked. I was never able to get over my alkwardness until I found a friend, Melissa (Mel) who accepted me as I was.
Most of the time, these "socially enept" people are only socially enept because society has turned them away.
If you want these people to be socially acceptable, try accepting them first.
Not that I'm cool or anything now, but I do have friends, people who I care about and care about me. Popularity isn't everything. Friendship is. Thank God for friends.
Jay | http://oldos.org
Recalling from personal experience, I am by most definitions a dork and have been one since I picked up my first book in life.
As a general rule I was more inclined to read books than socialize granted that was all I knew. Everyone would want to talk about the latest fad or trend and I just simply was never interested. Whenever company was over, I'd just simply ignore all that and go to my room and read. I had few friends in my life, mostly those I could relate to. Aside from the occasional bully, I was happy socially.
However my stepmom couldn't stand that being a social giant. I was to relate to everyone and anyone. She would constantly drag me out of my room and try and get me to talk to people. I never did out of spite, mostly just clamming up or worse being nasty to anybody she tried, until I could get back to my book (and later computer games). I was not a pleasant conversationalist when forced like that. Therefore I question the value of corrective action against a socially dis-inclined person.
For what it's worth tho, I'd like to think I turned out normal. I'm the first of my brothers to get married (well in 2 weeks anyways). Generally people say I relate well to others. However you generally find me talking to people I can relate with intellectually rather than people who are more inclined to talk about the latest "survivor" episode or some other gunk (I didn't even watch the Super Bowl!). However I can BS my way through anything if needed, for exapmle a job interview or performance review, etc.
Your turn to rant!
...in bed
The lesson is that social interaction doesn't require a major breakthrough. Slowly build up your confidence and you'll be amazed at the results which follow.
What I saw missing from my geeky friend's social skill set was empathy. They knew they were different and smarter than the rest, and they liked being smarter. Made them cocky, and they looked down upon the rest. The more they were teased, the more they withdrew, and the more they looked down on their tormentors. So how does empathy help? Look, these are smart kids and they can be reasoned with that they are going to have to spend a lifetime among people not as smart as they are. There is no getting around that unless you become a near hermit. So wouldn't it be smart to try to see themselves as others see them?
Yeah, who cares if you comb your hair anyway? Aren't there more important things in life, and besides people shouldn't judge me by my outer appearance! True, all true. But you know what? They do and they will. So does it make a difference whether or not your hair is combed? If no one cares, no. If people do care, yeah, it causes hassles for you that can so easily be avoided by a 30-second brush with a comb. Not hard, appeases the ignorant. Comes in handy if you ever have a job interview (and you will want one someday, won't you?).
Empathy allows you to think through the other person's eyes. Yeah, they aren't as smart as you, but they can't fully help that (biology and all that) and yet they are still humans with as much right toward dignity and respect as you would want for yourself. Apperances and actions shouldn't matter in a perfect world where intellect was all that counted, but we don't live in that world. We do have to interact with people who judge us for all the wrong reasons. Isn't it smart to spend just a minimal amount of effort to smooth our way in life? If you are perceived as a jerk by others, no matter how invalid the reason may be, it will cause friction in your life.
The smart person sees that friction coming and heads it off with a few simple social tricks that fool the ignorant. It's great as a party trick too!
Isolating children from peers and reality is not a good way to impart social skills. Communicating to them from a young age that they're special and better than other people is a negative towards producing functional adults.
Social skills are built through experience, now from memorizing a set of strategies for coping with the stupidity of other people. If part of that is learning to deal with people who don't like you (for any reason), well, that's life.
I see this sort of idiotic reasoning as crappy self-justification, sort of an "I'm better than everyone and that's why they hate me". People who adopt this sort of view are walking down a dangerous road towards more isolation (and probably the things that go with it, like depression or other psychological problems). It's the wrong way to go.
And I know of whence I speak -- I got my ass kicked on occassion in grade school. I had to deal with all the names and other bullshit. But hey, that's life. Learning to deal with advesity is what makes a person who they are.
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Ausbergers syndrome - learn it, know it, ask yourself if it applies here. It is similar in nature to Autism (think of RainMan but really watered down, almost to the point of it being questionable as to whether or not he is / is not affected.)
... while being totally socially inept?
Do the youthes you are talking about have amazing technical skills, wonderful (photographic) memories, the ability to empathize with the computer
Anyways, it is worth understanding.
Glonoinha the MebiByte Slayer
I wouldn't try to build social skills in these geeks. Some of our greatest minds in history had negligible social skills which contributed to the free time needed to achieve greatness. What if Linus Torvalds spent all his free time playing pool? Would we have the light bulb had Thomas Edison been a party animal? I think not.
Unknown host pong.
Find a school for gifted and talented kids (some states have 'em) and get him to apply. Find a summer camp for him to go to (e.g., math camp, science camp, computer camp, chess camp) that will be populated w/kids like him. Get him in some kind of peer group.
I hope this isn't too obvious.
John.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
Quite frankly, the teacher should be more concerned about the bullies; the smart kid isn't the problem, the bullies are. Why?
They usually turn out to be complete rejects as far as society goes; violent neanderthals, basically. Everyone looks the other way until BAM, they hit the real world and suddenly end up in jail for bashing their girlfriend's head against the wall(unless they happen to make it big in sports). Meanwhile, the geek suffers and may be secluded, but ultimately contributes to society in ways the ape never could have.
The solution here is to be strict with punishing the kids that pick on him. Johnny makes fun of him for not combing his hair? Johnny gets a time-out and a talk about how we're all different people, and we need to accept those who are different from us. Children start out as pretty accepting- but in the early years they can either learn it's really NOT ok to pick on other people, or they can get away with it, feel slightly good about themselves, and keep doing it. Learning to accept others makes them far more likely to succeed in school and particularly in the workplace(ie, "team players").
Please help metamoderate.
While being related to that, you could also say the child could be dyspraxic and dyslexic, as I am.
In what has been described in the blurb, I see what I was when I joined year 7 at my UK school.
The best way I coped with social situations was literlly to relate them to computer programming. Each individual is an object, they have the same properties, but diffrent values.
The best way to socialise with one another is to exchange the diffrent values you have and try to find similar ones. When you do, its best to follow the similar ones, and thus you can become friends with them.
If they have diffrent values but express intrest in the ones you have, you could show them about that value. Thus you have also made a friend through diffrences.
I still find it hard to socialise with girls, however, with time comes perfection, as I currently have a girlfriend.
You need to, without making them feel unwanted or put down by suggestions, make them think a bit about their outwards apperence. Hand them a comb in the morning, and make a small joke about why to use it. (E.g. better look snappy, you never know who might walk through the door - or something similar without the cheeseness).
Do get them tested for all three, both of my points, and the parent posters point, as early diagnosis is very helpfull.
Good Luck
NeoThermic
Use my link above, or to view my server, NeoThermic.com
I met a high school kid a couple of years back who blew away any anti-social geek I've ever known. The /. crowd only *thinks* it's out of the social loop, but trust me, this kid has everyone here beat (the fact you come to this site at all makes you more social and recreational). To begin with, he read no fiction whatsoever. Only text books. High level math and physics. Neither science fiction nor fantasy appealed to him. I wish to god I could remember what he said about the /. site after I pointed him to it.
/. crowd, to really help this kid. You may have no idea why this kid is acting the way he is, so don't try to fix him. He's not an iPod mini. If you screw up and make things worse, it's a person, not a couple hundered bucks, that's lost.
Anyway, I *tried* to get this kid into something that even the geek crowd would think was recreational, but nada. No music, no movies, no video games, no sports (assuming foozball counts as a sport). Sure, he's headed to Yale, and he knows assloads about engineering already (he could talk down to a master's student from GA Tech), but I can't imagine how lonely the guy may one day end up. It's *possible* that he'll meet a girl who'll fall in love with him for what he's like now, but his playing field is severely limited as such. And yes, I understand that his idea of recreation was the things he was into, but it isn't exactly common ground when it comes to finding friends. He basically reminds me of the guy from Sneakers who made robotic dogs, but more limited.
I finally decided that it wasn't my place to help this guy. That might be the case with the student in the article. I personally think that it'll take a psychologist/psychiatrist, and not the
This is step 1. Honestly, I know that it's shallow to judge someone on their looks, but hey, it is something that we have *evolved* over millions of years. People who look better succeed, it is a *fact*.
If the kid is upset that people laugh at his hairstyle, then, duh, maybe he should *change* it?
I honestly don't understand why geeks will get upset when people mock their style.. you have thousands of examples of (halfway) decent style to draw on daily, and you don't have to spend a bundle to be dressed normally for your age group. Unless you are going out of your way to look different on purpose (goth, etc ) there is no need for *looking" like a loser before anyone even speaks to you.
"Asperger Syndrome or (Asperger's Disorder) is a neurobiological disorder named for a Viennese physician, Hans Asperger, who in 1944 published a paper which described a pattern of behaviors in several young boys who had normal intelligence and language development, but who also exhibited autistic-like behaviors and marked deficiencies in social and communication skills. "
By Barbara L. Kirby
Founder of the OASIS Web site (www.aspergersyndrome.org)
Co-author of THE OASIS GUIDE TO ASPERGER SYNDROME (Crown, 2001)
You can never equivocate too much.
but a bit simplistic, as a short post must necessarily be.
You won't be able to keep him away from bullies... they abound, and show a certain cunning in oppressing others. Far better a strategy may be found in your second point... teach them how to deal with these types until such time as the legal system offers remedies against the bully's physically assaultive behavior (I doubt too many geeks fear verbal sparring matches with these goons; as the quicker mind tends to prevail). It might also give them some experience with enduring pain and hassle... a valuable trait.
As for getting them laid early in life... I may be in the minority on this one, but caution is definitely in order. If you make their first sexual experience involve some Thai prostitute, you'll forever warp their expectations and impressions about intimacy. No bullsh*t... those experiences are emotionally powerful, and you tend to remember them. Depending on how you interpret those memories, they can become emotional baggage that affects your relationships with future partners.
Sex is a powerful thing... best let him save himself until such time as he can make his own conscious decisions about it, and has the maturity to handle it.
Some of our Slashpervs may, of course, disagree.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
Believe me, I went through this in a major way, since I grew up in a sports-loving-intellectual-hating public school. Here's what helped me break out of it:
1) The kid should make no apologies for his brains. Unfortunately, many such kids are bright enough to realize that people like you if you're stupid, and thus try to act like an idiot to try to make friends.
2) Show the kid that social issues can be solved just like mathematical and scientific problems. Individual people, especially children aged 8-12, are pretty easy to predict, so encourage the kid to try experimenting with various approaches, changes in appearance, etc, and noticing how each classmate reacts. You might try having the nerd take notes and create a report findings to the teacher, and if their not inflammatory, to the rest of the class.
3) Provide opportunities for the kid's intelligence to be used to the benefit of classmates in a context which matters to them. For instance, give them a mathematical puzzle to solve as a group with a reward based on how quickly they can do it. Suddenly a nerdy kid becomes useful, and everybody's friend.
4) Make sure the kid knows that eventually the nerds win. Big time. They control almost everything, from sciences to many businesses to sports teams to governments. Also make it clear that bullying is a sign of weakness, not strength.
5) Let him find some nerdy friends. They often exist.
-------------
Here are some ideas which you should never ever ever try:
1) Don't blame the nerd for bullies. Teaching a nerd not to be a victim is fine, but to blame the nerd is to tell him that you support the bullies. Dumber kids might not see that connection, but a nerd definitely will.
2) Don't give the nerd self-help books. That just encourages more reading and less social behavior, which makes matters worse.
3) Don't force the nerd to spend time with a particular classmate. The nerd doesn't enjoy it, because the classmate is clearly pretending to be a friend, while the classmate immediately resents the nerds presence because it was imposed by an adult. No one wins.
I am officially gone from
Having never taken a martial art, I don't know how effective they are. However, an alternative is to start running. Running has to be one of the best physical activities, and can be done throughout your entire life.
If the school has a cross country team, (especially if it is no-cut, like mine was), then that may be the perfect way to get involved with peers in an activity. It certainly opened me up more to other people and was one of the best decisions I ever made.
You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it dissolve.
I have a cousin whose parents always labeled him as "too good" for sports (so of course he ended up believing that, too). So, now not only has he never played a sport, but he looks down on people who do.
Just recently, he applied to one of the better acting schools in California. When he didn't get in, he threw a hissy fit worthy of a six year old -- stomped around the house, yelled at his folks, cried, made quasi-abusive calls to the college demanding to talk with the people in admissions, etc. This wasn't one night, either; this went on for months.
Simply put, he doesn't know how to lose. Or, maybe more specifically, he doesn't know how to react in a positive way when things don't fall the way he wants them to. All his life he's been sheltered from competition and told that he's gifted and better than everyone else and all the other crapola that parents in the 80's pushed on their kids, so when something happens to challenge this point of view he falls to pieces.
So, instead of getting a spot at another school and working on a transfer, he's convinced himself that the people in admissions are threatened by his talent and that they don't deserve him. When the school year starts, he'll be working part time at a coffee shop in San Francisco instead of going after his dreams.
Anyhow, when/if I have kids, you can bet they'll play something. Soccer, baseball, football, whatever -- aside from the other benefits of physical activity, I think it's a valuable place to learn how to deal with adversity (aka, lose).
Every year during my review, I just pray the words "slashdot.org" aren't mentioned.
Since we don't actually know much about this kid, the best I can do is try to address some common problems.
First, the kid is smarter than just about everyone around him. Way smarter. You know it. He knows it. Make sure that he understands that just about everyone else already knows it as well, and those who are too dumb to recognize it aren't worth impressing. So he doesn't need to beat them over the head with the fact.
Tact is often 90% of the battle. People who are intellectually gifted but socially maladapted tend to be insecure about it, and will retreat into whatever they feel they excel at. So it's pretty frequent that "the smart guy" is the one who ends up jumping down peoples' throats over minor errors. It's not a good friend-winning strategy, but people tend to build themselves up by tearing others down.
So, he has this brain on him. How to get him to use it for good instead of evil? How about teaching him how to tutor his classmates? If you can drill into his head that he needs to be forgiving of mistakes, and compliment people for their effort, it could lead to some positive interactions. For geeks his age, positive social interactions are often few and far between.
Fashion shouldn't be too hard. He doesn't need the $50 jeans or the $200 shoes. Just throw away everything that's too threadbare, or actively hideous. The goal isn't to turn him into a GQ model, but to simply raise his fashion sense to the point that his clothes aren't a limiting factor. The same goes for hygiene. Get him to do something with his hair. Doesn't much matter what.
He might want to take up weight lifting or running or cycling. Something to give him a bit of confidence in his own body. Karate might be cool as well. If he can find something he enjoys in the way of team sports, all the better.
Now the word we've all been waiting for: Girls. I can't say I'm wise in their womanly ways, but let's get a few of the serious no-no's out of the way. Treat them with respect, show interest in their hobbies, don't insult their friends, and for god's sake, don't bitch and moan about how girls all want guys who treat them like dirt. That attitude is both insulting and wrong, and I've seen way too many guys who do it. Occasionally, it's true, but far more often it's just a defensive measure to keep the guy from having to evaluate what he did wrong.
Find something he likes, and find a way for him to get others involved in it (even if it's "just" his fellow geeks).
Just remember that you won't be able to do anything without his cooperation. If he's totally stubborn, help him with the scholastics and hope that he figures the rest out on his own.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
Or if that's not his thing, and he isn't scared off by the new-agey fringers, yoga can work, too. Not for ass-kicking, but for getting in tune with his body, which, if he's a typical geek, is way out of whack.
One of the best insights I remember from Coupland's Microserfs was the talk about a geek's disconnection from his/her body. How it's just this thing we pay little attention to, and consequently, it does not serve us well. I'm a runner, too, but while that works on a stress-reduction level, I don't think it puts you in tune as well as a more precise discipline such as martial arts or yoga.
Beyond some frank discussion (everyone needs someone to tell them the truth about stuff), however, what more can you do? You can only do so much. In truth, a woman will change him -- for the better, if she's a good one. Let's face it, guys are extreme, and admirable for being extreme. We can live off very little and get by, and that lends itself to all kinds of single-minded dedication, and thus achievement, but women tend to bring temperance to what they touch. (again, the good ones). Just my $.02
Social skills are a two way street. Make sure that the people around him are interacting with him, too.
Today, I am a fairly stereotypical introverted nerd. However, I have heard from my family that I was actually a fairly extroverted kid.... until school. There I committed three sins: I was ugly (a tooth issue not diagnosed correctly until later), uncoordinated and couldn't play sports well (just nearsighted enough to ruin my depth perception, also undiagnosed for many years), and I knew stuff (could already read and do simple arithmetic in kindergarten). Hattrick.
I'm sure I wasn't a social wonder in kindergarten, but who is? My point is, I never had a chance. Now I'm introverted. What choice did I have?
Mind you, I'm happy enough with the outcome; you can't hear my tone so this might sound bitter. It's not; to me this is just how I am, I figured this out years later.
"But what about his hair?" Well, social skills form via feedback, which must be both positive and negative. If a kid is simply ejected from society at a young age, then he's never had an opportunity to learn about hair styling; he literally doesn't know about it. I recall not caring, either. So even to the extent that you may have a kid clueless, it may even be a result, not a cause.
Can society take the whole blame? Beats the tar out of me, but I doubt it. Maybe he's got a light case of Asperger's syndrome... I'm pretty sure I don't, though. But you can't write the effect of his society off, either. I recall trying to reconnect and being firmly ejected over and over.
How does this help? I don't know. Let me know if you find out. Seems people don't get mature enough to allow kids to re-enter society until somewhere around high-school. Getting out of his age group might help.
(Stuff like this makes me strongly sympathetic to the homeschooling system, which often involves significant out-of-age interaction, short-circuiting the need for every kindergarten class to reconstruct society from scratch; is it any surprise they get it so wrong? What do you expect from five-year-olds?)
On my 20th birthday I happened to meet my grade 3-5 teacher in a restaurant over lunch and he remarked how I had survived the social experiment that was my 'gifted class'. It wasn't until I managed to find and keep a girlfriend that I found out I was an arrogant ass-hole (why she's with me I'll never know). Since learning about social skills from my gf, I've discovered that the praise culture that develops in gifted classrooms leads to egomania among the students. Gifted students learn faster/better, but that doesn't make them special. They have other failings that average students may not have. I still have ego problems (I'll do just about anything for praise, and I have real problems internalizing criticism) but I'm better than I was. I don't know how any of what I've said answers your original question, but I guess I'm trying to say that teaching and raising 'gifted' kids is definitely not a solved problem.
I think humbleness is sorely lacking amongst people with talent. When you match humbleness with talent, you get people like Linus Torvalds. Check out this article at Wired. It was linked from the front page of Slashdot a while back but I'm too lazy to look for the link. The first sentence of the article is "Linus Torvalds wants me to believe he's too boring for this story." I kinda doubt someone like ESR would ever be the subject of an article that started out that way. Arrogance is a real problem amongst the geek culture, and I think it's arrogance that stands between many geeks and a thriving social life. I work as a co-op student at a local software company, and I'm fortunate to work with a few bright people--all graduates of computer programmes at a fairly prestigious university. The social lives of my co-workers are just about inversly proportional to their level of arrogance.
Perhaps it is the socially-skilled people who curtail their arrogance, and not the humble people who garner lots of friends--I can't determine causation from correlation--but it's obvious to me that the two attributes go hand in hand, and I think it's telling that my circle of friends has a rather narrow radius whereas my ego sometimes gets stuck on the doorframe.
Ian
What is the great need to 'change' him, so that he 'fits in better' with 'normal people'.
Let the fucking kid be himself, and allow him to be proud of who is is. Allow him to grow into whatever personality he is most comfortable with.
"Tell him he might have to wind up running human emotions under emulation if necessary.
Not knowing what the hell is wrong with him will stress him a lot more than having something, anything, he can deal with."
Maybe this is an improper or even crass question, but when exactly did it become popular for everyone to have a pet disorder? It's really quite pathetic. No one is a bit shy anymore, they have Asperger's syndrome, no one feels under the weather for a time, they have chronic fatigue syndrome, no one dreads going to work in a drab boring office tower, they suffer from sick building syndrome etc. If you want to teach him about Asperger's syndrome, do him a bigger favor and also teach him about how certain psychoanalytical trends have all the earmarks of fad diagnoses.
I submit that what you have proposed here is possibly the worst solution to a kids problem of shyness (even if it's to the point of 'painful' shyness). Telling him: you have X syndrome, you better learn to deal with it now so you can start spending the rest of your life "running human emotions under emulation" is downright depressing and gives him an excuse to throw his hands up and essentially absolve himself of any personal responsibility to remedy his situation.
Would it not be better to provide guidance on how to have REAL relationships with people, find friends of his own interest and maybe gradually introduce him to participation in fun activities with his own peer group??
- "Hear that?! The percolations are imminent! Cease your ingress!"
At least, to some degree. I am still something of an introvert, though lately I simply don't have enough money to go out. (I don't really have enough money to put gas in my car this week.) Before you ask, since broadband costs per month about what it would cost to go to dinner someplace decent once, I don't feel like it's an inappropriate use of my money.
I was considered a "gifted child", I went to a private school only for gifted children for a year and a half or so, before I was apparently kicked out for being violent or something. I have no recollection of the event, besides crying on the way home, and that they gave me a coupon for a free ice cream cone. After that day I went to public school, which was bad from start to finish. They had a GATE ("gifted and talented education" program) which was a sad and pathetic joke. For example, because I was one of the younger students, they wouldn't let me participate in their astronomical pursuits. The only thing I really remember from the GATE program was the speed-reading machine, which looked to be of a fairly ancient vintage, and which has pretty much ruined reading for me because I kill off novels in just a few hours. Now that they're $7 for a goddamn paperback, I can't afford to buy new books, except every so often I'll throw down the money for a nice hardcover - the last two non-textbooks I bought were Cryptonomicon and Quicksilver, can you tell I'm a Stephenson fanboy?
Added to all of this was the fact that my parents split up when I was five, and my father (who is an alcoholic, in recovery, and hasn't touched alcohol except to hand it to one of his sons :) in several years) was not around for most of my development - actually, he wasn't really around for most of the time before I was five, either. We have a great relationship now but that definitely altered who I was, and arguably not for the better. Of course, we'll never know, but one thing it certainly must have done was harm my ability to socialize. In addition my mother was somewhat manic depressive and had her own problems forming attachments and my half-brothers were troublemakers (and only lived in the same house as me for about a year and a half, little of which I remember) so the only male role model I ever had was my "Big Brother" as in Big Brothers and Big Sisters. He was a great guy (Hi, Gary!) who worked for Parallel Systems (I think that was the name, they were someplace in or near Santa Cruz which is where I am from, it was definitely Parallel but I don't remember if it was computing, systems, whatever.)
Now the moment you all are waiting for, the moment where computers enter the picture. Actually throughout this time I had a series of computers. The first one I ever owned was a Commodore 16 which my father got me, he got it "cheap" whatever that meant, probably in trade for something. It had no storage, but it did have the box and the manual, and I fiddled around with BASIC. Gary loaned me his Apple ][+ with two floppy drives for a while, and that was much better. Later, I got a shiny new Amiga 500, and a BSR 1200 baud "phone modem", and the rest, they say, is history.
Back then of course internet access was available only from schools or very expensive services, so I BBS'ed, and made friends that way. I really only had a couple friends growing up, and at this point I had made a few more (like five) from summer school, other ingrates like myself who were of course all intelligent and mostly misunderstood. (A couple of 'em really were violent, thieving little bastards, but they were people that I could get along with for the most part.) But the BBSes were a whole new world in which I could represent myself with words until I had the confidence to meet people face to face and employ my drastically underdeveloped people skills, which like most other skills, improve with use.
One of the people I met through the BBSes was another social inept like myself (he, too, improved greatly over time, partly due to social
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
such as the suggestion that those of us with AS are indulging in some kind of fad.
... etc. If you're one of these people, then even if AS is a correct diagnosis, it's critically important that you not label yourself as AS, because it'll just become one more label you hang on yourself as a way of giving yourself permission to fail.
When I was evaluated for AS, my psych told me that I had clear enough symptoms that an AS diagnosis was appropriate... but that ultimately it was up to me whether I had AS. If having the knowledge that my brain was wired differently helped me cope with life, helped me accomodate my shortcomings, let me live a happier and better life, then by all means: let's get the AS diagnosis taken care of.
But the flip side is that a lot of people take diagnoses and turn them into excuses why they can't do $foo, why other people need to accomodate them, why they're
AS is often a fad diagnosis. (The worst I ever saw was a father telling me about his four-year-old with AS. Come on.) But the existence of fad diagnoses does not in any way negate the existence of accurate AS diagnoses, nor the help that self-knowledge can bring.
I have AS. I'm a graduate student; I almost got married once, but it didn't take. I've worked in the industry and received my fair share of glowing recommendations and don't-let-the-door-hit-you-in-the-ass goodbyes. I have the respect of my peers and more friends than I deserve.
None of this happened either because or in spite of Asperger's Syndrome. I'm wholly responsible for all of them--the particular way my head is wired has zero responsibility for any of them.
The way my head is wired is just a fact of existence. What I choose to do with my life... that's up to me.
Frankly, I'm inclined to agree with your call, on that one, Barbara. Upon cursory glance, this student does sound like a classic case.
ASpies are usually filled with a great passion for certain topics that interest them. One way to get them interested in being social is to introduce them to others who share their passions. Even this can be awkward for some, though.
It is useful, in some cases, to teach them that there are very real, practical reasons for gaining social skills. Rare ASpies have been known to be capable of focusing their amazing learning abilities on attaining social graces, from what I understand. They create sets of rules to operate by. They search for patterns in the behaviors of others, so that they can apply their rules. It sounds horrible -- as though it were some sort of act -- but to some degree, a great deal of social behavior is an act, isn't it? Why else would there be etiquette books and finishing schools?
Perhaps what you wish to teach is not social "skills," but, rather, the ability to find pleasure in being social. Can that be taught?
Well, maybe it's best to start with those aforementioned folks who share your student's passions. Start by making things fun!
You need to check out Fast Seduction.
:)
Yeah, it's horrible, flame away, but it works like you wouldn't believe. Good insights into the female mind. I played around with it as an experiment many years ago to help get my people and relationship skills up. It's actually sickening how well it works. 3 second rule is gold in all walks of life. And for gods sakes, get some new clothes and get a haircut and shave. $150 worth of weights and 45 minutes a week will change your appearance forever, and it MATTERS in interviews.
The feynman stuff is as true as EVER. You don't buy a chick anything. You should be trying to get her to buy YOU stuff. Now there's a challenge.
Treating social interaction as a grand experiment is a lot of fun, you might learn something, and maybe get some, too.
Along the same and more depressing lines, check out the Ladder Theory of male/female relationships. It's amusing, but has a ring of truth to it.
Good luck!
..don't panic
When I was going to College, the biggest influence in my confidence and people skills was a job in retail. NOT something even remotely connected to technology. I.E. No Future Suck, Elecsucknics Boutique, etc. Selling clothes or glasses are probably the best.
Other benefits:
1. Money. I mean, who couldn't use some more money? You can buy clothes, haircuts, women, toys; hell, he could even buy a gold brick if there's nothing else he wants.
2. Dress sense. Unless you're in a job that supplies a uniform, you're going to have to learn how to put together a good outfit. Some outfits will suck, especially at first, but soon the good outfits will outnumber the bad.
3. Talking to people all the time who don't give a nut how smart you are. As far as they're concerned, you're dumber than they are.
4. You will learn that a company will stab you in the back, then figure out if it's cheaper to pull out the knife and stab you again, or use a new knife. That's a VERY valuable lesson.
If he'd rather not work, then he's probably already too far gone to help, but the College / University that he's going to should have dozens of clubs. That's probably an okay substitute.
---
ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
RELAX!
As a coder and socialite, I can fill you guys in on the secret.
Coding is a VERY PRECISE SCIENCE.
Talking to people is a VERY RELAXED ART.
On nights that I'm in "code mode" I don't go out and socialize, or party, etc. I write code. The problem with geeks is that we don't spend enough time in social situations. Just like everything else in life, you have to put time into things that are worth doing. In the same way that you can soak up some code by spending time with it, you can soak up social graces by being around people (that aren't close friends).
PEOPLE ARE NOT COMPUTERS. If you don't put a comma in the right place, or you don't puncuate your sentences properly, your conversation will still compile. The only way to mess up a conversation is to OVERTHINK or OVERANALYZE it. The best thing to do is just talk to everyone as if they were a close family member or friend. Ask them about their day... Ask the cashier at Publix or Kroger if she/he's been busy today. They'll chat with you.
Also, don't chat with people just for a predefined GOAL. People can see right through that (especially girls). Share a few sentences with the grocery bagger EVEN THOUGH YOU HAVE NOTHING TO GAIN FROM HIM. It will do 2 things - it will relax you when talking to a stranger, and it will help you build your basic conversational topics.
Hell, start small. When you call 411 and ask for a number, and the chick is looking it up, ask her if she's been busy. Ask her if shes based out of your town. If it's a dude, do the same thing. Learn to just talk to people and act like you care what they are telling you. But DON'T BE CREEPY. Listen to what they say and follow up on it briefly, but don't linger on things. When your bags are done being placed in your shopping cart, tell the person, "good luck."; or "have a good day". or whatever. Being social is not nearly as complex as learning a programming language; so stop looking at people like every period, semicolon, comma matters.
People are very basic.
The end result is that you'll be more relaxed in general when talking with people. You won't have a "goal" when talking to someone, and people won't think that you do and they'll just talk about whatever with you.
Alcohol helps, but it's not a solution.
Once you find the "keyword" that you and the little slut have in common, you can milk it and show your intelligence on the subject and then bed her.
Stay tuned for Chapter 2: Intermediate conversation - In this chapter we'll discuss how to tell her things like, "Don't wake me up when you leave tomorrow..." and "I really appreciate the head, but I'd be really impressed if you made me a sandwich..."
Don't think that a small group of dedicated individuals can't change the world. It's the only thing that ever has.
When I was 16 I decided that I would be happier if I normalized myself. Based on studies on soviet alcholics I concluded that if I did enough brain damage I'd be close to normal
Well it didn't normalize me but the thing I discovered was that when drinking heavily I was charismatic and appraochable. I had spent 2 years in the gym but had no luck with women. *bang* as soon as I have as much booze in me as a squad of navy pilots on leave I was irrisistable. by the time I was 18 there was a list of girls who would go to parties only if I was going to be there.
I also figured out that all I had to do was act like I did when drunk and I was much better with people (the eye contact, energetic voice, the warm smile, being happy to see people, etc). You do not have to ever have the "social skills" all you really have to have is the ability to emulate the social skills. this is basic acting people. It doesn't have to come naturally but you do have to be able to study what charismatic people do and be able to parrot it.
Body building also doesn't hurt. Women as well as men judge you initially based on the only thing they have and that is appearance. Besides it is just like any other RPG, it is all about leveling.
Martial arts? been there done that. If you live in fear this might seem like the answer. Unfortunatly your charismatic martial artist is about as common as your charismatic astro physisist (maybe less, I understand that Hawking used to be great fun at parties). This is only a good idea if he is getting beat up and then, only if he feel the opposition is not going to feel his new found skills entitle them to equalize the situation whether it be through numbers or weapons.
If he is as sharp as you say; above and beyond all else remember he doesn't have to socialize with people his own age. Grab him a few PHDs and post grads from fields that interest him and let them play together. Or see if he can just start college early (some places will pay for it if he his still a minor) The people who are mean to him now, will dead end shortly after high school and that they will never matter like they seem to right now. It is a couple rough years but after that everything gets better.
This one should go AC as some of it sounds like bragging and the rest might sound sociopathic to some.
Take them to Burning Man!!!
I guarantee you - if you have never been, you and your outlook on life will be different.
If you want the least frustrating experience - find some friends to go with, or ones who have gone. Or, find out if you have a regional burn group - and go to the regional burn, or any one of the other events that the group may sponsor or host. Get involved with the art, with the sound, with the sights - get involved with the people!
Believe me, you won't feel too weird anymore afterward - Burning Man introduces whole new levels of strangeness into your life.
My first Burn was last year. My only regret is not going sooner. The people I met, the friends I made, the art I experienced - I was made anew.
As part of this re-making, I learned something that should be common sense, especially for someone my age - but it wasn't. It is something fundamentally important, that I missed all of these years - and learning it led to my final decision to go to Burning Man. If it hadn't been for the wonderful friends I have, I might have missed this simple truth:
A stranger can only become a friend through getting to know them. If they act like they don't like you, or don't want to talk to you, it most likely isn't you. It's them. In other words, if you are being polite and doing everything to be friendly with someone you don't know, and they still shun you - move on. It is they who have the problem, not you.
Teach them that, let them learn it - then take them to Burning Man.
Both of your lives will never be the same again.
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
The other disciplines which have been helping us too-smart-for-our-own-good people get in touch with their bodies are the studies of music and dance. For the clueless, I particularly recommend study in strict formal traditions where they tell you things like "This is right/this is wrong" rather than "Just express yourself." In addition to making practitioners more in touch with their bodies, both disciplines have interesting social effects. They can provide a modality of interaction particularly suited to shy people, one which doesn't involve small talk; they can provide both cooperative and competitive interactions.
-*- Any technology indistinguishable from magic is insufficiently advanced -*-
Put gifted kids together.
Yep, that is the best way (from my personal experience).
It not only helps them to gain some social skill from the interaction with similar kids, the moral support I got from these groups was very healthy too. You are surrounded by a bunch of kids who all have the same problems, and that helps you to deal with the bullies. I developped a "I am more intelligent than this jerk, so I dont care what he says"-attitude that helped me survive school.
Granted this is arrogant and needs to be overcome when you reach adulthood, but IMO it's still better than what other people I know have experienced. Not knowing that they were more intelligent, they felt as "cheaters" because they performed well on tests without learning, something that was preached by their teachers to be "impossible". Thereof their whole succes in life seamed a lie to them and they lived in fear that this lie will be discovered one day. Also they felt isolated because nobody understood them.
And they were the lucky ones that did well in school instead of malperforming because they got bored.
The day they first joined a group of very intelligent people generally comes to them as a relieve and sometimes even as an "enlightenment". I literally saw a woman in her fifties burst in tears on her first Mensa meeting. Having contact to other kids that understand and respect him will not only teach him social skills but also show him that he's not alone in the world, but that there are others just like him.
So dont wait for him to make this discovery later in life, but get him in touch with similiar children now. Contact the gifted children program of Mensa or a specialized organisation like the American Association for Gifted Children to see if they have a local group of gifted children.
BTW, from my experience gifted children are far more likely to accept someone much younger or older in their groups than "normal" children. I guess they are happy to find someone that understands them at all, so age doesnt matter that much. (I still wouldnt advice to put a 5-year-old in a group of 16-year-olds ;)
I also was a member of a chessclub which is important as it gets you in touch with "normal" people. Not hyperintelligent, but not the typical school bullies either. But it didnt gave me the same emotional satisfaction as the gifted children group.
Finally, dont expect wonders. I still wasnt "Mr. Popular" in school, but I always had some few, but good friends, even some (even fewer) girlfriends and was happy. But even then, and despite the fact that I got to a highschool for "better" students, it was sometimes pretty rough at school. But when I got to (I guess the US equivalent is college), I fund it very funny that the same people that bullied me before became very nice to me. Suddenly they were concerned about their marks and guess who they did turn to with their problems in Math ;-p ;-p
I didnt abuse my new power and didnt let them abuse me with this new promise of "popularity" either, but kept friendly and acquired a nice middle position in the hierarchy. I suddenly got invited to parties and became a somewhat more normal, but rather shy student.
Now, at university, I'm almost on the top of the food chain
I have discovered a truly remarkable proof for my post which this sig is too small to contain.
Wow, what's your charisma at, like 19? I'd get the kid to reroll if possible.
Corporations: your universal scapegoat for all society's ills.
90% of TKD schools are McDojos (bullshido.com), so my advice to anyone who thinks of learning TKD: MAKE SURE YOU DO NOT GET HOSED. There are some really crappy schools out there. Make sure you learn self defense, not how to dance. Click the link to find some good advice. And yes, I speak from personal experience. Thank god for Jeet Kune Do.
That's right. All your base.
Dude, nothing- and I mean NOTHING- fucked me up MORE in high school and grade school than the goddamned jocks. If you're not a jock, it doesn't matter if you're "on a team" or not- you're shafted into the shittiest position and made a target of opportunity by the opposing team, slammed into "By accident" and blamed for the failures of your own team, and generally shat on until you're ground into dust.
You want to fuck the kid up, stick him with a bunch of primates that play sports all day. See how he likes his life in a few years.
You might be kidding about this, but I don't think you're all wrong.
You need to expose these kind of people to real social situations: including drinking, etc.
The best example I can come up with is as follows:
Back in high school I used to hang out a the local Starbucks a LOT. Most of my high school clique did too. (If if makes anything make more sense, I've always been a computer geek, but was very popular in high school. I wasn't just hanging out with Linux geeks at this Starbucks...)
In any case, this kid named Eric started showing up. He was the most shy person I have ever met, but obviously wanted social interaction. He'd come up to Starbucks, pull up a chair next to our table, and not say a word. When you asked him a question, he'd mumble a response so low you'd have to ask him to repeat it 4 times. He wouldn't speak, he wouldn't say anything at all.
About a year later, we convinced him to come to a party with us. And he drank. He got drunk. And he talked at a normal tone! He actually TALKED.
It wasn't an instant cure, but over the months following that, Eric came out more. At first he would only talk while he was drinking. But as time went by, he became comfortable with talking, and when I last saw him, his social problems had entirely disapeared.
You might be kidding about the "Get him drunk" comment, but I ask everyone to think for a sec: "Why do most people drink?" in the first place?
Even for those of us without hardcore social interaction problems, it's because it still helps us loosen up, etc.
You may not be as off with your "Get him drunk" comment as people might assume.
Sig.i>
As a kid, I had a hard time with communicating with other kids my age just because I was so much smarter than they were. A second grader who reads highschool science textbooks for fun doesn't really have much in common with other second grade girls who's idea of a hard book is The Babysitter's Club series.
Plus, it can be rather isolating when even most adults haven't got a clue about the things you're interested in.
Sometimes I think that it would be easier to be average and to go along happily clueless of anything below the surface of things.
Eagles may soar, but weasles don't get sucked into jet engines...
I agree with what you did. What would assaulting the man have done? There are plenty of people who did fucked up (similar) things to me in my past and I seek no revenge. The events have passed. My hurting them won't help any others; and it won't help me.
Photos.
When I was in college, We had this one professor who was brilliant at his work (numerical methods in astrophysics) and a good teacher. However the guy had no social skills outside of his teaching, and he looked like a tramp. A fellow student ran into him at a train station one day and said "hi!", the professor actually RAN AWAY SCARED.
I was a terminal nerd at the time, but meeting an intelligent guy in his '50s who was less well adjusted to the world than most students, scared the hell out of me. It was like being visited by the ghost of Christmas future.
I'm still rather antisocial, but after watching a possible future played out so vividly, I started to take acquiring social skills a lot more seriously.
Karate can be helpful, but not for everyone. I am currently in the same situation, however, I am lucky enough to go to a large school where I can literally become invisible to avoid teasing/bullying. I haven't been picked on since middle school. The only classes I'm really comfortable in are my technology classes (and I'm a girl - it's hard to fit here too!), so I've made my extracurricular fit me. My high school has a FIRST robotics team. It's great - everyone works super hard to uild and design a robot in 6 weeks, then we get to go to Regionals and some people get to go to Nationals! For someone who may be uninterested in sports or other activities, this could allow him to be with other people that share his interests. The competitions are great! It's like a rock concert, literally, with out the drinking and fights and for geeks. Even if he's not so interested in robots, as I am not (but am more interested now after 2 years), there are other things you can do. The robot is programmed in C and there's a seperate smaller competition for a 3D animation built with 3D Studio Max. I have to say, this is the best experience of high school so far. I don't quite fit at school yet, but I've made friends that might pick on me for being nerdy, but I can pick on them back :-P
I remember on one project, I was so pissed off that someone had given us something completely stupid, and practically impossible to do. Mark knew exactly how to handle it -- he told me that they were expecting me to fail, and that I should do it just to prove them wrong. He knew exactly how to turn my anti-social tendancies into a benefit, not a handicap. [and I turned my part of the project in on time... too bad the contractor never did, and walked with over 50% of the hardware, and never produced any of the software, that he was supposedly 'working on in [his] test lab'.]
In a small company, yes, everyone will probably have to do a little bit of customer relations. In a large company, with good managment, they will know how to deal with various personality quirks, and how to get the most of each person. [And likewise, if a particular person is worth the trouble]. Unfortunately, Mark got promoted, and I was hung out to dry by a completely 'hands off' manager, and was fired by his boss for pointing out his mistakes repeatedly.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.