This magical "gift" you keep referencing is what? Can you define it? Is this "gift" quantifiable and measurable? Is "gift" an all or none entity that exists in realtime; or waxes and wanes and even disappears and reappears over time?

Can you quantify and measure (please name the instrument or tool you will use) in NOVA 5 year olds which kids have "gifts" that will translate into a future NBA hall of famer, a Nobel Laureate in Medicine, a future President of the USA, an acclaimed writer, the next Tiger Woods, 2400 on the SAT in the 10th grade, a world class pianist, a professional lacrosse player, a world class mathematician for example?

You throw around the label gift and gifted for humans as if you know what this is, how to identify it and how to measure and quantify it? Please advise the appropriate age to identify, quantify and measure this "gift" --- at conception, in the womb, at birth, at 1 year of age, in K in Grade 9, in Grade 12, in University, at age 35, when accepting the Nobel or Pulitzer prizes or the NBA ring?

You throw around the Cogat and NNAT and WISC as tools that measure this "gift"? How do these tests in a 5-year-old identify NOVA kids with the "gift" for a Nobel Physics prize, the White House, the Pulitzer prize, the next Biil Gates, the Phi Beta Kappa, concert violinist, great public speaker? What specific "gifts" do these tests identify in NOVA 5-year-olds? What metric do these tests use to quantify and label all these "gifted" NOVA kids? How many gifted NOVA 5-year-olds are out there? We must know this number as this is the most tested generation of the ages. And many of these NOVA 5-year-olds with these specific, measurable and quatifiable "gifts" make it into Who's Who (become Nobel laureates, Presidents, Pulitzer Prize winners and NFL football players? Does a super fast 40 yard dash in a 5-year qualify for an Olympic Gold in 16 years down the road. Or an 8-yr old age group national champ predict the next Michael Phelps?

Michael Jordan had a tough time making his high school basketball team in the day. He was certainly not the early annointed one.

It's easy to tell me from the retrospectocope (in hindsight) who has a gift after all the prizes and accolades are won? But, can you tell me which 5-year-old in NOVA has a gift for anything damn thing but to eat, cry, poop and bedwet based on your definition of gift and how you measure and quantify the gift in NOVA 5-year-olds?

Kids keep on prepping. You don't know when your number will be called and chance favors the prepared mind and body.

The "gift" is a necessary but not sufficient element of "success". The gift, coupled with hard work may get you there. Michael Jordan did not become the greatest basketball player ever just on the gift, but, others worked just as hard, but did not have the natural ability.

Similarly, I have worked with people that were hard working -- always hard working, but did not have the intellectual horsepower. There are people who are intellectually gifted and hard workers, and they are the intellectual leaders. As an example, Steve Jobs is notorious for his hard work. But, there are many people that worked just as hard that did not have his vision.

Hard work coupled with giftedness can make one a leader in the field, whether it be basketball, football, baseball, poetry, or physics.

Exposure to concepts in the home is not the same thing as training that involves completing multiple sample tests in advance.

Environment can surely affect intelligence in multiple ways but people are not born with equal gifts in all things. Roger Bannister was a gifted athlete who trained hard to achieve a sub 4:00 mile. His achievement would have been impossible were he not born with athletic ability. Some people are more athletic than others, some are more musical than others, some are more artistic, some are better leaders, and some are more intelligent than others. We just all have different strengths and talents. We can work hard and achieve to the best of our ability, but some people just start out with more ability than others.
And actual achievements in the long run are more important than the measure of potential.

Sure, it can be. You'd be surprised at the intensity of exposure in certain NOVA households with books, science, computer, architectural and engineering kits, the internet, computer, online courses, games and the like.

It would put completing multiple sample tests in advance to shame.

Open your eyes and ears and think of the things intelligent and educated parents can simulate for their eager and smiling children in their primary and secondary education.

Exposure to concepts in the home is not the same thing as training that involves completing multiple sample tests in advance.

Environment can surely affect intelligence in multiple ways but people are not born with equal gifts in all things. Roger Bannister was a gifted athlete who trained hard to achieve a sub 4:00 mile. His achievement would have been impossible were he not born with athletic ability. Some people are more athletic than others, some are more musical than others, some are more artistic, some are better leaders, and some are more intelligent than others. We just all have different strengths and talents. We can work hard and achieve to the best of our ability, but some people just start out with more ability than others.
And actual achievements in the long run are more important than the measure of potential.

Is "actual achievement in the long run" dependent on a "gift" or the environment, drive, purpose, focus, dedication and preserverance?

How do you this "measure potential" you speak of? I suspect many have it and few use it.

Exposure to concepts in the home is not the same thing as training that involves completing multiple sample tests in advance.

Environment can surely affect intelligence in multiple ways but people are not born with equal gifts in all things. Roger Bannister was a gifted athlete who trained hard to achieve a sub 4:00 mile. His achievement would have been impossible were he not born with athletic ability. Some people are more athletic than others, some are more musical than others, some are more artistic, some are better leaders, and some are more intelligent than others. We just all have different strengths and talents. We can work hard and achieve to the best of our ability, but some people just start out with more ability than others.
And actual achievements in the long run are more important than the measure of potential.

When did you and the world know Sir Roger Bannister was a gifted athlete? At conception, in the womb, when he was born, in primary school when he broke the 4 minute mile? Did Sir Roger develop and mature into a gifted track athletic with training, drive, focus and preserverance starting (and of course, 2 normal legs and arms and a cardiopulmonary pump) in the early years?

I disagree. The average organism (which most of us are) can be trained to be experts and gifted at many tasks. I am not speaking about those few at the either tail of the Bell shaped curve. Many at the upper tail, without exposure, training and work, amount to a hill of beans.

Expertise and success in law, business, medicine, journalism, sports (Track, NBA, NFL, Baseball, Tennis, Swimming etc), politics, debating, arts is much more about hard work and training than "gift". Many, many, many more individuals have the potential ("gift") but not always the drive, dedication, focus, preparation, hard work and preserverance.

I therefore disagree with you completely. You ascribe the final station and success of individuals to the mysterious concept of "gift". I think you are hung up on the gift and gifted label. Many individuals with potential ("gift") in life get derailed by the environment. This includes enviromental conditions of the womb, the mother and father, the home and school or lack thereof. How do you separate out those individuals with gifts from those that are derailed by circumstances biologic circumstances beyond their control in the womb and early life. How do can you tell when someone born with this "gift" gets derailed or the "gift" is taken away. When and how do you establish an individual has a gift or do you wait until they get into the NBA or get a Nobel Prize the make this assessment?

Exposure to concepts in the home is not the same thing as training that involves completing multiple sample tests in advance.

Environment can surely affect intelligence in multiple ways but people are not born with equal gifts in all things. Roger Bannister was a gifted athlete who trained hard to achieve a sub 4:00 mile. His achievement would have been impossible were he not born with athletic ability. Some people are more athletic than others, some are more musical than others, some are more artistic, some are better leaders, and some are more intelligent than others. We just all have different strengths and talents. We can work hard and achieve to the best of our ability, but some people just start out with more ability than others.
And actual achievements in the long run are more important than the measure of potential.

If a very young child approached me about trying to get a great education. And this child came from a poor, pathetic, parentless, home environment and did not attend a fancy pre-school or K you bet I would coach and mentor that child and expose the child to what my children have been exposed to in their home and community environment. And after some time I will marvel at the plasticity of mental performance when they catch up or even exceed their advantaged peers. The earlier the intervention the more likely the success. I really don't care if the kid takes away one of the entitled AAP seats. It that happens, it is even more deserving!

Again, people are confusing working hard and test prep. When people are looking for test prep materials, they do not want to be told to just read to your child and expose your child to lots of varied enriching activities. When someone asks where to go for test prep, they are typically looking for books or programs that provide sample tests for the child to complete. They want the child to be taught specific techniques to do well on a specific test.

That is the kind of test prep that people object to, because those tests (CogAT and NNAT) were designed for children to take without having seen that type of material before. It is not the same thing as providing a child with rich educational experiences throughout their growing years and encouraging your child to work hard in school.

No one here is confused. Preparation, test prep, raised test scores. Books or programs that provide sample tests for a child to complete and prepare for a test raises test scores. Witness the 100,000 students that have "test prepped" with completion of multiple SAT books review and significantly raised their test scores.

A child doesn't have to see a CogAT or NNAT to prep for this or any other test. Simple knowledge of the domains examined in CogAT and NNAT by school teachers, parents, older siblings is enough to expose a child over a short or long period of time to the concepts tested and to understand the questions asked.

I submit no one here is confused about these issues. CogAT and NNAT exercises are not a foreign language to kids prepped or prepared by extensive reading and writing, mathematics, geometry/shapes, puzzles, analogies, etc. An educated middle or high school student could expose a 5 and 6-year-old to all the concepts in these tests without the need for books, sample tests and the like. I think you are making way to much of these simple tests for educated families that know the drill and how to raise kids and place them in the right schools to get the proper teaching and exposure to all the tested domains and concepts. Send the kids off to the proper enrichment camps where they play with legos, puzzles and do all of the tasks seen on these exams. You must think these tests are super special testing never seen or heard of concepts for a 5-year-old or intelligent educated parent? Do you think the high performing students in the area used books and sample tests to prepare? You can ... but we all know it's not necessary. Read, write, and understand mathematics and I guanrantee you will not fail this test. In order to pass, a child must engage in these activities and tasks...a condition of prepping or preparation.

Talking about books, sample tests, the real test are really semantic diversions. A nurturing family and school environment gives our kids the answers to all these questions in advance. There's really no need for the actual test before hand.

A good course in genetics (genomics, epigenomics) and brain development will go along way to helping lay people grasp the logic of faulty concepts such as "fixed" intelligence. 21st and 2nd century man, I suspect, are two different creatures when it comes to "fixed" intelligence, relative "intellectual performance" and the tools and instruments one would measure this with. I wonder how the 2nd century man would perform on the WISC test? Since intelligence is "fixed" according to some the scores should be roughly the same ... as should metabolic and physiologic imaging of their respective brains overtime? Does anyone here even think these metabolic and physiologic developmental brain images would be equivalent? Presumably this is the substrate that gives rise to intelligence.

One does not even have to go back as far as the 2nd century to witness plasticity and malleabilty of mental/intellectual and physical performance.

Think about some of the "physical barriers" of man ("fixed" intelligence and physical performance analogy). Anyone remember the 4 min mile biologic restraint in the first half of the 20th century. Sir Roger Bannister, an Oxford medical student and later physician, destroyed this barrier when he cracked the impossible -- a sub 4 minute mile! Today, a half a century later this is a routine accomplishment.

There is plasticity of the musculo-skeletal and cardiopulmonary system of man that make these physical achievements possible (witness the falling performance records over time) and thus physical performance not "fixed".

There is plasticity of the neuronal and neurologic/nervous system of man making intelligence, similarly, not "fixed".

Kids keep prepping. That's what Sir Roger Bannister did and proved the naysayers flatly wrong.

Again, people are confusing working hard and test prep. When people are looking for test prep materials, they do not want to be told to just read to your child and expose your child to lots of varied enriching activities. When someone asks where to go for test prep, they are typically looking for books or programs that provide sample tests for the child to complete. They want the child to be taught specific techniques to do well on a specific test.

That is the kind of test prep that people object to, because those tests (CogAT and NNAT) were designed for children to take without having seen that type of material before. It is not the same thing as providing a child with rich educational experiences throughout their growing years and encouraging your child to work hard in school.

The thing is I can not make the NBA. My body type and my height would not let me: I am a power forward and how many 6'2" power forwards are there?

It is much less likely to have a woman playing at the NBA or NFL level (maybe kicker...)

Wrong on both coulnts: I am 6'2", and male. I maybe could have played football at Division I, but not pro.

I was wrong then. I yield. But, you would agree you would have a significantly far greater chance of reaching the Pros (NBA) than a woman. The number of woman ballers in the history of the NBA would support this view?

A good course in genetics (genomics, epigenomics) and brain development will go along way to helping lay people grasp the logic of faulty concepts such as "fixed" intelligence. 21st and 2nd century man, I suspect, are two different creatures when it comes to "fixed" intelligence, relative "intellectual performance" and the tools and instruments one would measure this with. I wonder how the 2nd century man would perform on the WISC test? Since intelligence is "fixed" according to some the scores should be roughly the same ... as should metabolic and physiologic imaging of their respective brains overtime? Does anyone here even think these metabolic and physiologic developmental brain images would be equivalent? Presumably this is the substrate that gives rise to intelligence.

Anonymous wrote:

PP: I am 95% certain you are incorrect. You take the best athletes, and they will excel at the sport they are prepped for. I can assure you no amount of prep is going to make me an NBA player. No amount of prep is going to make me an NFL player. The thing is the natural athletes with the desire to exceed will exceed at their chosen sport. How else can you explain the athletes that devote most of their energy to one sport, but can also play a second sport at a high level....Bo Jackson comes to mind.

Similarly, there are people that are just smarted than other people. Training and prep can make the test scores look as good, and the evaluations look comparable. However, in the end, they will not be the intellectual leaders of society....they will not be the Albert Einsteins, the Steve Jobs (or Wozniak).

I'll give you one up. I am 99 % certain no amount of prep is going to make you an NBA player of football lineman. Afterall, you are less than 6 ft 2 inches tall and are female. There are biological constraints for the average female related to hormones (testosterone, growth hormone, estrogen, progesterone levels and the like) making your desire and uphill battle. But, the average male will have a much better chance.

Wrong on both coulnts: I am 6'2", and male. I maybe could have played football at Division I, but not pro.