Einstein

"Do you know what Einstein's most famous quote is?"

I was not aware he had a famous quote other than that crazy E=MC business and if my little Einstein explains that to me I will have to hire a tutor and pull him out of public school. "Nope," I so intelligently reply watching him in the rearview mirror with his face hidden by the cover of his 50 American Heroes book that the Easter bunny so cleverly found for him, unable to purchase any toys that would interest him anymore.

"The fourth World War will be fought with sticks and stones."

"Huh." I digest this. Interesting. So Albert was an Einstein afterall. His mathematics did help to develop the very weapons that could wipe out humankind and this is his famous quote. So on the way to a haircut we discuss this. Nuclear warfare, intelligence, reducing the world to cavemen fighting with sticks and stones. It was an interesting ride. Just another fascinating conversation with my eight year old.

I do not have the courage to tell him that he has not qualified again for the gifted program at his school although he is repeatedly invited to be tested for it. He does amazingly well on state standardized tests yet cannot do well on the nonverbal portion of the Cogat test. So year after year his teachers are impressed with his vocabulary, wisdom and scores but that is not enough. They have never seen his journals of notes and projects. They have never watched him on the floor of his room reading his biographies or researching his latest interest. To them he is one student in a group of students who is quiet, shy and curious but will do his best no matter what is presented. He will conform.

I am going to ask them to stop testing him, to stop searching for the giftedness that is only revealed on their tests. Their constant wondering is taking away what is already there and making him doubt it himself.

"Did I make gifted?" he will ask me again in the fall. "No. They don't know it yet," I will answer holding his self-esteem gently in my hand.

Not their giftedness anyway.