One of the childhood disasters that has quite commonly happened to aspies is to be involved with the gifted children movement. Isolated spikes of special ability in an aspie's focal interests may be overoptimistically misconstrued as meaning a high educational ability.
Some progress in an answer just received from the National Association for Gifted Children is of enough interest to need recording fron the reference of anyone who experienced the gifted movement being totally on the side of unchecked teacher authority. They now realise the term "gifted and talented" has impacted some lives badly and they want to call it "high learning potential", okay that could still be dangerous, and they state the objective of " personal success ie what they want to achieve." Now that is seriously progress. As recently as 1998 supporters of New Labour's high pressure policy were openly on radio 4 praising the prospect of "making" the kids work very hard.
And they have now said they are into "developing a children's Bill of Rights" "to help prevent issues of this nature." It is a milestone shift that has come 40 years overdue. Their whole scene needs holding to it.
Maurice Frank
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