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To say you’ve been coasting through the school year would be an understatement.
You’re not one to boast, but when you look around the classroom you get a strong feeling
that you don’t deserve to be among this rabble of underachievers.
You imagine in the past they’d all be sitting there wearing dunce caps, those hats almost
falling off as they try and look over your shoulder to get the right answers.
Surely the teachers must have noticed that you don’t belong with these undisciplined
fools.
Why haven’t you been moved up a grade?
This is plain, unalloyed injustice.
Why don’t they see this?
Or, perhaps it’s all in your head.
Maybe you’re on an ego-trip that can be classed as delusions of grandeur.
Today we’ll take a look at how you might really know for sure you if you have superior
smarts.
So, you might think the only way to prove this would be through testing.
If you keep scoring higher, surely you must be more intelligent.
But intelligence is complicated, and while some really smart kids might do ok on tests,
they might not always be able to get the highest scores.
A test score doesn’t always mirror intelligence, and not everyone is good at memorizing answers.
Let’s now look at some research.
You’re curious You often ask questions.
You want to know how everything works.
You sit and ponder the meaning of life.
Life itself to you in all its facets seems fascinating.
You might have heard about IQ, or EQ, but do you know about CQ, which is the curiosity
quotient.
It relates to a person that has a hungry mind.
In the Harvard Business Review Dr. Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic said that people with lots of curiosity might
soon get bored of routine tasks.
They thirst for more knowledge, which might be a reason these people don’t always get
the best scores on tests.
Maybe they require more exciting classes, new subjects, even a different learning environment.
These are not lazy kids, but they can become stultified quickly if they are not faced with
new things to learn.
They embrace complexity, and they don’t always get that in class.
You’ll know if you are one of these curious people.
That doctor quoted the renowned scientist Albert Einstein, who said, “I have no special
talents.
I am only passionately curious.”
Einstein also said people should never stop questioning.
Reading at a young age One study published in the UK that said children
who read at a younger age tend to do better later in education.
One of the authors of the study said, “We found that those who are better at reading
tend to be smarter later in their development.”
To come to this conclusion they tracked identical twins over nine years.
The reason they did this of course is because identical twins share genes and grow up in
the same family.
So you have the same environment and the same genetic factors.
The study said that when kids start reading fiction early they learn to use their imagination;
they have to imagine other worlds and reason with characters who might be good or bad.
Lots of other studies have also shown how reading fiction can make a person more empathetic,
because the reader is asked to put themselves in someone else’s shoes.
Reading can also of course help a person with their grammar and expand their vocabulary.
There’s more, too.
Another study published in the Public Library of Science said that reading fiction can improve
both emotional intelligence and empathy.
So, if you’re curious and maybe reading lots of books on how things work, or your
reading fictional literature and becoming part of someone else’s world, it seems this
can make you smarter in various ways.
We shouldn’t really have to tell you that reading can make you smart, but lots of kids
hardly ever pick up books to read when they have some free time.
We are not only talking about books you have to read as part of a curriculum.
If you’re the kid that always has his nose in a book, or at least does that quite often,
it’s most likely that you are learning a lot about the world and the people in it.
You’re messy Ok, so your parents are going to hate us for
this, but hey, don’t shoot the messenger.
Plenty of scientists have said that embracing disorder can be a good thing.
The authors of one study wrote, “Disorderly environments seem to inspire breaking free
of tradition, which can produce fresh insights.”
Messy people might be very creative, they might have a method to their madness.
Another study undertaken by the University of Minnesota Carlson School of Management
said messiness can ignite creativity and innovation.
Some people seem to think that messy kids might sometimes be kids ready to challenge
systems that are in place.
They are thinking outside of the box.
A different study by researchers at the University of Iowa said when really young kids are messy
this might help with their education.
The reason was because young kids tend to be curious and pick things up and put them
down.
They create their own little chaos, much to the chagrin of their parents.
They are forever looking around and playing with things.
These studies about messiness are usually related to creativity and out-of-the-box thinking,
and we are sure plenty of tidy kids are also smart.
We’re just saying that your mess might mean something positive, which for many years has
not been the case in traditional thinking.
You might stay up late Your parents are going to hate us for this
one, too, but we found studies that said night owls tend to do well in school.
One such study, published in the journal, Personality and Individual Differences, said
kids who stay up late might have novel values, or individual values, and that might help
their intelligence.
It might sound crazy to you, but Psychology Today explained that most animals follow a
sleep pattern and that’s just what they are genetically programmed to do.
Humans on the other hand create a bespoke sleeping regimen.
We can be night owls or morning larks.
You’ve likely heard that early to bed and early to rise is the healthy thing to do.
Embrace the sunrise and all that.
But it seems more inquisitive people stay up late.
We should say this might be related to older children and in no way are we endorsing young
kids stay up all night.
It just might be that some older teens in high school that stay up late might be demonstrating
their individuality.
You roll with the grown ups An article published by the BBC talked about
exceptionally gifted children.
According to that piece, some gifted kids show early on that they can hold their own
in adult conversations.
These kids might be continually surprising their parents with insights, or they might
get jokes that usually kids just don’t get.
This might mean they have figured out complex language patterns or the nuances of adult
humor.
Their parents will be taken aback at times by their language skills, and this no doubt
will also impress teachers if the kid doesn’t use this maturity to breach some classroom
rules.
Remembering patterns Gifted children might also remember patterns
and sequences, such as they can tell you when the next train is coming or they know what
time a certain TV show will air each week.
That might not mean they are simply addicted to TV, but they are observing things in the
world.
Speaking to the Huffington Post, an educational specialist said gifted kids watch and observe,
they keep their eyes peeled, whether looking outside or looking at other people.
She said, “This is because brighter children’s brains are more receptive earlier than more
typical children’s brains.
They eagerly and naturally absorb from their environment so much that adults are often
surprised at what they seem to already know!”
This might also be related to having a heightened sensitivity, so this kid will know when something
is wrong or when someone is sad.
They have observed this before, they know the pattern, they have read the scene.
You can delay gratification This is all about impulse control and planning.
There’s a famous test in which kids were asked to choose whether they would one cookie
now or wait a while and have two.
It turned out that many of the youngsters who could delay gratification not only got
double the cookies but also went on to score better in high school exams and then did better
in life after school as well.
Having this ability to hold back and understand it’s better to wait means more self-control,
which is a big factor in success and well-being.
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That’s monday.com with the code “infographics” Do you share any of these traits?
Did they match up with how you did in school?
Tell us in the comments.
Now go watch our video on the “Scientifically Proven Best Ways to Study”.
Thanks for watching, and as always, don’t forget like, share and subscribe.
See you next time.