What should a parent do if they suspect their gifted child has ADD (ADHD)?
First, they should seek an evaluation by the best-qualified professional that they can find. Parents should make sure that the professional they select has experience evaluating gifted students with ADD (ADHD). Parents need to learn more about what ADD (ADHD) looks like in bright, inattentive ADD (ADHD) students, and help their son or daughter to learn about this too. Parents who suspect that they too have ADHD should talk openly to their son or daughter about their own struggles. They should help their gifted son or daughter understand that struggles with postponed assignments, sleep difficulties, incomplete homework, careless errors on tests, and unpredictable memory lapses may all be part of a very treatable condition. It’s important that parents also teach their gifted son or daughter about the very positive traits often shared by gifted individuals with ADD (ADHD): • patterns of “divergent” thinking that can lead to rare insight, • a wealth of creative ideas, • an ability to hyper
