When my oldest daughter was in the first grade she could show her teachers how to trouble shoot the computers, was doing math at a 6th grade level, and was also socially well adjusted and an otherwise normal 6 year old who just preferred to hang out with adults.

She struggled with reading and writing and went through a long series of medical and psychological testing to determine why this otherwise brilliant child was so far behind her peers.

I discovered that she simply was not hooked on phonics and that the teaching style was not working for a girl with a photographic memory and highly developed visual processing skills. I developed a teaching program for her that took her from where she was to a high school reading level in a matter of months.

When the test results came back we were told that aside from the issues with reading and writing (she had a massive vocabulary) that she would always struggle with finding peers as she tested off the scale. They said it was like talking with a young adult in the body of a very small girl. By this time I was able to tell the evaluator that she had already caught up and surpassed her peers in reading and writing.

Statistically, she is considered to be 1:2000.

Most important for me was instilling a strong work and study ethic as I understood all too well what it was like to go through school and find that there just wasn't any academic challenge and that it can make one very lazy.

My oldest daughter told me that her little sister is way smarter than she is... The little one does algebra for fun and can multiply 3 digit numbers in her head and has an incredible work ethic and drive to excel in school because it is serious business to her but she says nothing is really that hard.

I went through many of the same things my daughters did when I was younger... Have told them that all the brains in the world are no good unless you learn how to apply what you have learned and that ordinary people excel because of this while some of the smartest people struggle and fail.

I am smart enough to have married my wife and can usually keep up with her and those kids...

Amazing when you consider how hard I worked to kill as many brain cells as possible in my 20's and early 30's.