Gifted kids: born brilliant or pressured by pushy parents? | 60 Minutes Australia

as the light fades across Sydney's west little sahara hillman varma is well into her fourth hour of training prevalent spurred on by her father a young golfing prodigy is honing the skills that make her one of the most promising talents in the country we just stay on the putting green and dad puts around LED flood lights around the green and then I practice then it's a nightly ritual that ends only after she's nailed the perfect shot do you ever say to him all right dad I think we're getting a bit carried away here or are you saying to him more lights dad at just 12 Sahara's already represented Australia now she's determined to turn professional before she turns 16 how're you playing golf these days um six or seven days a week now at school I'll go to school then I will practice and then I'll come home do some homework if I don't finish that I have to do it at six o'clock in the morning so you play so much golf at night that you get up early in the morning so you can do your homework before school sometimes I have to wake up at 5:30 the everything maybe you're missing out on you know the quality childhood too much golfing not enough time with your friends it's good to have childhood but I don't like I didn't carried away with it because you still have your life priorities and you need to think about that as well so if you had a choice play golf or hanging out with your friends what is it Golf [Music] Sahara's ambitious dreams are shared by her equally ambitious parents Karin and Vik do you think she's just exceptionally gifted or has she been pushed pretty hard both but is there a possibility that you know this is straying towards Sahara living out your dreams and not her dreams they certainly weren't my dreams before they are my dreams now she doesn't want to be in front of the TV she doesn't want to be you know playing video games she doesn't want to be doing all that stuff she wants to be on the grass you can't keep that kid off the grass born with rare talents rivaling those of professional adults a prodigy or supremely gifted child can often display simply breathtaking skills but natural ability will only get them so far and like anyone else they need to practice if they want to make the most of their gifts that's where it gets difficult for parents like Karin and Vic who are often accused of being overzealous and pushing their daughter too hard in the pursuit of glory as anyone ever called either of you psycho golf parent probably well they probably will wrong not to our face you feel it's very much Sahara pushing this yes we divorced so we don't we wouldn't spend nearly as much time together if if Sahara wasn't playing golf it's not I mean walking alien holes of golf with your ex is 36 or 72 holes of golf but we do it because CG wants us to you know and what's not great about that like Sahara piano prodigy Isabella Liu is a little girl with big ambitions at the tender age of nine the tiny virtuoso already spends more than 40 hours each week rehearsing and that's on top of going to school how much practice do you do 5 to 6 hours each day and on the weekends I do 6 to 8 hours when you wake up in the morning you play piano before school yeah one and a half hours do you think you're gonna be famous one day probably if I keep this up do you have a dream yeah I want to tour around the world and perform concerts too a lot of people but her parents Agnes and look insist that intensive workload is completely their daughters decision so for Isabella 36 hours of school awake 46 hours of piano practice yeah it's like a full-time job Wow yeah it's a lot for a young girl yeah it's actually yeah but she does she doesn't really seem tired it's like when you really like something you you don't really feel used you have been spending so much time on it Agnes and Luke say their daughter's hard work and dedication are already paying off this year Isabella became the youngest person in history to headline a performance at the Sydney Opera House no sign of her slowing down anytime soon who pushes Isabella more when it comes to practice is she quite driven or do you have to crack the whip not really we don't really push her to practice a lot we actually push you not to practice though sometimes we have to set the alarm clock and then one maximum 1/2 hour you need to have a break does she have time to socialize yes there's certainly a stereotype about the pushy parent particularly in giftedness but in general there's no pushing from the parents there's a lot of pulling from the child come here and help me with this and it's really about the parents kind of catching up Alan Thompson is the head of Mensa internationals gifted youth committee when it comes to prodigious youngsters he believes it really is the children pushing their parents for more practice time and not the other way around is there such a thing as too much practice for the young children yeah that's a good question so we still talk about the 10,000 hours of practice to achieve mastery which is a number of years depending on how many hours you put into it I think following common sense there and allowing the child to drive it to a certain extent is good how much do parents push it my dad pushes me but they don't force me even though he is really strict on the golf course he gives me like 50 pushups all the time what if you do a bad shot yeah dad once made me do 600 push-ups without stopping and the next day my arms are literally killing me 600 without stopping yep crazy he's still over me and counted it was very sad but it taught me a lesson to outsiders that might seem like a harsh lesson but Karin and Vik maintained that everything they do is with their daughter's best interests at heart Sahara told us that the record so far as you may do do 600 push-ups one day 156 hundred I'm inclined to believe her he was making her do push-ups I was mortified because he did it once during a tournament and I just went walked off I said you you you actually look like one of those parents now there's something just to just to make her focus bring their focus back to her studies and golf and sports and life that you know when you do something wrong there are consequences you'd be aware of overbearing parents like a do me a doc itch or something I mean you do you see that and think okay I need to make sure I don't end up like that there are some parents like that but not us I don't make a depression every child is different and Paul and Lee Ann Hopkins only two aware there are no simple solutions when it comes to nurturing their talents at just 13 their son Nathan boasts an IQ of 137 ranking him in the top 2% of intelligent people on the entire planet do you find your intelligence is a blessing or a curse in some ways it's a blessing in some ways it's a curse though and I get very annoyed at myself a lot that I'm not reaching my full potential what age do you think Nathan became smarter than both of you when he was born we do explain to Nathan you know we're not stupid but there are some things that we do know as parents that he doesn't yet there's other things that he knows that we don't so we try and be a bit of a team most of the time Paulin Leanne say they're just trying to keep up with Nathan yeah and I'm more than happy to let him leave the way right now that means supporting Nathan's attempts to break the world record for solving a Rubik's Cube pretty impressive 14 seconds I see parenting a gifted child as a dance with two partners one being the parent the other being the child and it's about trying to find the same song and the same dance steps together and adjusting and I think it's important for them not to be held back from their own abilities so I was always just trying to meet Nathan wherever here was that and run with it how much do you push Nathan and how much is he a self-starter if he's interested in it you don't need to push him at all if he's not interested in bulldozers I'm not gonna move him too far Alan Thompson agrees it's important for parents to strike a healthy balance and remember that the one thing all children need is a childhood it's hard you have to remind those kids sometimes don't hang out with your mates yeah absolutely I think they get called by whatever their obsession is that might be a chessboard calling to them to come over and play with the pieces or a Rubik's Cube so they can memorize all the different opening algorithms but allowing them to also bring their body back into it for physical translation of intelligence is useful allowing them to play because they're not gonna be a child forever but it's not always that easy to divert a child prodigy away from their true love even when isabella Lou isn't practicing for her next recital she spends most of her time at the piano teaching the next wave of prodigies like her equally talented four-year-old sister Ella issue a good shoe sometimes Ellen who is the best piano player you know is she better than you no definitely not [Laughter] whatever lies ahead for these prodigies nice one thing is for sure their determination to succeed that is how it's done will never fade do you feel like there might come a time you know when you're older when you think you know what mainly I spent a bit too much time on golf when I was there not really I think if you don't have like a priority in life then what's the point of it you need to devote some hours to what you want to do have you thought about what happens if you don't ever get that good I'll keep practicing until I get better hello I'm Tara brown thanks for watching to keep up with the latest from 60 minutes Australia make sure you subscribe to our channel you can also download the 9 now app for full episodes and other exclusive 60 minutes content

Channel: 60 Minutes Australia

Views: 232,541

Rating: 4.619658 out of 5

Keywords: 60 Minutes, 60 Minutes Australia, Liz Hayes, Charles Wooley, Tara Brown, Liam Bartlett, Allison Langdon, Ray Martin, Peter Stefanovic, Jana Wendt, Jeff McMullen, Jennifer Byrne, Mike Munro, Richard Carleton, Tracey Curro, Peter Harvey, George Negus, Ian Leslie, Gerald Stone, Sarah Abo, child prodigy, golf, piano, rubix cube, intelligence, gifted, smart, education, parenting, parents, tom steinfort

Id: K14o0Cpt3lA

Length: 12min 46sec (766 seconds)

Published: Mon Jul 08 2019