when I signed up for this I thought that
the E and TEDx stood for education well
as it turns out it stands for
entertainment now I feel obligated to
entertain you I need to watch my ease a
little more carefully and I want to tell
you there’s a reason why this was a
problem for me I’m severely dyslexic so
that’s why I missed god bless you that’s
why I missed the e in that particular
situation so I’m going to make up for
that problem by throwing you some
chocolates so that you’re gonna like me
right away
so you’re awesome and wonderful you look
terrific and so do you you are awesome
human beings I want to tell you a little
bit about myself I’m 6 4 I’m wearing a
baseball cap it’s probably as much as
you really need to know oh come on it’s
funnier than that I was in Oklahoma one
time and I was throwing chocolate out to
the audience and there was a woman
sitting about right where you are and
she was looking at me like I hate you
and all of your immediate relatives and
I thought I’m the great doctor Jim I
will win her over so I threw a piece of
chocolate to her and it was arcing
through the air and I could see it
coming down and I knew I was gonna be
wonderful and it went look right in her
didn’t win her over the kind of guy I am
is when I first started my practice I
lived in a Township where they put marks
on the tires and I’m a little OCD sort
of bothers me a little bit when I do
that so I figured out that if I had
moved my Jeep up 3 feet on the even days
and moved it back 2 feet on the odd days
on the 17th day as I drove past City
Hall
if I was going 30 miles an hour the
tires would spell bite me I had a lot of
free time and if the mayor was looking I
would wave as I went by my wife taught
me an important lesson about statistics
I went into the bathroom and there was
this much paper in there and I took it
out to her and I said dear wife what’s
the deal with this paper and she gave me
the look well one eyebrow goes up and
the other one goes down I knew was in
trouble but I’m a guy I went back in a
couple of weeks later and I saw this so
I went out and confronted my wife and my
wife as a PhD and she’s way smarter than
I am and she said look there’s no
pleasing you that’s a 300 percent
improvement the moral of that story is
be careful that the statistics actually
work in the real world I went to the
seminary
that’s another TED talk in and of itself
very briefly and while I was in the
seminary I learned that if I was going
to do good things in the world that I
would have to stand on the shoulders of
giants and a couple of you human beings
are here and I’ve been standing on your
shoulders for a number of years so thank
you and I also learned that if you can’t
dazzle them with brilliance you should
at least baffle them with bullet points
this is really funny because Ted hates
bullet points but I was able to work it
five humans that’s my attempt at
entertainment I would like to go on now
to tell you why I’m here today I’m here
to tell you about twice exceptional
human beings those are people who have
enormous strengths with debilitating
weaknesses so the strengths make them
gifted but that the disabilities are
like oh my god
simultaneously within the same person
there were about 300,000 twice
exceptional human beings who were small
children and about three times that many
adults there an N of one no two twice
exceptional people are exactly the same
it’s all about the neurons and just for
a second here in this first row we don’t
have a full row I’m gonna have you human
beings do this go like this alright now
just imagine somebody’s next to you so
the neurons don’t actually touch what
happens is an impulse comes this way a
little chemicals released it’s caught
here and then it goes on the way so
we’ve got a network here you are a great
network I’m loving your networking all
the way down so it says turn on turn on
turn on turn off turn off turn off
modulate a little bit more a little bit
less in every possible direction those
are the net the connections you can put
your arms down you got your deltoid
workout in there the number of
connections you have really determines
how bright you are so the the most of us
have about a hundred trillion neuronal
connections but some of you lucky human
beings have 10 to the 79th neuronal
connections that’s a one with 79 zeroes
behind it you have my permission you can
say dr. Jim said that I am more
complicated than the Milky Way galaxy
because I have more connections in my
mind than there are stars in the
universe we’re here today talking about
bounce and this is all about the brain
so we’re gonna go high-tech go like this
in the front all right if the
connections are good in the front you
can be gifted if the connections are bad
in the back you may have a disability of
some sort
so the giftedness is in the front of the
processing is in the back and giftedness
is
proximate ly to to the top five
percentile hot tip here IQ tests are
just one way to find giftedness and not
really the only way I like to go to that
great American philosopher Forrest Gump
yay and I stole this from Forrest Gump
gift it is as gifted does so if you’re
doing gifted don’t worry about IQ tests
what are the deficits
well the deficits can be dyslexia a
disability in reading writing or math it
can be ADHD it can be generalized
anxiety disorder it can be the spectrum
disorders it can be depression here is a
little example of how a deficit can work
I’m gonna change the emphasis on one
word okay I’m just like because I’m
gonna try this I did not say he took my
pencil it was me I didn’t say he took my
pencil
ah that’s that’s him I didn’t say he
took my pencil let the Sun about she has
all I did was change a word and what
happened to this sentence three
different meanings what if you don’t
have the wiring to understand that what
if you don’t have the wiring to know an
angry face from an anxious face that
could be a huge disability in our
culture the rest of the world is like
dude what is up
it could be twice exceptional as what is
up these are people with enormous
strengths and debilitating weaknesses
most human beings learn the basic skills
and as they go up to the more complex
they get less and less competent but
twice exceptional people are upside down
in their abilities these human beings
get stuck with some basic skill
processing but do the harder stuff much
much much better they’re way better in
medical school than they were in the
third grade Ernest Hemingway wrote one
or two pretty good books he was a
terrible speller dan quayle believe it
or not has superior intelligence I swear
but he’s remembered for the great potato
incident poor dan quayle please don’t
put the dunce hat on somebody for a
basic skill problem that’s the back of
the brain we’re more interested in the
fronts of the brain so what’s the
problem well gatekeeping mechanisms can
be the problem and a gatekeeping
mechanism can be a standardized test it
can be an obnoxious teacher it can be
negative thinking within your own mind
it can be the alphabet test and
standardized testing it’s someplace that
a person gets stuck and of course we
have dr. Theodore J naysayer to help us
with this process and he’s one of those
guys that does this when he talks to you
which is the international symbol that
of I am way better than you are and I
had a joke worked out with the middle
fingers but my wife said do not do that
joke at the TED talk so I’m not but you
know where I’m going with this I want to
read you something that happened to me
this is from a naysayer that I dealt
with I wrote an article and here’s what
they wrote back to me I recently
reviewed a rejoinder that you wrote for
the Journal of learning difficulties
about twice exceptional learners I found
the article to be trite lacking in
content and generally missing any points
that made me sweat whoo after a human
being gets about 10,000 messages they
start incorporating the negative things
that are going on ask yourselves when
would you start believing it at a
thousand messages 2,000 3,000 try 10,000
by the time you’re 12 years old I want
to tell you about the National Education
Association I’m sorry about this hat
I’ve got a bald head they’re like you
got to cover that head
the lighting is gonna make all the TV
stuff go crazy but don’t pull it down
too far because then it’s gonna cover
your face and we’ll have shadows it’s
like good god here’s what those folks
had to say about twice exceptionality
looking at the big picture twice
exceptional students are important to
the future of our communities you’re the
community they’re unrealized potential
convene in measureable societal costs I
want you to think for a second about
what those costs could be inspiring
community leaders who are never elected
half of you can really relate to this
right now choose for the diseases that
are never discovered twice exceptional
people are wonderful medical researchers
and physicians revolutionary inventions
that are never in patented if you’re an
entrepreneur there’s a good chance that
you’re a twice exceptional person I want
to tell you about Jimmy when I met this
little guy he was an 8 year old person
and I knew I was in the presence of
greatness but Jimmy gave me the double
headache
right away it’s like oh man I’m in
trouble with this guy because IQ tested
at 158 his math was 178 100 is an
average score my students at Washington
University can’t do the math that Jimmy
was doing as an 8 year old person he did
it in his head without writing anything
down now Jimmy has some problems he
struggles socially and he doesn’t have a
lot of friends but the thing is I want
to be his buddy
want to tell you that he’s a smart as
Albert Einstein who was a twice
exceptional person I want to talk about
John for a few seconds
John was a top one percentile guy
handsome person health-nut was a genius
with electronics but john had two
problems severe depression and he could
not do the times tables no matter how he
tried to learn them so I said to him
well John you know how do you how do you
do this he goes a little dr. Jim asked
me a question that’s okay buddy seven
times seven it was okay Fred goes to the
store two Aisle seven he walks halfway
down he meets Seuss it was the
multiplier sue reaches into the seventh
shelf and pulls out a loaf of bread and
on that bread is 49 he taught himself to
do that no teacher taught him he did
that for all the number sets my story
doesn’t have a happy ending in his early
20s John took his own life
20 years after the fact normally this
really breaks me out but 20 years after
the fact I still think about him in the
lost potential mmm it’s my allergies I’m
sorry
I can hear John’s voice sing come on dr.
Jim we got to bounce up let’s get going
well here’s Leonardo da Vinci you know
I’m a bald guys you know I think I could
pull that hat off what do you think
it could happen this is what it’s Weis
exceptional person did with the Last
Supper
it’s Legos when you see Legos I want you
to be thinking ah there may be a
giftedness around here
what we need is fairness I don’t care if
you’re a conservative a moderate are a
liberal I don’t care if you’re young or
older like me we all want fairness we’re
wired for fairness so what does fairness
mean it means equal access to
participate in the society not getting
stuck at a gatekeeping mechanism we’re
here to talk about bounce so it’s
getting from here bouncing over to there
where you have equal access
I want everyone all of you human beings
here to be able to come to the table the
table should be filled with half women
and you women should make the same money
every type of person including twice
exceptional people need to come to the
table because America is great when
we’re all participating well what are
some of the things that keep people from
getting there the alphabet tests you
know what these are it’s how you get
into college and I’ve got a great idea
for you alphabet test humans just let
the test go for 12 hours you have your
fast thinkers and they’ll get it done in
the normal time and they’ll get their
scores and I want them to be air traffic
controllers they’re great people but
what about the slow methodical precise
twice exceptional people they will give
us a measure of endurance they’re so
important we don’t measure endurance
it’s the most important thing Edison
told us that genius is 99% perspiration
just use the roll-on and you’re all good
with that right when you hear this
statement if you’re so smart how come
you can’t that’s when the light bulb
should go on this could be a twice
exceptional person okay what can you do
from these chairs tonight
I want you to validate strengths to
human beings in this room validated my
strengths and it’s the only way that I
got eight was able to do this TED talk
validating strengths is the number one
thing that you can do I want you to
think about something human beings no
matter how big your issues are no matter
what the gatekeeping systems are no
matter how bad the naysayers are no
matter what the basic skills problems
are we’re not going to have to bounce
past the gatekeeping mechanisms if the
gates are open in the first place so I
want you to do this real quickly with me
because I’m long on time go like this
close gatekeeping systems we can
visualize and together
open the gates so that everyone has
equal access so let’s do it let’s open
the gates thank you you’ve been wonderful