Isla McNabb’s ability to read back words written on an erasable tablet led her parents to contact Guinness World Records

Isla McNabb’s ability to read back words written on an erasable tablet led her parents to contact Guinness World Records

Reading words aloud that adults scribble on an erasable tablet may not be the way many children spend their second birthdays. But it’s how Isla McNabb celebrated turning two, and it put the native of Crestwood, Kentucky, on the path to become the youngest ever female member of Mensa, the world’s oldest high IQ society, her parents said in a recent interview.

In a conversation published on Monday, Isla’s parents, Jason and Amanda McNabb, told the Guinness World Records website that they realized their daughter’s intelligence should be assessed after an aunt gave her an erasable writing tablet as a second birthday present.

  • 2xsaiko@discuss.tchncs.de
    0·
    10 months ago

    Hm. I could read at like 2 and a half years. I could even read text rotated upside down (though I’m not sure it was at that age but it was when I was in daycare) and I have a couple funny stories involving that.

    However I would now consider myself a fairly averagely intelligent guy compared to the other people in my CS classes. Much can change in that time.

    So to best support Isla, the McNabbs enrolled Isla in Mensa, hoping to connect with other similarly situated parents who could share some information with them.

    If they think it helps, I suppose. Still feels to me like this could easily go wrong and be a good way to drive the kid to burnout because of the expectations. But maybe I just have a bias against Mensa, because all talk about them that I hear seems to be negative. The media attention certainly doesn’t help in any case.