With everything going on right now I forgot to bring this up. Last week Emmett’s therapists told us that she thinks Emmett may be a savant. While significantly language and speech delayed, Emmett is simply absorbing everything else. He is learning very rapidly and remembering almost everything. I’m not quite sure what to think about this. Although, I will say that aside from speech and language, it’s like Emmett just “woke up”, if that makes sense. It will be interesting to see where he is when we go back to see the developmental neurologist for a follow up. Emotionally, Emmett is still behind but his intelligence is simply amazing (as we keep hearing from the people evaluating him).
Anyway, I just thought I would share that with you all. Does anyone have any experience with savant syndrome? I would be VERY interested to hear from you on this.
Well there's a huge difference between being a genius, being a 'savant', or having something like eidetic memory.
From what you're saying it sounds like the therapist was talking about an overall type thing, rather than one specific area that she feels like he excels in. He could be very smart, a genius, and/or have eidetic memory (photographic memory), without being a savant.
A 'savant' has one area in which they excel far above what would be expected of anyone, and the term is usually only used in conjunction with someone who has severe mental limitations in other areas. It sounds to me like your son is intelligent all around, and just has limitations in a couple of areas.
Oh..I agree. I think he\’s 2 young to know anything for sure.