FAMILY: Karthik with his father Karthik Rumaiah, mother Sumathi Karthik and younger brother.
Except for the USA, no other country has an established system to cater to the needs of ‘Gifted Children’. There is a need for special programmes or curriculum for them. Anyone interested in joining the special Parent Support Group (PSG) can contact Karthik at [email protected]
By Umer Nangiana
He is a genius and he knows it. Who would be interested, in the first place, and then be worried about ‘exponential growth’ of economy, for instance, at the age of 10?
Ishwar Kalyan Karthik is. Ask him about his message to the world and he has this to say, “Always when you ever have a chance to exploit exponential growth, please take the risk. Exponential growth doubles everything.”
It does not end here; he would go on to explain it to you, mathematically, how it works — to multiply what you already have. And do not doubt the boy’s accuracy. He has been judged and officially declared a ‘gifted child’ with a mathematical problem solving and numerical operations IQ of 160.
At 8, he had the intelligence level of a 16-year-old. Student of Grade 5 in Doha College, Ishwar is listed as a high “profile child” by NIAS India Gifted Children Programme, Bangalore, India.
He has also earned High Honours in The Center for Talented Youth (CTY) Talent Search from Johns Hopkins University, USA. Talk to Ishwar about mathematical equations, formulae or any scientific concept and he will surprise you with his knowledge of both science and mathematics.
So what motivates him to go for mathematics at his young age?
“I don’t know. I just feel like doing it. It’s a bit like asking a football player what motivates him to play football,” Ishwar says rather matter-of-factly.
I met him at his family residence in Mansoura where he lives with a younger brother, and parents, Karthik Ramaiah and Sumathi Karthik, who hail from India and are based in Doha since 2003.
He has had an interesting evolution as a student. “When I was a kid I used to see my mother doing calculations and I asked her to let me try them. She handed some to me thinking I would not be able to solve them but I did, didn’t I, Mama?” Ishwar says, looking at her mother, sitting to his left, with a smile. “Yes,” she smiles back.
From here on, it seems pointless to treat this as a conversation with a child. It turns out to be the right call.
Sumathi, his mother, tells Community that Ishwar enjoys studying advanced math concepts and numbers such as Golden ratio, Euler’s number, Pi, Tau, Avogadro’s constant, Googolplex, Speed of light, Yahtzee, Graham’s number, Pascal’s triangle, GIMPS’s prime number, Ackerman’s sequence and Archimedes’ sand reckoner.
Leonhard Euler, a Swiss Mathematician, is his current favourite. “He has a number named after him which is ‘e’ — in calculus equal to P2.7128,” Ishwar says to ‘justify’ his liking for the pioneer mathematician and physicist. He goes on to show me how Euler achieved the number through his formula on a piece of paper right then and there!
This child plays with equations and figures. He even thinks in calculus and numbers. Besides Euler, Ishwar likes Newton — as a mathematician. “Everyone thinks he is an amazing scientist but after reading about him I think Newton’s contributions to mathematics are important,” the ‘little mathematician’ tells me.
Mathematics aside, he is brilliant at other sciences, too particularly, physics and chemistry. At an ‘Ask me Quiz’, he would challenge the audience to ask him any question on terms like Einstein’s Theory of Relativity, Time Travel, Poincare Reoccurrence time, Quantum foam, Planck length equations, Quarks, Platonic solids, Higher Dimensions, Big Bang Theory, Black holes, Neutron stars, Schwarzschild radius besides others.
“He studies a lot about Astrophysics. At 8, he once told me about Einstein’s theory of relativity. When I told him I could not understand, he immediately took a paper and explained using example of Usain Bolt (the fastest man on earth). After making some calculations on Bolt vs. Gravity, he told me that it’s based on Einstein’s theory of general relativity and time dilation,” Ishwar’s mother recalls.
She goes on to speak about his interest in mathematics and science from a very early age. At 6, he wanted to know Algebra, always wanted to attempt the complex questions. A year later, he would just pick a hand book on Physics or Chemistry grab much of them without any assistance.
“These days his favourite hobby is doing chemistry experiments with the chemistry kit which we got from one of the museums in Bangalore,” gushes Sumathi.
I have a friend from the neighbourhood who is as brilliant at chemistry as he is at mathematics, Ishwar chimes in. “We spend time together and do experiments to learn,” Ishwar says after drawing a bar-graph on a sheet to show me his and his friend’s strengths and weaknesses. At 3, he could read almost everything and could even correct spellings, his mother adds. “As a child he used to ask me so many ‘why’ questions. Why the sky was blue when the sun rays were tallow? Why the egg white turns solid on heating? And many other such questions,” Sumathi remembers.
Then, she could somehow answer him but not now. “He now usually collects information from books, encyclopAedias, pamphlets and mostly online and through YouTube videos,” his mother says by way of explanation. He also has an extraordinary sharp memory.
Fortunately, Ishwar’s parents detected his high intellect early. With the realisation dawned on them the issues this ‘gifted child’ could face in time to come. He may be mentally six years ahead of his age fellows but not physically. So while he feels comfortable talking to someone maturer than his age; others still naturally see him as a child of 10. More problems come in academic life where he is always craving to go beyond curriculum.
“Ishwar may benefit from a social skills curriculum or counselling to support his emotional growth. Many students with gifted abilities struggle with boredom, bullying, anger, isolation, depression, perfectionism, anxiety and underachievement. Be aware of these possibilities and act quickly to find him the support he may need,” an ATCL team from Qatar Foundation that assessed him suggested to Ishwar’s parents.
Except for the USA, no other country has an established system to cater to the needs of ‘Gifted Children’. Ishwar’s parents realised there must be other children like Ishwar in the region and they must also be facing the same problems.
“We have already agreed with few like-minded people to form a group for which we want to reach out to the community in Qatar,” says Karthik Ramaiah, Ishwar’s father. He says there is a need for special programmes or curriculum for such highly intelligent and talented children and he knew of some others like his son in Doha.
Anyone interested in joining the special Parent Support Group (PSG) could contact Karthik at [email protected]
Aspiring to become a mathematician or a scientist, Ishwar is already on his way. However, ten years from now, he says, he would be done with mathematics. “I would achieve most of my targets by then. So I would not be doing practically much just math-related,” he says with the confidence of a celebrity. He is flexible on what profession he would choose, even if engineering sounds logical at this point.
“At six, I wanted to be a space scientist. Now, it has changed. It keeps on changing,” Ishwar adds as if to remind one of the endless possibilities. Besides mathematics, he likes sports. Football is currently his favourite game and Messi his favourite player.
What is so special about Messi, I ask.
“His accuracy,” pat comes the response from someone, who can score goals of his own like there’s no tomorrow. “When he takes a penalty shoot from a certain angle, he never misses,” Ishwar responds as if visualizing another one of those near-perfect kicks from the Argentine heartthrob.
All is mathematics for the prodigy.
Ishwar’s Presentation and participation on the Pi Memorization Contest at CNAQ on 13 March 2014 can be viewed at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VDxaWjj6s5A and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7J3sj-gYcU
