Remediation of underlying deficits/ to label or not

Forgot to mention that she uses her left hand to write but she’s actually mixed dominance for handedness.

Janis

Janis,

In my experience it is much more efficient to address underlying processing issues, when you can. The difficulty, of course, is that school doesn’t stand still why you do. You are in a decent position in that your daughter isn’t far behind right now.

My son has integration problems as well. I found that PACE was not successful for us because his integration issues were located at a sensory-motor level. I guess that is what you have to figure out. Clearly, if the integration issues show up in audiological testing there is a sensory component to it. In our case, integration went all the way up to difficulties with academics. We found through trial and error that cognitive approaches were not successful—at least not two years ago. PACE mostly showed me how many underlying deficits he had that we didn’t realize!!!

We found a lot more success using Neuronet, The Listening Program, and Interactive Metronome to address his issues. If you could do NN, that is what I would recomment but it is not widely available. I think IM really helped with integration for my son, as well, but he has very motor based difficulties, while I don’t recall your daughter does. I don’t recall your daughter does. I would probably start with sound therapy—I think it works on memory as well as integration. The difference we saw in ability to do auditory processing type tasks (manipulating sounds) was amazing. His ability to learn improved through TLP. We also did Fast Forward but I don’t think it improved integration for him. It did improve auditory memory. But, I think, I’ve told you that. It is a difficult program to get through—I’d certainly do sound therapy first (heard later that it makes FFW easier).

Audioblox doesn’t have the auditory component that PACE does, which is why I choose PACE. PACE though was just too difficult for him. Audioblox seems to be best suited to a child whose deficits are visually based. I know Linda F is delighted with it for her child while DEA whose daughter had strong visual skills and CAPD was not. Are you daughter’s memory issues global—affecting visual sequential memory as well? Maybe others would know whether it would help with visualization—I know you have to remember the sequences of blocks and you are supposed to see this in your head. But this is really sequential memory which I don’t know if this is a weakness for your daughter. I see that as different than seeing pictures in your head. One advantage of Audioblox is that it is cheap. I also think it may be better suited to a younger child. One difficulty we had with PACE was that the increments were so large. The lowest level is supposed to be equivalent to a six year old.

My gut is that you’ve got auditory issues with CAPD but reading comprehension is primarily a visualization task so you have issues there too. You may have to attack them separately.

I don’t know how much this helps but you asked me to comment!!!
Beth

Beth,

Thanks so much for taking the time to go through this with me again. The visual side is more of a mystery to me. There are no glaring indicators of any visual weakness, yet I’m not 100% sure that all those bases have been covered. I think her visual-motor skills are advanced. She could buckle shoes at age 2, tie at 3 or 4, braid strands of her own hair perfectly at about that age, etc. On the other hand we still have the b and d issues, but then I think about the mixed dominace and wonder if all that isn’t somehow related. She has an excellent visual memory as far as directions go because very early she could tell me where we were going (even unfamiliar places) based on looking out the car window. It was quite amazing. But would she have good visual memory for objects and patterns? I’m not sure.

Dr. J told me that on the WISC her lowest scores on V and P were in the subtests that required integration: Similarities (8) and Picture Completion (9). However, those scores are not extremely low by any means. High scores were Arithmetic (13) and Coding (14).

Maybe I am over-analyzing this. There certainly is no one locally who can sort things out beyond what I already know. And I am not sure what I would gain if I try to find out elsewhere!

Thanks, as always for your input!

Janis

Janis,

I would agree with you that your daughter’s small motor skills are advanced. None of my kids, ld or not, could tie their shoes before 6! How about gross motor? These things play out differently in different kids.

Visual skills are diverse and being strong on one doesn’t necessarily mean you are strong in others. I have two books called Visual Perceptual Skill Building that I got from Rainbow Resource Center (881-341-3456). They are designed for OTs or teachers. There are a variety of pretests in them that hones in on visual skills. My son had difficulty with a number of them, most striking was visual sequential memory. But he excelled at others!! We had an OT evaluation and I found this book an easy way to understand the breakdowns. The only visual skill I see lacking in the book is visualization. But it might give you a sense (easily and cheaply) of whether there are visual deficits as well as some low key exercises to work on with her. If not, then I’d guess that it is just the visualization issue.

Mixed dominance seems to show up more in LD kids (although all mixed dominance people are not LD). I think it makes efficient processing more difficult. My son has mixed dominance as well. He is right handed, left footed, and left eyed. Guess is he is right earred, although that is more difficult to determine. We were doing jump roping for Neuronet and I was just amazed how much easier it was for him to jump left foot first. I am def. right side dominant and I am pretty incompetent with my left foot. After practice, he was just as good with his right first. This proves to be an advantage on the soccer field!!!

Both PACE and Audioblox work on reversals. We did some work before doing PACE that might help your daughter that I got from a program similar to Audioblox. I found that my son had no directional sense (although he could find his way around places—go figure) and we had to use his body to get that orientation.

If she has no visual deficits (including memory) other than visualization, I’d probably go for TLP (for auditory memory/integration), some directional exercises, and some visualization exercises. If you are in for over kill, you could see what Audioblox does for her. I think it is 30 minutes a day—could try over the summer. I’d wait until she was at least 8 to do PACE/Brainskills.

Beth

ACCCH mixed dominance. Why does that always come up? My son had mixed dominance and I know a few other kids that have this who are LD.

The reversals should be helped with directionality exercises. I thought my son knew his left from his right really well and then we did audiblox and I could really see that skill was just not automatic. Same thing with counting backwards and forward. I thought sequencing was conquered but he would mess up when counting backwards so I could see that while it was vastly improved it wasn’t completely automatic.

His balance also has improved but he recently tested at 2 years below where he should be. All these things add up to a child who has to work harder on academics because he doesn’t have the underlying cognitive skills completely automatic. The effort he puts into those skills takes away from the higher order stuff.

She sounds kind of similar to my dd. Can she visualize images if you read something to her auditorily(without a picture clue)? My dd would tell me - no, I don’t see anything. Another clue is if she describes things in feelings vs. visual descriptions. V/V would help this and her comprehension if this is true.

I would agree with Beth that PACE may be too much at her age, esp if you haven’t addressed the APD issues yet. Fastforward is typically good for addressing APD, but she may be even a bit young for it and you want to really understand what kind of APD she has. Fastforward is very good if you have word/sound discrimination issues and it does address memory. My dd was only 5 and had an extremely difficult time with Earobics, and she barely had the attention to do 20min per day. I could not even imagine doing 1.5-2hrs of Fastforward. So I chose Tomatis(even tho our SLP recommended FF vs. Tomatis). She breezed thru Earobics immediately after - except for the sequential memory. Brainbuilder took care of the memory exercise.

Bob Doman with NACD says that reversals are caused by mixed dominate eye. The Dr. Gibson, who developed PACE , says he believes that reversals are because you don’t tend to ‘move’/’work’ from left to right. I believe they are both right - if your left eye is the stronger eye, you will want to ‘lead’ from right to left.

Thanks, Dea, that is interesting re: the mixed dominance. People don’t tend to talk about that much, but I have always thought it had to be tied in.

It also reminds me of something related that I have not mentioned. On the TAPS-R, where Anna had poor memory subtest scores, she had an 81 on auditory number memory forward but had a 101 on auditory number memory reversed!!!! Now go figure!!! Maybe she would comprehend what she reads if I gave it to her backwards!

The thing that confuses me about FF is that she does have pretty good phonemic awareness at this point, so the only reason to use it would be for the memory. And I am doubtful I could get her to do it for 100 minutes a day to be honest. It’s challenging enough to get her on Earobics for 20 minutes because she still gets frustrated with the clown memory game.

Janis

Dea,

You know what? I looked at the NACD tonight for the first time in awhile, and I see the articles on dominance and short digit span. I feel like I have found someone who understands my child. Of course, I do not know how respected these people are, but it is nice to hear someone address some of our exact issues. I had purchased Brain Builder months ago but have not started using it. I was uncertain whether it was the right thing, but now I definitely know she needs it as one component. I’m not sure if the Listening Program would do her any good. Not sure in what order to do anything.

Beth, do you want to sell you TLP CD’s yet? ;-)

Janis

Janis,

I didn’t purchase the CDs. We did it through our Neuronet therapist who had purchased the CDs.

I would do TLP first. We didn’t do TLP until we had hit walls on everything. As you know, there isn’t much clinical research out there and I am a skeptic. But it really did make a difference and I regret not doing it first–back when he was finishing first grade like your daughter. It would have made all the other therapy easier.

Beth

Well, well, well. I have totally missed something. Tonight I decided to try a little visual sequential memory checking. First we did some digits auditorially. She could repeat four digits fairly consitently but could not do 5. NACD says she should be able to do 7. But I already knew that was low.

So, then I tried writing 4 digits, let her look at them for a few seconds, and then write them on her paper. She only got two out of seven sets of numbers correct. So I went back to 3 digits, and she got four out of seven sets correct. Thia astounds me. She did worse with visual sequential memory than auditory. I wonder what kinds of problems this will cause with math? Now what should I do?

Janis

Hi Janis,
Maybe she has weak visualization of numbers. How is her comprehension of print? I can’t remember. Possibly she could use V/V and then On Cloud Nine?

Thanks, Shay. Someone from her school is planning to take On Cloud Nine Training this summer. I’ll have to look it up again. Actually, she has had little trouble with math thus far. They use Saxon, which is good anyway, and she is repeating first grade, so no glaring problems in math at this point.

This morning, she came to wake me up and told me it was 8:52. I thought, wow, I need to get up. I sat up, looked at the clock, and it said 8:25. The digital 2 and 5 are exactly the same except reversed. So she is doing reversals with more than b and d plus she has a sequential memory problem visually and auditorially. I am so auditory focused that I know next to nothing about these types of visual issues.

Janis

Yep - that was the exercise my dd got stuck with and hated the most(prior to Tomatis tho, she couldn’t do any of them except the rhyming frog). We did brainbuilder for 1month and then she breezed thru those balloons. We went on to Earobics Step 2 and she never got frustrated or stumped by anything (and she was like 6 or 7 at the time). Increasing her digit span (sequential memory) was like chipping away at a cement wall. I truely believe we would not have had success with Brainbuilder had we not done Tomatis first. I followed Tomatis with TLP and discovered that when we plataued with BB, TLP helped us get to the next level. I believe it so much, that now whenever we do anykind of cognitive program, I always do some kind of booster before hand (Tomatis is easier for us, because it only takes couple of days, vs. couple months to complete all of TLP).

I’m not familiar enough with the TAPS auditory memory task to understand maybe why she could do well going forward vs. backward, but I would guess there is a visualization component to it? In Brainbuilder you have to do be able to go forward and backward on your digit span, both auditorily and visually - to go backward, you really have to be able to visualize. It may be worth the $60 to get the program just to really understand where she is getting stuck and if it’s visual, auditory or both?

The NACD.org website has alot of articles talking about dominance, how to test it yourself, it’s importance as well as digit span. The NACD also profiles it’s clients with those that are visualizers and those that are conceptualizers - many ‘neurologically disorganized’ kids are one vs. the other. That absent minded college professor we all had or hear about - was probably a 100% conceptualizer.

If it were me, I would not spend the $1500 or so on FFW just to address memory? I maybe would buy TLP and Brainbuilder. But you also need to figure out WHY her memory is not good and address those issues. Something is CAUSING her memory deficits. There are several factors that effect your memory - 1) familiarity with the stimuli 2) attention allocation 3) discrimination of the words - can you ‘hear’ and or how well can you articulate what you hear 4) how you organize or sequence 5) rehearsal strategies(how does she repeat information back to herself)-and I think visualization or imaging abilities will effect this rehearsal strategies.

My dd has a CAPD and item number 3 was huge for us. Numbers 2 and 5 were secondary (and number 5 could really have been a result of the other factors).

I agree with Shay and Beth - and it is probably a visualization issue. My dd has the same problems (and she is left eyed dominant). I spent most of our early years remediating the auditory piece, thinking she did not have a visual issue.

My dd could not visualize or image at all if information was presented to her auditorily. She did not have as big a spread on the visual memory and auditory memory as your dd from a digit span. Visual was easier for her than auditory, but it still was not that hot. We’ve improved ALOT of her auditory issues (not gone completely), but I do suspect there is some kind of visual problem going on that has not been diagnosed yet.

Something CAUSED her to be left eye dominant and if I look at her baby thru preschool pictures, I don’t think her right eye looks right - kind of like a lazy eye. Also, understand that some auditory problems can cause occular development problems.

I’ve done alot of NACD work - we were on program for like a year. Be happy to give you my perspective if you want.

Another thought - you may want to consider Audiblox- it does alot of visual memory/sequencing kind of exercises, plus there is one on auditory that’s actually pretty good. I did Audiblox because we were very bored and burned out with Brainbuilder and it had a number of exercises that looked like they accomplished similar results. And interestingly, the Dr. who developed Audiblox used alot of research that came from Glenn Doman - Bob Doman’s uncle.

Audiblox was funner than Brainbuilder. It did not help my dd’s auditory processing problems, but I don’t think it was a waste of money for us.

Dea, very interesting. Anna does not have trouble with auditory discrimination at all. I already have Brain Builder. I really bought it for my son who is very bright but was complaining of not being able to remember things in school. He has never used it, but I knew Anna might need it, so it wasn’t a waste of money!

I’m just trying to figure out who would assess what the underlying causes are. I am in NC and eventually could take her to Mel Levine (although I have no idea of the cost). The NACD requires three trips for evals. I am not comfortable with finding my way around Atlanta where their nearest site is located. Not to mention the cost. It does sound like some of Audiblox might be useful now that we have identified some visual issues. What about Lindamood-Bell? Aren’t they pretty much on the right track? Maybe she needs Seeing Stars, V/V, and On Cloud Nine following something like TLP and BB. I think I might bite the bullet and get most of the LB training. I just have a lot of kids at school who could use some of those strategies, too.

Do email me about the NACD if you have a chance. I’d like to know more.

Thanks so much for all this info!
Janis

I had pretty much ignored Audiblox as I had heard that the auditory component was not strong. However, now that I believe there is a visual component, I am looking into it again. I do not mind at all taking the chances with programs like Earobics, Brain Builder, and Audiblox because they are relatively inexpnsive unlike FF and PACE. I like guarantees when it comes to spending thousands!

I need to ask you and Beth one more question. Does TLP really require a provider? If I could find the CD’s, could I do it myself?

Janis

We have Brainbuilder too and my son was actually worse on the visual part than the auditory. I suppose that is why he couldn’t memorize sight words, in addition to not being able to decode!!!

I don’t think there is one right way to remediate a child. I would do TLP first just because it really does help reorganize the child and make other things easier. I frankly don’t know how much Brainbuilder helps by itself. The biggest difficulty we have found with therapy is being able to do it. Sure, it would help but if the kid can’t get there, well, it is a waste of time and money.

You could get the series I recommended for visual assessment and screen her for other visual issues. If she does, you might try Audioblox instead of Brainbuilder. It is broader and might help with some of the integration issues as well.

I have Seeing Stars and I think it does help with visualizing letters. I haven’t got my son to be automatic yet, but then I do it in tiny spurts not the 60 some hours that Karen N. did at a clinic. It seems to me that the ability to hold letters in your head would help with visual sequential memory, although I haven’t tried assessing my son since we started doing it. You can easily add Seeing Stars to work with PG and not think of it as a separate program (so not either Seeing Stars OR Audioblox).

The visual stuff—beyond sequential memory—don’t seem to affect math until you hit about third grade. In first grade my son scored in the 79% on SAT. We had great difficulty with division and fractions last year. He just wasn’t teachable. This year, with improvements in his visual skills (from Neuroent) and IM, he is doing much better with math. He even got an A first quarter!!! I think he will get a B this quarter.

Beth

Beth,

Yes, I will go back and look up the materials you listed to assess visual skills. You confirm what I think about math. I feel like the school probably thinks I’m crazy at this point as she’s not really behind in anything but reading comprehension. But I know good and well that these things will cause problems later on. I am just so glad that your son is having such a good year! There is no way that would be happening if you had not pursued all this therapy on your own.

I am beginning to feel like school LD resource programs are generally a waste.
This is a little off topic, but we have the parent of a child with diagnosed APD in decoding asking for LB LiPS. I have half a mind to take the training this summer and just let the special ed. director ask me to work with this boy. Then I can say, wanna pay for my training workshop?

Janis

The manual tells you exactly how to implement the program. There are 8 CDs each with 12 tracks on them. You listen to 1 CD per week, 2x per day and listen to the various track schedule. Takes 8 weeks to implement the program. If you have problems with regression, a provider could tell you how to adjust the program. Most likely, you won’t have any problems - ususally only severe kids hit regression with TLP(like Downs or Autistic kids).

What’s regression you might ask? What sound therapy does is use certain frequencies that stimulate the vestibular system. In turn, it creates new neuropathways to the brain. When you hit areas of undevelopment in the brain, it can cause regression or changes. These are ususally emotional kind of outbreaks. We didn’t notice anything with TLP, but when we went thru the Tomatis program, my dd would go thru emotional meltdowns which lasted during a 3 week period(the high frequencies are what effected her). She also experienced night terrors during the part of the program where it worked her right ear dominance. TLP is MUCH milder than Tomatis.

You may want to have her evaluated for CAPD. It doesn’t sound like she has it, but you could rule it out. There are different ‘models’ of CAPD, depending on what part of the country you live in. Jack Katz out of Univ. of Buffalo defines 4 profiles - Decoding, Tolerance Fading Memory, Integration and Organization. Comprehension difficulties show up under the TFM profile.

We live in Colorado and I had my dd evaluated at CSU, which also does CAPD research. I was startled to find out that in a minimal noisey environment, she could only ‘hear’ 56% of what was said. (84% is normal and she could understand 100% in soundproof).

Dea,

She was evaluated in the fall of 2001 for APD at the U of FL APD clinic. She does have APD, that’s why I’ve been focused on the auditory and not the visual! Plus, I teach hearing impaired, so I recognize the auditory and language issues easily. She does not have trouble with speech in noise or sound discrimination. (She has learned her basic phonics and can decode short words. I have a feeling that the memory issues will make longer words difficult, however. She is repeating first grade this year.). She showed problems in auditory integration (putting parts into a whole) and obviously the auditory memory issues are there. There is a possibility that temporal processing is an issue, but they stopped short of saying that based on the fact she may have been too young for the task. She had just turned 6 at the time of testing.

Janis

Here’s some personal info about a particular kind of learning pattern:

I have always been one of those absent-minded professors — can conjugate Latin verbs forty years later, do calculus in my head, but have really serious trouble remembering what day of the week it is, where I’m driving to, the name of the person I am talking to.

Yes, absolutely I am a conceptualizer. In fact recently I was advising a parent to teach her child by connecting things in thought patterns. I do those Latin verbs by chanting in rhythm, and I do the advanced math by visualizing graphs etc., often moving. Any material that can be related in any kind of pattern, logical or linguistic or visual or rhythmic, is easy to me; disconnected facts are extremely difficult if not impossible.

However, I am *also* a very good visualizer, although with some very funny holes. I analyze words by visualizing type on a white page — Century Schoolbook font to be exact, probably from primary school influence. I do well on IQ test type puzzles including those reversals and rotations of 3D objects. I paint in watercolours. I plan and build major house renovations.I *teach* three-dimensional advanced calculus.
The funny holes: I have always had real trouble with faces. Couldn’t picture a face or draw one above cartoon level until well into my thirties; slightly better now but still weak. Used to have immense difficulty recognizing people, although improved to low normal in my forties.
I had terrible trouble with figure-ground puzzles, even the kindergarden find-the-kitty variety, until into my twenties. Art classes as an adult caused a light to flash on in my head and I’m now moderately good. The funny thing is that I can clearly remember having had the problem, I cannot for the life of me see why it used to be so difficult — it seems easy and natural. Weird mental double vision.

A side note on all this: too many adults have a very good forgettery. I remind people of one basic rule of teaching — *anything* is easy, as long as you already know how. It may be easy for you, but that isn’t the point; it’s hard for the new learner and when you were a new learner it was hard for you too. It seems easy and automatic to you now, after you did the years of preliminary work, but if you drag your memory back you may remember some sticky points and beating your head on the wall. The *worst* thing you can say as a teacher, especially an LD teacher, is to say “This is so easy, just do it like this.”

Okay, please, I just had a birthday and my memory is slipping, what is TSP?

It is The Listening Program. I have been undecided about that as I couldn’t see how it would help my child’s particular APD. I can see how it might help children with poor sound discrimination.

http://www.advancedbrain.com/tlp_overview.html

Janis

I am trying to decide what to choose for auditory integration for my son and would appreciate your comments.

Where can one buy the CDs from? DEA?
Beth- would you mind asking your Neuronet provider where did she get the CDs from? (vide the info about home-based AIT that one can buy from NC).

The closest provider to us is using Berard’s method. 2 sessions a day for 10 days (starts on Fri. and goes non-stop).
http://www.ideatrainingcenter.com/
$1200 this is still much more than the $420 that DEA(?) quoted- how can we get these CDs…..

I had found this:
http://www.seriouscomposer.com/Home_system.htm
Janis- this might be close to you… This seems to be equivalent to AIT only done at home.

For Tomatis we will need to travel like 2 hours each way and my son is already telling me that he will do whatever therapy can be done at home, hence I was thinking about the TLP.

My dd is a conceptualize also. She is quite the absent minded child. But she is also a good visualizer if she sees a picture of the image. Not good if she has to do it on her own. When we did Audiblox, she could do the highest level of blocks where you have to remember a string of I think it’s like 30 with various patterns. She could ‘copy’ off the board with beautiful handwriting and if she has a model could draw pictures at age 5 much better than I can.

However, if she has to mentally image the picture without a model, she is not real good. Her handwriting is MUCH worse on her own than when she is copying something. She use to tell me that she never dreamed? When I read her stories, I would ask her to describe for me what one of the characters looked like - what image does she see in her head. She could not tell me - she insisted she didn’t ‘see’ anything. Language Wise has an exercise where you pick an object and you have to write as much about it as you can. She had a very hard time - only wrote about feelings vs. describing it.

We never did V/V or Seeing Stars (both would have been good for her, and probably still would be), but we have been doing visualizing kind of exercises for a number of years. I noticed most of the improvements when we did PACE. MTC seems to be helping with more symbol imagery. I don’t think we are where we should be, but I have seen progress.

Ewa,

Here is the site with TLP. But they only sell through providers unless we can find a set second hand.

http://www.advancedbrain.com/tlp_overview.html

Janis

Ewa,

I just read some studies linked to the NC AIT site. I still am not really seeing my child’s profile there. It looks most promising for children with autism, speech-in-noise problems, and auditory hypersensitivity. It is just so hard to know the right thing to do!

Janis

We go to the center for InnerChange in Co. 303 320-4411 Dr. Minson who runs the center helped develop TLP. He offers Tomatis at the center(he is the only MD in the country who offers Tomatis). They are honest,caring and trustworthy. I don’t know what they are charging for TLP these days - I paid $320, but I got a discount because we were doing Tomatis with it and were one of the first clients to use TLP. On top of the CDs you need to buy the $100 headphones - these are very important. We have gotten our $$ worth from the headphones - we use them for lots of other things too.

Let me explain the difference between the programs as we saw much better results from Tomatis than from TLP. If you do a brainmap for an LD child - CAPD, ADD, Autistic, PDD etc. you will find that there are areas of the brain that are overstimulated and others that are basically asleep. Whereas in a child who is ‘normal’ - you would see an even brainwave pattern. Dr. Tomatis (France) discovered from working with Monks that certain frequencies of music seemed to stimulate the brain. It’s only certain kinds of classical music and Gregarian chants. Mozart used alot of these frequencies in his music. Dr. Tomatis developed a listening test that is kind of skewed on a bell curve - the 1st part of curve are frequencies that stimulate more sensory integration issues - balance, motor, coordination etc. The next part are frequencies that stimulate speech, language, academics. The last part targets creativity. If you went into Dr. Minson’s center he would be able to test you and discover what part of the curve you were off the most and he would customize the program to target your areas of weakness. (not all centers use this listening test) In contrast, TLP also targets those areas, but it’s generic - no customizing.

A Tomatis center also uses very expensive headphones that have bone-conduction in them. Some people really need this bone-conduction - my dd was one of those kids. They also use something called an electonic ear - it looks kind of like a fancy stereo receiver. These are the 2 reasons you have to go to a center vs. doing at home. Last, Tomatis does right ear dominance work, TLP does not. Dr. Tomatis believed that being right ear dominant is the most important.

After you finish either program, it if worked correctly, you will have ‘woken-up’ some parts of the brain that was inactive before. Most likely it won’t be a normal brainwave pattern, but your child will appear more ‘awake’. Where the child may have been very frustrated and just not learning (because he was probably trying to use that part of the brain that was asleep), learning will become easier. You still have to do the other remediation and start USING those new neuropathways that were created. It just makes the other remediation easier and see results quicker.

Tomatis was the most expensive therapy we did - I don’t even want to know how much we spent. But it was also the easiest. Apart from driving 1hr in rush hour traffic 3days per week, my dd just listened to music in a room with some other kids(they play games, draw, do homework etc.) and mom or dad sit in a relaxing parent room where you talk with some of the other parents, read, or listen to music yourself. It was great.

I think my dd was 6.5 when we did the testing. There are certain subtests of CAPD testing that you can’t do until they are 8. And a good 40% of kids will grow out of some areas of CAPD by the time they are 9-10.

We are overdue to have testing redone. I so hope that some of my dd’s background noise issues she has grown out of, but I have a feeling she still has issues there.

CSU does most of their research in the background noise area, so I couldn’t really map what profile she was as they didnt’ use the Buffalo model or any other that I had read about. However, they developed a type a earplug that helps drown out certain frequencies to reduce background noise issues. With this special earplug in, my dd went from 56% to 80% (still under normal, but much better). We used the earplug for a year (of which you have to then get it resized). We never got another one - dd said she couldn’t tell a difference, didn’t like wearing it and we were making alot of progress, so just didn’t bother. The other problem we had with the earplug was that she was only suppose to wear it in the classroom. But if she didn’t wear it all day, she would lose it easily. I didn’t want her to have to wear all day - worried that she needed to learn to drown out the noise on her own. I probably should revisit again - I’m worried this has effected her language development. Her expressive language is still her biggest issue.

Janis,

I found this:

http://www.up-to-date.com/saitwebsite/auditorytable.html

I’ll post my perspective here and if you have questions, feel free to email at address above.

We did NACD shortly after my dd finshed Tomatis and we had started Brainbuilder program. It was early in my LD Journey when I was in panic mode and searching for a ‘cure’. I was frustrated by most of what I had been reading about LD and the various types of remediation. I felt they only addressed the symptoms vs. cause and 90% of the professionals claimed it’s just something you have to learn to live with and make accomodations etc. I just couldn’t accept that.

NACD was the only program I found that looked at the big picture as well as addressed the cause vs. symptoms. We traveled to Ogden, UT(dd loved this) to do an initial evaluation and they drew up a program for us. The program was half neurodevelopmental and half academic(they also look at nutritional as well). It took 2-3hrs per day to implement - high burn-out. We went back for a quartely assessment and after that I took the parent training class so I could do my own evals and write up my own program.

I learned ALOT about what my dd’s strengths/weaknesses were, what makes her tick and some causes etc. I learned how to be a better parent-teacher, how best to input information to make it stick (reallly how to teach my child), some interesting academic methods that worked for my dd,why digit spans are important and at what level you should be to introduce new things (like they want you to be at a digit span of 6 before you start phonics or doing visualizing /conceptualizing remediation). We saw improvement, the year she was in NACD, she had started K at bottom and ended at top of class(but K is alot diff than 3rd grade). However, we never cured her by any means. And we just pooped out. Digit Spans we got to solid 7 (9 was our goal) and never got dominance switched.

NACD does have some really good successes, but MOST people don’t accomplish that level of success. You will see most success if you homeschool and have a strong support network that can help you with program and you are a super-mom. We could NEVER accomplish even half of the program we were on these days, with the additional outside activities and homework demands as it is. NACD didn’t know alot about CAPD or have alot to address it. I didn’t like their reading program (it is VERY similar to Audiblox and then they move you to more phonics, but didn’t like the phonics program either - I like reading reflex better). They are not flexible in looking/adding other programs into their program (like they don’t like PACE - says it doesn’t have the right intensity, duration, frequency). Liked the math program. Still have mixed feelings on switching dominance.

If you are still interested, I would recommend ordering the tapes and attending the parent training seminar (it was really fun and I learned alot from it). I still use what I learned from NACD when I evaluate what other programs I’m going to do with dd. I don’t regret I did it, but not sure I would do it again. It was also pretty expensive when you factor in the airfares and hotel.

Great Ewa! That is certainly a very helpful table. It is interesting that the program that originates in NC is only and hour and a half from me. But the training in that program is $2000 and I think that is steep. (I figured that I might take the training and become a provider if I have to buy CD’s to begin with!).

Janis

TSP — TriSodium Phosphate; extreme household cleaner, great for softening paint to make the next coat stick better.

You must have been looking for TLP as mentioned by other poster

I happen to be mixed dominance in most things, and possibly left ear dominant.

I noticed last year at the Montreal Jazz Festival, with 50 000 people going around to twenty different venues, that I was able to get close to the stage quite easily if I slithered up on the left side — such that my head was turned to the right and left ear towards the stage. Right ear dominant is probably the majority since that side is always much more crowded.

Although I do have a certain number of problems, the majority are very well remediated, and I’m an excellent student. So why would it be important to mess around with dominance? We have learned that trying to change hand dominance is both ineffective in general and often very bad news for the personality, causing nervous problems.

I’m reading this thread with great interest because I don’t have as much a handle as many of you on where ds stands visually. We know he has incredible auditory memory, and I was concerned about his visualization skills. I think seeing him do Seeing Stars revealed that he can visualize letters - something I was both surprised and relieved to find out. But he’s still a lousy primarily phonetic speller. It seems like there are so many places things can fall apart!

Dea,

Thanks. This is extremely helpful. I am not super-mom and I know we could not undertake an intensive program. Also, while I’d be interested in the neurodevelopmental aspects of NACD, I would not be interested in the academic side. I feel like I already know many of the best academic programs. I agree that I’d use Reading Reflex…I went to the conference and training in New Orleans last year. But so far, Anna doesn’t even need it. She is having Saxon phonics again this year and is doing quite well. But the words are not long and her short digit span makes me think that phonological memory for longer words may be more difficult. It scares me that they want a digit span of 6 before phonics. Anna has about 4 auditorially and not even 3 consistently visually at age 7.

I think I am going to order Audiblox. I wonder if we can even do enough of it. I can see from reading the Audiblox message board that they are very particular about following the program exactly.

What tapes from NACD are you talking about? Their products page is not available now so I’m not sure if it’s on there. I would absolutely love to just learn more about the neurodevelopmental aspects. I think it would help me as a special ed. teacher.

Janis

We just had a good session with our son’s psychiatrist, who has been seeing him for anxiety, and to further assess his unusual profile and set of deficits. (He feels he’s coming along very nicely btw)

He suggested we have ds listen to music at bedtime as way to wind down since ds can’t read well enough to read at night and enjoy it. He also thought it would be a good way to help him turn off his thoughts when his motor is running a little too fast.

Noone has suggested my son has auditory issues - in fact he seems quite strong in that area. But he’s sure an absent minded professor and a super slow processor. Motor planning issues - you know the type.

I’m thinking we should use this time productively if there are music CD’s that would be soothing but also therapeutic. You guys know much more about this auditory training stuff than I so let me know what you think - would any of these products be usable in a more informal setting?

n/m

Karen,

I am going to agree with you that people are so extremely focused on the phonemic/phonological issues that they really are not checking the visual. I just informally made a list of numbers the other night and tried an experiement to see if my child had a better visual sequential memory than auditory which I assumed would be the case. But I was wrong!!! She did worse! None of the testing that has been done showed this. But I have to believe it has some effect on learning.

Janis

The NACD website has an article called ‘The Learning Disabled Child’ - It’s from their jounals and is Volume 6, No. 8. It explains dominance and why it’s important in an LD child.

To be completely neurologically organized, one needs to establish a dominant hemisphere in the brain. NACD believes a completely organized child needs to be right-handed, right-footed, right eared and right eyed OR left-handed, left-footed etc. Dr. Tomatis believed being right eared was the most important.

If you lack a controlling hemisphere, it can effect your function. It can cause processing problems - information gets stored in the brain and it may be difficult to retrieve it.

Most people are neurologically disorganized to some degree. It effects some people more than others. Bob Doman believes that if your function is effected such that you cannot learn etc. the 2 best things you can do is either switch dominance or increase your digit span. If you can’t do one, then do the other.

There’s another viewpoint that you don’t have to switch dominance, but you can do things that make your left-right hemiphere’s talk better. The Handle Institute discusses this on their site.

I haven’t been on their site for quite awhile, but there is a series of tapes that you can buy. There is a main guide to Child Development and Education and then separate tapes on Learning Disabled Child, The Parent-Teacher and Child Management. I believe it was around $100 to buy the whole kit.

These are also available thru advancedbrain.com. We use the Thinking CD and Concentration CD. There is a Relaxation CD, ProductivityCD
and I think several others.

We play them as background music. I think they are around $15-$19.

Thanks. I’ll recheck when they get their products back on the site.

Janis

My 11 year old son is addicted to the Odyssey series tapes. They are Christain moral story type audio tapes. Here in Phoenix they play them on a radio station every night at 8:00 pm so it is free. All three of my kids were listening each night but then somehow we got out of that routine. A friend of mine has all the tapes that we borrow and my son just loves them. I’ve even heard him quote from them.

If interested check out focus on the family 1-800-a -family or you might try whitsend.org.

In the summer, while up in Michigan for 6 glorious weeks, I put a walkman with headphones using books on tape from the library so my boys can multi-task, playing outside and listening to tapes at the same time. My 9 year can’t stand to miss play time while looking for insects, frogs, and crayfish.Getting him to read has been a bit more challenging. He is so worn out at the end of the day that he just drops from exhaustion so reading at night doesn’t work with him. He will however listen to the tapes for a short time during the day but only if they are on the head set.

Just a thought. The music idea sounds good too.

Michelle

Hi, Michelle,

I am very familiar with that series but hadn’t thought of using it with my little one! I think it comes on our radio on Saturday mornings. I just don’t think about it unless I am in the car! I’m wondering if she’s too young, though, if your 11 year old likes them. I’ll have to check the web-site and see the age range they suggest. I’m afraid it might be hard for her to follow being auditory only. But she certainly needs to begin learning that skill. Plus it would be nice to fill that little brain with something better than Sponge Bob! Thanks for the great suggestion!

Janis

If there is one area that I don’t see a lot of remediation is spelling. I haven’t been able to remediate that but I figure that if you are a bad speller, you can ask someone to proof your work; pretend you are an author. There are few kids in my academic inclusion English 11 classes that can spell. I think that that is the least of the problems. My daughter writes well but she always has someone edit her work for spelling and grammar errors. I wouldn’t spend much time on spelling unless the child is young and in elementary school.

Victoria,

I, like my son am also mixed dominance. We should form a club. LOL

I score as gifted on IQ tests but I didn’t perform as gifted in school. I did ok at school but I remember being constantly bored and never paying attention. I breezed through nursing school because it was really interesting to me. I have always wondered if I had a few attentional issues as I am very disorganized when I don’t have enough structure in my life. My disorganization is something I just fight, and it is a struggle. I know all the facts about organization and can actually teach classes on being organized, but I can’t always do it myself.

My son with the mixed dominance is a fantastic conceptualizer, and, if I say so myself, so am I. I could alway grasp concepts, even way out there medical texts that were beyond my educational level. I remember always explaining things like plasmid mediated rna transfer of antibiotic resistance to my colleagues. When we developed a problem with this in the hospital they sent me out to do the inservices for the physicians even though I was the most junior member of the staff.

I don’t know maybe there is a link. I will say that when my 4 year old started kicking the ball with his left foot, I made him use his right.

DEA,

You are awesome. You give us such incredible insights. Thanks.

Dr. Stein from oxford does patching of the left eye to try to cause right eyed dominance. There is a long explanation about this on his site. If I recall correctly, it seems similar to what you are describing.