My son is 8 years old, 3rd grade and dyslexic. He was originally tested in 1st grade and his verbal IQ was 95, performance 131 with a full scale IQ of 113 on the WISC III. On the achievement tests, the biggest gap showed in math, but at that time, his teacher felt that math wasn’t the biggest problem, it was reading and writing. He’s since been in a regular classroom, being pulled out everyday for Alphabetic Phonics. His reading has really improved (although he’s not yet on grade level), but writing is still a major problem. This year math is really proving to be a problem too. He just took the practice TAAS test and scored in the 43 in reading and 36 in math. He has been in reading tutoring after school for the last few months. We are having a 504 meeting next week to try to decide what to do. The school is trying to get him into a smaller setting for the TAAS where some of the questions can be read to him. I have talked to our special ed. coordinator about getting the IQ and Achievement tests done on him again to see if he may qualify for special ed. now. The main reason is that I just think he would do better in a smaller setting with more individual attention. Any ideas?
Re: Dyslexia and 504 meeting
Before you push for sped placement, drop in on the classes. Some places, they’re great. Most places, however, they really aren’t set up for very bright kids with dyslexia.
I would, however, get the battery of tests because as Ohio siad, with a spread like that you do want to know what ever you can. (Personally I don’t think just having the WISC was that big a blunder, though. A non-verbal IQ test wouldn’t really have changed what they did. Yes, it sounds like he is truly gifted in non-verbal areas — but most school stuff is verbal. And the great majority of programs and services for gifted kids are geared to verbally gifted kids. It would haev been good to know more about his strengths — but not grounds for a lawsuit.
I would also check out this page: http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/
especially their information about visual-spatial learners.
http://www.gifteddevelopment.com/VSL_List.htm
The view of special ed as a place with “smaller setting and more individual attention” is, unfortunately, not as rosy as the reality in many cases. I’m biased, though, because in one of those fairly bad situations that was the school’s favorite sales pitch — when they had a troublesome kid that they wanted out of regular classes. So that “individual attention” class was wehre the bad kids were. So, that phrase makes me snarl, but not for truly rational reasons — could be very different where you are. But check.
It *would* be worhtwhile to get his giftedness in writing. Teachers are often much more tolerant of any given behavior if it’s in a child that they perceive as very bright. Somehow, the problems are eccentricities instead of flaws to be corrected.
Just how bad are the writing and math? There are things you can do…
Re: Dyslexia and 504 meeting
I’d second Sue’s opinion, and add that you might want to inquire about graduation rates for children with profiles similar to that of your child (smart kiddos with learning differences).
In my state, resource classes are a dumping ground for anyone who can’t make it in regular ed. This includes, on my current caseload of 2nd and 3rd graders, Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, Emotional-Behavioral Disabilities, Pervasive Developmental Delays, Autism, Downs Syndrome, Attention Deficit Disorder, and Learning Disabilities. My Masters is in LD, and that’s what I’m good at, although I thing I could be effective with any one of these groups in isolation. My current caseload renders me incompetent.
The constant stress of being unable to meet my students’ individual needs has led me to realize that I need to look elsewhere to do what I do well, which is teach.
Re: Dyslexia and 504 meeting
It was the WISC that was given…now I have the breakdown:
Information 8
Similarities 14
Arithmetic 9
Vocabulary 9
Comprehension 6
Picture Completion 13
Coding 18
Picture Arrangement 13
Block Design 11
Object Assembly 18
He was given the WIAT achievement test (in 1st grade) and the only place it showed greater than a 15 pt. discrepency was on part of the math. And it was only 16 points off. Our state says that you must be 15 points under to qualify for special ed. We were just wondering today if perhaps if tested again, there would be a greater gap.
We are arranging for an occupational therapist to come check him out for the handwriting. His teacher said today that she thought he needed one.
As for the giftedness….the school saw that immediatly with the IQ score of 131 in performance when he was in 1st grade and in 2nd grade we tried the GT program. That was bad. It was a lot of research and writing and even with the teacher making all kinds of modifications for him, he just was miserable because there was such a glaring difference between him and these “verbally bright” children. My daughter is like that, very academically smart, all common sense. My son, however, is a total dreamer. Very creative and artistic. Loves to build things and make up stories. So, we exited him from GT—the GT teacher agreed with this move.
He had all of the language tests when he was diagnosed dyslexic at Scottish Rite. I see what all of you are saying about the Special Ed room not being really equiped for my child. It may not be the rosy room I’m imagining. I was just wanting him in a smaller environment so that he could do better. His teachers (3 of them) said today that he is really having a lot of attention problems. He just cannot stay on task. I suppose I should check into it, take him to the dr. but I’m scared of medicating the creativeness out of him. That and he’s the sort of child who always reacts to medications in a different manner than what you would expect. Thank you all for listening. I’m just trying to get my head straight before the 504 meeting.
Consider a tutor?
You might want to think about getting a tutor with experience working with LDs. Even if he gets SpED services, it’s almost never one-on-one and has to address the needs of the other children which can be totally different from your child’s needs.
Our son (dyslexic/dysgraphic/ADD) had a terrible time with simple addition, subtraction, mutiplication, and division despite a fairly high IQ. We’ve never had a math tutor for him because his reading/language skills were so bad we had to concentrate on that. But by 6th grade, the basic math facts eventually clicked in and now he’s doing well in GT math. I think his brain just had to mature to a point where he could store and retrieve this information easily.
Don’t assume ADHD meds reduce creativity. I worried our child would become a zombie, but instead we have a child who can now live up to his full potential and he is still quite creative and retained his sharp sense of humor. I see no change in his personality except possibly at night when the medication wears off (the so-called rebound effect). Might be worth a trial. Ritalin is out of their system within 4 hours. For a child who is both ADHD and dyslexic, I wouldn’t rule something that can help him concentrate better.
Re: Dyslexia and 504 meeting
Wow that seems like a pretty diverse group they have you in charge of I can imagine how difficult it is. I am very fortunate in that my sons self contained LD class only has 10 students and she gets the help of an aide. The class has 3 kids who fall on the autism spectrum and the other students have various LD’s that effect thier sociability. The social worker and school psychologist also come into the classroom to teach social skills. The speech/language pathologist also works in the classroom part of the day two times a week as does the reading specialist. As you can see this is a well supported enviroment for these students. All the students are also mainstreamed for science, social studies, music, gym, and lunch, during these times the spec ed teacher, the aide, and when needed the speech/language pathologists assists the mainstream teacher. I think other districts would benefit from this model. I have seen real progress made by my son since this placement. The best change has been in how happy he is.
1. your son needs a nonverbal IQ test- with that split (131-95= 36points) I think the psychologist should be sued for failing to give a nonverbal IQ test, If the iQ test you are refering to happens by any chance to be the wisc, then you have a potential suit against the psychologist for malpractice- the protocalls of the wisc clearly state that if the spread exceeds 15pts then it is not an accurate measure of the childs ability.
2. Your child needs a full language evaluation, receptive, expressive, pragmatic and auditory processing.
3. with a preformance IQ 131- theres a darn good chance with a nonverbal IQ test your child will qualify as gifted (i dont know what texas law is regarding gifted children- in ohio the iQ has to be 2 stabndard deviations above the mean, so a kid with an IQ of 131 qualifies. We have children who qualify as both gifted and learning disabled-the schools really hate to serve them.
4. your son needs to evaluated by an occupational theapist for his writing difficulty to see if it is a disability, but not before the nonverbal IQ test.
to qualify for services under LD a child has to have a discrepency between ability (IQ) and achievement- thats why if the IQ test is bad everything gets thrown off.