Where do we go from here???

I also see discrepancies in your son’s scores. Does the psychologist say why he doesn’t qualify? I would think he would.

Regardless of what the school does for him, I’d have him tutored in reading. I’d like to see him getting accomodations and some remediation in school but until then I’d have him working a reading specialist. I’d also read outloud to him every day and have him reading from any book that feels like easy reading to him. I’d help him with homework and schoolwork in any and every way I could and talk with him about his feelings about school to keep up his self esteem. If you believe his had ADD, you could explore with the family doctor whether you’d want to treat that with any of the available medications for it.

It isn’t possible that your son’s IQ went down but it is possible for scores on IQ tests to go up or down. The testing process isn’t a perfect one and results can change based on many things.

I have a similar eye problem myself — left eye shut off completely due to astigmatism. This was untreated for all my childhood due to very very bad medical judgement (Freudian psychologists — the blindness and headaches were all in my mind) and I am permanently visually handicapped. Get the glasses, do any exercises required, use an eye patch if necessary, and do anything you can to retrieve that eye’s functioning. He may not thank you now but he will be glad later.

I have also been working for the last five or six months with a boy with a similar profile — verbally very bright, actually quite a good reader — on grade level in a French school where they have none of this guessing nonsense. But he couldn’t write at all, and his math was a shambles. In the first hour I found that he had not the faintest idea that there was supposed to be any direction in this stuff. He made his n’s starting at the right and going up and back, because he found it “easier”. He tried to write the French word “il” and it came out “li” — but NOT because he reversed the sounds — he wrote i - l OK, but since he moved his pen from right to left, it came out *looking* backwards. Of course math being sometimes one way and sometimes the other was completely trashed. He did not know any addition or subtraction facts, counted painfully and often got things wrong even then.

Now, he is in Grade 3 and working adequately on grade level. He writes passably with only a few rare reversals, spells OK, and has jumped a grade level in math in a couple of months; now doing two digit addition and subtraction and getting a grip on carrying and borrowing, remembers most of his facts and figures out the rest quickly and usually accurately; is starting to “see” math systems, like the fact that 8 + 6 = 8 + (2 + 4) = 10 + 4 = 14.

I am also working with a little girl who again is an excellent oral reader but was also failing the reading tests due to writing problems, slowness, reversals, etc.; in about three months she has gone from failing in Grade 1 to passing in Grade 2.

Here is the tried and true, slow step-by-step process that really has helped with these kids and which has a very good chance of working with yours:
— Get a white board and markers, and rolling writers for daily work; as far as possible ditch the yellow pencils, which require too much pressure and interfere with developing free hand motion.
— If possible mount the whiteboard on the wall or a steep slope to prevent the habit of lying on top of the desk, which prevents any smooth motion and interferes greatly with vision.
— start by practicing on the whiteboard making l’s and t’s and o’s; make *all* marks from top to bottom and left to right *only*, and o circles *counterclockwise*. Practice over and over until the motion patterns are automatic.
— Get a good letter formation guide and work on the letters by formation groups — straight letters like i and t and l, circle-start letters c and e and o and g and *d* and q, zig-zags like v and w and z, and so on. Start by making the letters *large and loose* on the whiteboard. Avoid pen lifts as much as possible — a smooth semi-cursive style. The goal is smoothness and rhythm, *not* nit-picky every line in its place (which is counterproductive and leads to messiness in the long run). Once the letters are being formed in a consistent way, not just shape but directionality and order and rhythm, then move down to rolling writer or fine marker on paper.
— supervise the student’s homework and stand over him and do not let him write *any* letter or number upside down and/or backwards. At first this will slow him down (even bad habits are faster than unlearning and learning new ones) but be mean and persevere. At first you may have to reach out and stop his hand as he tried for the hundredth time to write n from the right. You may also have to guide his hand if he doesn’t follow verbal directions (my little girl didn’t for some time). Hang in there. After twenty hours or so of consistent correction, most students get the idea and start to work on change. Then, you have to watch for quite a lot of time more to stop backsliding.

In a very very large number of cases where I have done this, straightening out directionality has had huge benefits that have overflowed in surprising directions — in the one case a kid who can finally keep his addition facts in his head, in many cases kids who suddenly spell a lot better apparently (but not really) by magic, in other cases higher grades in apparently unrelated subjects like geography or history.

Thanks for the tips.

The psych. said that he can’t see anything that would qualify him for a 504 (which all his teacher and I are asking for at this point). However, I think a 50 point discrepancy between his highest and lowest score on the WISC should qualify him for something. Especially seeing that he will be taking the MCAS in the spring. After looking over a sample test I know he will not be able to pass it without at least a little extra time and some sort of help. He always get stuck on the simplest of words and can’t seem to move past them. He could literally be there all day stuck on the second paragraph. As for the paragraph they will have to write…forget it. His teacher doesn’t mind at this point because she says she can read his writing (however, I still have trouble with it at times). The people that are scoring this will think a 5 yr. old wrote it. Although it will make sense and be articulate once you decode the handwriting and spelling errors.

I have noticed that he does write his letters “wierd”. He doesn’t write them in the traditional way that everyone is taught. He starts in odd places. For example, with the letter “n” he will do the slope first then the line, for “y” he makes the longer line first.

As for math…he is having a lot of trouble with double digit reversals. I actually commented on how much reading he was suppossed to do every night for school as he had written 51 minutes for every day that week. When I asked him what it said he quite plainly replied 15 minutes a night. Needless to say this can cause many problems when he is seeing 63 + 12 when it is actually 36 + 21.

This eye problem is a tough one though as he seemed fine all those years. The opthamologist was really surprised at how well his right eye is accomodating. I’m just anxious to see his reaction as I have a feeling its going to take a while for him to get used to the glasses.

Thanks again for the tips. It’s so frustrating to have a child that seems to “know everything” except the basic functions he should be learning in school. It’s also frustrating that we as parents try to get help for our kids and I have to leave a major decision like this in the hands of someone that has met my son once (the school psychologist). He says that since he is making some progress he won’t qualify for anything. I’m at the point of just telling my son to stop trying (I really won’t, but I have thought about it). His self esteem is eroding as he thinks he sounds like a robot when he reads in class, his work is messier than the other kids, he doesn’t see the same things the other kids do such as letters/numbers, etc. Even though he is a smart kid. Every teacher he has had comments that “he knows so much stuff”. Which just adds to the frustration. It doesn’t matter to him how much stuff he knows he just wants to keep up with the other kids : (

We’ll just keep plugging away and try some of these tips and the VT , hopefully something will work.

Thanks again :wink:

Keep plugging — and keep that oral information going in :)
Now would be a good time to get him into books on tape… he’ll “hear” good sentences and paragraph structure (nonfiction would be good too) at that higher level than he is able to read it.

You are telling my story almost to a tee….except, I just had my son tested (he too, is 8 1/2 and in third grade), but I haven’t received their recommendations back yet. I can also relate to his testing, but I don’t have numbers in front of me. I assume those too, will come back with the recomendations they give me. Anyway, I am brand new to this board. I have been trying to do research on LD and this is the site that seems to be the most helpful to me.

One of the problems I have, is that for a couple of years I have been told that my son is inattentive, but no one EVER mentioned that he might have a learning disability that was contributing to that. I feel somewhat robbed in that I kept trying to find out why his math, writing and reading were such a struggle for him, but the only thing a teacher could tell me was that it was because he was sloppy and didn’t pay attention. I think sometimes it’s easier for a teacher to label a child that way, because there are 20+ other students they have to worry about (no offense meant here, just my opinion). It’s hard as a parent to hear these things, but then not to be offered any information as to how to fix it! He was tested last week for an entire day, and NOT ONCE, did they find that he was inattentive. As a matter of fact, they stressed to me how hard he worked while he was there, and they were quite sure that he worked twice as hard as a normal student would. Of course, this is what they see one on one, and not what a teacher sees in a large classroom.

One thing I didn’t have him tested for, was auditory processing. I’m not sure at this point if it will make any difference though, because he’s been evaluated for everything else.

Anyone have any thoughts as to how an auditory processing problem might contribute to a developmental writing disorder, short term memory disability, dysgraphia, scotopic sensitivity??

They found during his testing that his eyes don’t converge…..they thought that this perhaps contributed to his lack of being able to copy from one paper/overhead to his paper, etc. When they did a computer test for attentiveness at the end of a two hour evaluation, he closed one eye to see the letters flash quickly on the screen. Also, when he had to put the blocks together in the pattern on the book, he turned it at an angle to put them were they had to go, then straightened it out when he presented it to the person doing the testing.

Again, I’m just now finding out these problems. I couldn’t be more overwhelmed at this point. He’s in general education (public) and receives no help at school. What is my next step?

and yes I still work twice as hard as anyone else. I had surgeries and years of eye therapies, I have a hearing impairment/CAPD and ADD on top of it. After I got the proper remediation I ended up being in GATE. I have a daughter who is gifted in non-verbal ways but she has ADD, my hearing loss/CAPD and she has a severe astigmatism. She too works twice as hard especially one on one and she does get inattentive when she can’t sustain her attention in the classroom.

Take it one step at a time. I made it and so will your son. Get his vision stuff sorted out and see how that impacts his attention in the classroom. Then figure out your next step after that.

that I know my son works hard. He works so hard at home with me, and he works so hard at his tutor’s. But, that all gets pushed aside at school, because no one there ever sees what he does one on one. It’s just assumed that he’s lazy and lacks effort, and also that he’s inattentive. I sware, I could throw up every time I hear that…..the reason he is inattentive at school, is because he does not process the information that the teacher gives the way other students do. That seems to be a really hard concept for me to get across. It seems very logical to me that he does get inattentive, but the thing I ask myself, is why? Now that he’s been formally tested, I know why. Too bad nobody in the school ever thought there was a LD with him….it was always about him been sloppy. It’s very frustrating!

I’m glad you are becoming aware of your child’s specific learning difficulties and strengths. I’m also happy for your child that you are doing all you can to learn more about learning disabilities and are such a strong advocate for him. Don’t be surprised, unfortunately, if your child continues to be believed to be simply unmotivated and/or inattentive.

It has been my experience that many teachers fail to understand or refuse to believe that learning disabilities are anything other than character flaws—especially if the student is bright. It’s the phenomenon of invisible disability.

As far as the school psychologist is concerned, I believe that those scores qualify for services in that there would appear a significant discrepancy between ability and achievement. If you want to push it, get in touch with an advocacy group and bring them to the next meeting. (You can inititiate a meeting.) You also have rights under due process in the event that you can’t reach a consensus with the members of the multidisciplinary, diagnostic team. In other words, his opinion is just one opinion and certainly not the last word on the subject.

I’m sure that your son is very, very hardworking and that his difficulties do not stem from laziness. That said, don’t rule out “inattentiveness” as a problem just because he was on task during one on one testing. One reason ADHD is so hard to properly diagnose is that kids who have often respond better in one to one settings and so it can be very hard for a tester to personally observe the symptoms. The same can be true at home when you are working closely with your child and he feels your love and support and is “motivated” to respond to you. This does not mean that he does not have ADHD. Nor does it mean that he does have it. it means you’ve got to look really carefully at the question. LD can look like ADHD and ADHD can look like LD and if you’ve got one, the odds are increased that you’ve got the other. They often travel in pairs, but not always. Don’t be afraid of that ADHD label. My child was diagnosed with severe LD and only several years later with ADHD. Before we intervened to treat the ADHD, he basically made no progress, even when he was getting the right kinds of treatment for his LD. After dealing with the ADHD, he began to respond, got out of special ed and is a top student in his regular school now.

Well, the eligibility is not determined by the discrepancy between highest and lowest score. It is determined by the ability and achievement discrepancy. He actually makes it for CA purposes on the WJ reading score of 89. That is 28 points lower than his IQ. I cannot comment on the visual-motor stuff. There was a lowish test that I am not familiar with.

Most of his scores are in the average range and beyond. He has some relative weaknesses in processing speed, but processing speed scores in the 90’s are certainly not low.

I expect we would place him, but I can see why another may not really want to. His WIAT scores were decent. 100 on pseudoword reading would suggest that he is learning to decode, I just don’t know how rapidly he can do it. WIAT comprehension was decent and in range, only 12 points less that full-scale IQ. Since your son does not show a discrepany between verbal and performance IQ, the full scale score is considered valid.

If it were me, I’d probably place him and try to get scores up over 100 and get him out in three years or less, ready to succeed in general ed. The vision stuff may help, too.