son's diagnosis

IMO, it’s a non-dx. It means that on the coding section of the WISC where they convert letters to nos (I think maybe it is the other way), he did poorly. But this is absolutely meaningless without other info.

It could be because any of these: he disliked the task. Maybe he won’t make a good secretary when he grows up. :-) He has slow (or slower) writing or even that he has dysgraphia (It doesn’t dx dysgraphia either). The tester made him feel pressured and he doesn’t work well under pressue. The test is timed and he doesn’t work well with time pressure. He may have difficulty rapidly converting one thing to another. He may not be able to do the task.

The trouble with even the later is that we don’t really know what the task means!! Weschler back umpteen years ago decided it was a component of children’s “intelligence” (whatever that is) and included it in the kid’s version but not the adult version.

If you suspect a learning disablility then you need a test of learning processes and achievement given by someone who knows what they are talking about (ie not whoever gave your kid the WISC). An IQ test will only tell us that he has a normal IQ or not. A low IQ (not a low subtest) might mean he is mentally retarded, if and only if he has low adaptive skills (can he dress himself, bath, speak, etc at the level he is supposed to for his age). A big gap between the verbal and performance scale is sometimes considered part of a learning disability. A low verbal scale vs performance is sometimes seen in dyslexic kids. A low performance vs verbal is often seen in kids with nonverbal ld (NLD, math disabilities, etc.). Some subscores tend to have a bit more independent meaning. Poor digit span can indicate poor auditory memory (but might mean poor attention or even hating the task). OTOH, kids with high comprehension, vocabulary, and similarites tend to be verbally bright. But at least that is a pattern and not one single subtest.

Anyway I have seen this here before but a single score on a subtest, just about means nothing (I’d say it means absolutely nothing but I’m going to be more careful).

Your child does NOT have a coding disability as there is no such thing. IF he has trouble reading and can’t sound out words he might have a problem “decoding” but I have never really heard that this is positively correlated to this subtest. It could be. But you would want other measures that would prove that. Even watching your child read, would tell more than looking at a single subtest.

HTH and isn’t too much info.

—des

First, a score of 10 is average, 50%. If he scored lower than 10 it is not an automatic “red flag” unless it was several points lower and all his other subtest scores were above average. As des said, there is no such thing as a “coding disability”. A kid who has trouble with this task might have trouble sustaining attention to boring tasks, or trouble copying from the board or a textbook, or trouble with the physical act of forming letters and numbers. So it could be related to attention, visual processing, or fine motor skills or all 3, or it could have very little significance. You need to compare to other test results and observations, with the help of a professional.