sensory integration or learning disability?

Personally I dont see anything shouting sensory intergration OR motor planning

Are you sure its the physical act of writing? Perhaps it is difficult for her to find the words she wishes to write?

I also think they can be intimidated when teachers start to correct for grammar and punctuation-even more so if she is a perfectionist. She could have flowing thoughts but stop and wonder “is this a complete sentence?” “Do I need to say a ant or an ant?”

Or…the ideas may not flow in a manner conducive to putting them on paper

BTW, ADD is characterized by the inability to “regulate” ones attention so it’s difficult to draw conclusions from the type of activities she does or does not stay focused on-its more a matter of….well, random distraction

Not saying she has ADD-just making what I feel is an important distinction! :D

[quote=”maryjanenancy” Even though she writes neatly, she will do anything to avoid writing. She will find anything to distract her at home or at school. When she finally focuses on writing, she takes forever to complete even just a few sentences (i.e., she took 2.5 hours to write 7-8 sentences and she took 1 hour to write 3 sentences).
Thanks,
Mary[/quote]

Some children with dysgraphia are capable of producing very neat handwriting because they are essentially “drawing” each letter rather than automatically producing the letters. As you can imagine, this can be physically and mentally draining for the child. It takes quite a lot of effort to try to remember how each letter is supposed to look and to reproduce it neatly, while simultaneously figuring out (and remembering) what you want to say, how to spell the words you want to use, etc. Your description of it taking your daughter an extremely long time to produce very small amounts of work may well be an indication of some kind of LD. It could also be an indicator for ADHD. Many children with ADHD have difficulty with writing, perhaps as part of a memory issue.

Often, sensory integration problems are a sign of (and part of) a broader neurological problem such as LD or ADHD . Children with developmental coordination disorder also tend to exhibit sensory problems. Your description of your child’s gross motor skills suggests that DCD is a diagnosis that should be explored. There is a high co-morbidity between DCD, LD and ADHD.

You are definitely taking the right steps to find out what is going on with your daughter. Doing so will make it so much more likely that she will get the help she needs to overcome and work around her difficulties.

It helps both speed and smoothness of writing, and greatly reduces fatigue, to discourage the detailed “drawing” of each letter and to teach the forms by kinesthetic *feel*. I use a whiteboard and wipe-off markers, and you can also use a blackboard and chalk. Later you use clean white paper and a smooth-flowing pen such as a superfine marker or rolling writer or fountain pen — NOT yellow pencils, which encourage high pressure and tightness.
To start, it is best to mount a large board on the wall so the student can get away from the habit of leaning on the paper and working tight-tight.
Have the child form large (four inch to ten inch) counterclockwise circles with smooth swinging arm motions. Then straight lines in one swift swoop, top to bottom and left to right. Then cursive patterns like a bunch of looped l’s, a bunch of i’s without dots, a bunch of c’s, a bunch of downward loops like the tail of a g, then more complex forms llike a row of o’s.

Once the child is making free-flowing shapes, then practice letter forms **large** (still several inches high) and *loose*, moving the arm and hand, NOT twisting wrist and fingers. Do NOT say a thing about neatness at this point — good forms will lead to neatness in the end, but an overstress on neatness at the beginning will lead to the kind of tightness and fatigue and slowness you are now seeing.

If at all possible talk to the teachers and tell them you are trying to help get away from the slow work, and please will they NOT say anything about neatness as you work for speed and fluency. This is way out of the box for most elementary teachers, but do try.

After individual letter forms, move up to words on the board, still large and loose and swooping motions. You can do both print and cursive this way, although if you do this right cursive is actually easier — one smooth rhythmic hand/arm action.

When you go back to work on paper, stay large, two lines high is good for practice, and avoid twisted forced lying on the desk postures that prevent free motion and encourage hand strain. Use pens and avoid the pencils. If you can get or make a slanted desk surface (like a drafting table) this is the best for writing. The left hand (or right for lefties) should be at the side holding the paper steady, never supporting the chest on the desk. Make sure you have good light.

It takes some time to change a physical habit, several months and even years, but now is the time to start — it doesn’t get better by waiting and practicing failure.

Thanks so much for your replies! I appreciate the advice and suggestions. I need to step up the process on her testing by the professionals at school and start working with her on the white boards and then paper. Her teacher has been pretty accommodating so far. For a final version of a pumpkin story, she told my daughter that she could type it on the computer if it was faster for her (not sure if that’s good or bad but she’s recognizing my daughter’s difficulty with writing).

If you have any more ideas, please pass them along. It’s fantastic to have more knowledge about how I can help her.

Be sure the school includes an occupational therapy evaluation in the work-up. You may also want to consider getting a private occupational therapy evaluation through your medical insurance, as private evaluations are almost always more thorough and will include assessment of sensory integration. (Not all school OTs are authorized to assess sensory integration.)

Nancy