Hi-
My daughter is 11 and always scored way high on the ITBS and other tests
-been placed in the highly-capable programs since 3rd grade and learns at an extremely fast pace–—
but, she can not spell! I have been bringing this to her teachers attention since 1st grade- constantly asking if she was dyslexic(her father is)-but always got the same answer—no no no –look how well she reads and comprehends……….blah blah blah……hey I know when my kids struggling and I could watch her spend hours on spelling lists, only to get 50% or less…..
Now that she has entered 6th grade she’s been placed in a multi-age learning enviroment for her fast paced learning-they really push these kids-4 years of curriculum into 3 years of middle school.
I’m just now finding research on dysgraphia-
She already knows that all her work must be done on the word processor before being turned in, what else can we do for her?
The teachers feel that her placement in the program is where she belongs, does any of the labeling with the school districts help as far as dysgraphia?- In our state she has to pass the WASL in order to graduate? I honestly dont think this will happen since written essays are a part of this test.
I’m going to get her the Mavis Beacon typing, after reading some of the post that seems like the way to go….
any other suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
Sometimes she doesnt even realize how smart she is becase she has to work so hard to get anthing on paper, yet “verbally she can outdo any one in her class” thats a quote from her teacher……
?????
Re: Extemely capable with what seems to be dysgraphia
Keep doing what you are doing in terms of placement and teaching her to type. GT/LD children (which sounds like a diagnosis that would fit your daughter to a tee) learn so much better when they are challenged intellectually. In addition , consider a private evaluation to determine the nature of your daughter’s issues and look into software to help her organize her thoughts and structure her writing. Specifically, look at Inspiration for making outlines, webs, etc for pre-writing and at word prediction software such as Co:Writer. You might also consider voice activated word-processing, like Dragon Dicate or others. Finally, I suspect your daughter would benefit from working one on one with a tutor to help her with her writing. If you find a tutor who understands the problem, gets that this is a very intelligent and motivated child and knows how to make the instruction fun and challenging, you will see improvement.
If you want to work at home on her spelling, I would recommend “Spelling Through Morphographs” from SRA. It’s expensive (about $200) but works really well. Some colleges use it for remedial spelling instruction. Website with a placement test for it is http://www.mcgrawhill.ca/school/schoolGraphics/sra_spellingthroughmorphographs.pdf .
If she doesn’t pass the placement test for STM, she would be a good candidate for Sequential Spelling (http://www.avko.org ).
Both of these programs are easy for a parent to do daily at home — 10 to 20 minutes per lesson.
Some dysgraphic children have difficulty learning to type. A program that usually gets around this difficulty is “Keyboarding Skills” by Diana Hanbury King.
Nancy