It sounds like you are in a really challenging place. I read your original post but was hoping someone would first jump in with some of the research you were looking for, as all I can contribute is really musings and more questions (just what you need!). Some of this may thus respond to info since deleted, so apologies in advance if I confuse the details.
You've definitely helped, not confused, thank you.
Research: On the research side, I too have been unnerved by frequent claims that handwriting is critical to learning.
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My (very) personal, (very) inexpert opinion, shaped by my family as well as oodles of reading what lit I can find and parent experiences in places like this, is that (a) I suspect it may not be true (research seems awful weak), and (b) it probably doesn't apply to LD even if it is.
That's what is really missing - research that examines in which situations handwriting has a measurable benfefit, and which it does not (ie LDs, truly equal or superior skill with typing, etc)
As I understand it, the more you can reduce the demand on working memory, the more you can learn. On this, the psych research is unequivocal. When you lack automaticity in writing, reading, spelling, calculation, whatever, all your brain power is sucked up with the lower-level mechanics and little is left for higher-level analysis - or even listening while taking notes. So in general, my advice is to on one hand, do everything you can to increase automaticity and free up brain power. But on the other hand, also do everything you can to just bypass the un-automated skill when *thinking* is the goal.
Certainly I have read that here and heard local professionals talk about it (though school's never seem to really get this idea), but I haven't seen any actual research so had asusmed it was anecdotal.
Remediation and A/T: For us, that has meant lots of reading remediation for DD, but read-aloud/ audiobooks and scribing and AT when she wanted to think and produce stuff. She's now self-sufficient with her AT for writing (mostly tablet with word prediction), and reading is decent if slow and needs repeats. We still plug away at spelling remediation (because she is a writer and thinking about how to spell every word when she's writing really screeches her creativity to a halt), but otherwise ignore spelling in her work. One exception remains poetry - when she creates poetry, her brain moves so fast she can't type it, and instead scrawls illegible smudges across her whiteboard, then dictates to me to type up immediately before she forgets it, because even she can't really read it. This summer we're going to practice editing with Grammerly, but that will be a separate exercise from creating written work. (The goal there is increasing independence rather than automaticity.)
This is really interesting insight into how you work, thank you. Is grammerly more than just a typo/grammar checker?
For DS the math monster, it has meant taking verbatim notes for him on brainstorming and written schoolwork (he's now pretty self-sufficient typing on a laptop). Also, a whiteboard for extracurricular math, where I've done the bulk of the writing over the years so he can focus on the math he loves without writing getting in the way. (He still prefers the whiteboard, and for extracurricular courses like AoPS and others I have just taken pictures of his work and put them into a PDF to submit - never been a problem). Both kids tried speech-to-text - which is a godsend for many and I highly recommend trying - but mine found it frustrating (it's not great with kid voices, and hard to use at school) and takes a lot of practice too. I suspect DD will go back to it over the next few years, though.
This is really interesting, thank you, Math being such a particular problem.
FWIW, both use keyboarding for almost all schoolwork and tests (except math). For instance, DS in high school science will keyboard most of a test, while handwriting formula, diagrams, etc on the original test paper. Anything that involves a full sentence is on the computer. As long as they could handwrite school math and avoid unnecessary writing and repetitive worksheets, we've actually done fine with quite basic AT - mostly what's built into an iPad or Google classroom.
I don't know anything about Google Classroom, is this something only your children use, or is it a school wide tool?
I'm matching your original post here for background detail, I realize, and still haven't gotten to the point - but you had a lot of questions! Don't have time to make this shorter
, so I've added in some headings to help navigate....
Isn't it always harder to be shorter? Thank you for taking the time for the detail, it's very much appreciated.
Automaticity: One thing that really jumped out at me in your post was that you mentioned lack of automaticity as well as spelling errors. As far as I understand (another place I was waiting for aeh's expertise!), a purely physical issue like hypermobility would not cause these issues, but a cognitive processing issue like dysgraphia would. From the collective experience of parents here, I have concluded that while physical weaknesses that affect writing can be strengthened, dysgraphia does not seem very amenable to remediation. Any number of people have reported short-term improvements that vanish as soon as the OT etc stops - in other words, automaticity does not seem to improve in the long term. (It's like my kids with LD being able to ace a spelling or multiplication test - and then not remembering any of it the next week, as soon as they stop the constant practice that's keeping it in their short-term memory. It never automated.) So it's important to know what problems you are addressing, and how much you can realistically hope to improve automaticity. Reading is super remediable, and worth every second of effort. Executive function can be improved, though a lot is finding and practicing your own work-arounds and back-up systems. A lot of other LD stuff, however, doesn't automate readily.
I know all this, and yet it was really helpful to read it, just like this, just here.
My eldest child has autism, dyslexia, auditory processing disorder - and hypermobility. For her handwriting issues really are about speed/volume and pain. Her handwriting degrades due to pain and fatigue, and her quality of content probably does too as pain and fatigue increase, but She doesn't actually appear to have any automaticity issues around handwriting and written expression, she's just MUCH better off typing.
Middle child has ADHD and hypermobility (probably my most hypermobile child too), and you're right (and I have somewhat suspected) there are probably automaticity issues at play in her handwriting situation. She's always been the most overtly effected with regard to handwriting, and she basically lost all therapy gains once she moved to keyboarding. The teachers who were involved when she changed to keyboarding were all so aware of how powerful that change was that they then became acutely aware that not keyoarding had to be why Math was the only area that didn't improve. But they didn't have any ideas to address the problem and then we changed schools (for other reasons).
Looking at what is similar and what is different between our children, I think it is likely that the youngest child will be most like the eldest. Her handwriting holds her back in the classroom and makes her feel bad, but her spelling is excellent and her writing is far above age norms despite her handwriting. So we are looking to reduce handwriting where volume and speed matter, but we don't need to remove it entirely.
What, exactly, have been the benefits for your older two (concrete as well as theoretical possibilities)? What have been the costs, especially including opportunity costs, to all of you? Are the benefits worth the costs? Are there differences in child 3 vs the other two that would significantly change the nature or weight of those costs and benefits?
I really needed to have opportunity cost pointed out here. This was a really useful "ah-ha" moment!
With respect to your Q3, I have concluded that a person with automaticity issues that affect writing can think, or they can write. Pick one. Because you only get one.
This actually speaks most to the middle child and math. We haven't done enough. We have to find something that works for her. But school is of the opinion that there is "nothing" that helps math and you must handwrite it. So really I think I need to solve this problem for the youngest and then roll it up to her sister...
Final thoughts. For gifted kids with LD, the question is often much less "Can they do it?", but rather, "At what cost?" They have amazing strengths and compensation skills. With enough time and effort and perfect alignment of the stars, they can do almost anything - produce, say, beautiful handwriting (but it's created as a picture, not automated letters) and do all sorts of impressive things. But just because they could do it once doesn't mean they can do it everytime. That's the very frustrating and confusing reality of LD, magnified for 2E. And when they do it, there's a huge amount of other things they can't do at the same time. They have to have priorities, they have to choose.
Again, thank you. I must say it to myself again and again. At what cost, at what cost...
It's been hard for me as a parent who didn't have these struggles myself to understand and truly accept and support and even encourage these limitations and choices. It's been an even harder battle with schools and others who see the ability, and assume the kid could do it all if they just. tried. harder. There are some things my kids can improve a little or a lot, and some in which they will never get much better. And some things that just aren't worth the cost. That's not me being a pessimist, that's just reality. Time is a lot more finite when you're 2E. Choices are harder. Opportunity cost really, really matters. We are enormously fortunate to live in a world where there are so many other ways of doing things. Over the years, I have gotten more comfortable with working around the low-level mechanics as much as humanly possible, and focusing our effort on the higher-level stuff that keeps my kids learning and pursuing their passions and supporting their strengths with as few barriers as possible.
So that's our experience so far. Sorry about the book!!
Thank you, this has really helped my confidence in myself about some of the reasons why we chose to homeschool this child and to help me start defining some goals/pathways.
