Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment At what age is a LD likely to be found?

Hi Displaced,

I'm in your shoes to a large extent. Our kids have very similar profiles. We just finished extensive neuropsych evaluation, and my DS6 (almost 7) is very, very similar to yours. I posted relevant numbers in the 2e section and you should check them out! I edited out absolute values, but left in the intervals. Private message me if you want to talk about the absolute values.

I'm no expert here, but I can tell you one useful thing - based on the score spreads and on some additional assessment, DS was indeed diagnosed with dyslexia/dysgraphia. We are jumping into researching therapies, and hope to actually be able to get him some meaningful support.

Also - reading this thread is the first time I've been grateful that DS expresses his anxiety/struggles in school as "fight", not "flight." I see so clearly that his disruptive/rough behavior in school pushed us in a way that a quieter, more internalized struggle on his part never would have done. When I have heard of other PG kids' quieter struggles, I always wished DS would struggle more quietly, too. But now I realize that his spectacularly un-quiet struggles pushed us to look harder, sooner. And I'm so glad we did.

Note to self - Try to keep this frame of mind in place as I dive into the school struggles this year.

We still have a lot to figure out about what DS's assessment tells us. But it feels good to have something to really work on!

Sue

Thank you for your response. I will look at your thread. You don't happen to live in the SE US? I'd love to I meet up (ETA -- oh, your profile says CA. Bummer)

I understand what you're saying about behavior with regards to struggles. IDK which category DS falls into, all I know is at this age school should not be hard but fun and easy, especially for a gifted kid. But everything written is a struggle and not fun for him unless he just writes willy-nilly (not carefully). He can write and write but at least half of a whole page is usually illegible.

BTW, can anyone explain between verbal IQ and verbal index? I don't even know the difference!

It is possible that ADHD might cause achievement discrepancies, but I lean toward dyslexia/dysgraphia.
Yes, that's what I meant.
Many other things could cause this, including anxiety, sleep disorders, attention problems. But learning disabilities are among the top associations, and looking at the overall pattern, that's still where I'm leaning.
Yes. It's a different test, so you have to take into account standard error even more so than within test.
He should have scored higher on comprehension based on his verbal cognitive ability. But he didn't.
Significant. I suspect auditory discrimination weaknesses.
That's more auditory discrimination symptoms. Probably affects his articulation. Yes, schools have speech language pathologists on staff, who are eminently qualified to assess auditory discrim, artic, and language memory/processing.
Scribing is to maintain his interest in written expression and allow him to continue to develop language expression skills without becoming so frustrated by the process that he decides he can't do it, and won't do it in the future. I would separate the handwriting practice from language expression and creative writing tasks.

They are the same.

So a SLP can assist or help diagnose these things, but the concerns of dysgraphia or dyslexia or further testing should be done by a neuropsych, is that correct? I feel like I'm all over the place :P

Yes.

Thanks. I will add SLP to my list of specialists to make appts with. Insurance will cover it and it may be faster to get privately vs waiting for the school, then just request services with the school.

I had some more questions, if anyone's willing/able to answer.

I can start a new thread if necessary but I'm hoping to keep at least some things in one place

If we were to get OT treatments, would that negate the ability to diagnose dysgraphia? Is the SLP able to give diagnoses before treatment (if anything is present), or do they just recommend specific treatments without a diagnosis, just treating symptoms present?

I'm not even sure how dysgraphia and dyslexia are diagnosed. Is it based on the scores from the testing he already had (as in, if it were present it would be numerically shown or otherwise diagnosed?)? If so, are the numbers relative to IQ or other testing results or absolute cutoffs (less than 70 on a subtest for example means a LD is found, etc)?

Is it diagnosed on how he is working during the testing (observations)? Or is it more comprehensive, taking into account multiple subsets during testing, multiple observations, etc?

I don't want to delay treatments that will help him. But if we don't have an official diagnosis before starting treatment, and his symptoms improve and he never gets a diagnosis, then we still have an issue as far as accommodations. Does that make sense?

I don't want to delay accommodations if necessary, but if it's months before testing is accomplished I don't want to ignore treatments this whole time if I can start them sooner.

No, although if therapy were intense and over a long period before testing, it might muddy the Dx a little bit. Yes, and also yes. SLPs can Dx communication disorders, and they can also recommend therapies without a Dx.Yes. And some more. Yes, they are relative to cognition, but yes, some school systems use absolute cutoffs instead.Yes, and yes, ideally, but again, some practitioners stick strictly to test scores, although that is not best practice.I don't think his profile will shift so much that the deficits become unclear, if you remediate for a couple of months before testing. If you have the therapist (or yourself, if you are doing home remediation) take repeated measures, documenting his baseline and weekly progress over the period of remediation prior to testing, you will have collected some good response to intervention data that should be included in the formal testing results.

Ok, now I feel a little silly. I was looking over the testing date, and it was only late March. I thought it was months earlier. Would it be better to wait on retesting and see what happens since is was only 5-6 months ago?