Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional 2e assignment mix

DS is a first grader and has dyslexia, dysgraphia and dyspraxia. In the last two years he's had OT with Handwriting Without Tears, a neuropsych assessment with the Eides, Toe by Toe at home, a summer session at Lindamood Bell and then follow up testing with the Eides. He is doing great.

He attends a small private school with about an 8:1 student teacher ratio. His teacher wants feedback from us regarding his workload. In very simplistic terms, DS works above grade level with some accomodations and at grade level without them.

Here is an example: His reading comprehension assignment is first grade level. He reads a little paragraph and then responds to one sentence questions with one sentence answers. For him this is not really a reading comprehension exercise at his reading level. It is a handwriting exercise so he can practice writing sentences with normal looking letters, spacing and punctuation. He needs this practice and it doesn't seem overly burdensome.

Some assignments are a bit more challenging like looking at pictures and matching them to the constellation name.

A weekly assignment with his spelling list is to look up all twenty words in a dictionary and read the definition but only copy two definitions. I think he gets an oral quiz on knowing what each word means and coming up with a sentence using the words.

So what is an ideal mix of assignments for a 2e student in early elementary? I am guessing that for grades 1-3 the focus is going to be on the LD exceptionalities.

He complains about the amount of work but it seems more like "Spelling is no fun! I wish school were just lunch, recess and field trips!" not the concerning type of complaints.

He spends a lot of time at school 8:00 - 5:30. This means he has about equal playtime and work time. There is a two hour work period in the morning and a two hour work period in the afternoon. The rest of the time is spent at recess, reading books of his choice, playing games with his friends, eating and going on little excursions to the woods or library.

He never talks about the work during the work period except to comment that it is boring or that he made up a hilarious sentence. All his stories about the school day involve what he and his friends (and new this week - girlfriend!?!) are doing at recess.

Is it possible that after all my fretting and his hard work he is actually doing well, needs no advocacy from mom and I can just relax a while?

Some of his assignments seem pretty easy. There is regular equation math and then math with lots of drawing pictures. He draws funny pictures. So if the problem is "There are 3 sheep in a pen. There are 2 sheep in the field. The sheep in the field each get 2 buckets of grain. How many buckets of grain do you need? Draw a picture, write an equation and solve the problem." His pictures look like cartoons with captions and sometimes a backstory.

So in a nutshell - his assignments mostly tend to challenge his LD's more than his intellect, he self-enriches some assignments, has enough free-time and enrichment activities at school that the overall experience is enjoyable but is not getting a lot of academically accelerated work at his intellectually gifted level with accomodations.

Good enough for the first month of school or talk to the teacher about it?

DS's teacher last year at this time (first grade) sent home the first grade math homework saying that she knows the math is too simple but he should practice writing numbers. I could understand her line of thinking, but I saw it as teaching DS to hate math assignments. I think the math should have been at the appropriate level (for him at that time, around 3rd grade) with accommodations made, like fewer problems or not having to draw a bunch of silly pictures or write unnecessarily to "show his work." If he needs to practice drawing, that's fine, but why tie it to math? You want him to make actual progress in math, not just in the other e, if that makes any sense.

I think his day sounds somewhat balanced with play-time/time to explore and work-time. However, I agree with blackcat -- the math should be at the appropriate level for his academic capability. Ditto for reading and reading comprehension -- if he is able to comprehend and can answer questions about the book, it is okay (to me, atleast)even if his handwriting is messy or not really neat. One should remediate the handwriting aspect separately, and not combine it with "Oh, the handwriting or the spacing is not good. So, perhaps he should read lower level books". If there is an IEP, I would specifically ask for that -- that the remediation of the "e" be separate from him being challenged academically.

Thanks blackcap and mom2one, I think you understand my concerns. One thing that makes any problem difficult to pin down is that the curriculum for him is varied in each subject. In math for example there appear to be four to five different types of exercises being used. There are the drawing problems like the sheep example from above, there are sheets with just six problems of 3 digit addition and subtraction, there are 48 problem single digit timed math fact quizzes, there are read the graph and solve the problem worksheets and then these Venn diagram logic type worksheets. According to his WIAT scores he is a strong math reasoning but weak computation type person. He isn't a math kid. I think the math reasoning was maybe 95th percentile. I guess my problem is that I don't know what is ideal so it is hard for me to say whether what he is doing is a problem. I can say for sure that he needs math fact practice. He is a finger counter.

It has been a year since his full assessment and he has done a lot of remediation. There were assessments at Lindamood Bell and the Eides saw him this summer but they were just looking at reading not math and I am not sure the school really understands it all.

The school is offering Dora Reading Assessments and Adam K7 Math Assessments. Maybe I should start with that and go from there.

Does anyone have familiarity with these assessments?

So confession time, I meant to say something to his teacher but got busy with work and never got around to saying anything.

The good news is that the teacher decided on her own to cut repetition in half for regular math and switch to oral answers for math fact quizzes. He is moving along nicely now.

For reading comprehension he and his teachers have worked out a solution. He is reading books of his choice at home (and taking them school) and then discussing what he read with his teachers. If they have not read the book, he lends them his copy so they can read it too. It seems like more of a book club than school work but it is a nice set up for all of them.

I think his teacher has moved from having high expectations for a preconceived idea of a first grader to having high expectations for him based on his capabilities.

I am so glad it looks like this is going to be a good year.