Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Easy math problem frustration

My daughter (just started 2nd grade) keeps getting matched with great teachers. This one has already noticed that my daughter has trouble repeatedly writing spelling words out as spelling practice exercise and modified the exercise for her, which is great because she actually can't write and focus on spelling at the same time. She learns spelling by singing the letters to herself and then taking a practice test. All the other stuff is just very frustrating busy work that reinforces bad handwriting habits. I include this info to illustrate that teacher notices the issue and to say that the teacher is open to sensible modifications. My daughter should be getting a 504 in a month or two anyway (we are still doing testing--right now it just seems to look like dyspraxia-related processing speed issues) and the expectation is to get her accommodations for disorder of written expression.

But now she's coming home telling that math is really, really hard. How can second grade math be hard? She seems to be having two problems.

1) They are doing addition of numbers like 23 +2 like this:

Step one: Decompose 23 into 20+3 by creating circles coming down from the 23 and writing the 20 in the first one and 3 in the second.
Step 2: write out 3+2=5
Step 3: write out 20+ 5=25
Step 4: write out 23+5=25

Obviously, she doesn't need to write anything down to know that 23+2=25, and I've heard the complaint that kids get bored writing all of this stuff out, but I don't think that is mine's problem.

The more I watch her, the more I see how absolutely terrible she is at breaking things down into steps. I think I can drill her on this and that if she just practices these steps, she'll have them down. Is that the right thing to do here or is there something cognitive that she's missing that she needs to be able to do, that me drilling her in the algorithm will render ineffective? Or is it like the spelling, just a totally ineffective way for her to solve a problem?

It also looks like she's having trouble drawing circles and fitting the numbers inside of them and she doesn't like to write down the equation. When I force her to, she'll write 3 2 5. Then I'll tell her she left out the equation symbols and she'll force them in between the numbers while being very frustrated.

Is this normal? Are there modifications or ways of teaching this that will make it easier for her to write the steps down? I hate to have her hate math because of something like this. (FWIW, she is not math gifted, but she is working above grade level and generally scores in the 99th percentile on school math achievement tests.)

The other problem is even weirder, and it is something that I am starting to be able to trace back as a consistent problem. She is sometimes given a number (like 26) and told to show this number 4 different ways (2 dimes/6 pennies, 20+6, XXVI, etc.) She is really stressed out about this.

Whaaaa?

She told me that there are so many ways to break 26 down that there are just too many choices in her head and she doesn't know which ones to pick and gets stressed out and can't think. I remember when she was in a montessori preK, the one problem she had was in choosing what activity to do. She said there were so many choices that she couldn't decide. And if you ask her a very general question, like "what did you do today?" she says she doesn't really remember. At the school open house, they had to write down one thing they wanted to know about second grade and she couldn't think of anything. She said that she just did first grade for a whole year, why would she have questions? That being said, it's totally a blank page thing. Other than that, she seems to be a REALLY flexible thinker.

Getting back to the second math issue, I don't know what to tell her except for to just pick one thing out of the air and write it down. It doesn't matter which of the 26 ways she chooses. They are all the same, just choose one. I totally don't understand why this is so hard.

Does anyone know a way to help her through this problem?

We're with the perfect teacher and perfect place/time to ask for accommodations. However, I'd personally prefer she learn how to handle and solve her own learning challenges without accommodation, when possible.

Some of the things you've noted could be related to *not* having accommodations in place yet for her DOWD/Dyspraxia. A lot of what you write sounds very similar to my dysgraphic/dyspraxic ds who also had a diagnosis of DOWD during elementary school.


It can be hard for all sorts of reasons - it's possible the concepts are tough for her, or it could be hard for a dyspraxic student because it's handwriting intensive.


Are you sure she knows 23+2=25?


It sounds like you're still waiting for a full report from an evaluation or she's had a recent evaluation - if this is something that's not addressed in the report, can you ask the person who did the evaluation if they have any insight that might be relevant? My dysgraphic ds is very very good at math - but he refused to do any math worksheets in early elementary and would stare at them and tell us he didn't know what to do. It wasn't the math concepts that was the challenge, it was the writing. He does have an expressive language disorder in addition to dysgraphia, but I think it's really all tied into his dyspraxia. We weren't able to really see his math abilities or have him appropriately placed in math until we had accommodations in place for handwriting.


This really sounds like it's dyspraxia-related (fine motor skill challenges) rather than a math challenge.


No, it's not normal for neurotypical kids - but yes, it sounds like "normal" for a dyspraxic student who has fine motor challenges or possibly a student with undiagnosed vision challenges. Have you ever asked your dd if writing/drawing makes her hand or wrist hurt? Does her handwriting seem sloppy and not evenly spaced? Has she had her vision checked?


If the issue is related to dyspraxia or another type of challenge rather than actually understanding the math, chances are great that once you've accommodated for the challenge she'll like math a-ok (unless that's just not her personality!).


I think that you'll hear a lot of people respond that this is typical for a gifted kid - to have so many thoughts inside their head they don't know what to answer. It all also sounds so much like my dyspraxic ds, but he says the issue for him isn't having a ton of things in his head to choose from, it's really not knowing what to write down. It's not just an I'm-confused-about-this-one-question - show-me-how-to-do-it-and-I'll-get-it - it's a glitch in communication ability. It's difficult to grasp that it's an actual challenge in kids who are extremely bright because when they are able to communicate it is so obvious that they are highly flexible thinkers with huge cognitive abilities.


I've been telling this to my dyspraxic ds for similar assignments for years, and he *still* has difficulty choosing. He's almost grown now, and we've had so many opportunities to talk about the "why" and for him, and I can't really explain it well but I'll try. If you put a set of 10 different objects down on a table (real, physical objects) and told him to choose one, he could do it without thinking. Trying to get information out of his head is an entirely different process. He does have to think about it but it's almost like the step of "move your hand to object A on the table and pick it up" is missing when it's something in his brain that needs to be selected and retrieved. Learning challenges are a lot like swiss cheese - holes/gaps in random places (terrible analogy but I can't think of anything else at the moment!)


The ultimate goal for almost all of our kids (those with LDs or disabilities and those without) is to one day become a happy, independently functioning adult. People with disabilities often need some type of accommodation. Naturally you don't want to put an accommodation in place that your child doesn't need and may come to depend on, but the flip side is that with dyspraxia chances are good your child will need some type of accommodations somewhere. You may find that once you've accommodated for handwriting, for instance, that some of the other things that look like challenges will disappear. So my recommendation is take it one step at a time. Get the report if you're still waiting for one. If not, go back to your evaluator with the questions you've asked here to get their opinion. Then start putting the accommodations in place that are recommended for the 504. With the math, I'd try scribing for her at home and see if that relieves the frustration or if she's still confused. For most 2e kids, there isn't going to be an overnight answer for everything - it's going to be a journey where you figure out one piece of the puzzle then tackle the next. I suspect you'll have a bit of that "peeling of the onion layers" to do to fully understand everything that's going on with your dd.

It's really wonderful you have a teacher who's willing to make modifications and accommodations - that will help tremendously this year!

Best wishes,

polarbear

ps - this is something that is probably not related to what's up with your dd at all... but I'll throw it out there just in case it seems to be familiar at all. One of my dds had really bad vision (not eyesight, but double vision, eyes not tracking etc) when she was in early elementary. She also hated math and would get really really upset and frustrated over trying to learn concepts like you mentioned above. Sometimes she's learn some concepts very quickly, other times she'd just collapse in meltdowns crying about how she just didn't understand math. She'd fallen behind grade level by the time her vision challenges were diagnosed and remediated, and for the next two years or so we (parents and teachers) all continued to see the math issues as separate from her vision issues and dd continued to have meltdowns over new concepts introduced in math. That all changed, however, with time, and she eventually started not only catching on in math but complaining of being bored, and she's now not only caught up to grade level but is subject-accelerated in math. In working with her over the past year though I've realized she still has impacts from the time early on in school when she couldn't see - impacts in the way she needs to visualize a problem etc, as well as needing to hear an explanation rather than read it. She *can* read really well now, but I think her early brain-training relied so much on auditory information due to vision issues that that's how she learns math now and it's not going to change even though she reads well and can see much better. The way she thinks through problems to understand them also many times doesn't mesh with how I would work through it, but it's logical to her and it does work - it's just not in the way that a person who is using eyesight to see and then in turn can easily come up with a visual perhaps thinks things through. Hope that makes sense!

Thanks so much! I wrote that at about 3 in the morning and it is a little long. Thanks for reading through all of it.


Yes. And I'm sure she knows that 223+239 is 452, though she does not want to write the problem down, just the answer--and that can lead to calculation errors. We just finished playing a card game (Dominion) that involves adding up lots of different point values, so I know she can rearrange numbers in her head (at least to some extent) in order to make calculation easier. She's never been a math fanatic, but last year she liked math and did well in it.

What I don't know is if she can separate the steps out to get to those answers the way the teacher would like her to, and if so, if we should drill her on that at home. (I find that with motor tasks she needs lots of repetition.) To tie my question back to the spelling, one spelling exercise they do is called a sailboat. They write one letter of the word, then two, then three...It is incredibly frustrating for her and she does not need to do it to learn spelling. As a mom, I don't want to make her do it because it is counterproductive. Nothing about "sailboating" is useful to her in spelling or in life. Is the math issue like that? Meaning if I don't encourage her to go through the frustration of sitting down and using this written system to decompose numbers and write so many equations, will she be missing something?

I'm not worried about dyslexia. She's been reading since she was 4. She reads about a minimum of two hours a day and way above grade level. Vision has been checked. Working memory isn't bad but it isn't unusually high. However, she just panics SO MUCH when it comes to writing things down. I think it limits her working memory and that could be a problem as well.

Again, this sounds so much like dysgraphia.


Honestly, I don't know if it's counterproductive to repeat the math of if there is truly some nugget of something worthwhile doing tied into it that might be worthwhile doing for the sake of later learning (I am highly skeptical that what you've described is required for a student who understands math lol... but I'll try to be fair to the teacher and let's just suppose that there is something worthwhile in going through this exercise...). So... given that there is something (we're assuming) worth learning through doing the method - jmo, it sounds like the frustration is most likely due to fine motor skills... so do the math without the fine motor. Scribe for her. Have her answer orally. Take the fine motor out of the equation and see how difficult the task is. Whatever you do, don't make her repeat handwriting and drawing tasks for the sake of learning something entirely unrelated to handwriting or drawing.


The thing about dysgraphia (if it's dysgraphia) is that when the student is using handwriting, all the available working memory gets used for rethinking how to draw each letter, so a dysgraphic child with even exceptionally high working memory is going to have essentially no working memory available for anything else while using handwriting.



Exactly. Sounds *so* much like dysgraphia! But the good news is - if it's dysgraphia, it's *not* a working memory challenge - once you've accommodated for the dysgraphia (i.e., taken away the handwriting component of the task), you've freed up the working memory.

polarbear

It sounds very much like your school is using Singapore math for its curriculum. The curriculum is hard at first for most kids to get the idea that there is more than one way to get to an answer, or to solve a problem. While they are in the concrete part of the curriculum, there is a lot of the "write this in 3 or 4 different ways" stuff, it seems really annoying and useless at this point, especially when the child already knows the answer, however, the beauty of this curriculum is that once they are in the habit of looking for the different ways of solving things, or of writing numbers, the pay off is huge in upper elementary and into middle school when the math actually gets harder and needs different perspectives to solve the problem.
I have taught the curriculum and love it because the real outcome of it is that kids acquire a true number sense that allows them be successful in higher level math much more readily than being taught the traditional way where they learn the algorithm and that's it. Having said all of this, I do not have much experience with 2e kids in my math classes. I know my non-2e daughter was frustrated with having to pick just 3 different ways, but we were finally able to convince her that it really didn't matter which ways she wrote down the answers, as long as she picked 3. It may be helpful to ask if she can do math work on graph paper with really large boxes, then she can write 1 number per box and put the +,-,= stuff between them, or make a bunch of papers with the circle pre-drawn on them (they use these V shaped number bonds for a long time in Singapore math).
Good luck.

I agree that it sounds much like SM or MiF. I did do SM with my (not officially Dx) dysgraphic-y and math-y child, and found that having to do the same problem multiple ways was not that annoying--it was definitely writing that was the issue. I scribed through the first five grade levels worth of SM (which is all that most people do of the curriculum, anyway), and accepted oral explanations of word problems, with just the answer written down.

This is where scribing and supplementary oral assessment come in.

The irony here is really palpable.

I do agree that the others are correct that it sounds like a writing problem. Good luck!

First of all, are you sure she shouldn't be qualifying for an IEP rather than a 504? DS8 has similar issues and has an IEP (although it probably all boils down to severity and scores on tests--he was about 2 standard deviations below the mean for motor development, for instance).

Second of all, he would kill me if I made him do all of that writing, or if the teacher required it. He is brilliant in math but does not show steps. He does things correctly, but would he be able to explain the steps he's taking? Probably not. Long division, for instance--he does it in his head. I recently had to show him how to do it on paper and line up numbers, because he wasn't showing any work, he was just writing the numbers on the top of the line, and the remainder. He was doing ALL the steps, but in his head--he wasn't writing them down. It sounds like the school is trying to teach various strategies for adding. Some of these are silly, and others can help her do future math in her head more easily, allowing her to not write as much. I don't see the use for making her write down everything step-by -step if she can explain the concept verbally with various problems. But I think sometimes schools make it much more complicated than it needs to be. 23+6 for instance would be the same as 20+9. You take 3 way from the 23 to make a multiple of 10, but then you have to add that 3 back onto the 6. It's easier to start out adding by "making a 10". When I learned this back in second grade, they probably didn't teach that concept, they probably had 23 + 6 on a worksheet with the 6 lined up underneath the 3, and I counted on my fingers. There was one method, which was unfortunate. That being said, I really don't understand your example or what they are getting at, so if your DD is confused I don't blame her.

If she is able to understand various strategies for adding, rather than just lining up numbers and carrying as needed, then I don't see what the point is of making her write everything out. I would negotiate this with the teacher. DS was accelerated to work with 5th graders in second grade, and they are very flexible with his messy work. As long as he understands the concept and gets the correct answers, no one really cares about the written work aspect. The teachers actually seem really impressed by his ability to do everything mentally (although I would prefer if he showed a little more work than he does--and at some point, like Algebra, we will probably have to figure out how to keyboard math).

Thanks to everyone. I find so much help on this discussion forum. I have never found anything like it.

Blackcat: I have been told that she has to be doing below grade level work to qualify for an IEP, and at this point she makes straight As and works above grade level. Even the writing doesn't look below grade level. The issue is the refusal to write and draw. At this point her issues have been seen as behavioral (lack of trying/effort). But, honestly, the school counselor is very supportive of both my kid and a 504 and will get her the accommodations that she needs under that. I just don't see a need to fight any other battles.

BUT...

She's just starting second grade, and there's just not that much spontaneous writing yet. I see academic problems on the horizon--and the behavior shaming has been a huge emotional problem for her for years.

Last night I did the same type of math problems with her that I described above--only instead of having her write, I scribed for her. There was no hesitation. She answered all of the questions quickly, including the blank page question.

It's a writing issue.

We talked about the difference between math being difficult and writing being difficult, that they weren't the same thing.

Ugh. We've been struggling with this for years. In the past the DCD has created social, emotional, and physical problems but we are only now seeing an academic effect. I knew this was coming, but I was hoping it wasn't.

How much writing do you guys require your kids to do? Just generally? I know she needs to start typing, but I don't want her to totally give up on writing while she is so young. She does need to know how and get some practice at it, right?

ElizabethN: Yeah, I saw that. :-). Not ironic. It was just 3:30 in the morning, and I'm pretty bad at math myself. For some weird reason, I don't really have any desire to go back and change it.

If the disability causes impaired educational performance compared to peers without the disability, then she should qualify for an IEP. Our school gave us the same line (or similar, they need to be "failing" or below average), but it's just not true according to the state criteria and eligibility checklists. Kids can qualify for an IEP even if they have passing grades and are progressing from grade to grade. DS ended up in the "physical impairment" category. That being said, is it worth a fight? I guess it depends on what services she would qualify for. Since we switched schools, DS gets pulled for writing every single day. He also gets pulled out for OT, DAPE, and speech (not every day). At this point they are working on keyboarding with him but are still trying to get some legible handwriting out of him. If you see her start to struggle academically on a regular basis, or fall behind, it's definitely something to keep in mind.

I wouldn't "give up" on writing yet, but I also wouldn't force more writing than she is physically able to do. DS looks incredibly awkward when he writes and complains about his hand hurting after a few sentences. He is actually fairly fast when he writes but it is so messy with no spaces between words.

I keep meaning to post here but haven't had time. DS9 also has writing issues and we've had very similar experiences. We scribe a lot of his homework and the teacher occasionally scribes at school. We don't have a set formula for when we scribe and how much we make him write but whenever there is excessive frustration or when it is going to seriously impact his mark it generally gets scribed. There is only one teacher and only so much time so I'm sure his grades would be higher if he had a full time scribe but that isn't realistic at this point so it is what it is. We don't really emphasize grades and talk a lot about working through the challenge and doing his best. He knows he's smart, he knows we think he's smart and that writing to show what he knows is something that is going to be a struggle but that is ok. He will have a laptop this year in class which hopefully will also help.

I will say that math is generally where he has the biggest battles which is kind of ironic since he is a super, super mathy kid. "Show your answer in numbers, pictures and words" is usually a sign that there will be a battle. He doesn't get why you'd ever need to do all of that when the answer is clearly 42 (and I can't really blame him). In the end he wants A+'s in math. He couldn't care less about most of the other subjects but he cares about math so we've used that as a motivator. We tell him that if they want 3 ways, they are probably going to give 3 marks for it and he will never get all 3 marks if he only shows one way (or just the answer). This helped because it changed it from me (or the teacher) MAKING him do this to him earning his marks by jumping through their hoops (I tried to keep my cynicism to myself as long as I could but he eventually came to his own conclusions so we just went with it).

The other reason that math is more of a pain is they tiny, tiny spaces they give for answers. This really stresses him out. We've encouraged him to get extra paper and do his work there and hand it in with the worksheet if needed. If it is homework and there are 30 problems on the page and I know he can do it I just scribe and he has to tell me absolutely everything (like where to put the carry 1's, what to cross out for borrowing, etc so it looks like he didn't just do it in his head even though that is what he does and then adds the other stuff in after). This year they had government testing so part of this exercise was to train him on how to use a scribe with all of the rules that they have in place.

It is a fine line to walk. I do want him to develop his writing as much as possible but at the same time it can be the source of much frustration. Not sure there is a right answer but we just fumble along as well as we can.

As Blackcat mentioned, a student does *not* have to be working below grade level to qualify for an IEP, but the purpose of an IEP is to provide individualized instruction that is different from what she is receiving in her classroom - so you have to prove she needs "something different". I'm not sure from what you've posted that she actually would qualify for (or need) an IEP. It sounds like she needs *something* - a proper diagnosis, for one thing (as in, understanding what her challenge with handwriting is based in and how it impacts her academics), and she most likely will need either remediation or accommodations in the classroom and for homework - which should be based on the diagnosis. So... while she may not qualify for an IEP, I'm curious - has she been through an actual IEP eligibility process? (this would include ability vs achievement testing as well as potentially OT and SLP evals etc). OR have you simply been told that she wouldn't qualify and there was no actual evaluation?


This can happen so easily to children with some type of LD or challenge that impacts their school performance - when the teachers don't understand, when parents don't really know what's going on, and when the child of course has no idea why they can't write/etc like the other students in class. This is why it is *so* important to do two things - the two things a parent *can* control - first, do everything you can to figure out what the actual diagnosis is. It's incredibly helpful to a child to have an actual name for what's up and to understand what that diagnosis means, to realize it's not simply that they aren't good enough of that the people who are saying they are lazy are really and truly wrong, even though they are adults. The second very important thing to do as a parent is to advocate and let your child *see* that you are standing up for them, supporting them, advocating for them. Even if you get absolutely nowhere, your child sees that you are in their corner, standing up for them - which in turn gives them self-confidence that they can depend on you while at the same time showing them how to speak up and fight for themselves (which they will need to do later when they are older).


If it's dysgraphia and the only challenge is the physical act of handwriting, it's possible that a 504 plan can include everything your dd will need in terms of accommodations and remediation (learning to type, access to keyboarding, etc). OTOH, I still think it's really important to know for sure - is it dysgraphia? Is it something else? before you can have a good solid plan to proceed with knowing how to accommodate/etc properly. For example, if it's dysgraphia, the chances are good that handwriting will never become automatic and your dd will need to keyboard or use other means of communicating when "writing". In that scenario, you'd want to get her keyboarding asap, and only do very basic handwriting instruction. But what if it isn't dysgraphia, and she *does* have the ability to develop automaticity in her handwriting? Then you'd might want to pursue a one-time high-intensity handwriting program to get her writing neatly. What if the issue is posture or pencil grip etc and that's all it is? Then a few sessions of OT might be what's needed. It's really tough to know *what* to do if you don't fully understand *why* you are doing it (i.e., what's causing the symptoms).

The other reason a full eval might be useful at this point in time is - it's possible there's more to it than dysgraphia or a handwriting challenge. It sounds like there is an outside chance she's having difficulty with word retrieval or written expression (getting her thoughts out or organization of thoughts or something).


Exactly. We ran into this with our ds - he has an expressive language disorder but it was not obvious enough for us to realize it until he was in 4th grade. Partly because the work he was given in school didn't call for open-ended spontaneous writing, partly because he had dysgraphia so we thought the unwillingness to complete writing assignments etc was always due to dysgraphia.


Save the examples like this that you do at home - they will be useful in advocating at school.


I have to apologize - I tend to forget the details for each person's child when I reply to posts, so I'd forgotten your dd has a DCD diagnosis. Since she's got that diagnosis (so does my ds), I'd consider that's most likely the primary reason she has handwriting challenges, and I'm guessing she'll have difficulty developing automaticity of handwriting due to the DCD. You should absolutely be able to get a 504 that includes accommodations such as scribing and keyboarding based on the DCD diagnosis, as well as observations at school and at home.


My DCD ds does *not* use handwriting at all other than answers at school that require a few words or 1-2 sentences. When he was first diagnosed at the end of 2nd grade we were told to spend the summer teaching him handwriting as one last try at helping him achieve "what he was able to" and to then drop it - forever. We were also told he should start keyboarding right away, practice as much as he could, and in school we should scribe until he was able to keep up with keyboarding. There is one gotcha here - keyboarding is not fast for our ds (due to his DCD, whereas for many children who have dysgraphia but not a DCD diagnosis, keyboarding can become lightning fast). In spite of that, he is still faster keyboarding than with handwriting, and keyboarding results in much better grammar/ punctuation/etc.


I have never seen not using handwriting as "giving up". We live in a world where very few people actually use handwriting in their daily lives, so a kid who grows up keyboarding... isn't going to stand out at all as an adult, or even really all that much as a high school student. OTOH, a student who is forced to repeat something over and over that they aren't neurologically equipped to actually accomplish is at risk of developing low self-confidence as well as potentially wasting time that they could be spending developing their areas of strength or just learning something that is interesting and fun.

This all depends on the individual, of course, but fwiw - my ds was not excused from learning cursive writing in school - his whole class practiced for at least 10 minutes per day every single school day for the entire 4th and 5th grades. DS actually had relatively neat-looking cursive writing. Then he had summer vacation after 5th grade. When 6th grade started and an assignment was given out and the class was asked to write in cursive, ds could not remember how to make *any* letter in cursive other than writing his name. He remembered what the letters look like and he can easily read cursive, but he couldn't remember how to "draw" a letter - and that's the key. Neurotypical folks don't have to remember "how" to draw letters every time they make them. Imagine having to figure that out every time you write a letter. Would *you* want to focus on learning something that will never become automatic, or focus your study time on something more productive?

Hope that didn't sound preachy - wasn't intended that way at all!

polarbear

I'm not sure what the process is. School told us she didn't qualify. Here's what he have done:

She saw a private neuropsych as a young 4 (at request of preschool) who noted poor motor skills. Coding portion of the WPPSI was at 50%ile. Qualitative descriptions on Perdue Pegboard was low average for both hands, borderline for dominant hand, and average for left hand (at the time she seemed ambidextrous--or as my husband likes to say, ambimaldextrous). Neuropsych recommended OT and social skills, said she was quirky and slow but nothing wrong, IQ was high but would go down, don’t send her to prestigious private schools where everyone is encouraged to march to the beat of the same drum.

OT diagnosed as DCD, but DD did fine on most of the initial assessment she gave, including handwriting. The initial assessment was very short and casual.

A few weeks ago (week she turned 8) she saw a private neuropsych who specializes in gifted kids as part of us getting documentation to qualify for 504. At this point, only the WISC-V has been done. Psychologist is doing more testing this week and next week. I have not seen the results, but she ran some of the test numbers by me, just so I could tell the school where we're at and what she'll be recommending. I don't remember exact numbers, just that they seemed to match the 4yo ones but with higher verbal (she reads constantly) and lower (26th percentile!!) processing speed with a very low coding score. She said that the 99th percentile scores in most areas combined with 26th percentile processing speed was a big issue for her and she needed accommodations for disorder of written expression.

Is this the IEP eligibility process or is there something else? I don’t want to push for IEP if the school will give her everything she needs without one because we have a very good relationship and I don’t want to mess that up. A lot of the admin at the school like her and they want to help. I do not see her getting services. She was in EI as an infant for PT and never qualified for OT. There is something missing in these tests they do that doesn’t catch her problem. Her handwriting does not look bad unless she doesn’t know what she wants to write.

Thanks for all of your other words of wisdom. We do have her in intensive handwriting tutorials with a teacher from a special needs school. The big dysgraphia symptoms that I see in her are crossing her thumb over her fingers when she writes, tight grip, “drawing” letter strokes backwards (even though they look the way they should on the page), and the fact that she resists writing so much. She spells terribly when she's writing, but makes 100s on spelling tests in the advanced group using the same words! On spelling tests she misses punctuation in sentence dictation but she understands punctuation. She also does not draw. She says she can’t figure out how to draw the things she wants to draw. This has always been a HUGE behavior problem at school. They really don’t get it. I would say "inconsistent" is the way to describe her relationship with legible writing. My husband said that was his biggest problem too. Teachers would ask why he could do something one day and not another, and he didn't know why. He really didn't have an answer.

Husband is dysgraphic and was never supported in school (nice ivy league family, high achieving private school that his mother begged to keep him in). He received no support and was always seen by everyone, including his family as lazy, stubborn, and a waste of potential. His parents have passed away, but I think his brothers just see his issues as aesthetically unappealing. I see a real distaste for him in his family. He still struggles with not fully being able to recover from all that. No DCD label back then. He was diagnosed with "fine motor dysfunction." We are fixated on helping her through this because of all my husband went through. He is having a very hard time seeing her go through this. I think because he is reading about DCD for the first time. I can just see him getting angry and sad for himself (and sometimes relieved). And we know that once you get out of school, You. Can. Just. Type. The fact that you can be okay if you can just get out of school without having your sense of self ripped to shreds is what is most distressing for us. We just want to get her through this.

I am very thankful for the advice. We want to do things differently than his parents did. And she’s so academically inclined (he is too), that we want to make sure she doesn’t give up on school. I struggle with wondering how to tell a young child that there is a reason she has trouble with something without giving her an excuse to not try to overcome it.

The school can't tell you she doesn't qualify for anything unless they evaluate. We got the same line. I had outside OT/PT assessment results and gave them to the school, and they were shoved into a folder with no one even looking at the reports. I would do some research on what the names of all the disability categories are in your state (names may vary between states, but all states have to provide the same types of services), for instance see if the information is on your State's Department of Education website under "Special Education". I found the eligibility checklists for each special education category and I could see that DS would possibly qualify as either "Other Health Impairment" or "Physically Impaired". For the latter, he qualified by having a diagnosed physical/motor disability (DCD) and the results of observations showed that he is "slow" in the classroom and has problems completing work at the same rate as peers. He was the last to get in the classroom because he kept dropping things on the floor taking stuff out of his backpack, and then last to get his math worksheet (which was a mess in terms of handwriting) turned in and join the rest of the kids for "circle time". So the "educational impact" was demonstrated. Once a kid fits into a category, the school can do pretty much whatever they want for services (OT, adapted phy ed, speech, etc). Your DD may benefit by seeing a school OT, esp. if she gets help with things like letter formation, pencil grip, beginning keyboarding skills, etc. Is it worth a fight with the school just for that? I guess it depends on the attitude of the staff. It's not worth it to fight to get services from incomptent people who don't understand or see an issue. I prefer IEPs over 504s because with an IEP, they need to meet with you and have you sign off on things, document progress, etc. With a 504, it's harder to enforce and there's really no monitoring of progress. But I do think the most important thing is to have appropriate modifications/accommodations and if you can do that effectively with a 504, then that may be all she needs at this point.

If you want her to be considered for an IEP, I would put in a written request to the principal and/or the spec. ed director for the district, detailing what your concerns are. They need to respond within a certain amount of time and plan an evaluation that addresses the concerns. Even for a 504, there still needs to be some sort of eval process, but not as comprehensive as what you would get for a child to be considered for an IEP. If they know there is a disability, they really need to do a comprehensive eval under the "Child Find" mandate if you and/or teachers have any concerns. You shouldn't even have to request it. But not all districts/schools are up to speed. Our district seems to evaluate only when it's a blantatly obvious case of a child needing an IEP (which is illegal, but worth the risk for them if it saves them money/time).

Boy, does that ring true.

Yesterday, I took mine to the playground. A couple of kids she knew were there. At first I saw a lot of "come join us!" Then I heard one kid say "Go slower. It's [my daughter's name] turn." Then they just wandered away and she played by herself on the swings for a while. She just can't keep up.

DS9 is dysgraphic and the best thing we ever did for him was to entirely give up on handwriting at the start of grade 3. His pediatrician insisted on it because of DS's ever-increasing anxiety. That medical advice was more compelling for the school than the dysgraphia diagnosis and was what convinced DH (who had worried that we were giving up too soon). If I could go back in time I would have thrown in the writing towel in grade 2. A lot of emotional damage happened that year. He was already noticing the difference between his output and that of other children in grade 1 and the difference kept growing in grade 2. I think, and our experience with DS is, that once a child is capable of basic writing, there is no benefit past that point in continuing to practice/instruct writing.

There are a lot of similarities between my DS's early signs of dysgraphia and what you describe with your DD. DS didn't/wouldn't/couldn't draw, resisted writing, formed letters from the bottom (they looked just fine once finished), took an outlandish time to complete any written task, had written answers grade levels below his verbal answers, and held his pencil like it was an offensive weapon. Teachers thought he was lazy or inattentive because some days he could actually write things, but most days he couldn't. He went from loving school to hating it before we were able to get in front of the challenge and we still struggle with the fallout from that.

DS actually liked having a name and explanation for his challenge. It helped him to conceptualize it as brain wiring, rather than the wilful behaviour the school thought it saw. He hasn't used it as an excuse to not write, interestingly he writes at home to label the drawings he now does (they are very rudimentary drawings, but wonderful to see in the circumstances). I think it can be empowering for children with challenges to know what the challenge is, how it manifests, where it comes from and how to address it. DS can now relax about writing because he understands his own wiring and the unexpected result is that he writes more than he did before he was the one who got to decide when/if he writes. I'm not sure any of that makes sense, but in essence I'd say don't worry about your DD not trying to overcome it.

DS was visibly relieved that the reason he was having a hard time writing wasn't because he was "stupid" which was the conclusion he had come to as a 6 year old when the kids at school were easily writing and he wasn't. He actually tried more after we talked about it and about how it was going to be a more of a challenge for him than it was for many kids. I think it was freeing for it to become something that he could work on and that if he wasn't acing immediately it didn't take away from his self image as a smart kid.