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    #240486 11/16/17 08:11 AM
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    geofizz Offline OP
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    DS11 has now completed 3 years of OG as part of his IEP. His OG teachers are well trained and generally considered some of the best in the state for the quality of their work. DS is engaged in the OG sessions, and everyone reports he works hard with focused attention.

    In his 3 year re-evaluation, his WJ and TOWL spelling scores went down each by about a half a standard deviation. The split between his functional vocabulary, both written and spoken, and his spelling is now more than 3 standard deviations. He knows all the rules, but is unable to apply them even when editing if composing or editing. The writing samples I have indicate he misspells 25-30% of all words on first attempt.

    I'm told there is nothing more that they can do for him besides accommodate with spell check. I'm hearing from the team that no one really knows how to address this in kids like DS. "Some kids with dyslexia never get to the point where they can spell reliably."

    We have a truly amazing IEP team, where each person has a clear understanding of the 2e issues at hand. Everyone recognizes that many of DS's issues are fundamentally rooted in being 2e, as the spelling would be less of an issue if the vocabulary weren't so extreme. Accommodation only goes so far, as spell check and related tools require he be somewhat close to the target word. He also will not have access to spell check on AP exams, yet it was the goal of everyone on the team that DS have full access to advanced classes and associated exams in high school.

    Help? Thoughts? Direction? Testing I should request?

    Likely related info: DS will continue to qualify for an IEP under OHI as he's a disorganized mess without support. OG and an amazing gifted language arts teacher have largely resolved the decoding and writing composition issues that led to the initial IEP qualification. His handwriting is illegible, however OT data suggest the issue isn't motor control or strength. He skipped first grade where handwriting is taught. I suspect he's suffering from lack of instruction in this area. Handwriting will be part of the next IEP, and folks are looking into ways to address this productively going forward.

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    aeh Offline
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    That's a challenge. I have met a handful of students over the past couple of decades who were truly intractable dyslexics, even with high-quality OG. AP exams can be tricky, as the College Board basically gets to make their own rules, however, especially with his documented handwriting issues, he should be able to get some useful ones:

    "If you have a documented disability, you may be eligible for accommodations on the AP Exams such as:
    Extended time
    Large-type exams
    Large-block answer sheets
    Permission to use a braille device, computer, or magnifying device
    A reader to dictate questions
    A writer to record responses
    A written copy of oral instructions; as well as other accommodations"

    I would suggest that the most applicable is the second-to-last accommodation, which currently is listed as scribe, but in functional adult life, should target speech-to-text assistive technology. Perhaps also computer, which may or may not include access to spellcheck.

    A few thoughts on AT: spell check actually works quite well for severely-impaired spellers if used in combination with thesaurus. I routinely recommend that students with his profile (very high oral vocabulary/very low spelling vocabulary) use them this way:

    1. type/dictate an easy-to-spell synonym of the word you have in mind to your device.
    2. use spellcheck to make any necessary corrections.
    3. highlight the word and open the thesaurus function, selecting the best word (often one you had in mind already) from the list offered.

    Yes, it's a bit more work, but it allows students to employ their spoken vocabulary in their written products.

    For classroom work and adult life, I would suggest that the number one accommodation will be, as I mentioned earlier, speech-to-text.


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    geofizz Offline OP
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    Thanks aeh.

    Thanks for the info on the AP accommodations. I wasn't aware of the scribe accommodation. Any idea of what it takes to qualify for that beyond typing responses?

    DS already uses a thesaurus to find the word he wants when he's way off: so he figured that one out already.

    Speech to text so far has been a failure. He has oral motor apraxia which means that the clarity of his speech is too low for the computer to pick up, particularly when he has a cognitive load from composition at the same time. He was left so frustrated last time he tried it that he won't try again. District-provided tools did work for his sister when she broke her arm, though.

    So how do you determine "truly intractable dyslexics"? If you've seen just a handful in your years of practice, it leaves me wondering what fraction of the dyslexic population this applies to, and what secondary factors might be present. While my statements above as to his OG services are accurate, I've had persistent concerns about some of the details of how the services were provided.

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    Originally Posted by geofizz
    Thanks for the info on the AP accommodations. I wasn't aware of the scribe accommodation. Any idea of what it takes to qualify for that beyond typing responses?

    Sorry I can't help with the OG etc, but just wanted to let you know that we had no issues getting either College Board or ACT accommodations for our ds - I think the key was supplying all of our documentation: original diagnosis report + most recent 504.

    There's a standard set of accommodations you can apply for through CB, or you can request accommodations your ds receives that are outside that standard suite. There's a note on the form that if you request the "outside the norm" accommodations you may have to arrange specifics re testing for your student (sorry I can't remember the exact wording).. I mention it just to let you know that our experience was... we had to do that anyway even though the accommodations we requested were all in the "routine" list.

    Best wishes,

    polarbear

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    aeh Offline
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    Working with secondary-school students in a system where I have a pretty good idea of the quality of OG instruction in the feeder schools, I can usually make a decent determination of whether there is any additional benefit to be obtained from OG by looking at multiple aspects of reading. Fluency is usually the last deficit to resolve, although for some, spelling is where the residual lies. But generally, they can apply their word-level reading skills in isolation, even if slowly.

    Keep in mind also that OG addresses primarily the phonological awareness prong of reading decoding. There are two other principal factors: phonological memory and rapid naming (automaticity). When used at a high enough level of intensity and frequency, some of the automaticity may be taken care of through sufficient repetition (though there is another research-based intervention with better data for pure fluency development). Typically, OG-type programs should include at least 2x60 per week, but preferably at least 5x45 in small group instruction. (The home-based individual tutoring programs from All About Learning recommend 5x20 for reading, plus 5x20 for spelling.) The specialists I've worked with have also made decisions about groupings vs individual intervention time based on factors including the student's responsiveness to intervention and level of severity; sometimes even the small group is moving at an incompatible pace for specific students.

    Another factor is that there are many more ways to spell a sound than there are ways to pronounce a spelling. It sounds like he actually has made significant progress in OG, as his reading is described as having resolved. It may be that his intervention needs to shift to target spelling/encoding more than reading/decoding at this point. He may know the rules, but he may also need incremental practice to acquire some more fluency.

    And one more item: among the more intractable dyslexics, I have seen severe articulation disorders popping up as a pattern. I think it significantly interferes with sound-symbol correspondence, because the sound they generate/hear is not the one aligned with written English. So then it becomes a huge memory task, to match arbitrary sounds with arbitrary symbols. I've seen some success with combining the speech therapy and OG (in one case, the speech path was also our OG therapist, so she was able to actually do both interventions together).


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    geofizz Offline OP
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    Thank you both, polarbear and aeh.

    The input on the severe articulation disorders is interesting. I've often wondered if he doesn't even hear the sounds in words like we do, thought his hearing is impeccable and he skims above the line for Auditory Processing Disorder. When discussing grammar, his entire IEP team felt like he needs to translate his thoughts into English before he can write them.

    DS's initial SLP dx when he was 3 (before they even dx'd him with the apraxia) said that he had a 25% chance of reading on grade level by 12th grade with appropriate therapy. It had struck me as odd and targeted at guilting parents into following through with therapy, particularly since he was nearly reading already at that point and he made lightening fast gains on the artic goals he had at that point (apraxia dx didn't come until age 7). ...He hit a PHS level for comprehension in 4th grade. Spelling, however, seems like it might wallow in the mid-elementary levels. Alas 2e.

    Thank you so much for the input on accommodations. We have a meeting in January set up with the director of student services and the high school vice principal to discuss his HS pathway, since he'll go there for math starting next year. I will add the accommodations to the discussion in that meeting with an eye toward college board accommodations. He's on track for at least 2 AP classes before the end of this next IEP.

    Last edited by geofizz; 11/18/17 07:28 AM.
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    aeh Offline
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    FYI, a recent article on artic and related disorders and reading disabilities. The study itself is not particularly relevant to your child's age range, but there are several interesting references in the introduction.

    http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jcpp.12648/full


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    geofizz Offline OP
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    A very interesting read, thanks.

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    Hi Geofizz! Long time no see...

    Not sure it will be much help but happy to share what's going on with DD12 in case there is something of use for you.

    DD spent 4 years at a spec Ed school and had a truly wonderful reading interventionist. She used Wilson consistently and by the end of 5th grade DD was at (or ever so slightly above) grade level. At that point teacher started introducing some parts of Lindamood Bell. I'm not sure just what parts but could go through notes and emails to see if there is any more specific info if you need it. By the end of 6th grade DD scored a 97 on the level Z Fontas and Pinnell. She was technically 1 point away from being released from dyslexia intervention. Reading teacher said the 1 point came from putting the emphasis on the wrong syllable a couple of times while reading a passage aloud but DD self corrected so she wasn't concerned. Everyone on the IEP team (including me) was shocked by this amazing performance.

    That being said she still can't spell. At all. I mean even simple 3 letter words. She is now less likely to omit vowels than she was a couple years ago but they aren't necessarily the correct vowels. She still confuses certain letter sounds. While she can tell you the rules she can't really apply them while writing. (ie Just this morning she asked me how to spell "raw". If asked she could tell you how the "aw" sound should be spelled but that doesn't seem to enter into her process when writing the word herself.) Very few problems with decoding but encoding remains a significant challenge. Last year as part of her TAG program she had to create a "Jeopardy" game and lost points because on her title page she said Her Topic ADDITION instead of Her Topic EDITION. To her they sound alike and she had no idea she used the wrong word...

    She is dysgraphic as well as dyslelexic so even more problems when writing by hand. She now chooses to write short passages by hand but they continue to be significantly shorter and way more simplified than what she types or does using voice-to-text.

    She is no longer at spec Ed school so no longer working with awesome reading teacher so I don't anticipate much improvement in spelling. I have been told her spelling will likely improve now that she is reading text rather than relying solely on audio books. Frankly I don't really believe it will improve too much. From my perspective she made more progress by the end of 6th grade than I ever expected her to make by the end of high school so any further improvement will be gravy.

    Taking notes, writing worksheets or doing any kind of standardized testing remains an elusive goal. I admire your son for being in a position to be looking at AP exams. I'm not convinced we will ever get there - certainly not without significant accommodations being in place. In these situations I wonder what would the college board do to accommodate a child who was let's say a quadriplegic? Early in his career DH had a student who wrote beautifully but had no use of his limbs. He was in college - and doing quite well - so there had to have been accommodations in place for his testing. Sadly that young man passed away long before DD came into the picture so we can't ask him but it shows that any sort of physical limitation has to have been accommodated - right? I think of that as my starting point.

    We are just starting to look toward high school here - trying to determine what she will need to be able to do so we can work backward. I wonder if that might translate to contacting the college board now so you have time to get things in place for him before he takes that first AP class.

    Anyway that's my input whatever it may be worth. Kudos to you, your son and his whole team for all the hard work and progress!

    ETA And yes DD also has the articulation issues. Diagnosed with dysarthria her intelligibility has been rated at 91% after years of speech and oral motor work. She can hear errors when others speak (and can actually be pretty persnickety about it ...) but can't hear or feel the difference in her own speech. Despite this the voice-to-text built in to iPads works for her most of the time. She has to force herself to speak slowly and distinctly, and often gets frustrated having to repeat and correct, but she can use it pretty reliably. She then uses the text-to-voice feature to read the sentence back to her to be sure it says what she thinks it says. Time consuming but at least she can do it.

    Last edited by Pemberley; 11/19/17 07:34 AM.
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    Originally Posted by Pemberley
    In these situations I wonder what would the college board do to accommodate a child who was let's say a quadriplegic?
    FWIW one of my sibling's friends is a quadriplegic. In high school, they had a full-time aide that attended all classes, took notes and scribed outputs. Their exams were written in a separate room with a scribe and extra time. They finished a post-secondary degree and masters and with similar arrangements. With tech advancements, they have been able to use speech to text for some things. They has a career in her field. (I don't want to post too many more details for privacy reasons but if more details would help - send me a PM). Now all of this was outside the U.S. so the college board wasn't involved but if they could do stuff like that 25+ years ago, you'd hope that it would only be better now.

    Last edited by chay; 11/19/17 11:42 AM. Reason: making it even less specific
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    Originally Posted by Pemberley
    She is no longer at spec Ed school so no longer working with awesome reading teacher so I don't anticipate much improvement in spelling. I have been told her spelling will likely improve now that she is reading text rather than relying solely on audio books.

    Pemberly, given the era I went through school and where I went to school I was never diagnosed with anything (at school). But I was a classic 2E kid and my spelling improved continually until I started to develop cognitive issues due to health problems in my late 30s. I didn't read well (understatement) until upper primary, I read avidly during high school and I am sure that this helped. However I believe that the single biggest factor for me improving my spelling was moving to full time keyboarding at university. Once I was keyboarding full time I slowly got better and better at spelling, I feel like the rate of change was far faster in this period than during years of advanced reading in highschool. My spelling was never amazing, but did become markedly better than anyone would have imagined during my schooling. All those things people say about needing to use the pencil to develop muscle memory, aid learning and retention etc... All seem to be true for me with typing and absolutely the opposite with a pencil in my hand. I have new problems now with typing that weren't there 10 years ago, but there was a time that I could reliably feel that a word had been typed incorrectly and go back to fix it. Whereas I still struggle to spell reliably on a hand written shopping list or a note to the kids' teacher/s... So don't assume she's done. She could be, she might not be.

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    Further to my own post, my greatest spelling weakness is still spelling aloud, but it was only after I had my own children in school that I went from zero ability to do this to having some limited capacity. People don't stop developing and learning at some magic age, even core skills like spelling and reading comprehension. And gifted children grow into adults who possibly have more chance than average at continuing to push past their other Es and make unexpected gains.

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    aeh - I was recently offered the opportunity to have DD's AT instruction taken over by an SLP. I turned it down assuming we needed someone with an LD specialty. Was I too hasty? Could there be a benefit to having an SLP/AT connection like you saw with the SLP/OG combination?

    Earlier this year we had a top notch AT Eval by someone who specialized in AT for LD kids so we have a framework of her current needs in terms of apps, programs and equipment. Our new focus is note taking and streamlining her use of the AT. ie Try to get some of her cumbersome 5, 6 or 7 step processes down to just 2 or 3 more efficient steps if possible. Or is the speech connection you mentioned related to spelling totally separate from the use of AT? As I said earlier unlike Geofizz's son DD has gotten voice-to-text to work pretty well. She switches between keyboarding and voice-to-text when having difficulty with a specific word.

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    aeh Offline
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    The principal benefit of having an SLP work in conjunction with decoding/encoding intervention is that they can give more specific instruction regarding the exact oral-motor sequences that generally produce certain speech sounds, and then directly tie that to the graphemes, so that even if the student can't quite generate the correct sounds, they have an additional (oral-motor) tag to connect phonemes to graphemes. And sometimes it even helps their articulation. A lot of learners reach a point where they are stimulable, but have trouble re-training old habits, which is partly an automaticity deficit. (Not an SLP, so I'm getting a little out of my range here, but this is what I'm told by my SLP colleagues.)

    Whether your DD would do better with an SLP or LD learning specialist managing AT isn't clear cut. But if you've maxed out on whatever she had before, then it probably wouldn't hurt to have someone with a slightly different angle try. I've had building AT specialists who were SLPs, and were very successful with students of a wide range.

    I'd also comment that I actually have seen students whose spelling improved after adopting routine AT, as they were now consistently seeing correct spellings (vs their own questionable spellings), so even if they continued to struggle with phonetic decoding/encoding, at least their visual memory of correct spellings was being reinforced. It's not the most efficient way of learning spelling for most people, but the learners we're talking about aren't most people.

    For streamlining AT, when generating written responses, I usually recommend speech-to-text for first drafts, then editing and revision via keyboard/wordprocessor (with spell/grammar/style checkers engaged, and thesaurus function). For note-taking, it depends on whether she's taking notes from a lecture with/without visuals, with/without diagrams or symbols, in what content area, etc. In the classroom, I would also suggest accommodations that are not solely AT, such as teacher-provided electronic notes (skeleton during class, and complete provided after class, so that she adds some of her own notes in real time, but doesn't have to worry about missing anything, since the complete notes will be available after the fact). If you have SmartBoard or similar technology in the classrooms, the teacher can also print screenshots of the board as s/he goes along, and provide those as a copy of complete class notes after each class. Or if no SmartBoard, your DC can be allowed to take photos of the board on whatever approved digital device she has with her.


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    geofizz Offline OP
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    Wow, Pemberley, what amazing progress! All that hard work has paid off. And to pass on the impact of your experience and your openness in sharing it, I passed on to a local family how your DD had two different reading groups while the reading/decoding vs comprehension split was so high. This approach has now been applied locally.

    We got our OT report on DS' handwriting. Again, his giftedness is being blamed. No one has taught him to write. Argh. The OT suggests that he'll just have to slow down and recopy more neatly. In the OT assessment, she had him slow down to copy more neatly a writing sample I'd provided from several weeks ago. The writing sample had 6 spelling errors out of 24 words. In recopying, he fixed one error and introduced one. Since his spelling is now supposed to shift towards aggressive editing, it seems to me that he'll have to do everything 3 times. Compose. Edit. Recopy.

    Yes, I know all this should be done with typing/AT, but I still don't see a reason he can't be taught to hand write. We have no evidence for a reason why he can't write legibly, which leaves me pointing back at his lack of 1st grade instruction.

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    What is the reason you want him writing by hand? As a 4th grader DD herself asked to stay with OT longer when it was suggested it wasn't worth the effort. Her reasoning was that she wouldn't always have access to technology and needed to be able to write a note by hand if necessary. By 6th grade she declared "Continuing to work on handwriting is a bloody waste of time." She can now form letters, more or less the same size and facing the right direction. They don't necessarily stay on the line and aren't always spaced properly. So technically her "handwriting" has improved but when combined with her dyslexic spelling no one but an experienced sped professional can read what she wrote. It's a lot of time and effort with minimal tangible result. I'm proud of her for sticking with it but I agree that there are significantly better ways for her to spend her time.

    Over the years many people have pointed out that few people really write by hand "in the real world". Voice notes and keyboarding are now everyday methods used even by NT adults. I thought they were just being kind but I am seeing it more and more. I still write notes by hand during meetings but frankly more often than not I can't read my own handwriting later. I'm trying to push getting DD an AT work around for note taking - I see that as her biggest challenge to re-entering a mainstream environment. But for just about everything else her AT seems to serve her pretty well. Last year when she participated in the district's TAG program with gifted NT peers her AT approach was in some ways a benefit. She saved hours not having to copy things she had written by hand and was able to work more easily with her research by copying and pasting between documents on her iPad. I realized that all those kind folks had a point.

    While a can see a semester working with an OT on hand writing basics I'm not convinced at this point there is a huge benefit to him spending a ton of time on this. His academic needs will be getting more complex and I would rather see him have time and energy to focus on learning new and interesting material rather than arduously handwriting then copying over and over trying to correct spelling. He could type using spellcheck and then edit once. From my perspective this would leave more time and energy for actual learning. I know it works better for my DD. Just a thought. I credit Polarbear with emphasizing this over the years as I tried to figure out the best path for DD and her challenges.

    Great news about local families benefiting from DD's high/low situation. Bit by bit 2e kids are getting what they need as we share our experiences. It warms my heart.

    I had DD try the thesaurus technique aeh outlined above and we discovered google docs doesn't seem to have one built in. We loaded a thesaurus app but I'm wondering if we're missing something. It would be easier to tap a button while working on her document rather than having to copy and paste between apps. Any ideas?

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    There's a free Thesaurus add-on you can get to from the toolbar at the top of GoogleDocs. Doesn't seem to work very well, honestly, but you can also use the native "define" function, as that will also generate a list of synonyms in the sidebar, which can be easily cut and paste into the document.

    On handwriting: I feel that a reasonable goal for handwriting is being able to fill out a form, and write a one-line note. Any writing beyond that, we all typically use AT, so why sink unnecessary energy into more work on it.


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    geofizz Offline OP
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    Handwriting: yes, filling out forms, etc, are necessary, but also doing math is really difficult to do with any AT tools out there. Imagine 4 equations and 4 unknowns, something he was just asked to do. It took the front and back of a page, and he made an error someplace (couldn't read his writing).

    But fundamentally, I fail to see why no one is willing to even try to teach him. I understand moving to AT when interventions are deemed to have taken him as far as they can (like spelling, in his case), but no one seems to have ever been willing to even see if the source of the problem is lack of educational opportunity (skipped first grade) or dysgraphia.

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    I wonder if a quick trial of Handwriting Without Tears would be helpful? I don't know if an older child would benefit but it would probably ease your concerns and certainly address that basic handwriting instruction issue. FWIW DD hated it - she said "for me it's most definitely writing WITH tears" but people swear by it. Maybe someone here knows if there is a home version worth trying.

    Has your district ruled out dysgraphia? It seems remedial instruction from an OT to address your concerns would make sense and not be terribly time consuming or use too much in the way of resources. I just ran the question by DD and she feels strongly they have to determine if he's actually dysgraphic. "If he's dysgraphic it's not going to make any difference for him." Just a bit of btdt advice from one 2e kid to another...

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    HWT definitely sells home versions. It's one of the more popular handwriting curricula used among homeschoolers. They also have a free app for practicing letter formation using their wet-dry-try technique. They also sell keyboarding programs, and bundled handwriting/keyboarding packages. You'd probably want to try the grade 2 program, as that is the last grade that works primarily on manuscript. (FWIW, they even have workbooks in Spanish, French, and Hebrew.)

    For math AT/speech-to-math, look at EquatIO (chrome extension) and MathTalk (Dragon product for math), among others.


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    geofizz Offline OP
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    Originally Posted by Pemberley
    Has your district ruled out dysgraphia? It seems remedial instruction from an OT to address your concerns would make sense and not be terribly time consuming or use too much in the way of resources. I just ran the question by DD and she feels strongly they have to determine if he's actually dysgraphic. "If he's dysgraphic it's not going to make any difference for him." Just a bit of btdt advice from one 2e kid to another...

    Can I say how much I love this? Please let her know for me that I really value her input. The school psych is in two minds about the dysgraphia dx. He has some of the hallmarks of dysgraphia but not all. Then again, she recognizes that he compensates mightily. But your DD is absolutely thinking in the way I am: we need to know if he can learn to hand write before sinking a lot of time and effort (and inevitable tears) into all this.

    I did a lot of calling around and calling in favors in the last few days, and I found an OT that seems like she's keen to meet a 2e kid and will devise a way to evaluate the hypotheses at hand: (1) his handwriting is a result of missed educational opportunity due to skipping 1st grade or (2) he has dysgraphia.

    But wow, the "middle schoolers can't learn handwriting" concept is rampant. I had a few snippy phone calls with OTs where clearly I was unaccepting of reality. Hopefully the OT I found can give us a path forward.

    DS is also devising his own version of Handwriting Without Tears with remarkably clear goals -- heavy on the motivational peppermint patties and drawing strongly on his experience as a violinist. He wants his handwriting to be legible at a moderate writing pace - fast enough he can keep a sentence in his head. I'm going to do it his way to start because he has a plan. For all this, he's been the one most able to predict what will and won't work, so who knows, maybe we'll get somewhere.

    Now off to buy a huge bag of Yorks...

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    Joined: Apr 2014
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    Originally Posted by geofizz
    Now off to buy a huge bag of Yorks...
    I am totally on board with any motivational plan that involves Yorks!

    And seriously,..I would not be surprised if his self-knowledge and determination deliver results.


    ...pronounced like the long vowel and first letter of the alphabet...
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