Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional gifted scores and severe processing speed issues

hi everyone
i'm new. My DS, age 7 was diagnosed PDD-NOS at age 2 and i had the shock of my life when he had a WISC-IV that showed his FSIQ increased over 50 points from two years ago. And instead of a mix of scores in the 8 to 9 range and a FSIQ of 89, he now has:

GAI: 138
FSIQ: 119
VCI: 132
PRI: 131
WMI: 99
PSI: 83


Subtests were

block design: 12
Similarities: 13
Picture Concepts: 19 (!)
Vocabulary: 15
Matrix Reas. 14
Comprehension 18
Digit Span: 10
Symbol Search: 10
Coding: 4 (!)

The psychologist told me he suspects no PDD. He has no issues with social skills and is doing well in school with exception of math computation which is very frustrating. He has almost all the characteristics of gifted children, mostly displayed in the more "positive" way. For example, he dances ballet and plays all sports, loves music and museums, and sings on stage..

I suspect highly he is Visual-Spatial and am looking at that angle. The pysch used the term "Twice Exceptional" but admits he's not sure what the exact disability is that goes with the "gifted" piece. He is a specialist in gifted kids that i use for my Daughter who is uniformly gifted with FSIQ 147 and no history of any developmental issues. He also has a profoundly gifted grandfather and several other HG in the extended family.

Are these scores similar to what anyone out there is dealing with or can anyone think of anything that might point me to what is going on or how i can help him more (especially the processing speed).

thanks in advance

irene

First of all, I don't know anything. Some people on here do and I'm sure they'll chime in to give you real advice. In the meantime, though, I'm looking at your coding score combined with "trouble with math." Now, my son's coding was 1/2 visual and 1/2 auditory. His relatively low score surprised me because I've always thought of him as very visually-oriented. Now, I'm trying to learn about dyslexia to rule that out! You never know where this stuff's going to take you.

Could you child have SPD or an auditory or visual problem? What makes you think he's visual-spatial for example? Also, what is your child's behavior like? Attention issues, sensory seeking/avoiding, hyper, anything ringing a bell?

You're missing one subtest - Letter Number Sequence?

My son had a similar range though not quite as extreme as your son's. His lowest scores were Coding 8, SS 8, DS 7 with his top scores 18.

He is very slow processing but not as slow as his sister who has severe auditory processing problems. Math is really hard for her. It can take her up to 4 minutes to answer a 2 step math problem like 2*2*2. Talk about frustrated. Is this similar to your son's performance?

This is likely to become more of an issue for your son as gets older and you may want to ask for special ed assessment if he is already struggling with math.

What level math is he doing - multiplication and division?

Patricia

hi,
thanks everyone for taking time to reply.

here is more info.

He has no sensory issues, but very emoitional. For example, he started taking ballet after he caught me watching a pbs special on rudolf nuryev and was in tears. I asked "why are you crying" expecting him to say he wanted me to change the channel. Instead he said "i think i will never be able to dance like Rudolf". He now has several "passions" over different subject areas.

On math, he is great at the big picture but miserable at learnign his math facts, which he has spent the entire YEAR doing- just addition and subtraction.

Last week i came across a description of the Visual Spatial LEarner and "upside down brilliance" and was up all night reading as it fit him to a T. ***But I'm not sure if that means he is disabled??? or is it a learning STYLE.

His weaknesses are
-can't seem to memorize simple math computation
-has no concept of time
-disorganized
-distracted by things he sees
-hates schedules -everything has to be spontaneous.
-no interest in workbooks of any kind- even the ones they used in preschool for phonics that the other typical kids llked and the PDD kids loved
-can be overly emotional


His strenghts are
-science and social studies
-reading (went from K level to 5th grade level on acheivement test in about 8 months with no end in sight). No early reading or interest in letters.
-music and dance
-sports- can hit a baseball with pitching machine and plays in little league.

Also I am wondering if the CODING Subtest score has more to do with the CODING then the SPEED .He does meaningful things like comprehension questions very very quickly. But can't do the nonsense stuff.

any other input or suggestions appreciated.

i forgot to mention back to Patricia. Yes, I think 2*2*2 would be tough. also he gets special ed for his (possibly misdiagnosed) PDD-NOS so he gets extra time on all tests. But its just the math that it shows up on. The other ones he can be done in typical timeframe. It really bothers me because he is starting to hate math at school but loves the things we do at home.

Some of the things on your list of weaknesses (emotionality, preference for spontaneity, impatience with rote work like workbooks) I associate with giftedness and would not see as weaknesses. Rather I would see them as differences that may be advantageous or not depending on the setting.

Taking the long view, these traits are, in my opinion, advantageous. They just make him not fit in well in elementary and middle school. The older he gets the more "positive" these traits will be and as an adult they will be highly valued.

Other things you listed as weakness sound like executive function problems. Weaknesses in EF are associated with many different neurological conditions including ADHD, ASD, psychiatric conditions like early onset bipolar and dyspraxia/motor planning. It can also be developmental and he just needs time to "grow into" the skills he needs, like being organized.

Children with these difficulties tend to "grow into" their disability as they progress in school if they are not developmental artifacts. The skills associated with good executive function become more important to their academic success especially once they reach middle school and that is often the first time they are clearly identified as having problems.

Whether it's a disability or not - well from an academic point of view it is. You can see how his constellation of strengths and weaknesses are causing him problems with basic math. It may well cause him problems with reading too once he progresses to middle school.

Your observation about coding may be right on the nose. The problem with not being able to do tasks involving unfamiliar or nonsense information is that you need to be able to make sense of this kind of information when you read higher level textbooks and do math. Think about how your brain works when you see a word you don't know, especially a complex one like deoxyribonucleic acid all spelled out or a complex math problem that includes square roots and scientific notation. Or think of geometry - it has a huge amount of vocabulary to understand and recall - all the different kinds of shapes and angles. First step is to make sense of "nonsense" information - which may be very difficult for someone with the kind of problems you describe. Between needing to hold the novel information in memory while the brain searches for related information to "hook" the new info to and his slower processing speed - this becomes a very difficult task.

My son has similar problems but definitely has slow processing too. His latest psychoed eval said he had difficulty accessing material that is overlearned by most students. As I understand it, this means he does not automatically recognize and make sense of very basic information like letters and numbers. He has to go through a mechanical sort of process in his head when he sees letters and numbers to make sense of it so coping with novel information like complex new words is very difficult.

I'm not sure if this is like your son's problems but I think my advice to you would be to take the long view. I suspect that your son is going to really struggle with math facts of all kinds and, like my daughter, may never get them down. But once he gets to the level of high school his ability to see the big picture will serve him well and he can use a calculator for the basic stuff. I would make sure that his IEP calls for direct instruction in math from special ed ASAP if it is not already set up that way.

One reason for this is that you may need several years of documentation of his inability to overlearn this information despite remedial instruction in order to get accommodations and modifications like use of a calculator on high stakes testing at the high school level.

If he has problems recalling or executing multiple step directions - at school that might be division problems - then you may be looking at a language processing issue that needs speech therapy or intensive special ed support to help him learn to retain and follow directions. My daughter struggles with this and I've been told this is because of her severe auditory processing issues.

Sorry I'm so long-winded. I think I was born that way.

Good luck,

Patricia

I hope this isn't too off-topic, but when I read this, I think of a right-brain, visual-spatial learner with left-brain, sequential weaknesses. On the division, I was wondering whether you may have tried Silverman's suggestion (see page 2 of this article http://www.visualspatial.org/Articles/mthstrat.pdf )

I was wondering how effective this suggestion might be. My dd is getting to a point soon where she'll want to learn long division and I'm afraid the steps are going to be a problem.

Additionally, if steps are an an executive function task, is executive function a left-brain thing? Just thinking out loud.

Executive function is a frontal lobe thing It does not fit well within the "left vs right" brain paradigm as far as I can tell.

We have tried many different approaches and so far none have really "worked" any better than any other. And there are some things like math facts that just cannot be done any way but memorization.

Understanding, remembering and following directions/steps is a complex skill that can fail for many different reasons. EF issues is just one possible area of difficulty that may result in problems following multiple step directions. In my daughter's case the problem is auditory processing and extremely slow processing speed. These could be seen as partially EF problems but really have more to do with other aspects of cognitive function.

EF problems are difficulties with attention, control and metacognition - switching attention when you want to or need to, focusing attention for extended periods regardless of the novelty of the stimulus, controlling emotional reactions to situations, creating and maintaining order at the informational and physical level, having insight into your own mental processes. These skills develop along with the frontal lobe myelination and development as children grow up. That's why problems with EF may not become apparent until middle school when most neurotypical children's frontal lobes have developed to the point that they can do these things easily and reliably.

thanks everyone these response are intense and wonderful! lots of things to think about. The EF piece is just something i haven't come acrsoss on my own. I feel i have kind of a dumb question after all this. If he was your kid, would you push for enrichment services. Is he gifted? The gifted services become available next year, though i am unclear how kids qualify exactly. He seems to have such a thirst for higher level knowledge, however, I am afraid that his weaknesses may make it very difficult for him to keep up with the other kids and it would backfire.

also, does anyone have any idea what types of real life tasks would be associated with a very high score on picture concepts?
i'd love to have an example of types of things he could really ace.. he got a 19 (but really a 21 when i looked up his raw score in extended scale).


irene

This is from Sattler/Dumont, Assessment of Children: WISC IV and WPPSI III supplement, 2004:

"Picture concepts, a core Perceptual reasoning subtest, requires the child to look at two or three rows of pictures and then select from each row one picture that best goes together with the other selection(s) to form a concept. The task is to find a common element in the pictures that forms a category, concept, or classification... Picture concepts appears to measure abstract, categorial reasoning based on perceptual recognition processes. The task is to scan an array of pictures and determine which pictures have a common characteristics. The child first must recognize or identify each picture and then determine a quality that picture in one row shares with a picture in another row."

Not sure what that really says, but... a description of the subtest.