Geofizz,
FWIW, my son is definitely NOT a visual thinker, yet he has similar troubles to your son with writing ("Journal time is torture"--I'm SO with you, unfortunately)--with the exception that often if he is assigned a topic, he can't do it because he "doesn't know what to write." If he picks his own topic, he does a lot better. Don't know if you've checked whether that's true for your son. In any case, completing stem sentences is a lot easier for him than free writing on any topic.
We're in a similar place. Having him pick his own topic is torture (effectively what journal time is), but giving him a topic stresses him out. The best I've managed to come to lately is "write about X" and he'll respond that no, he wants to write about Y, and the produce a perfectly acceptable piece of writing about Y. However, if I tell him to write about whatever he wants, he can't.
Most important REPETITION repeat repeat repeat the same type of simple writing task/assignment until he could do it -
OMG YES. That's my instinct as well, but the teacher keeps suggesting we do a bunch of different stuff. This jives with what I see in his producing the paragraphs when we sit down to work with it. Stick to one thing until it's a lot easier.
do know that his achievement scores were along the lines of
--off the chart in math (something like 22nd grade or something similarly ludicrous--definitely above the 99.9th percentile)
--quite good in terms of expression (sophistication, content, etc.)
--average for grade level on spelling (though weak on sight words).
Same boat here. Remarkably similar boat.
Basically you ask a few questions and then after the person answers ask a few more about how they arrived at their answers. Once ds was older, around 10 or so, and very self-aware, I was able to talk to him and ask specifically how he thinks through a problem, and that's how I learned that he sees in pictures and movies.
I'd greatly appreciate it when you're feeling better. My quickie google didn't turn up any obvious hits. I do suspect that DS will struggle to express how he thinks. DD10 is just about now to this point, and she's one of the more self-aware and articulate people (kid or adult) I know.
Same thing happened here, although our ds was also prevented from moving forward in math because he couldn't write his math facts down quickly (argh). Anyway, those word problems used to drive *me* nuts! And it was never simply "explain" - ds' school curriculum was into "explain in three different ways".
We are so amazingly lucky that the teacher gets it, and he's not been held back in math too badly -- he does the verbal stuff with the 2nd graders, and then gets 5 minutes a day to move ahead with the teacher. She's taken him most of the way through 4th grade this way. DS will go into a gifted 4/5 compressed math class next year with everyone's fingers crossed that it goes well.
On the testing, in our case, I point to the lack of any dips in his WISC testing as evidence against ADHD, which is what the teacher suggests. CELF-IV matched the VCI of the WISC with no splits, and the WJ was shockingly high across the board. I'll ask about the TOWL. Thanks.
The board is awesome. Hopefully this conversation is still consistent with evelyn's initial goals! Hopefully I haven't dragged it in a new direction. If so, evelyn, holler, and I'll split off a new thread.
