Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment LMB and advice, please

Thanks for the additional data and info - it really helps!


I asked about this to see if there was a split and if it indicated an issue with fine motor vs visual processing - both can be at the root of dysgraphia. It's clear from your ds' scores that his dysgraphia is fine motor in origin.


The processing subtest scores on the WISC also make sense for fine-motor dysgraphia.


So I'm guessing that his individual subtests on the WISC aren't all at the 95th percentile level - that's neither here nor there, because you have what you need in the report (although to be honest, I always like to get a copy of the subtest scores whether or not they are mentioned in the report, just so you have them in case, for instance, someday he has repeat testing and you want to compare how he's improved).

I am also guessing the psych included specific writing skills in the report that needed work? And recommendations for the type of approach to remediation?



The reason I'd want to see subtest scores here is - the 95th percentile she's reported for each broad category of reading and writing might indicate each subtest is at 95th percentile (and would be expected to be at 99th), or it could mean that he's got 1 or 2 subtest scores at the 99th percentile and one subtest that is lower. This happens frequently for dysgraphic kids - the WJ subtests labeled fluency rely on handwriting and are timed - two challenges for kids with dysgraphia, so it's not unusual to see lower than expected scores on those two subtests. If they are much lower than the other subtest scores for each category, what you might be seeing is that he's actually performing at the level you'd expect conceptually for both reading and math, but he can't show it quickly with written responses. That's just a possibility, and it might not be the issue with your ds - his psych seems to have been very thorough in her report. The reason I'd want to know that for sure, though, is that for my ds - he really did lose ground on math achievement in early elementary because he was held back in math due to his dysgraphia due to his teacher's requirements to be able to write timed math facts quickly and also be able to express every danged math problem as a word problem.


This is exactly what we saw (and still see at times) with our ds who has an expressive language disorder.



I wouldn't be quick to assume that the issue is either interest or being an expert on a topic. Being an "expert" means he has factual knowledge, which means he doesn't have to generate an idea to write about. He also may "look" disinterested when he's lost and has no idea what to write about - but that doesn't necessarily mean he doesn't care about it. Does that make sense? So rather than assume that he's able to write when he's interested or an expert, track the assignments where he is able to put his thoughts into words and look for similarities across the assignments that are less subjective - can he summarize a factual article? Does he struggle when he has to come up with a creative fiction story? Does he have difficulty describing or developing characters to put into a story? etc


This is most likely dysgraphia, and this is why it's sometimes difficult to recognize that there is an expressive language challenge coinciding with dysgraphia. I would suggest having him switch to typing asap for all class assignments. Keyboarding really helped us pick up on where our ds was impacted by his expressive language challenge by taking a large chunk of his dysgraphic challenge out of the equation. Adding in word prediction software was also a huge help, because it eliminated the need to do massive spell-corrections after writing, and the length and complexity of thought put into his sentences went up exponentially with word prediction.


This all sounds like classic dysgraphia.


I've always been really honest with my ds and I've also always felt that I have a primary role in helping my ds learn how to write (because it's going to take him extra work over NT students), but I've also not seen any of it as a negative. For instance, I'd show your ds what you expect a "good" sentence to look like - give him an example to imitate and learn from. Our SLP helped me recognize something about dysgraphia which you don't always get from reading the references online - the thing dysgraphic people are challenged with isn't just handwriting, it's a lack of development of automaticity. They have to do certain tasks over and over again many more times to make them "stick" than NT people do. I don't know if this happened with your ds, but it took my ds literally years to learn how to tie his shoes. Handwriting never became automatic for him, and learning how to write a sentence and then a paragraph etc were all tasks that took a lot of repetition. I don't know if you have other children, but it was very eye-opening for me to see ds' younger sisters learn how to write - it was sooooo much more automatic and easy. Anyway, you can look at a sentence your ds has written and reframe how you are looking at it - if he asks you if it's "good" let him know that what the teacher (or whoever) is looking for is "x,y,z" and he has "whatever portion of x,y,z" and he can improve his sentence by doing "whatever it takes to get to x,y,z".


Are you referring to work he's done at home where you are watching his effort or the result of work he's done at school? I would try to not judge his effort at this point - you can ask him if he's giving it his full effort, but even that, I'd let go of for now. You mentioned above that he cares about doing good work - give him credit and trust that he is trying his best. One of the most damaging things I've seen happen with my ds is that teachers and other students assumed he wasn't trying his best when really he was but it just didn't *look* like he was trying because he was lost and had no clue what to do, or because his dysgraphic handwriting was slow and impacted his ability to spell etc. It's easy to give up hope and check out when you're struggling with an LD that no one has figures out how to remediate or accommodate yet. It will take some work to get there, but in the mean time, the single best gift you can give your ds for the long run is your confidence in him. Self confidence at this stage might be a struggle for him, and he's got struggles with classwork - but he's also going to eventually be successful, and if you take some time to read the bios online of successful businesspeople etc who struggled with LDs as children, you'll find a common thread among all of them - either a parent or a teacher or a *someone* who was an adult who believed in them.


Again, this is all classic dysgraphia. And it in know way is a reflection of his true spelling ability or his true math ability.


He needs to have an accommodation at school to be given fluency tests (timed tests) orally. At home, when he says he thinks he can't do subtraction, have him give you answers orally and see if he can't do more quicker that way. It's also probably going to be helpful if you start explaining to him that he's dysgraphic and what that means in terms of ability to use handwriting to express yourself. If you haven't already talked to him about it, I'd do that now. It may seem depressing or deflating to have to talk to your ds about having a disability, but the flip side is - it's an explanation and it's how you help him see he's not a low achiever at spelling or math facts and that he *can* do them given the proper accommodations.


Not all dysgraphics have illegible handwriting - but what they do share is that the handwriting isn't automatic, so while writing their working memory is completely used up with the handwriting process and nothing is left over to focus on spelling, grammar, etc and most importantly - how to express their ideas.


Thanks - I misunderstood what they meant about the auditory function. To be honest, I am not sure I'd worry too much about the LMB report at the moment. Have you had your ds' SLP (I think he has one?) run any type of expressive language assessment? As well as the TOWL (it's a written language test) - I think from what you've described these will be more useful at the moment.

BUT I'm not a professional, so take everything I've written with huge red flags and grains of salt the size of snowballs

Best wishes,

polarbear