Followup on the meeting -- we were partially successful. He scored 61 on the IAS and they agreed to accelerate him in Reading, but not Math. The timed math tests got in his way....he can do the calculations, he knows his math facts, but because he can't regurgitate the facts when a timer is involved, they will not accelerate. They are supposed to work with him to get him fluent, but they are still going to use timed tests to gauge fluency. What would you do in this case?
This is jmo, but I believe it's really most important to understand the *reason* for the slow fluency before trying to drill on something like math facts. It's possible that their idea of getting him fluent will work, but if there is a root cause behind the slow fluency type of tests, and you haven't defined what it is or understand what it is, you could waste a lot of time trying to get a student to accomplish something in a way that isn't going to work, and the only thing you'll come out with on the other side is one very frustrated student.
Your ds had a really large gap between GAI and FSIQ on his WISC, and he's got a relatively low fluency score on math achievement. That combination of scores could signal any of possibly 1000s of different things going on from simply not bothering to move quickly on a few subtests to challenges that can be defined as LDs and require remediation and accommodation. I wouldn't worry quite so much about not having been accelerated in math *yet* in school (our 2e ds was held back in math in early elementary for exactly the same reasons), because chances are with a highly capable student such as your ds, you'll be able to get him caught up and back to the level he is capable of working at.... once you *understand* why he scores lower on timed tests.
The tests our ds had that helped his neuropsych identify the issue causing slower scores on fluency/etc tests were: Beery VMI (visual motor integration), a series of executive function/etc tests (NEPSY), and several others that I can't remember the name of at the moment. The Beery VMI and one of the NEPSY subtests were key for our ds - because they identified an issue with fine motor processing. If we'd simply waited and hoped that our ds would eventually "speed up" it never would have happened because he wasn't physically capable of writing faster. Once we had accommodations in place (for math his primary accommodation is extended time, also has access to keyboarding) - he easily caught up and moved way ahead. Math is his thing - he's great at it. But if we hadn't identified what he was truly struggling with, he would never have been accelerated and would have been seriously depressed and frustrated. The worse consequence for our ds (prior to diagnosis) was that he had begun to truly believe he *couldn't* do things simply because handwriting was a challenge.
So - what's going on with your ds might be nothing, or it might be something. Just in case it's "something" I'd seek out further testing to determine why he had the large gap in GAI vs FSIQ on the WISC. I'd completely focus on that first, get it done, and then with the understanding you get from that, return with the info to his school and build a plan for math that makes sense in terms of placing him where he should be in terms of cognitive ability.
Second item - the teachers were saying that he gets in his own way by playing with supplies at his desk and clowning around instead of doing classwork. He apparently has missed a lot of recess this year because he had to stay behind to do the classwork. I tend to think he is doing this because the curriculum is not challenging him, how can you tell if misbehavior is due to lack of challenge or something else?
If you have a clue there might be a "something else" (which you have from his testing), then you do your best to understand the "something else". In our case, behaviors which we attributed to boredom with instruction really were, in part, due to our ds' "something else", and once we had accommodations in place to address the challenge, the problem behaviors disappeared.
We have a followup meeting in 6 weeks, at which time I want to be able to refute their claims that DS is immature, I just need the ammunition to do that. I am also contacting DS psychologist to see what he would recommend.
It's a good plan to contact the psychologist, but rather than focusing on refuting claims of immaturity, I'd take the focus off of the school and put the focus on figuring out why there is a gap in processing speed etc. It's a subtle change of focus, but basically it helped me a lot in the elementary years to remember to focus my efforts on my child's needs not focus them on the battle with the school. Hope that makes sense!
Best wishes, and keep us posted!
polarbear
