I have a DS10 who is MG with ADHD. He has always read above level at school, reading MAP is 95th-99th (although he is having trouble making gains now in 4th grade), his handwriting has always been very neat, and he has never been a terribly poor speller. His spelling did lag a little behind for a while, compared to his reading ability and overall intellect, but I know that reading and spelling do not necessarily advance at the same pace and it's never been awful, just not always great.

Here are things I've seen over the years that have given me pause...When he was a preschooler and I was trying to teach him to recognize the alphabet, he seemed to forget from day to day what I'd shown him. He was very interested in numbers, but not letters. He did not learn to read at the pace or with the ease that his older brother did, despite the fact that we all believed him to be smarter and a quicker thinker than his brother in general. By the time he was 5.5, he was doing ok with reading, but that seemed a little laggy to me when compared to my impression of his intellect. As the years have gone on, when he reads aloud, he skips words, he replaces some words with others, and is rarely what I'd consider a smooth, fluid/fluent reader. It can be frustrating to listen to him read sometimes due to the hesitation. If I can see what he's reading, I often have to ask him to stop and go back to get the words he missed, because they may change the meaning of the sentence entirely. He does read for enjoyment, and he can get through a book fairly quickly if he is really drawn in by it, but I'm not in his head to know what sort of effort he is putting forth internally to get that done.

Because of his ADHD, he has always been prone to impulsivity and I've assumed this was bleeding over into his reading. The speediness, the skipping, it all seemed to be reflective of his ADHD associated H/I. But the more I read about many ADHDers also being dyslexic, it makes me wonder if I should be paying more attention here. Is it possible that he is mildly dyslexic and able to compensate well? He has some traits that make me think maybe, and others that do not fit at all, but I don't want to overlook something if he could use some help.

Last edited by melissan; 05/01/19 03:43 PM.