I don't really know where to best start, but I need some help with figuring out what direction to go in. I've posted a few times, and come here for reading now and then.
I have 9 yr old twin boys who are really struggling. They were tested at age 5 and had scores ranging from extremely low (>25th percentile) and ranging up to 99.9. Both overall scores were in the upper end of the 99th. Verbal scores were on the low end, but 'normal' but short-term memory tasks were at the very very bottom. Achievement scores were slightly lower. Their profiles are extremely similar, so forgive me if I deal with them as a pair here, rather than individually. If I do otherwise, this already long question becomes simply way too long.
There has been a life-long aversion to doing anything difficult, and they clearly lack basic common-sense type thinking. They don't watch the world around them and have pretty much no situational awareness. Consequently their 2 yr old sister knows more about household tasks than they do, because she watches and learns. The boys have to be painstakenly shown and re-shown how to do basic tasks and they'd forget their clothes if they weren't reminded. They've never actually managed to handle even the shortest series of directions. There were a few preschool years where they had absolutely no interest in interacting with other children, but thankfully do wonderfully now with a select group of other kids who share enjoyment of their very imaginative play. For the most part, getting them to exit thier imaginations and join the real world takes very strong prompting from us.
As for schooling, they take a language immersion program. One was reading at above a grade 3 level before kindergarten, and the other started later, but mostly caught up. He has some visual issues, and even at age 9 has trouble with small print and reversing letters. School is in a totally new language and their grade 1 teacher felt they were reading 1 and 3 yrs above grade level in that language. Things motored along in grade 2, with some 'zoning out' issues, which the school was unwilling to address unless they were more diligent in the tasks at hand. Neither one of them was willing to do that. Their has been no question that the boys' *factual* information in their heads is astounding, but not actual thinking and performance. Their Grade 2 performance was slightly above grade level. Now, in Grade 3 their inability and unwillingness to work is becoming a really really big problem, especially in combination with the fact that they spend all their time in their imaginations and have trouble tuning back into the classroom when instructions are given.
Their current teacher (same as first grade) is actually quite well aware of their academic strengths, but talked to me the other day because she has not been able to get them to show anything more than minimal work. There are areas where they are at a minimal pass because she has not been able to get either of them to hand in anything resembling appropriate work. Where it is on-topic, for example a story in language arts, they will each turn in 4 short lines rather than a few pages of a story.
I'm at a loss here of where to focus our efforts. At home we are dealing with the issue of effort through consequences & potentially withholding a benefit they are working towards if they don't shape-up. This is only a small part of the issue, though. I'm at a loss for even where to start with the rest.
The testing done at age 5 was really just the basics. Obviously there is something else going on. They are wait listed at the University Clinical program, but that isn't going to happen any time soon.
I know this is rambling (and probably poorly written as I'm multi-tasking, but please, please, any guidance on what might be going on and ideas for trying to help them out would be *greatly* appreciated. The issue may not be related to giftedness or 2E at all, but I suspect that at least part of it is.
If you are still reading, thanks.
