Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Repeat IQ test, Full Assessment for LD

Hi, everyone
Looking for some advice from some of you who have traveled this path.
My daughter was tested by WPPSI-III at age of five, and had IQ of 144.Lowest score was processing speed (122).
Now a rising fifth grader, who has atrocious spelling. C- student. Still reversing B and D (own name starts with B). Cannot consistently use conventions such a capitalization, periods, apostrophes, and commas. One of the examples of her work that caused particular concern: "setens" for "systems". A few more: "one" for "on". "fier" for "fire". "missippi" for "Mississippi". I could go on, but you get the message.
Also: omits, alters, and adds small words when reading aloud, like the, an, on, there, etc.

My index of suspicion for dyslexia is very high. Though she was screened for this in third grade, but it didn't pick it up.

So, has anyone been thru anything similar? She is scheduled for a full assessment by educational psychologist, so I am waiting for that. IQ test will be repeated.

Have any of you had children who have been tested twice? Where the scores close? Anyone have a gifted child who later turned out to be dyslexic? Thoughts? Advice?

Yes and no. I have a 2e child who has twice taken the WISC-IV and who is dx with inattentive type ADD and who may be dyslexic. Mine does not have issues to the extent yours does and her grades are higher, but all of what you mention is there, just not to such an extreme.

My dd's two WISC testings were 20 points apart with the first one being PG and the second, a year later, MG. Even with her MG testing, she had parts where she was at or above the 99.9th. I tend to think that her "true" IQ falls somewhere in btwn but possibly somewhat closer to the first than the second testing.

B/c she is so able, schools have never suggested a LD as she is, on her bad days of testing, still average for grade. On her good days -- wow! I don't know if I'll be much help as we've not figured out a way to fully address the spelling errors, headaches when reading, losing place on the page, poor written conventions. We've taken more a route of trying to accommodate and come up with ways for her to notice that she's making these errors.

She's in a very structured middle school, I'm going to work with her this summer if she'll let me on reading words in groups rather than word by word, she types whatever she can to make use of spell check, I review her writing and point out errors to her but leave it to her to figure out what the error is once I point out where it is, etc.

Good luck. Let us know how it goes and if we can help.

Hi Bella,

My daughter was dx with dyslexia and dysgraphia a few months ago as a 4th grader.

The instruments used for screening dyslexia in schools won't catch fluent readers. DD scored 99%ile on all sections of AIMS WEB this year. This test seems most accurate for kids closer to the average with single -syllable phonological problems.

My daughter reads at a high school level or above (finally assessed as we were going through the IEP process), but the writing mechanics and spelling are much as you describe. DD cannot segment syllables of a word, and makes errors in pronouncing any letter with multiple pronounciation, like the letter g and all vowels. None of this was caught because she hasn't enountered an unfamiliar word in grade-level assessments, and the nonsense word reading was single syllable.

The diagnosis came from a neuropsych exam through differential performance on the WISC verbal section and the WIAT reading and writing sections. The diagnosis has been further substantiated by the director of the university reading program who observed DD in a variety of reading and writing tasks.

This was DD's only full length IQ test, but the scores were within points of group cognitive screening tests and the KBIT.

Cricket, thanks for reply. Have you ever had her assessed for LD? I would assume so, since she's had IQ test twice? And esp. if she tested PG, and has struggles?

An aside: I had my oldest daughter tested at age 6. Full score IQ was 120 (and that was JUST FINE with this mother!). But...if you had asked me which daughter would be "gifted" I would have staked my life on the one w 120IQ! (I won't go into detail). But her processing speed index was only 88! She is excelling at college prep school.

So I am very puzzled by this data and what it all means. Thinking about also retesting eldest child, who I really think is AT LEAST as bright as sibling with higher IQ. Any insight or advice?

And I really appreciate your statements about how much you think DD is struggling. Her father wanted to send her to Sylvan. Her teacher thinks something is going on, but I am so far the only one who thinks dyslexia. All I know is that a full assessment by educational psychologist is warranted. B/c any child with 140+ IQ entering fifth grade who spells "on" as "one" has this mother WORRIED.

I would also be v interested in any thoughts/comments re: siblings, IQ co relation, etc.

Thanks!

Geofizz,
Yes! Thanks for that. DD was SCREENED at end of third grade by concerned teacher, but nothing showed up.
However, I am almost certain this is dyslexia.

Could you pls. explain the abbreviations I am not familiar with? IEP, WIAT, and KBIT? Will my DD have these tests as part of full assessment by educational psychologist?

DD has also just finished 4th grade, so your comments are really helpful. My ex husband has been calling me crazy, too emotional, and saying she needs more discipline(!). So I am forking over the $ for testing. Your comments help me know I'm on the right track.
Thru web research, I read the SPELLING is most sensitive indicator of dyslexia in gifted students.

Count us in as well - you are not alone.

DD first tested after kindergarten because the school test (RIAS) gave results that just didn't match the kid I knew. She tested gifted, but the verbal score was way low, I thought. Private tester used WISC and got generally even and high scores - 143 FSIQ and about 130s, but with wider spread on WJ-III. A year later we skipped from 1st to 3rd. Even then I saw hints something wasn't quite right - letter and number reversals, but that is not uncommon up to age 7 and sometimes even 8 from what I saw and heard. She was still in the top 5-10 % of the receiving grade.

We had horrendous problems last year with the state mandated writing test in 4th grade - she hated writing and spent more energy fighting it than doing the work. She can get through the spelling tests, but it's very hit or miss if she can still spell some of those words 2 weeks later. DD (now 10) just finished 5th grade and this year we went back to the same tester because the problems still weren't going away. Still letter reversals and now number reversals and mixing up the order, which can make math (fractions, multi-digit multiplication and long division) real tedious.

She comfortably reads at least 3 grade levels higher (just end of year tested around mid 9th grade level), but the biggest most obvious thing I found is that she struggles reading out loud. She mixes up words and rearranges words in a sentence. She can't pronounce words that she knows and has heard - just can't seem to put the word on the page together with the word she has heard. I say it's obvious, but mostly to me - given the wide range of abilities in the current 5th grade classroom, she mostly just blends in.

I saw someplace else someone made the comment that it's like they've memorized the shape of all the words. I'd agree with that, but it's like the word on the page and the spoken word are two entirely different things. I think our most recent example was "arrogant" as she was reading out loud that came out "arROWgant" and when I corrected her she thought it was a different word entirely (even though she admitted that the definitions between these two 'different' words were actually the same).

I don't remember all the tests, but we came out with a clear diagnosis of classic dyslexia and possible ADD-I. We didn't redo the IQ test, but did work in the WIAT for acheivement. In general they were more like high average - 100-115ish, so there's definitely been a difference in the acheivement testing for us.

The psych who did her testing said commonly the gifties can compensate through late elementary school, and they can continue to do well with reading for pleasure, especially fiction. Typically they will tend to select reading material well within their ability, they will take the time to trudge through the stuff that's a little hard if they are interested and there is always enough 'fluff' in most fiction to allow them to skip individual words and still get the gist of the story. Alternatively, there is enough info for them to figure out stuff from context. The problems come when they can no longer compensate and work around their limitations. The pysch seemed to think that often happened around the end of elementary school and early middle school. The focus turns from learning to read to reading to learn and the texts get more dense, so they can't use context cues and they really need to know the words they are reading.

We resorted to accomodations in a 504 this year after the last round of testing and the dyslexia diagnosis. More time on tests, more time to write, testing in small groups or individually so that she can read out loud to herself, using blank papers to block out part of the text on a page, using graph paper for math to try and keep things lined up correctly. I will say that it's been a struggle to get her to use the accomodations and tools - she doesn't really think she needs to use them. Getting her to acknowledge that they do actually help is a struggle because she is still in the top 5-10% of her class on paper. I would like her to get used to them so they are automatic when she does get to a point where they make a noticeable difference. It may be that some sort of accomodations make a perceptible difference for your DD right away and that may make it easier for her to appreciate the benefit.

Good luck with your testing, if and when you get an answer, then you can work on the accomodations to deal with it.

That's exactly where we are with our dd. Even with those things that seem to make a difference for her, she refuses to use them much of the time (except chewing gum during tests b/c she likes gum) b/c she doesn't think that she's either gifted or LD and doesn't think she needs to. Like Prissy's dd, mine is a very good student, just not performing consistently or to her potential.

One other thing I recall, in re to both me and Prissy mentioning a combo of ADD and dyslexia, I don't know if both are issues for your dd or just our kids, but I have read that something like 80% of kids with ADD have some comorbidity with another LD.

Well, despite my earlier novel, I still forgot something.

Although we did not have any kind of dyslexia screen (that I know of), I'm quite certain that my DD would have exceeded whatever bar they set in such a screen. In third grade, even accelerated she was clearly in the top 5%. Her reading assessments were comfortably 2+ grades above grade level, and this was with a full grade acceleration. Pretty much every year, the teachers have thought she was doing fine, until I pointed out details and specific instances that just didn't fit an HG+ kid and once they knew what to look for, the evidence mounted. Without fail, by the end of the school year they all agreed that something was off, but none could put their finger on it.

Again, I don't remember the specific test, but the psych specifically pointed out that on the particular criteria that are frequently used to ID dyslexia my DD scored around the 10th percentile. This is a kid who is 99%+ pretty much across the board. The pysch was not even interested in labeling it stealth dyslexia - she clearly indicated this was textbook, classic dyslexia.

I can pretty much promise you no one in the school system would have noticed. I didn't even bother asking them to test her - I firmly believe that it would have been a complete waste of all our time. I'm fortunate enough to be in the position to have her tested privately and did. I will say that I am still not comfortable that we have all the answers we need, but I'm not quite ready to shell out the bucks for a full neuropsych workup when I think we are close enough to make things work. I reserve the right to change my mind in a year or so.

Anecdotally, for whatever it is worth, a very close family member of mine has ADD inattentive, and the more I read about it the more I am sure that he also has some kind of dyslexia/dysgraphia thing going on. We were recently reading the same pages in a book at the same time and I could not believe how long it took him. (maybe that is a processing speed thing rather than dyslexia?) His handwriting also just looks...labored. And I feel like I remember him struggling some with that as a kid. He is very, very smart--I am sure at least HG. My heart just hurts for him to know how hard he must have had to work to do as well as he did.

Prissy, thanks for post. That is very interesting, and has me even more concerned about dyslexia, b/c DD is reading in bottom third of class (at private college prep school) despite VIQ of 135 on WIPPSI. Her highest score was Picture Concepts at 19.

So confused about testing! What is the difference between full assessment with repeat IQ testing/dyslexia testing and neuropsych testing? Are they the same? This is private testing and quite expensive...4 hrs and $1200.