Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional ideas for helping with processing speed?

Hi there,

Am brand new here--just found the site this morning. Am already heartened by the active discussions and am looking forward to participating and hopefully helping others! In the meantime, I'm guessing there is expertise here that might help us. My son's recent WISC IV scores are below. Despite the low processing scores, he is an excellent reader. However, he has a really hard time extracting thoughts from his head to write down. (He is a fluent and sophisticated oral communicator.) As a result, his written productivity in school is very low. The teachers totally get what is going on, so we don't have "school problems" in that sense--but we're all searching for ideas that might make it easier for him to write. (We'll teach him to keyboard this summer.) He's in second grade. His other major problem is staying on task (because the inside of his head is so interesting, so he thinks about things rather than focuses on his work, which of course is written and thus, that much less compelling). Similar experiences? Ideas? His fine motor skills are not great, but the real bottleneck is figuring out what he wants to say.

By the way, I suspect his true comprehension and vocabulary scores are higher. But anyway, the main thing I'm wondering about is how to help him with the processing speed stuff--and how that might map to the writing and organizational challenges.

Thanks in advance for any thoughts!

Edited to protect privacy

What did your tester say about the large discrepancy in scores and do you have a full report from this WISC?

Yes, we have a full report--but that's pretty much it in terms of the WISC (and the WISC results are the most striking in the entire report). Academic testing shows what we expected--off-the-chart math scores, strong written scores in terms of sophistication of expression, weak spelling, etc.).

Maybe I don't understand what you mean by "full report"though.

The tester says that the large discrepancy is a big reason for what we're seeing in school--ie., difficulty producing written work, yet clearly extremely intelligent kid.

Sorry if I'm missing the point of your question. And thanks so much for taking the time to respond!

DD sounds like your son. She has a hard time getting thoughts out of her head, but I finally figured out that for her it is an issue in that she thinks in pictures so before she writes she actually has to translate the pictures into words before she can even begin to write it down. It is an extra step that slows her down.

For processing speed, the tester in our report wrote "Students with superior reasoning ability often tend to perform less well, although still adequately, on processing speed tasks." So apparently it is common, although dd did not score as low as your son on processing speed....she was still almost 3 standard deviations away from her standard scores in PRI, VCI, and FSIQ and almost 4 standard deviations from her extended scoring so it definitely is a bottle neck for her.

I would ask your tester what his or her opinion was of the discrepancy. DD's tester stated she saw a lot of perfectionism and wanting to do it correct and neatly so that she was not focused on speed and that that was very common. Good luck!

Your ds sounds sooo much like my ds13 in 2nd grade! FWIW, up front, we discovered through testing at the end of 2nd grade that my ds has fine motor dysgraphia (shows up in the same pattern of significant relative low in coding speed on WISC... his symbol search was higher - I think - I'd have to dig out his old reports to be sure). We later on discovered our ds also has an expressive language disorder - I believe it's somewhat related to his dysgraphia but basically it causes him difficulty in generating thoughts and then getting them out into written expression. You'd never know he has an expressive language disorder from *talking* to him because when he talks he's very clear, obviously very bright, can talk in great detail about things he's interested in etc.

A quick question for you - did your ds have any other testing or just the WISC? Did he have any type of achievement testing (WIAT or WJ-III) and did he have any follow-up tests of visual-motor integration or executive functioning/fine motor etc? These are things that are important (jmo) to determine *why* the coding and symbol search scores are so low - it could be fine motor (as you've noted a slight issue) or it could be something entirely different - vision for instance. Once you know *why* the score is low you can work toward remediating and accommodating


Processing speed subtest scores have nothing to do with reading - they test the ability to copy quickly and correctly (coding) and to find an object in a busy visual field (symbol search).


This is my ds. There were several follow-up things that were helpful in understanding what was up (and to be honest, I wouldn't say that any of us ever *completely* understood, we've just done our best to help him!) First, the TOWL-4 will be helpful to see if there are specific skills associated with writing that your ds needs help with. I'll add a disclaimer here - our ds had such a *huge* challenge with generating thoughts for written expression that the first time he took the TOWL it couldn't be scored because he couldn't think of enough words to write. The other eval that was *extremely* helpful was a speech-language eval (CELF-4). DS didn't score low on this, but he had wildly discrepant scores (from 99th percentile to 60th percentile). It's not a timed test, but his tester also noted that he answered most subtest questions quickly, except for the subtests that were lower scores, and in those tests it took a *long* time for him to come up with answers.


It's good you have understanding teachers. Try to remember though - they understand that he's struggling, but probably don't have the answer for "why" - and understanding "why" as much as you *can* is really important in putting together a plan to help him.

Keyboarding is a great place to start. For some kids with fine motor challenges, that's all it takes to open up and get the words flowing. So it's a great (and important) first step. If using the keyboard doesn't get the words flowing out (this is what happened with my ds), then I'd want to look further - if he hasn't had the follow-up testing I mentioned in my first paragraph above, I'd look into getting a private neuropsych eval if you can. I'd also suggest an SLP eval.

[quote[He's in second grade. His other major problem is staying on task (because the inside of his head is so interesting, so he thinks about things rather than focuses on his work, which of course is written and thus, that much less compelling). Similar experiences? [/quote]

TOTALLY similar experience. Our ds' inattention during writing assingments in his 2nd grade class had his teacher convinced he had ADHD - but he doesn't. He simply was completely and totally stuck with no idea how to proceed.


Neuropsych testing should provide you with a good clue re why the processing speed subtest scores are so low. And has he ever had his vision checked? If not, I'd get his eyesight checked out right away (and I'm not talking about developmental optometrist - which might be very useful too, but just a plain old vision exam). If his eyesight *is* ok, I'd also consider having a developmental optometrist look at his vision (they look at how eyes work *together* - tracking, etc). I have a dd who had severe double vision all the way up through 2nd grade that none of us knew about because she thought everyone was seeing double like she was! We discovered the vision issue through a neuropsych eval where she had extremely low scores on coding and symbol search.

Re figuring out how/if the low processing score subtests map into the struggle with generating written expression - try the keyboard. That might help right away if it's just a fine motor issue. Also check the vision - if there's a visual challenge, those subtest scores should increase dramatically after the vision challenge is corrected. BUT - I think the chances of a vision challenge causing the inability to generate written expression is lower than a fine motor (or other) challenge - partly because my severely double-vision dd had no issues with writing stories. Her handwriting was sloppy due to her vision but her ideas flowed.

Re the fine motor - you might ask your ds if handwriting causes his hand to hurt, and also google dysgraphia and see if he fits any of the symptoms.

Hang in there - and ask us any questions you can think of!

Best wishes,

polarbear

FWIW, my ds also thinks in pictures (and movies). The Eides say that it can be very tough for kids who think like this to translate the pictures into words because they have sooo so much detail in their heads. OTOH, my ds tells us that's not his challenge with written expression - he can get the thoughts out a-ok if he's asked a question about something factual that he knows - but when the writing prompt is open-ended he struggles - and he says at those time he "has nothing" up there in his head

So that's another thing you might want to look at - is your ds challenged with writing across the board, or is one specific type of writing more difficult for him?

And.. fwiw... forgot to mention - when our ds was in 2nd grade, we thought his challenge was all about writing, because he sounded so danged smart when he talked. We eventually found out (around 4th grade) that the same types of writing assignments that tripped him up in class (no ideas what to write) also weren't something he could do verbally either - we just hadn't really seen that connection when he was little.


I'd just add - I'd want a neuropsych to be sure of this. Our ds was tested with just IQ/achievement tests when he was not quite 6 years old for admission into a gifted program - and the dip in processing speed was attributed by the psych to perfectionism and being 6 and being male and not being used to timed tests (the processing subtests are timed). So we missed out on almost 2 years opportunity to be helping ds out and continued to think every time he didn't write something in class the issue was perfectionism. It *is* perfectionism for some kids - but when you've noted fine motor issues and the very low scores, I'd want to be sure it's not something else.

polarbear

polarbear and amazedmom, can you tell me more about this? What else do you see with kids like this?

We're also seeing writing struggles and generalized troubles verbalizing in my 2nd grader. The less specific the assignment, the worse it is. Journal time is torture. A highly structured assignment is easier. In parallel to this, DS has been hampered in moving forward in math because he struggles to explain how he got an answer. "Because that's the answer" evidently isn't acceptable. We know he doesn't perform math verbally. I'm curious about the pictoral imaging of stories and events idea as a possible partial explanation for what we're seeing in his writing struggles.

DS' teacher also suspects ADHD.

We did not see a dip in processing speed, though. A more complete neuropsych exam to complement out existing WISC and WJ will come in a month.

Geofizz,
FWIW, my son is definitely NOT a visual thinker, yet he has similar troubles to your son with writing ("Journal time is torture"--I'm SO with you, unfortunately)--with the exception that often if he is assigned a topic, he can't do it because he "doesn't know what to write." If he picks his own topic, he does a lot better. Don't know if you've checked whether that's true for your son. In any case, completing stem sentences is a lot easier for him than free writing on any topic.

Also--in case it's at all helpful--my son is exceptionally gifted in math and also is erratic about showing his work. Maybe partly because of the writing thing and partly because it's so obvious and partly because he doesn't see the value in writing down the steps.

amazedmom and polarbear--Thanks so much for the feedback! Will write more when I am reunited with the rest of my son's test scores (at home, where I am not). In the meantime, I really appreciate your many thoughts! I do know that his achievement scores were along the lines of
--off the chart in math (something like 22nd grade or something similarly ludicrous--definitely above the 99.9th percentile)
--quite good in terms of expression (sophistication, content, etc.)
--average for grade level on spelling (though weak on sight words).
Anyway, I'll look it all up and avail myself of your brain power and experience later!

geofizz, I have a head cold today... and honestly can't think of anything at the moment! lol! Under normal circumstances, I'm sure I could write a novel... so I'll come back to it later. I do remember that way back when ds was in 3rd/4th grade I had a very short list of questions that you can ask a person, and the way they answer reveals whether they are a visual thinker or not... I was just wishing the other day that I could remember it! Basically you ask a few questions and then after the person answers ask a few more about how they arrived at their answers. Once ds was older, around 10 or so, and very self-aware, I was able to talk to him and ask specifically how he thinks through a problem, and that's how I learned that he sees in pictures and movies. The movie description is really... well... different than the way I think!


This is what writing was like for our ds (and still is most of the time). I'll try to come back in a bit and list some of the things we did that helped. VERY briefly - things we did at home included playing games with ds where we brainstormed (whoever won the turn had to add a "whatever" to our brainstorming list), scribing for him and encouraging him when he was stuck, making outlines with him, using Inspiration (graphic organizing software - the younger kid version is called "Kidspiration"). Most important REPETITION repeat repeat repeat the same type of simple writing task/assignment until he could do it - ideally before moving on. This was really tough because all the way through school each year each teacher has been determined to teach as many different styles and types of writing as possible so it seems like every assignment is different from the last.

I have a ton of tips from his speech therapy work, will try to add those later.



Same thing happened here, although our ds was also prevented from moving forward in math because he couldn't write his math facts down quickly (argh). Anyway, those word problems used to drive *me* nuts! And it was never simply "explain" - ds' school curriculum was into "explain in three different ways". I can't tell you how many ripped crumpled math papers I had to rescue and beg ds to attempt again. His early elementary teachers would probably just freak if they saw him today, accelerated two years in math and doing very very well. I'm sure they thought he was dimmer than a burnt out lightbulb (I know his 2nd grade teacher thought that - she basically told us so...)



The way the Eides explain it is that there is so much rich detail in the pictures it's complicated and slow to figure out how to translate it to words. My ds, otoh, says that with the open-ended writing assignments, he has NO pictures.. when he has a picture he can write fairly well... although it's slow, but that's more related to his DCD (I think).


I don't think the dip in processing speed relates to expressive language (which is what causes our ds to have difficulty with generating ideas for written expression. The dips that people see in processing speed (ime) are usually related to a physical/neurological condition that's impacting the physical acts of copying/handwriting/eye coordination/etc. The reason those types of challenges show up as dips in processing speed are that the tests rely on marks made with a pencil, visual discrimination, and being able to perform the tasks quickly (the processing speed tests are timed).

The tests that ds had that pointed to difficulty with generating thoughts for written expression were:

WJ-III - one of the writing subtests, can't remember which one - will have to check, maybe "writing samples"?

TOWL-4 - test of written language, the student is shown a picture and told to write about it. DS couldn't figure out for the life of him what to write.

CELF-4 - part of a speech-language eval

pbear

We're in a similar place. Having him pick his own topic is torture (effectively what journal time is), but giving him a topic stresses him out. The best I've managed to come to lately is "write about X" and he'll respond that no, he wants to write about Y, and the produce a perfectly acceptable piece of writing about Y. However, if I tell him to write about whatever he wants, he can't.

OMG YES. That's my instinct as well, but the teacher keeps suggesting we do a bunch of different stuff. This jives with what I see in his producing the paragraphs when we sit down to work with it. Stick to one thing until it's a lot easier.


Same boat here. Remarkably similar boat.

I'd greatly appreciate it when you're feeling better. My quickie google didn't turn up any obvious hits. I do suspect that DS will struggle to express how he thinks. DD10 is just about now to this point, and she's one of the more self-aware and articulate people (kid or adult) I know.

We are so amazingly lucky that the teacher gets it, and he's not been held back in math too badly -- he does the verbal stuff with the 2nd graders, and then gets 5 minutes a day to move ahead with the teacher. She's taken him most of the way through 4th grade this way. DS will go into a gifted 4/5 compressed math class next year with everyone's fingers crossed that it goes well.

On the testing, in our case, I point to the lack of any dips in his WISC testing as evidence against ADHD, which is what the teacher suggests. CELF-IV matched the VCI of the WISC with no splits, and the WJ was shockingly high across the board. I'll ask about the TOWL. Thanks.

The board is awesome. Hopefully this conversation is still consistent with evelyn's initial goals! Hopefully I haven't dragged it in a new direction. If so, evelyn, holler, and I'll split off a new thread.