Hello all,

I had a question concerning gifted kids who are not yet reading in kindergarten....we had DD5 tested about a year ago (when she was a little older than 4 1/2) using the WPPSI, and she came out with a FSIQ of 139 (99.5th percentile). We weren't really surprised about the high score, as she hit every milestone early and has been very verbal since forever. However, as verbal as she is, she is not really reading much yet and shows no real desire to do so. Practically every gifted child I've ever known has started reading spontaneously before kindergarten (even my 4-year-old, who we thought was nowhere NEAR her older sister, started reading on her own this summer shortly before she turned 4), but DD5 just doesn't seem to "get it."

I've read that the WPPSI can be "off" by quite a bit because tests given so young are generally less reliable - is it possible she's not as high as the test indicated? Does anyone else have experience with late readers?

My 5yo who is very verbal is not yet reading. He has some visual issues though, and is probably a candidate for vision therapy with a developmental optometrist. My suspicion is these visual issues are why he's not yet reading.

Not all HG+ kids read early though. Some start at a more or less "normal" time or even late. It's not unusual for these later bloomers to go from easy readers to Harry Potter in a matter of weeks.

Does the test score ring true to you beyond the reading issue?

I'd advise that testing is merely a tool to help you understand your child. It shouldn't be substituted for your own observations or "gut" sense about your child.

My DD6's testing shows her as gifted. She will be 7 this December and is just starting to read. Level 1 HOP and exactly first grade on her reading according to some of her achievement tests. We aren't sure why she isn't reading yet. My other two, very GT girls read early. The psychologist actually wrote, severe underachievement of unknown origin on her report. We are keeping our eyes open for problems but so far I see it as more of and interest thing. Both her sisters read extrememly well and will read for her.

I don't have anything to contribute other than support. When we had DS tested at almost 6 and he came out clearly gifted, the tester showed concern that DS wasn't reading based on his verbal scores. I hadn't thought about it at all to that point, but when the word 'dyslexia' got thrown around I did worry. 6 months later I still have no formal diagnosis, but I've been treating it as dyslexia and he's making improvements. The way he struggles with words I do believe there are underlying neurological weaknesses that will just take time to build. Many have told me not to worry, he's a boy, he's at grade level etc, but I recently learned there are reading difficulties in the extended family and my better judgment has led me to treat it as dyslexia.

The thread started a little while before yours may be worth looking into. Dyslexia

I had a child who went from not reading to reading at about a 5th grade level at the end of kindergarten. We didn't even know he was gifted until he hit the ceiling of the screener his school used to identify GT kids. He was an intense, sensitive, and highly inquisitive preschooler that was very interested in science. I thought all little boys that age were probably like that. In 3rd grade he is generally operating 3 or more years beyond grade level and he reads at a high school level. We are homeschooling now after a rough K and 1st grade year.

I have a newly 5 year old daughter who has not been tested. She declared she wanted to homeschool like her brother. She has read barely on and off for a while. In the past month she has taken off and suddenly "gets" it. I wouldn't be surprised to see her where here brother was in K by next summer.

In my kids cases, I think they both tend visual spatial and they are both just a bit perfectionist and lazy. Both had the tools (letter sounds, etc) to read forever. Their interests lay in other places as preschoolers (very active kids!) and we generally never really encouraged reading before kindergarten when we got out early reader books. Don't get me wrong - we are a book loving family (we could use our own library)! They both just enjoyed longer, more involved stories. It seems like once we brought out the easier books and declared they were readers, they caught on pretty quickly. They are both highly verbal too.

Anyway - I just wanted to say I totally know where you're coming from. My son actually seemed behind some of the other kids in his kindergarten class that had attended more intense preschool programs. By the end of kindergarten, we had serious problems with getting enough for him to do.

I tuned into a webinar with Deborah Ruf t'other day and she made a statement that gifted non-readers almost always had tracking or other sight/visual issues. I dont exactly remember at what age is was referring to specifically, but I do remember her giving an age where gifties were 'normally' reading by...

Miss 8 was not an early reader. While she did have some mild tracking issues and does wear glasses for reading now... there were a couple of things I think that delayed her reading:

* early readers are dull, dull, dull and she was much more interested in complex and rich chapter books (websites like starfall certainly took away some of the boredom while building her pre-reading skills)
* she was highly sensitive to her mild tracking issues and having a slight discomfort and distraction when she was reading was multiplied by 100 because of her sensitivities so reading wasnt a pleasant thing to do;
* she wasn't happy at kindy and we've now learned that she does not learn anything when she doesn't feel safe. All of her energy at 4 was going into surviving school.

But once she started, she took off. Literally. And now is galloping along...

jojo

Jojo, I believe she said that level 4/5 kids were reading well above (5+ years?) grade level by the time they entered K unless there were tracking issues or dyslexia. (Plz don't quote me. I was interrupted a lot during the webinar so might be off with my facts) I actually started the dyslexia post because of this very issue with my DS7. I never considered there to be a prob until recently. DS7 read at 2 and 3 then stopped in preschool and K. Then after we pulled him from ps in 1st he started reading and really took off until school started again this fall. He said it is too much work to read. When I asked him what the letters on the page were doing, he started in on this elaborate creative spiel about what certain combos of letters do. For example 2 oo's next to each other look the infinity sign, and sometimes the p hanging over a b looks like a snowman and these over here look like rockets. No wonder he can't read. There are too many creative images bouncing around.

My 5yo son, who is also in K and has also been tested (149 on the WPPSI) is likewise taking an interesting path towards reading. I don't know exactly what lies ahead for him. I think I've just decided that it remains to be seen what will unfold. I told his K teacher at his conference last week (he is in a gifted charter school) that he is a "complicated" child. She agreed. That's about all I can say. For some reason, which I can't figure out, my son has decided that reading is just not something he cares about. He resists reading both at home and at school. His teacher seems unconcerned. She told me (she has taught gifted kids for 10 years) that many of them are very strongwilled and must be personally motivated before they will do something. My son is not personally motivated where reading is concerned. For one thing, I read to him all the time, and the books that I read to him are things that he wants to read. The little early reader books are not the least bit interesting to him. We were actually talking about it today, because I keep trying to find books at the library (early reader style) that appeal to him. He asked me, "Why do you keep trying to force me to read?" I told him, "When I was little, I read all the time, and I want you to enjoy it too." He said, "You liked reading, but I don't. What I like to do is origami and legos." (This is true, he is absolutely obsessed with origami and can do some very complex creations that I can't even follow. He is also a lego master, something that I was never into as a child). Basically, I think my child is highy visual-spatial, but not visual (in a "photographic memory" sense). My father is a brilliant architect who failed fourth grade because he couldn't read. It's possible that my son might have something going on for him visually, but it is not severe enough to warrant any special ed concern yet. We have had his vision tested, and it came out normal. His fine motor skills and writing are above grade level, although he resists writing as well (his teacher showed us a writing sample that she said was outstanding, although he won't write AT ALL at home). I really don't know if any of this helps, but I would just say that with these kids you have to be patient. I know how hard it is, as I am not a patient person myself!

I just overheard the my dd's first grade teacher talk to another parent. She was reassuring this parent that she usually has 3/4 kids who are not reading well at the beginning of 1st. This is in a gifted school (top 3% FSIQ). There are kids in the classroom reading BOB books.

I don't know when you "should" worry about not reading, but I would think that before 6 and in K, it is still very normal. I did think (for other reasons) that my DD might have dyslexia when she was 4.

I found this very informative, it talks about dyslexia in gifted kiddos. http://mislabeledchild.com/html/Library/DyslexiaReading/Stealth_dyslexia.htm

You make a good point here - but I think like many parents, we see our GT kid do amazing things but also some really "duh" things, and we think, "Is she really gifted????"

Example: When DD5 was a baby, we saw lots of evidence of high ability - walking at 8.5 months, unbelievable receptive language, etc. However, she never did figure out how to do something as simple as tipping the sippy cup UP to get the liquid out. She kept trying to suck it like a bottle or a straw (which we showed her how to use at 6 months). We joked all the time that she'd be in middle school asking the teacher to tip her milk carton up for her! :-)

Then, at around age 2, she would start substituting her own ideas and feelings for dialogue in favorite books (Example: There is a line in "The Paper Bag Princess" (a GREAT book, by the way!) that goes something like, "Well, a princess! I love to eat princesses, but I have already eaten a whole castle today. I am a very busy dragon. Come back tomorrow!" And one day when my kid was upset at something I did, she says, "I love to eat mommies, but I have already eaten a whole house today. I am a very busy *insert her own name*. Come back tomorrow!" *slams door* So we figure this type of thing is pretty unusual for such a little kid - stuff like this is what led to getting her tested in the first place. And even though the test score was relatively high, not reading by age 5 has caused us to rethink it somewhat. We go back and forth a lot!

I do work with older gifted kids, but my only experience with little ones is having my own - so I'm passing through new territory here! :-)

Two of my kids were not really reading in K.

In the first case, dd (now 8) is both a visual learner and also had visual processing issues - eye tracking/eye teaming - that were fixed with six months of vision therapy during first grade. However, I just found out the other day that she's reading right at grade level now (3rd) and honestly I'm a little disappointed. We did IQ testing during K, so I have a rough idea of her potential, though I might like to re-test. I'm not sure if it's a case of her not really trying harder stuff, or whether her talents simply lay elsewhere (she's a grade level ahead in math according to a recent MAPS test, whatever that is. But still, even in that area I believe she's capable of more).

In the other case, my ds (now in first grade) has had some special needs issues - had an IEP for speech and fine motor. At the start of K he didn't really know the sounds of all the letters. Now he's more than a grade level ahead in reading - though his teacher recently noted that he does not perform well re: comprehension when the test is timed, in which case he tests at a level close to the end of first grade. He can read timed, or he can have good comprehension, but not both. He too is a VERY visual learner. He's definitely more gifted than his sister. He has not yet had IQ testing yet.

Other than something like a vision check (perhaps with a behavioral optometrist to check how the eyes work together, in addition to a regular vision check, see www.covd.org ), I think mom2boys is right, sometimes you just have to be patient!

Does your DD seem to be a visual-spatial learner? Does she seem to have vision issues when it comes to reading? Is she a perfectionist who might not want to read until she can do it perfectly?

Of course I can't tell you about your own child, but I can tell you that we regularly call one another on GT denial moments around here. Most of us on the forum have them from time to time with younger kids, mostly because they have those "duh" moments. (Well named, BTW! LOL!).

Even the most highly gifted kids will have "duh" moments because they are still kids. I wouldn't let that dissuade you from believing that something more is going on with your DD.

With that said, I am very sympathetic to what you're going through because we are still muddling through what's going on with our DS5. Until less than a year ago, when he suddenly started doing math problems in his head, I wasn't really buying that he was GT at all. But he had this sudden, radical shift in interest and ability--really, REALLY sudden and radical! And apparently that's pretty common, especially in visual-spatial kids, which I suspect he might be. When they "get it," they TOTALLY get it, and in a big way. There's nothing gradual about their development.

He did the same thing with writing when he was 3.5, I think it was. He just decided he was going to learn how to write. He literally said out loud, "I'm going to learn how to write." And within 36 hours, he was writing as well as his 6.5yo brother!

So sudden, huge leaps do happen sometimes. It's pretty freaky when you're not used to that--as I am not!--but they exist.

I'm still not sure how GT our DS5 is, but I have come to accept that he does seem to be GT at some level. We're testing this school year.

So, yeah, new territory I completely understand!

Just don't be surprised when someone accuses you of GT denial. I feel it may be coming for you...

My daughter did not really like to read until recently (6th grade). She read mostly non-fiction before that. She always accelerated at a strange pace. I would see nothing, then she would jump way ahead.

Then, she did get over her sensitivity issue of not reading anything scary (a very broad category for her).

She met Harry Potter and Twilight and became a bookworm.

oops I posted to the wrong thread...sorry!


I wouldn't worry. My older dd8 started reading spontaneously before Kindergarten but it took my younger dd6 a little longer. She is also extremely verbal. She was speaking in complex sentences by 15 months, using humor, large vocab correctly etc. She has always been in love with books but reading just did not click for her until the summer after kindergarten. Now in first grade she is a very competent reader and well above grade level. Interestingly older dd8 who was the early reader barely spoke a work until she was two :-) Go figure...

Does anyone else have experience with late readers? [/quote]

Hi,

I wouldn't call 5 or even 6 or 7 a late reader necessarily. Your child might simply be average in the ability (or interest) in decoding print, and that may look out of sync with the rest of their abilities, but be entirely normal.

I'm thinking of my two brothers, both very gifted, one was doing some reading at 3 and the other showed little inclination and did not read before school instruction (which at the time began in 1st grade). That second brother was tested as a 4 year old at Stanford (I believe the Binet LM) and apparently received the highest score they'd ever seen in a 4 year old (and the LM was not new at the time). The other got a lower but still very high score. My parents were surprised because it was the early reader who also did lots of other energetically precocious things. As they grew up it became apparent that the tests were accurate, its the non-early-reading one that has more phenomenal abilities. He also has awkward printing and can barely do cursive writing to this day, can't draw more than a crude stick figure, and not for lack of practice as of course all through school everyone was working on his weak areas. It's a bit surprising he didn't read early because symbols (ie math/computing) ended up being his main strength.

My best guess on why for my brother didn't learn earlier was that he had an internally driven sense of what was important and what wasn't, didn't always include other people's, or standard, objectives. Expressed by passive disinterest rather than active resistance, made him seem a bit dull sometimes.

Polly

Polly - very interesting post - thanks!

For what it is worth, we could not tell if our DS8 was reading in K or not. We thought maybe he could when he seemed to know everything listed on his Pokemon cards, but were never sure if he was reading or if he had just memorized what they said from our reading them. He refused to read books out loud to us.

At the beginning of 1st grade we still were not sure of his reading skills. I was actually worried at that point, but then one day I asked/forced him to read a page of a Mr. Putter and Tabby book and he read it almost perfectly, with expression. He was tested for the gifted program at the end of first grade - he had the highest scores they have seen in a while. He was reading at least on a third grade level by the end of the year, probably higher.

Now in second grade, we still have to fight to get him to read. He would listen to books all day long if I read to him, but does not like to read by himself (except for Calvin and Hobbes.)

This is a very interesting post to have stumbled upon. My 2nd child, dd6 tests in the EG/PG range. She was accelerated to 2nd grade this year in a GT school so they are doing 3rd grade work. School moved her up based only on IQ scores and probably didn't expect that she was only reading about a year above her actual grade level.

So she's much lower than most of the kids in her GT 2nd grade class. We are so concerned we placed her in an extensive 3x a week very $$ Orton Gillingham reading program. She's been doing this for about a month now.

I've been so stressed about why she can't see to take off in reading. Having read Dr. Ruf, I really thought there was no way she could be a 4/5 child since her reading is so low. I've been researching LD's etc and thought that she must be dsylexic or something.

Your posts have calmed me quite a bit, thanks!

I am interested in any research/links on early non gifted readers. I know a familiy that (because of cultural expectations) spend a ton of time "teaching" there children at home even before Kindergarten and then making sure they are always ahead of the regular school curriculum. These chldren did start reading before school and pretty well. They don't seem to show other classic "gifted" charateristics and school acclerates them eary on because of their early acheivement. Just wondering how common this is and where I could learn more on this subject.

Thanks for your reassurances on this thread.

R

I wonder about this too! So many kids in our kindergarten class had a jump start on reading, either from their parents working with them at home or being in an all day Montessori program that really pushed early reading. It seemed a number of these kids didn't really advance in reading skills after starting kindergarten. By the end of kindergarten, and certainly first grade it was pretty clear who had leveled out and who the gifted readers were.

I really think it's incredibly hard to stereotype (and I'm saying this of as a parent of a late reading HG+ child, of course! It's a complex equation of GTness vs. exposure vs. interest vs. a particular child's learning profile vs. a variety of other factors I'm sure I'm missing!

It is hard to stereotype the kids, they are all so different.

I agree about this early reading that many times seems to level off. The family I know of had their oldest child accelerated from K to 1st. Then in second grade the Cogat testing didn't even show that it was high enough to put the child in the enrichment pull out but yet they had been grade skipped the year before????

I am particuarly sensitive to this issue because we had tried to have my HG son accelerated and his IQ score was fine. His achievement tests (especially writing) were low so this same school wouldn't move him ahead.... We just spent more time in preschool years following his interests rahter than "prep'ing" him for school before it even started.
Thankfully, we are in a FT GT school now and it doesn't matter.

What's frustrating is our orginal school seems to value early achievement (even though it was so parent led)more than anything. Had my son stayed in that school and tuned out because of boredom at the slow pace they probably would have never realized what he was capable of.

I am in a very similar place with my child. It fits her style though. Has to know exactly how to do it before she will really give it a go. Has to intellectualize it before she can do it.
I know as an educator and was told by the DR who tested her that there is no strong data that links giftedness and early reading.
All kids do things when they are ready, and not before.
That's what makes me angry about some of the achievement tests that they are giving to determine who should be admitted to the gifted programs. If she's not reading in K does she not get in!!?!

My brother, the 5th of 6 kids, was the only one of us that wasn't reading before 1st grade (no pre-school attendance). But when he was two, he took apart the toaster and put it back together again, correctly, because he was curious. When he was 5 my grandfather took him out to the garage with him to work on the cars. We have all known all along that he was the most profoundly gifted (we didn't use those words back then) of us all. I think he was too busy figuring out the world to be interested in reading. I was a lit major and we still have great discussions about great books, so he is a lifelong reader, he just didn't do it when he was 5.