TLDR; tested multiple times by public school systems in 2nd, 3rd, and 7th grade, last one being an individual test, schools never gave me a score or any feedback; top of the class without effort in elementary school, C student in high school/zero effort, 3.78 college GPA with equal effortlessness as elementary school; irritating sensual overexcitablites regarding tags, texture, and temperature; 99th percentile in several subjects on standardized tests and over 90th percentile in all but math every year; phonetic and spelling failure but very good writer and articulate speaker, math computation is impossible; abstract, metaphorical thinking/speech and hardcore visual-spatial learner. Why are my ACT and IQ scores depressed? Do I look like a 2e profile?


Hi everyone!

I suspect I have a twice-exceptional disability and wanted to hear feedback from those of you well-informed. I was never identified as gifted in public school systems, but their behavior regarding testing me was very odd. Any insight as to why I was tested over and over again without ever being admitted or told my IQ score would be lovely.

Standardized test scores always placed my reading, reading comprehension, and English-related scores in the 99th percentile. In elementary/middle, I scored 95th-99th percentile in social studies (99th) and science (95%). My math scores were above average back then, but still only around 80th percentile, much lower than the rest of my scores. Generally my standardized tests showed all percentiles in the 90s (barring Math in middle school) with one or two at 99th (English, reading comp) and the other scores scattered between 90-99th.

First tested for gifted program in 2nd grade, group test. Didn't get in/no feedback/who knows what I scored.

Tested again in 3rd grade at a different, better school system, this test wasn't in group format but the examiner didn't speak to me. Proctor-like. Tried to skip a harder question but accidentally filled the next question's answer into that bubble and ultimately rendered my test scores useless. I scored a mentally retarded IQ and my teacher was so nasty towards me afterwards she actually snail-mailed me a written apology via a Hallmark card the following Christmas! Why would my teacher even care about my score coming back so low when my family never pushed to get me tested or demand anything? Was I just more annoying on a day-to-day, classroom basis than I thought?

By 5th grade I'm struggling to maintain excellent grades in math, still getting the job done. I was placed in a daily, albeit brief, pull-out accelerated reading program with two others in which we chose our own (above grade level) reading material and wrote papers versus made group projects with peers. My STAR reading level (TN assessment) in 5th grade tested as post high school/entry-level collegiate.

I didn't try anymore in middle school. My personal spaces were so discombobulated and messy I'd lose important papers five minutes after receiving them. I still made great grades in English, reading, and social studies, but mediocre in other classes. Math first became downright impossible in middle school/6th. I'd REFUSE to practice multiplication cards to the point of screaming/crying fits.

Tested a third time in 7th grade, but this test was individual and took hours. I asked what it [the test] was afterward and she said an individual assessment for gifted program admittance--what? Why? Any idea why they tested me individually? Never heard a peep back from anyone about this test either.

No more testing. My parents had to hire a professional algebra 2 tutor for me to pass Algebra my senior year--I was failing. I graduated from high school with 12 semester hours of AP college credit but a dismal 2.2 GPA.

I grew wings and took off when I made it to college. Setting the class curve became as second nature and easy for me as daydreaming. I utterly flourished and my abysmal GPA sky rocketed from 2.2 to 3.5 my freshman semester. College was quite literally effortless and I loved it. I graduated with a BA in English literature (3.78 cum GPA, Latin honors, English dept. honors & university-wide honors) with a minor in history (4.0 in my history minor). I finished college in 3 years.

On the GRE I scored 158 verbal & 130 (the absolute lowest score possible) quantitative reasoning. My writing score was a 4.5.

While 15 (first and only time I took the ACT, this score got me my state scholarship) I took the ACT and scores are as follows:

Composite Score : 24
English 25
Usage/Mechanics 13
Rhetorical Skills 14

Mathematics 19
Pre-Algebra/Elem. Algebra 12
Algebra/Coord. Geometry 08
Plane Geometry/Trig. 10

Reading 30
Social Studies/Sciences 16
Arts/Literature 15

Science 21

Combined English/Writing 26
Writing (score range 2 to 12) 10

Why are my standardized test scores off the charts but my IQ test taking ability so low? I know my ACT composite, all ACT sub scores, and especially my verbal GRE score are just plain lower than I am capable of. I learned to read via sight words and did not learn phonetically. I have terrible, atrocious phonetic awareness. For example I often don't know if gender is pronounced like the g in "giraffe" or g in "godly." No idea how to pronounce myriad--migh-re-add or meer-e-add? Math computation and algebra are akin to speaking fluent Japanese. I hate to admit it, but if spell check/auto correct weren't practically integrated into our own brains through today's technology, my spelling would be horrible too. I used to spell "recommendation" with two c's until a few months ago and was flabbergasted when I realized "tomorrow" isn't spelled "tomarrow." I feel like I have an odd culmination of gifted scores, painfully average/below average scores, gifted sensitivities and processing problems, with odd 2e phonetic and spelling issues. Any thoughts?

Yes, you may have an undiagnosed LD. I'm curious why you are asking the question about your test scores at this point in your life. Are you looking for better self-understanding? Looking to advocate for your child who is similar to you? If you give people an idea where you are going with this, you may get better feedback.

Sounds like you could have dyslexia and/or dyscalculia (math disability). If you had trouble learning the math facts like multiplication, that would have made more advanced math very difficult. Sounds like there should have been interventions done by the school system. Hopefully others here can give you more input.

Knute - I'm definitely asking to better understand myself. I've always felt intensely different and alone as a child (for example I had hobbies neighborhood kids, much less girl peers, didn't find interesting at all-- bug collecting and "playing archaeologist") and this sense of alienation has continued into adulthood. I feel as if I experience the world so intensely, remember everything so vividly, and care so deeply in my very few relationships, I am often both overwhelming and overwhelmed at the same time. I feel as if being identified as gifted as a child would have saved me somewhat from my loneliness growing up, and to be honest, it's always bothered me I was tested so many times and never heard anything back. Why was I undeserving? These are my more psychoanalytic purposes for asking.

Practically speaking, I'm also crossing a professional crossroad in my life regarding pursuing higher education in the humanities/English versus attending law school. I want to first assess the suspicion I have regarding a possible learning disorder and set up a plan for tackling this before any kind of graduate classes. Additionally, I don't want to bite off more than I can intellectually chew and wind up overwhelmed academically. Maybe I am just not that smart--someone has to fall in those 124-127 IQ scores that are undeniably painfully close to the cutoff but just do not meet it.

I guess I'm most confused about the 7th grade test. I was performing with complete mediocrity at that time and was actually very much more interested in trying to fit in and survive socially than with school. I hadn't been tested since 3rd grade and that score was very low due to my bubbling error. Why do you guys think they tested me individually and then never spoke to me? It just doesn't make sense.

Blackcat - Thank you for your response. I had many strange issues other than multiplication tables--learning to tie my shoes and ride a bike two examples. Both of these activities also ended in repeated, crying temper-tantrums very frequently. I'm not sure if it was redundancy in the actual practicing coupled with a lack of interest on my part or other, possibly cognitive, issues causing these quirks. It took me a ridiculous amount of time to do both these things.

Phonetics-wise, I've realized if I mispronounce a word to myself only once it has imprinted in my mind incorrectly for eternity. It takes focus and vigilance on my part to correct pronunciation I've already botched in the past. Are all of these problems related? My issue with phonics, especially vowels, is the most debilitating issue to deal with everyday. I'm very smart, but I mispronounce "easy" words and have no idea I'm saying them wrong. It's very embarrassing in academia.

My writing score on the ACT as a 15 year old was a 10 out of 12, 99th percentile, and considered an excellent/very top/rare score for this section of the test. I believe this somehow has a connection with my sudden success in college. Once school became abstract, and depth of thought versus the regurgitation of facts became the ability being assessed, I flourished. It's as if I really stink at seeing the minute details of anything in particular but the vastness of the whole I see is astounding?

You should look up developmental coordination disorder as well, since you had problems with the bike and shoe tying. A lot of these disorders go with each other and co-exist. ADHD/ADD tends to go with it as well.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Developmental_coordination_disorder

First off, if it has been seven years or less since you exited high school, your records should still be in the archives (if longer, they may be there, or they may have been purged). If this applies to you, write immediately to your old school system and request all records, including your cum file, guidance records, special education records, and psychological testing. (You may not have anything in some of these categories, but then again, you may, and just not have known about it.) You have a right to any records that are there. These records may answer some of your questions about your educational history, and why you were repeatedly tested, without any apparent outcome.

I would agree with the other posters that it is worth looking into 2e. As you are concerned about how this may affect your immediate future educational and career planning, I would suggest that the simplest and most comprehensive solution would be to seek out a good psychoeducational evaluator who has worked with 2e adults. It can be a bit pricey, but it is likely to give you a great deal of insight into yourself, and factors that may affect your personal and professional interactions. Secondly, it may result in recommendations for accommodations for standardized testing or instruction. If it does, you will have to be assertive and well-informed to advocate for 504 accommodations in future graduate or professional school placements, but it could make all the difference in helping you to master your profession of choice, and demonstrate your strengths.

Your history suggests a word-level reading disability (aka dyslexia), with poor phonological processing, which is believed to be the core deficit. This is why you essentially learned to read by sight, instead of phonics, and why you report a history of being a poor speller. Incidentally, this can still be remediated, to some extent, in adulthood. If you choose to seek evaluation, it will be important to mention this to your evaluator, and to make sure that phonological processing is assessed, preferably using the more sophisticated processing tasks, such as those involving phoneme manipulation.

I wonder if you would have had more success with math reasoning, and thus progressed further in math instruction, if you had been allowed to use a calculator, so that lack of automaticity and fluency in arithmetic would not have prevented you from continuing to build math problem solving skills. It sounds like rote/basic skills in general are much weaker than your higher-level reasoning and application skills. That is very much characteristic of specific learning disability, especially at your age and apparent overall ability level.

Your sudden flourishing in college, in terms of writing, may be related to the fact that everyone uses a wordprocessor then, so those people who really need it as an accommodation (for spelling, punctuation, mechanics in general) no longer stand out in any way, and language mechanics also no longer holds them back. The absence of such accommodations on standardized testing, like the GRE, might have affected your performance, depending on how mechanics is scored.

Overall, your profile suggests that an evaluator might want to investigate what has been called right-hemisphere learning disability (overlaps with DCD, dyscalculia, can include dyslexia, often is associated with differences in social arenas).

I'm so sorry for your pain and isolation. I hear your frustration at the lack of answers from school and how that has carried over into your adult life. Have you read any of the Dabrowski materials on over-excitabilities and positive disintegration? Some of what you are describing reminds me of that work.


As a recovering attorney, I have to ask why law school? I can't tell you how many attorneys I know who feel trapped in their jobs. The most common question that I get from other attorneys who learn that I left the profession is not why?, but how? Check out some of Jonlaw's posts on this forum.


This sounds like a good idea. You obviously are struggling with these questions and the old school data raises questions and doesn't provide answers. A professional may be able to look at that information and use it figure out what testing is appropriate.


I actually think that many attorneys would fall in that range. I think that you greatly over-estimate the average IQ of the profession as a whole.

I know that this may be difficult to hear. I think that you need to let go of this. No matter how much you try to analyze this, it is just something that you will never know. Is it possible that the school shared the information with one of the adults in your life? Have you ever asked them?

I have never heard of this, aeh, and I am intrigued. Can you tell me more? Both of my kids are klutzy with slow-to-develop social skills, and DD was diagnosed with dysgraphia but does not seem to be showing it now.

I am intrigued as well. DS has DCD but his biggest strengths are those which technically should be weaknesses according to what other people with DCD experience. He is very strong with non-verbal ability and weaker with verbal ability. He is very good with math, visual memory, and visual perception. Rather than being dyslexic, he seems somewhat hyperlexic and can read adult-level text (he's 7). He could read rather fluently at age 4 with little instruction. I keep hoping that it's not really DCD, and he's just "delayed" but he has other things that tend to go along with it, for instance ASD-like quirks, problems with speech fluency and prosody, hypotonia, etc .

Here's what I'd do. I'd play detective for my own family tree and I would trace every characteristic that you are certain that you have back to the people you are the most genetically linked to.

For example, my biological father is a natural at mathematics and does not care at all about spelling. He went into a job where everything is abbreviated anyway; no one in that job was spelling.

Tests always have their limitations; test administrators have their limitations. For example, my child does not technically score the way I'd expect for speed processing. Yet, I know the strength of the speed processing without the test because I eye-witness the speed of the child and standardized tests have a timing element, so, in order to ace standardized tests you can calculate the speed of the child. How many questions were answered correctly and how many minutes did it take the child. So, I know there is something wrong with the speed processing test or administrator or both, and when the time is right (say to help another family) I will try to explain it. The schools get so touchy; they don't really want to know their short-comings. It is very different than for-profit businesses who hopefully understand you need feedback for whatever is not working.

Thank goodness and your good self, you survived it. I wonder if maybe you may have been needing the college setting early on. (Something to think about if you decide to have a child.)
Also, don't forget to check in on nieces / nephews / cousins. You might be able to help another family member by saving them from what you went through.

There is a table somewhere showing average IQ in each professional group. I think high 120's was the average for a lot of them.

I'd highly suggest reading the book: The Dyslexic Advantage

My son gets mispronunciations almost perfectly stuck in his head. One tool I've found is laughter to work on unwriting some of these as there is some indication laughter unhinges false wiring. But when your brain is forest-wired rather than tree-wired stuff like mispronouncing come from a bunch of connected things summing together to create an answer rather than one fixed memory. You may be able to reconnect by grabbing a dictionary and reading aloud similar words where you have the right pronunciation.

Well over forty and I've never learned to tie my shoes right consistently, though a picture of it and the principle of the opposing strings help me think through the right way. (thank you velcro)

It might be a useful time to read these books, as you decide which path to pursue:
http://www.amazon.com/Living-With-Intensity-Understanding-Excitability/dp/0910707898

http://www.greatpotentialpress.com/searching-for-meaning