Pemberley, here's the 7 year old list for my ds:
By 7 years old
Problems may include:
Difficulties in adapting to a structured school routine - yes, but he didn't act out in an obvious way, instead he was very quietly anxious and upset
Difficulties in Physical Education lessons - not obvious to us at that point, but he moved very slowly, didn't get excited about PE class, and appeared to be inclined to be a couch potato (the difficulties with PE lessons have become much more obvious as he's gotten older).
Slow at dressing. Unable to tie shoe laces YES YES YES. When he was around 7, he fought getting dressed a lot too. He didn't learn how to tie his shoelaces until he was 9, and then forgot again during Christmas vacation when he didn't wear his tie shoes for a few weeks.
Barely legible handwriting - you could read our ds' handwriting, but his teacher said it was one of the "2 or 3" least legible in his 2nd grade class. He also hadn't stopped reversing letters or learned punctuation, mixed up caps vs lower case, spacing was very uneven, words didn't follow lines on paper, and his spelling was horrible.
Immature drawing and copying skills - ds is actually very good talented at drawing, and this isn't unheard of in dysgraphic kids - drawing uses a different skill set than handwriting. He absolutely had problems copying written work, still does, and according to his neuropsych most likely always will.
Limited concentration and poor listening skills - NO
Literal use of language - yes
Inability to remember more than two or three instructions at once - Absolutely NO! But I have a non-dysgraphic dd who can't remember 1/2 an instruction on a good day, and apparently has no LD whatsoever
Slow completion of class work - yes in K/1, by 2nd grade for the most part he wasn't even starting school work.
Continued high levels of motor activity - Absolutely NOT. He's SLOW. Really slow!
Hand flapping or clapping when excited - no. FWIW, my older dd hand-flapped for awhile when she was around 4-5 years old. She's the dd with no known LD or anything else that remotely resembles a diagnosis
Tendency to become easily distressed and emotional - YES. Still true. Don't ask me about my day today!
Problems with co-ordinating a knife and fork - yes.
Inability to form relationships with other children - somewhat. He had 2 close friends that he met in Kindergarten that he kept throughout most of elementary school, but as most of the kids started branching out and making new friends as they got older in elementary, ds had a tough time making other close friends. This wasn't because other kids didn't like him - other kids have always liked him a lot. I think for ds it was related to his expressive language disorder, which I don't think is related to dyspraxia (but I could be wrong on that!). This year when he switched schools for 6th grade, he had no problem making new friends and right away found a good friend to pal around with.
Sleeping difficulties, including wakefulness at night and nightmares - Nightmares were never an issue, but when he did wake up in the middle of the night at 7 he would be easily scared by household sounds like someone walking across the floor or the furnace creaking etc. He also never needed much sleep. He continued to predictably wake up in the middle of the night up until he was around 6 years old, and he still goes through periods where he wakes up in the middle of the night. He's always stayed up late and wakes up early in the morning.
Reporting of physical symptoms, such as migraine, headaches, feeling sick - when he was 6 he went through a long spell of stomachaches which his ped said was actually the way migraines often present in young children. We eventually figured out it was related to stress and anxiety.
DS also became an extremely picky eater starting at around 6-7 years old, and I think that *is* related to his dyspraxia. Prior to that he used to eat just about anything, and he's starting to branch out a little bit more now at 12 years old, but he feels full very soon after he starts eating so he has a hard time eating enough at any meal to last very long.
polarbear
