Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional 2E Highly Verbal, Slow Processing Speed, ADD

To calizephyr,
My son is taking the standard classes the teachers compile for all 7th graders: 2 LA, 1 Science, 1 Math, Health/PE (supplanted with his gifted class this 1/2 of the semester), Spec. Ed. class (in lieu of a music class). And it was he who alerted me to the fact that he won't be able to attend the universities he'd like because of the lack of Math proficiency. I hadn't arrived there yet. He is looking forward to college. He sees the big picture and looks ahead. When problem-solving, he uses a wide array of resources. For example, if I were to teach him about an apple, I'd need to start by showing him the whole apple, then dissect it in portions, down to the seed. Whereas most teachers start with the seed because the students don't understand the whole apple at first. Does that make sense? Given this understanding of him, the answer is yes, he does anticipate college. He knows he wants to be in an occupation that only comes from higher education. And he gets that.
To Snowgirl, he likes taking things apart...not putting them together. That's why he doesn't do things like Legos. Learning how things function by taking them apart is his motivation.

Eema, I excited to hear more of what you have found successful because your child shares my child's weaknesses and strengths. What medication have you found useful?

I've had a few other parents tell me to homeschool my son. What is the consensus among the writers of this forum regarding homeschooling the 2E?

Idahomom, if he learns best by hearing about the whole apple first before the seeds, the opposite of how most teachers teach, that is a very common visual-spatial learner problem, and in that case I'd strongly encourage you to take a look at that website. There are a couple articles dealing with math as well. What, specifically, seems to be his difficulty with math, if you know?

How was his perceptual reasoning score on the WISC? Just wondering, thinking about whether whatever the problem is affected that as well.

snowgirl,
His Perceptual Reasoning was lower than his Verbal Comprehension at 110. Does that mean something? Thanks again for all your helpful input. He does alright in Math tests, but doesn't turn in his assignments fast enough. He says by the time he finishes one assignment, there's 4 more to be done.

Eema, because your child exhibits the same strengths and weaknesses as my son, I'm curious to know what educational choice you've made. Do you collaborate a lot with his teachers? Is he homeschooled? Is is in a private school?

Secondly, does your son have a strong work ethic. I question my son's. It's hard sometimes to distinguish between his slow processing speed, ADD, and simply lack of motivation to work. Do you know what I mean?

Could you add an accommodation to his IEP for a scribe or for reduced workload?

My daughter is also highly verbal and has a comparatively low perceptual reasoning score. The psychologist told me that her PRI score was affected by a visual-motor integration problem because the PRI subtests are highly visual and require building patterns with blocks, for instance. The visual-motor problem also causes her to have trouble with writing which slows her down on any type of assignment, including math. By the way, the subtests for processing speed on the WISC include "Coding" which requires the copying of symbols. Her score on that was much lower than her verbal scores, too.

His IEP includes a provision for reduced workload. If he turns in an assignment 80% complete--it's complete. But his teachers aren't following it. I've e-mailed them, with no response.

How does someone scribe for him? How does that work? How does someone scribe for her? Plus, I'm a little confused about how your daughter and my son could be visual-spatial learners when they're verbal scores are so high and their scores on block design and spatial stuff were so low. I'm experiencing a learning curve here, I think. I've taken the Visualspacial.org's "Is your child a visual/spatial learner? quiz. My score suggests he might be. Although in the areas where he doesn't fit...he really doesn't fit. For example, he's a very good speller and always has been. His great spelling is so natural and easy for him. He can't do puzzles and hates Legos, K'Nex, blocks, etc. He remembers both visual and audio. Hears it once and he can memorize it and recall it.

I don't necessarily think that my DD is a VS learner. She has some of the characteristics (different ones from you son) but not all. Even if a person is good at thinking visually or processing visual input they can still have a problem with motor output of visual info. From my understanding of the Eide's book, you can think of the brain as having various inputs (visual, auditory, tactile, etc.) and various outputs (motor, speech, etc.) If there is a bottleneck in one these the person has trouble processing incoming information or producing certain kinds of output. So it is possible, for instance, to have great vocabulary, comprehension, writing and reading skills but be unable to express oneself verbally on a comparable level to one's understanding. Producing written output is such a complex task that a bottleneck in just one area can affect performance. Things become even more complicated when somebody has more than one bottleneck!

I don't think that you have to have an affinity for puzzles or building things to be a VS learner. From how you describe your son's thinking style, it sounds like he is a big-picture person who sees something as a whole concept and then looks at the details. A more sequential learner would look at how the details go together and then see the big picture. At least, that's how I understand it . I think that visual/spatial vs. auditory/sequential is a very broad distinction and not very useful in a lot of situations.

My DD doesn't have a scribe at school although I sometimes scribe for her on homework. She tells me what to write or how to do a math problem and I just write what she says. If it's an actual handwriting practice assignment she does that herself. Lately, she has preferred typing her homework because she recently increased her keyboarding speed to where typing is faster than writing.

What if you initial his homework yourself and add a note that you have checked it and it is complete per his IEP? Often, teachers have other people grading the homework and even recording the scores. His accommodation is just slipping through the cracks!