Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional Expressive speech delay and possibly gifted

blackcat, I'm wandering off the OT for a minute, but in reading through your reply here (very similar to my ds, definitely didn't go through the predictable speech phases) - my ds also didn't go through any of the predictable early writing phases either and he didn't seem to go through any of the typical early reading stages. I wonder how much of that is all wrapped up in DCD?


My ds was diagnosed by an SLP but not until he was 10 years old - it took that long for any of us to put the pieces together and realize he was struggling with expressive language. The most obvious challenge was his difficulties with writing, particularly open-ended assignments, but as he got older he started telling me that there were times when he couldn't get the words together to know what to say (verbal). Somewhere along the way I read a brief one-sentence type blurb in a book (I think it was one of the Eides' books) that mentioned that writing difficulties in gifted children could be due to expressive language challenges and that SLP therapy could help. I had a friend who was a school SLP, so I asked her and she said absolutely. When he was assessed (privately, he didn't qualify for school SLP)... his scores were either average or off the charts on the CELF, but there was a huge discrepancy and nothing in between. On the two subtests where his scores were "only" average, the SLP who evaluated also noted that it took him a *very* long time to come up with his answers, much more so than on the other parts of the test, which he scores up in the 99th percentile on. The discrepancy in scores, combined with parent interview were what were used to diagnose his expressive language disorder.


I get a *lot* of the "I don't know" answers to things ds should know - especially when I asked about specific things during his school day when he was younger (still get quite a bit of it going on). It took me a long time to realize that in spite of his incredible memory (which is amazing)... he doesn't know how to tell me about some of those very simple things. Open-ended questions are really tough for him. He also has a tough time with summarizing information (verbally or in writing), knowing what details to retell etc and how to organize what he writes.

polarbear

Ok, thanks. The language assessment was done by a private SLP, but of course she was not aware of other aspects of his IQ (like the high non-verbal). It's probably a weakness and he uses the giftedness to compensate, but I don't know how much of a gap there needs to be before it's a "disability". Also, he seems to be making so much improvement over where he was a couple years ago when he didn't even ask questions. It's defintely something I'm keeping my eye on. I don't know how much is asyncronous brain development, how much is DCD, or something else. His SLP at the school doesn't see any problem so I think it would be pointless to ask her to do an evaluation. If we got another private eval, I would want to make sure it's someone who understands 2e kids and knows what to look for. I have been so frustrated with people not having any idea what is going on with his speech and all the oddities, like the voice, the prosody, the fluency issues, etc. and not knowing how to treat it. He has had 3 SLPs with the school system so far and all of them seem clueless.

Blackcats last post makes me wonder about getting DD3 a psych eval. The psych DD7 is seeing next month for a full eval (more so school purposes than anything) works mainly with gifted and 2e children.
I was thinking about waiting to get DD3 eval being that would have no barring on our everyday lives but now that I think about it, it would be nice to know where she is exactly cognitively.

Should I wait to test her as planned or do it now?

I don't think I would bother with an IQ test unless you have concerns there is a cognitive impairment (i.e. below average IQ). With DS at age 3, and all of his various delays, we had no idea that what we were dealing with was a 2e situation. But the testing back then didn't even show that. It was helpful to see that he didn't have any serious deficiencies, and it was helpful to see that he was very strong in some areas (like visual spatial ability) as opposed to verbal, but at that age it didn't really tell us enough to give us a real diagnosis or anything. So we walked away with "develomentally delayed", just like what we had when we walked in. Another reason I took him to the psych was he had all kinds of oddities indicative of autism spectrum, like delayed speech, hand flapping, toe walking, odd animal noises and speech patterns, etc. She observed him and ruled that out.

Thanks ladies! SLP and ped agree there is no autism or anything similar going on. Her speech eval showed cognitively she is great and on track, maybe advanced. SLP said as far as they can tell and based off the eval her only delay is expressive, everything has checked out fine.

I'll wait and see how DD7's eval goes. If it shows high IQ then when DD3 reaches school age I'll address getting an eval then. I don't want to get inaccurate results or spend that kind of money if 3 is a too young and won't make any difference right now.