Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment DS IQ - Average, Low Average, very below average?

IQ scores weren't even close to what was anticipated. Processing speed was an issue. Dr gave an unspecified ADHD diagnosis w/ possible red flag for LD. Wants to test again in two years. She said she couldn't be sure if the issues were sensory or ADHD. She was afraid he would have issues with comprehension and processing info. He does have distraction issues but he learns things very rapidly. He is advancing in his reading skills very rapidly and remembers what he reads. He has us write sentences each night for us to read. Sometimes he remembers exactly what we wrote the night before. His teacher has even remarked on how he is one of the best readers in he class.

I expressly told her that DS told me he didn't want to do the test and that he told me he wanted to play with toys and stop the testing. She refused to acknowledge the hour and a half car ride then a long waiting room wait as an issue. She doesn't even consider his lack of desire to cooperate an issue!

They say that children score between 5-10 points on IQ tests of parents and husband and I were both on the higher to much higher end academically. In no way do we believe this is an accurate representation of our child. Now what?

hnz1979, how old is your ds? I think there's an ideal age range for IQ tests, and maybe your ds is very young for it?

That said, it was one day, and you say he wasn't engaged. That right there would tell me as a parent to perhaps take the results with some caution.

As for processing speed, my DYS has a low average processing speed attributed to perfectionism. If you and your dh are gifted, chances are your ds is too. He may or may not have other issues going on that affected his test on that day.

KAD mom - ds is 5. His pre-k teacher last year said it might take a few years for the "giftedness" to show up. I told her the results and she was in complete shock. Her dd is gifted and feels strongly that our ds is also.

(Sigh) maybe he does have ADHD he is a busy kid with concentration issues. However he concentrates when he wants to quite well!

It sounds like, at this point, you really don't know what your ds' IQ is - and that's ok. Each evaluation, whether it yields what you expected or not, is simply more data. You look at the data, think about it, analyze it based on what you know about your son, use what you can and then file the rest away but remember it, just in case farther along in your journey something suddenly becomes obvious that relates back to what was seen at this eval. Parenting 2e kids is *truly* a journey - you will find answers and understanding, but it's usually over time.

FWIW, I think there's most likely a lot of good data in the eval you've just had. I'd shift my focus off of wondering what your ds' IQ is and looking for clues that might be hints as to the struggles he's had. Something sent you in for testing - so look at what you learned in that context. Forget worrying about whether or not you're seeing gifted quirks at the moment. The psych suggested he might have ADHD - this testing was inconclusive, but learn what you can about ADHD and watch over time to see what fits and what doesn't fit your ds. The psych saw some types of patterns in the test scores that make her suspect there's a possibility of LD, but your ds is still very young and yes, he wasn't at his "best" while testing, so perhaps an LD will show up later, perhaps not. The key is - if you see other signs o LD, remember that what you see might really be an LD and don't just automatically assume it's sensory or a gifted quirk etc. You have a red flag - it might be nothing, but it also might be something and only time and observing your ds as he gets older and moves into 1st grade and beyond will you really have the opportunity to know for certain.

Also, fwiw, my 2nd 2e child (10 years old) test all over the place. We have high IQ tests and very average IQ tests. She has a disability that impacts her ability to read, yet there are days when she tests light-years ahead of grade level in reading. It's *not* typically easy to test and assess 2e kids.

I'm also curious - you've asked "average, low average, very below average?" but haven't mentioned actual scores. Were there subtests that were *way* below average? Others that were average? Was there scatter? Whether or not your ds is highly gifted, I'd want (as a parent) to know more detail about the subtest scores and try to determine which were given before lunch when it sounds like he was more compliant with the testing. If you have really really low scores on any subtest during the time he seemed to be compliant, I'd really think it through - is there a possibility that the score reflects his abilities at this point in time and there's an issue to be addressed? I ask that because my sensory-seeking dd looked like she was extremely hyperactive when she was your ds' age, and she had an *incredibly* low score on one of the WISC subtests - and it turns out - the reason was her eyes weren't focusing together and she was either having double-vision or her brain was shutting off one eye when she tried to use them together, which in turn severely limited peripheral vision. So yes, she had this hugely low score - but it didn't mean she wasn't smart, it meant she couldn't see. And once she'd had vision therapy.. quite a bit of her hyperactive behavior also disappeared as well as some of her sensory seeking behaviors - because they were driven by an unrelated challenge, her vision. So anyway, just in the event you see a subtest score or set of scores that look really really low- don't automatically assume it was all non-compliance with the test. Think it through - is there a possibility it might relate to something you've noticed with your ds, and if so, try to dig a bit deeper into what it might mean.


Keep in mind that kids with LDs and other types of challenges can and do learn things quickly and maybe very eager students. Sometimes they are also quite capable of covering up their challenge because of strengths in other areas. It's not always (or often, imo) easy to look at any one child and see obviously that there is a reading or writing or whatever challenge.


Is it possible that he actually did cooperate, so she didn't see an issue with cooperating?


Your ds still has many years of school left to get to that "higher end" of academics. Maybe he will, maybe he won't - but to be sure he gets to where he is meant to be, the first thing to do is to help him learn how to manage his behaviors so that he's successful in school in the early years. The first key to "managing" behaviors is to understand what's driving them. You've started heading down that path to understanding, and you'll get there. It just won't likely be as quick as you'd hoped - but you absolutely will get there if you just hang with it, listen to all the evals, use what makes sense, keep the other in the back of your mind, and move forward.

Best wishes,

polarbear

@ Polar Bear/Master of None - we didn't pay a lot for this thank goodness. Tester specializes in autism and developmental disorders not giftedness.

His issues at school relate to defiance, not following through with directions, and lack of organizing information. And impulsive behaviors! Yet the principal feels he will be just fine and isn't that gifted and LD kid. And she commented that she has worked with that before.

Subtest scores were lower on processing visual information. I asked what part sensory overload could play in this. I'm not so much upset with the scores as that we did not have the information tied to any possible treatments/interventions. What if he needs visual therapy of some type? How can we help focus, etc?. I was concerned that the "where's Waldo" type of visual test may have caused visual sensory overload and that effected the low processing speed score.

Ds is very good at playing dominos and has been very intuitive since the first time we played on maching and seeing the correct dominos. So I know he can process visual spatial info quickly and correctly. I'm wondering if it is an attention issue? If so, what therapy can we begin? It seems many parents here have audio/visual therapies to help their children.

I don't know. I suppose time will tell. I just wonder why so many very intelligent individuals have children with (forgive me for phrasing it this way) "issues". My husband is a chemist and works with many very highly intelligent and very educated people. There are five people in his lab right now, and with our ds included, 3 out of 5 have children who qualify for ADHD. Does that seem odd? What does this say about intelligence and neurological issues? My best friend from HS married a validectorian who is very gifted in many ways, and their ds is diagnosed as orderline ADHD. It just seems that intelligence has some very strong correlation to impulsive tendencies and sensory issues.

I guess we just limp along the best we can. The school will not help in any way until our ds suffers academically. If he is 2e he will be able to compensate for many of the issues he is facing. I've been told that the next school will be much more helpful in 1st grade. I just pray with maturity he will be able to make better choices and hopefully work at learning ways to focus and compensate.

Your DS is still very young. Also, is he young for his grade? I believe that bright, impulsive children are often misunderstood. Their behavior may seem immature, at times, while they are actually quite intelligent. This can make the child seem "many ages at once" and can be due to asynchronous development.

I do wonder if the tester lacked any rapport with your DS.

Just some articles on bright young children that you may or may not relate to:

http://www.davidsongifted.org/db/Articles_id_10241.aspx

Eide

http://www.sengifted.org/archives/a...nal-looking-beyond-psychiatric-diagnosis

All the best to you and your DS!

I'd flip that question around and ask - is it possible that part of what looks like sensory challenges might actually be a child who isn't seeing well?


Not all professionals believe in vision therapy and developmental optometry, but fwiw, this was soooo important for my dd. She had 20/20 *eyesight* but her eyes didn't focus together at all - and once she went through vision therapy so many of the behaviors that we thought were all tied up in her SPD disappeared. She did definitely have some SPD-related issues - but we were mistaking other issues for SPD, including vision, simply because we knew she had sensory challenges and we didn't realize there were other things also contributing to the behaviors.


A low score on the "Where's Waldo" type test (Symbol Search on the WISC) definitely impacts the processing speed index score - and it's one of the two subtests that my vision-challenged dd scored anomalously low on before she had vision therapy.


And this is where issues with vision get tricky - we had no clues that my dd had a vision challenge... or perhaps I should say we had no clues that we recognized. What we found out from our developmental optometrist was that she had severe double vision due to her eyes not tracking (due to low muscle tone). We didn't ever see crossed eyes, and she seemed to be able to see to do schoolwork, play games etc. What we didn't see were subtle clues that when her eyes were overly stressed to focus her brain shut one eye off - basically she was then seeing through only one eye. That's why playing games etc and other close-up work was ok - her brain had a way of compensating for the double vision. What happened as she went on in school though was that the amount of effort she had to put into close-up work really started to strain her eyes. One thing you could look for is - does your ds make good eye contact or does he look off to the side when he speaks to people? Does he tilt his head when he's reading or looking at things up close? Does he have good posture when he's reading or does he curl up around whatever he's working on? How does he do with puzzles? Things like that could be clues that there is a vision challenge.


The psych suggested it might be ADHD, which is attention-related. ADHD doesn't only mean hyperactive. Two of my kids were suspected of having ADHD when they were young, and neither does - but it took a bit of time to figure out that what we saw wasn't an attention issue. It was vision for my dd, and an LD for my ds.


That does actually seem statistically a little high, so it might just be coincidence. I can tell you that the rates of ADHD, LD, ASD, are all rising exponentially in the US (I don't know about outside the US). There have been all kinds of theories about what might be behind the rise in these things (as well as similar increases in childhood allergies, celiac disease etc). I won't go into all that here ... just wanted to point out it's not just among families with high IQ kids.


I think one weak link here is that higher intelligence in parents can track with higher SES which in turns tracks with easier access to professionals who can help diagnosis and treat challenges. The same child with the same challenges, living in a lower SES family where the parents are challenged simply keeping food on the table etc might never get a diagnosis or help.


Maturity will help, as well as whatever remediation/accommodations etc that you come up with along the way. It does take time, and with time comes more data and more understanding. Although school might not *test* until a student struggles academically, you always have a voice as a parent that allows you to advocate with the current teacher etc, so you stay on top of trying to figure out what works for your ds, keep making suggestions to his teacher etc. Some teachers will work with you, some won't. Don't stop trying though - because your ds is watching Even though he's quite young, he's still noticing you supporting him And every time you advocate and aren't successful, it's at the very least practice in advocacy and eventually you *will* be successful.

The flip side of that is - you also don't want to depend fully on the schools, because they are never (no matter how great they are) going to be as fully invested in your child's success as you are. You are going to have to be his best advocate and supporter, and you're going to have to stay on top as best you can re understanding what's going on with him. I am not sure there are any 2e parents here who've made it through school with school being the sole source of remediation etc. Most of us have had to provide a ton of support and also enrichment outside of school.

I'd better stop now before I ramble on forever lol - hope some of that rambling helped!

polarbear

Thank you to all. This is the only community we feel we fit in! Thank God someone gets it!

Maybe I should have his vision/hearing professionally tested. I have VERY strong astigmatism that causes me reading issues at distances and at night. Today I worked with ds on reading and he did turn the page sideways to read. I've never seen him do that before but it may be telling me something.

Thanks again (ps - I'd love to hear the theories behind allergies/celiac/autism etc!) send me a link!

Husband doesn't think it could be the eyesight thing. His hand eye coordination is good with play and objects. Did your children have headaches, motion sickness, issues with tying shoes etc?

One of the most interesting bits of research I ran across about challenges and inteligence is that intelligence is a better predictor of vision problems than parental vision problems.

I have pretty severe astigmatism in one eye, and totally missed that DS had even worse than I did until it came up at his physical for kindergarten. Neither of us is good at procedural memory for things like tying shoes. In addition to whatever contribution vision made, he very much operated on his own plan at five and would have had completely meaningless resukts testing at that age. At almost seven with some correction for his vision his testing was ok, but heavily skewed on vision elements on the Stanford Binet.

A ten second screening at home of covering each eye and trying to read would've told us there was an issue. Normal vision is whatever an individual experiences and they operated under the assumption that everyone sees the same until told differently. Headaches can also be a huge red flag.