Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment new here-"stealth dsylexia" ?

Hi Suzanne, I don't have any advice, I just wanted to say "welcome"!

http://www.eyecanlearn.com/index.htm#Peripheral

This site has some definitions of the visual/perceptual issues and also some exercises that you can check out so that you can understand better what may be going on.

I sometimes wish I felt equipt to homeschool. But I truly don't see that as a viable option for us. IEPs and "well meaning teachers" are such a nightmare.

I hope that your ds can "graduate" in 3 months. That would be wonderful. For my dd, the estimate is 2 years, though at her last check, her eye teaming ability went from 40% to 80%!! So we are optimistic that she will graduate sooner than expected!!!!

Suzanne, there is discussion in one of the other threads in one of the other forums (how's that for vague) about dysgraphia not being just about handwriting....it's also about getting thoughts on paper.

Found it- the thread title is "Gifted scores and severe processing issues" pg 6 in 2e forum.

Hi again, I am back! I have the full written eval.
The diagnosis is gifted with "disorder of written expression" which confuses me, because she told me before he had
mild dysgrapia AND mild stealth dyslexia. She told me she "changed" his diagnosis. I have emailed her to ask about this.

I am planning on having my son work on his keyboarding skills, do the All-About-Spelling program, and continue the vision therapy. I am really not convinced he has dysgraphia-his biggest problem is spelling, IMO.

The tests she did include the WISC-IV, WIAT-II, TOWRE, and PAL.

I don't understand how his spelling problems can only be resulting from the "disorder of written expression." Am I missing something?

Thoughts?

Also she said
"The 20 point difference between his Full Scale IQ of 126 and his Written Language Composite of 106 is significant and has a base rate (occurrence within the norm sample of children his age) of 3%."

She also mentioned "A form of mild apraxia may be at work here."
But when I talked to an SLP she said there is no way he has apraxia..the only speech problem he has is an articulation problem with /r/.

Also I posted his scores here-
http://giftedissues.davidsongifted....n_you_help_me_make_sense_.html#Post46075

I wish I had kept it all in one thread!

And Dottie, to answer your question in the other thread abou pseudoword decoding,
he scored 108 for a Standard Score, which is the 70% ad Grade equivalent if 7.2. He just finished grade 5.
She said for the reading summary-

"He is a successful reader who demonstrates well developed word recognition, fluency, and superior comprehension that is in good agreement with measured verbal aptitude. Because he has some orthographic weaknesses, he truly maximizes context , in which he can leverage his higher-order cognitive abilities."

Hi Suzanne,
I have posted on other threads about dysgraphia. My son is 11, a great and voracious reader and hates to write. He refuses to write much of the time, which sounds more obstinate than your son. He was diagnosed with dysgraphia at 9, but I didn't put a lot of weight on the diagnosis because he can write very neatly and is a good speller. I've always thought his refusal was based more on emotion and perfectionism. The information on the Eide Neurolearning Site about dysgraphia was enlightening for me as it doesn't just focus on handwriting and motor skills. It also helped me to put myself into his shoes and imagine what it would be like to write my thoughts down if I had to consciously think of each work while I was writing.

It sounds to me like you have some good information to start with. If he takes to typing that could eliminate most of the difficulties right there.

Good luck with this, and keep writing.
Benny

Thanks for your response. It is comforting knowing you understand and that your child struggles to write, too. To some degree, I wonder if it is, in part, a gender thing. Boys generally do not like to write that much, in my experience. And slow writing may be due to perfectionism, right?

I keep wondering if he really does also have dyslexia. It seems so weird that she said he DID and then said he did NOT.
If he does not have dyslexia, why is spelling soo hard for him?
He spells "used" "uesed", "cried" "cryed"-despite years of intense phonics instruction and spelling programs.

Is the PAL test a good indicator of dyslexia? Did she do the "right" tests to rule dyslexia in or out?

And even if I don't know if he is dyslexic or not, I am not sure knowing really matters, because I am going to be teaching spelling to him using an Orton Gillingham method, ie I am treating him as if he IS dyslexic. I am just thinking outloud and wondering how important it is for me to KNOW FOR SURE if he has dyslexia or not.

This is what I have been struggling with for the last month. I have decided FOR SURE that my son has dysgraphia. Do I need to find out which type? Why? I met with his teacher today about next year (luckily the same teacher again!) and he will be typing everything in class and at home. If that works, hurrah! The teacher mentioned the difference in the depth of written expression between boys and girls (generally) at this age. A lot of the 5th grade boys had very sophisticated ideas about the novel they are reading when talking about it, but got a lot less down on the page.

The spelling really does sound dyslexic, but there are so many LD's out there that might cause this. A friend's daughter had spelling difficulties, but also read just at grade level, was not a huge reader like the rest of the family. The Mom was convinced something wasn't right and had her tested for the convergence insufficiency. She did therapy at the Drs (about $3000.00 I think,) and it worked. The words don't jump around on the page anymore. It is unusual to find this in an advanced reader, but I have read that it does show up occasionally in kids who read well and a lot.

I don't know anything about the PAL, so can't help you there.

I am sure that perfectionism can cause a lot of anxiety and if the writing is even a little hard as opposed to a lot hard, the perfectionism piece can cause someone to give up more quickly.

Homeschooling sounds great right now!

Interesting comment about vision in the "need help with scores" thread!