Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Identification, Testing & Assessment WISC results at last - Help Please!!

Wise words

Hi Raddy, and Breakaway, since both of you mention attention issues, I thought I would say that there are other assessment tools outside of wisc/iq and achievement testing, ones that really hone in on planning, ability to focus, etc. I suppose that's what you're getting at with 'should we investigate further'. If you see it affecting his performance at school, I would be inclined to look further, if they psychologist is not already planning further specific tests. The dr. should be able to list out to you which tests/'instruments' they would use given your concerns and exactly what they ought to show.

We were seeing some attention/speed things that concerned us and the additional testing has been well worth it in truly understanding what is up...naturally for several weeks after getting results we felt we had a million more questions, but our dr. was open to additional calls and emails, so we could ask about small things that we were not sure about.

Chris - the EP may plan further tests; the thing is knowing what is available. The little'un is attentive to things he's interested in, so maybe he is not being engaged. One thing the EP said in her report, vis-a-vis his exam results, was that he might perform better with harder papers(!)

little'un is, as I think I've mentioned to you before,Chris - way ahead of his peers intellectually. E.G in class talking about producers and consumers in the biological world where plants are producers, because they make their own food, and animals are consumers. The little tyke said 'what about Venus Fly Traps'. well, he's right you know, so things aren't black and white at his level - so he is asking some clever questions but will get a wrong mark in the exam.

Dottie has told me that with some of his scores on the WISC he will have difficulty with a school/peer match - ain't that the truth (again as I think we've discussed before?)

What tests did you have done I wonder? Any thing I can throw up to the EP may get us where we need to be right now.

Paul

Raddy - I'm sorry I didn't have much to say about your DS's scores. Didn't you post before you had the scores? Can you link to that post for me?

Are you asking about the mismatch between his VCI and WMI? We've had that discussion about what if DC is high in VCI and/or PRI but average in WMI/PSI, what does it mean? I don't know. I read somewhere that those indices are more important for kids performing below average. Others here though recognize avg WMI/PSI w/ very high VCI/PRI as a bottleneck.

D&C, Hi again
Yes I posted here:
http://giftedissues.davidsongifted.org/BB/ubbthreads.php/topics/49710/1.html

Seems the verbal about raw intelligence doesn't pan out with the written results - something else we have to query.

Hi Raddy -
here is subset of the list that our psych administered.
Your psych might have preference for other paths to take, of course. Hope it helps in your discussion. Ds does this as well, with the state standard tests, some of them are worded imprecisely or are downright wrong; those are hard for him to get 'right' as there are no correct answers!


'ADHD rating scale IV' for parents, teachers and ds might have filled one out, too. (check boxes rating behavior on certain things, like 'often', 'usually','seldom', 'never' finishes homework in prescribed amount of time )
'Behavior Assessment System for Children' (BASC-2)
'Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function' (BRIEF)
'Conners Continuous Performance Test II' (on a computer, child completes boring tasks
'Psychological Processing Checklist - Revised'
'Learning Disabilities Diagnostic Inventory' (LDDI)
There was also some assessment with an eye towards ruling out/in asperger's.

I know we've chatted on this board about the kids..
Our ds seems to be making some headway socially but I'm sort of holding my breath for now. We're at the start of a social skills training course, hoping for great things...but will certainly settle for even modest gains.
Good luck to you and your ds in your quest for additional insight.

Chris
Thanks for that. We will get all the info together and see where we go next . I will definitely run those tests past the EP next week. Of course a lot of it could be a maturity thing?

We really have found the book 'Mislabeled Child' a great help in understanding just what is going on. It does point to a possible problem with overload in his Working Memory Function, and possibly a visual problem. Little'un's eyes have been tested twice recently, but the book says there may be neurological problems that could possibly be due to a difficult birth.

I will say that though he does 'drift off', if he is given an engaging task he is into it and gets it done double-quick. If he finds it boring then he just drags it on and on, and getting him motivated is like pushing on a piece of string. His writing is abysmal but he can do it when he wants to. In class they can't shut him up if they are asking for input on a topic he knows something about - which is everything (God help his teachers :-) )

Socially - we talk through things a lot with him now to find out what is going on with his peers. Yesterday he said 3 boys had dragged him to the ground in the middle of playing, pparently unprovoked. On further investigation it seems they were playing and his mates said that they were alien 'Masters of the Universe'. My boy said 'well you're not my masters, try and stop me doing this' and hit one of the lads. Well of course pandemonium ensued( boys will be boys). He told us all this after much digging. He said that they were "not masters of the universe" - and I said "neither were they aliens - it was just a game!" When he saw it tht way we laughed and laughed - just hope he takes it ion board. So now we concentrate on 'joining in skills'.

"the Hidden Rules Of friendship" - again a book I picked up just a couple of weeks ago, is full of good help for this kind of situation and so far all it says seems to work.

We have summer holidays starting next week, and the EP said she will do any additional testing then (she works for the Local Authority, so as schools out she will be slack then). I will try to keep you informed.

Thanks

paul



Paul

Hi Paul,

Your son sounds like he shares some similar issue with mine. I have been considering the "Hidden Rules of Friendship" but many of the reviews I read were from parents with shy kids which is not the case here. I would love to hear more about how things work out for you guys with both social skills and testing. I hope you get some good information with the EP.

Susan

Susan
the book deals with all kinds of kids :

1. the vulnerable child
2. the intimidating child
3. the different drummer
4. the shy child
5. the short fused child
6. the little adult
7. the sensitive soul
8. the born leader
9. the pessimistic child

You are going to recognise a bit of your own in each chapter i'm sure and, as I said we have used some of the tips already to good effect - unlike a lot of the many books we have bought over the years. Perhaps your local library has a copy.

We will try and contact the Ep to see what the next step is - Chris has given us a list of the things they had tested, so we will probably make a start there. I will try and let all of you know how it goes and what the outcomes are, in case it helps. It's hard to know how relevant our experiences are as we are in the UK, but we'll see and keep pluggin' awy

Thanks

Paul