Anyone have a child with nonverbal learning disability?

[Michelle T]

My DS, 12, was recently diagnosed with NLD. He also has ADHD, which I've always known, but he was given this diagnosis officially. Plus, dyscalculia.

 

Anyway, my poor guy has a double whammy with NLD and ADHD. His poor attention skills and low retention block out the good rote memory skills that most NLD'ers have. He is on Ritalin LA, which does help quite a bit with the attentional/focus issues, but of course doesn't completely cure them, and doesn't do anything with the NLD.

 

I would love some good suggestions for the best methods to teach a child with fairly severe visual processing deficits, very poor fine motor skills, little ability to pay attention, and slow processing speed.

 

Anyone else with a DC like mine?

Michelle T

[Laurie4b]

My ds doesn't have NVLD, but does have some of the other issues. Occupational therapy has been a big help with fine motor skills, motor planning, and even some of the visual processing stuff. We are proceding with vision therapy to see if that helps with visual processing, and plan to follow that with Learning Rx (updated version of PACE). Both VT and OT give you exercises to do at home that you can incorporate into your day.

 

Definitely teach your ds to type. Keyboarding is such a necessary skill. We use Typing Instructor to keep increasing accuracy and speed, but the more he does it in general, the more motor memory there will be.

 

Is written language an issue, too? IEW has a writing program that provides the kind of step-by-step structure that will be needed. (We don't do all the elements of the style syllabus, but like the structure syllabus). Later on in high school, something like Jensen's Format Writing, with a very specific format, would be good for teaching writing.

 

There have been previous posts, maybe even on the old board, about NVLD. You can search the archives. There are some good sites online. One warning: Don't read Rourke's site. It's very negative. Though he is a major researcher, a professional friend of mine who has met him says the negative take is his personality. So spare yourself and stick to the more hopeful, helpful sites!

[godpoetry]

My son was diagnosed with this about 7 months ago. We are still learning what works as far as curriculum and such goes. I can tell you that we work in small sessions and most of our work is done orally. He does do some worksheets for English, but I keep them short. We use Math-u-see for math and it is working great. He will be attending OT as soon as we can get in to see one. For reading time, I have found that if I read some and then he reads some we can get through it without a meltdown or tired eyes. He is going into the 5th grade this year, but we will still not do no more than 3 hours of school a day. My neuro-psych told me since he learns mostly by hearing then to use that to my advantage and so I try to make sure he hears all directions clearly. I never give him any work that he does not hear the directions and then repeats them back to me to make sure he understands them. There is a ton of information on the web. If you need more help, you can pm me.

[CactusPair]

Michelle,

 

:grouphug:

 

My ds doesn't have NLVD, but at one time, before OT, I thought he might. I found adequate amt. of info on the web and a couple of books specifically about NVLD.

 

I'm sorry to hear about your ds's dx. I just wanted to offer hugs.

 

~ Hope

[luna]

I was so happy to see a post about this, as I am quite sure my dd, 11 has this. Her neuro-psych never gave her this label, but after researching everything in her report, I am nearly certain she has NLD. She has excellent verbal skills, struggles terribly in math, seems to understand something one day and completely forget it the next and has poor executive function skills. I feel like I am constantly trying to figure her out! She seems so smart some days and others I feel I'm talking to a wall. I let her do a lot of work verbally, not many reports. She enjoys listening to books on tape and even reading to herself, though I think she is struggling with more complex story lines. We also use Math U See after early Saxon. The Saxon 5/4 got too hard for her, adding new things every day. I pray daily for her as well as for myself to be patient with her! I am eager to hear from others about their experiences. Thanks for starting the post!

Katherine

[sandellie4]

One of our daughters has NVLD, though, to tell the truth, she is very similar to our children diagnosed with Asperger's. The only difference is that the dd with NVLD had birth trauma resulting in neuro impairment that the doctor could see on an MRI, while the other children did not. In any case, for visual-spatial work/reasoning, we have found the following materials helpful (many are computer-based, due to the fine motor issues, her fatigue, etc.):

 

Critical Thinking's "Building Thinking Skills" disk. Our daughter is a teenager, but had to start with the beginning disk. They really work her hard (she's on the second one now) but they motivate her to work on specific core skills.

 

Lexia's Cross Trainer has been excellent practice. She works on this for about 45 minutes a day.

 

Nancy Drew mystery disks. Most of the problem solving involves visual-spatial puzzles, and they really put her to the test. She spends months and months on these mysteries until she gets them.

 

We also found several books and card sets through Super Duper to help us directly teach figurative language, social problem solving, and categorizing skills. Critical Thinking Co. also has reading books that require the student to read very, very carefully, so carefully that he or she can pick out which sentence contained their answers or clues.

 

Once she found that there were things she could do, that they just had to be broken down into smaller bites and she would need additional time to complete assignments, she became quite the motivated student. She is currently working through Teaching Textbooks, almost completely independently. If you'd known her in 6th grade you never would have believed she would make it to this point.

 

It IS possible to teach kids with NVLD, and remember that Rourke, etc., were dealing with people who had never had access to any real intervention (you can do so much better!). I would urge you to call those in your support network when the frustrations get high for you. There have been so many times that I've wondered why I am working so hard when the progress is so slow. But when I look back, I am amazed at how far she's come.

 

Sandy

[luna]

Thank you so much for your response, Sandy. I have been discouraged by much of what I've read online and your post was very helpful. My daughter loves Nancy Drew and I am glad to hear the CDROM games are good. I will get them soon. Thanks for sharing your insight.

Katherine