LiPS, Barton, and my son's uneven abilities

[mellifera33]

nm

[PeterPan]

Yes, his working memory should improve with targeted practice, however it sounds like you need to work on it in more targeted ways.  Working memory is the scratch pad of the brain.  Low working memory impedes long-term learning.  You're only thinking in terms of decoding a single word, but you need him to be able to decode through an entire sentence, understand and piece together all those words, AND remember the sentence and meaning from the previous sentence in order to create context and meaning!  So "He sat it down" will have no meaning if he can't remember the sentence before gave a name (Bart) and was talking about a fishing pole (it).  Kwim?

 

Ways to work on working memory?  Not an exhaustive list

 

-meds for the ADHD (obvious, has it been diagnosed yet? and how old is he?)

-digit spans

-kinesthetic methods of working on memory like in the Kenneth Lane book

-activities from Focus Moves that will help him focus better to let him use his working memory better, work on bilaterality, etc.

-metronome work (see Heathermomster's instructions)  --as you build up the basic skill, then add in digit spans

-A Fistful of Coins--This game is a little pricy, but it's FABULOUS

-even really obvious memory games like Memory.   :D

 

Also, I've explained this before and you can find my old posts, but I integrated the steps of Barton 1 and LIPS.  I'm with you that it's an artificial divide and that it's too much to expect a kid just to drop the steps of LIPS and magically infer them and do them with the harder material of Barton 1.  I suggest you try Barton 1, but go to the first lesson (lesson 1) and do all the steps of LIPS with the Barton 1, lesson 1, letters. Does that make any sense?  After he can do all the steps through the vertical ladder of LIPS using the Barton 1, lesson 1 letters, THEN extend it, EXTEND the methodology and do the Barton lesson.  So it's like LIPS was the first two steps and Barton gives you the rest in the process.  Back off.  Don't expect him to do the Barton skills with a huge field.  Back off and do the Barton steps with the LIPS tiles using that super limited field.  Does that make sense?  

 

And yes, that was rocket science for us.  I've done pre-algebra with my ds and Star Trek Catan (only about twice his age for recommended ages) and Lego Technic and all sorts of things, but bringing down 3 mouth pictures to spell a word and then trading those faces for colored tiles and then trading those colored tile for letters was the HARDEST THING EVER.  This is a huge battle, and it's yours to win!  You CAN get this.  You know where the glitch is (the working memory).  So I would look for things that rid up glitches. Sensory can block it, meaning you need an OT eval.  Meds can help get you through it.  Omega 3.  Time of day and adequate food for the brain.  But it IS rocket science, sorry.  Also try backing off to a single letter to go through all the steps.  Remember, you're trying to go: face, colored tile, letter.  That's the progression.  So take it down to a single sound and go through the steps.  Then do it with two sounds where the sounds are nonsense.  Then build to three sounds.  Be uber patient.  If that takes a week for each step, that's fine!  Make a reward system so he's getting a reward for doing sessions, even if he's not doing more.  That way he knows you're pleased with him.  But try to get those steps SO SMALL that he actually can get there.  

 

The other thing that helped us was to use a big whiteboard, about 17X20. Do you have one?  I have a set of letter magnets from Lakeshore Learning that I ADORE, and we lay out every face that we've studied and all the letter combinations.  This can take an INSANE amount of time, but do it.  That's what it took to help my ds go from face to letter.  Does that make sense?  And we've done it SO MUCH that it is ingrained in his mind as a storage method.  This face looks like this, it makes these sounds, it has these letter combinations as ways it can be written.  Over and over, every day we did that layout.  Then, once you have that all down (which can take a long time), then you pull it up, piece by piece, saying the sounds and writing them in salt!  Now you're kinesthetic.  And we wrote on his hand, on his back, etc.  Every day.  We don't have to do it so much now, but we did that daily for weeks upon weeks upon weeks upon weeks.  Now it's more just an occasional review tool for us.  

 

Has he had an eval for ADHD?  You have options there.  I'm just saying it's a battle worth fighting, because that low working memory will bite him more ways.  Barton specifically wants the working memory to be up, which is why she includes it in the pretest (per her mouth, my phone call with her).  If you don't get it up, he can't do the manipulations for the levels as he works through Barton.  He really needs it up.  I'd be investigating ways to focus on it, add them to your day for 30 minutes to an hour of daily concerted effort.  That's what we did.  It's not like we just did LIPS and got a breakthrough.  We did LIPS *and* BalavisX *and* Focus Moves *and* RAN/RAS work *and* metronome work *and* were integrating Barton 1 skills *and* the Kenneth Lane book *and* were being obsessive with the whiteboard layouts, *and* were working in the salt tray.  I'm talking 2-2 1/2 hours a day.  Not just LIPS.

 

[PeterPan]

We've had multiple people on the board who got processing speed to jump from single digits with Interactive Metronome.  You can do a hack version yourself or get it through an OT.  Given everything he's got going on, an OT eval might be in order.  Might show you some more factors affecting his attention and ability to progress.  

 

The IM website should have a referral list. Sometimes you'll use the $$ equipment with the OT and then just do the homework at home using a metronome app.  Still the OT eval might be informative.  When your processing is in the single digits, jumping up into the 30s (which we've had several reports of here on the board over the years) can be HUGE.  

 

Cognitive therapies, bodywork for OT issues, etc. can be as important to learning as the right curriculum.

[mellifera33]

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[mellifera33]

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[PeterPan]

Ok, you embedded your reply, so I can't quote, hehe.  I can tell you that what you just described, where you read a sentence and he picks the picture that matches, is receptive language.  He can have normal receptive language and terrible working memory.  Did your psych do any language testing?  Psych 1 for ds did the CELF-5, which is a very extensive language test, and the jerk didn't explain ANY of it.  I've spent hours trying to figure it out, read about portions, figure out how you're supposed to understand it and apply the results, and I'm still not done.  Anyways, you might find there was some language testing like that in your report.  Working memory is a much more precise thing, and they test it pretty tightly.  You need that working memory up so that he can motor plan AND spell AND remember what he's writing AND compose, kwim?  He's going to need way more than he has now.  It's a worthy goal.

[PeterPan]

Yes, if he's got a verbal IQ significantly higher than his non-verbal, that does raise the question of non-verbal learning disorder.  Sometimes those kids seem to get ASD labels as well and sometimes they don't.  If she thinks she saw sensory, I'd get my buns in for an OT eval and get that going.  These people are so unthorough, no matter how thorough they seem to be.  Psych 1, the first time he talked with us, asked about expressive language therapy for ds.  It's a very specific thing you do and you would do it based on those (70% discrepant from IQ) low language scores ds had on the CELF5.  Did he ever bring it back up?  No, lol.  Jerks.  

 

NOBODY is as thorough as we are.  Well maybe somebody else is.  I'm just saying don't trust them to catch things.  Go over it and find every little implication and pursue it.  That's my advice.  

[PeterPan]

Ok, digit spans on the way to the park.  Is that all he's doing?  That's not real life.  He needs to be able to use his working memory *while* motor planning, while emotional, while spelling, while crossing the midline.  You want to shake it up and make it MUCH harder, kwim?  Skills are not used in isolation.  If he can *do* the metronome exercises from Heathermom, adding in digit spans can be crazy powerful.  That game A Fist Full of Coins (sorry, I misspelled it earlier) can be powerful, combining multiple weak areas for some kids.  At least for my ds, with his speech areas, it's taxing.  

 

You can also do n-backs, remembering the first or last digit of the PREVIOUSLY called number, etc.  Obviously his ability to recite 3 numbers you say in isolation isn't enough for him to do the more complex task of motor planning (pulling down the tiles) AND remembering the sounds AND...  kwim?  So don't practice in isolation.  Do those digit spans with colored tiles if you want!  With my ds, we did activities from Kenneth Lane's book on developmental vision, so I'd do things like giving a list of commands, which he'd have to repeat (the first hard thing, remembering and saying), then do.  So we started off with 1 or 2 and built up to 4.  That's not just numbers, but motor planning and speech and visual and...  all together, kwim?  

[PeterPan]

Developing Ocular Motor and Visual Perceptual Skills: An Activity Workbook

 

I haven't seen that other book.  Sorry, it's so expensive.  

 

Focus Moves,happily, comes as an inexpensive ebook on amazon.  It's maybe $10.  I made posters from the pics in it and printed them on 8X10 and put them in page protectors.  That way all the activities are in a notebook and we could just pull out the ones we're doing for the day.  

 

I just got another book, whose title escapes me (because that's how I am, sigh, forgetful) and it too has great warm-up type stuff to get that focus, bilaterality, etc. going. I'm looking forward to trying it with him.  The difference, with him, is SO profound when he does these warm-ups that it's very worthwhile I think.  

 

There, found it.  The place is Minds In Motion, and they have a couple books.  They also have some videos on youtube so you can get a sense.  People who've done VT, OT, etc. will see a lot there that is making just really basic skills work accessible for a lot of kids.  And sometimes that's all it takes to get kids on track.  I just thought I'd add it to our mix for variety.  

[mellifera33]

nm 

 

[PeterPan]

Yeah, I agree, anything that provokes anxiety is not good.  Better if we can say oops and make it funny or make it teamwork or slow down the pace to bring the task more accessible.  That's why it's easier to understand what you're trying to do and modify another activity than it is to use a predone thing.  A Fist Full of Coins is basically Simon, only with pictures and coins and no pressure.  There are different levels, and you can play as a team, with or without speech, whatever makes it work for you.  

[mellifera33]

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[PeterPan]

Ok, when we were doing LIPS, we did 4-6 short sessions a day.  Have you tried short sessions?  Like instead of doing your whole lesson plan, do 10 minutes and STOP.  We had a whole gig going for a while there:

 

-kinesthetic warm-up (BalavisX, Focus Moves, whatever)

-LIPS for 10 minutes (like look at the clock and STOP, no matter what)

-free time for 30 min or till X time.

 

Rinse, repeat.

 

Now ds can go longer, but even so that frequency and the idea of short, INTENSE sessions, sessions so intense he CAN'T keep going longer than 10 minutes, are really effective.  That way you sort of push his brain, then let him take a break and recover.  Then push his brain and make him think really hard again, then take a break.  Kwim?

 

So like for that whole layout with all the mouths and the letters, we might spend a session or two laying them down, another session pulling them up and writing in the salt, another session doing the next LIPS task, another session doing a LIPS task.  So it was the full work, but broken into short, intense sessions with breaks.  He also started needing some quiet time (he doesn't nap) to recover from that, so I had to plan for that, sigh.

 

Yes, I think you'll find ways to push things if you get Barton 1.  What I've been describing about how I blended them will make sense to you when you see it.  Basically you're bringing the LIPS faces over to Barton and doing the Barton tasks with *faces* before you ever attempt them with tiles.  And you make sure that at every step he can do them with ALL the modalities (faces, tiles, letters) before you go on.  

 

Also, I'm a terrible, cheating scoundrel.  I had him do every task through 4 or even 5 letters before we moved on to the next lesson.  He's gifted and so really, if you get the concept, it's a working memory question.  But I'm just saying THAT is how I pushed the working memory.  So if his letters in lesson 1 were C, A, T, R, N, S (I don't recall), then I had him not only spell the lesson words like CAT but also RATS and STANT (nonsense words).  Kwim?  I didn't stop at 3 letters just because she said to *because* I knew that in his case his working memory deficits were going to limit him much more than the conceptual difficulty of having more letters. 

[PeterPan]

Yes, sorry I didn't realize you didn't realize that, lol.  Yes, Barton 1 is going to look eerily reminiscent of LIPS.  Tiles are in your future, and you'll go through 4-5 letter words with them.  No, we break syllables in a much later level.  Unless you're me, hehe, then you do it ahead a little.  ;)  But no, for right now you just want to get him built up to where he can do 4-5 letter words.

 

But you know, now you're seeing your issue to target.  He needs more working memory, and you're probably going to need to target it multiple ways to make some progress.  He's a little young for Cogmed to be effective, unfortunately.  

 

You know, rather than thinking in terms of an ADHD eval (which I'm SHOCKED that psych didn't take care of, frankly, since that's easy as pie to diagnose comparatively), I'd look for a psych who can answer your bigger questions.  You want someone who is skilled in NLD and ASD who can sort out more completely what you're looking for.  They will look at motor planning, language, etc, and may catch more things.  

[PeterPan]

Well, he can remember 2 or 3 digits while we're walking. I don't think he's ready to go farther with digit spans yet. :) Yesterday when we were doing the three sounds exercise, he couldn't remember the first sound of s p m. I repeated it several times but he just couldn't remember it. I finally asked him to hold the first sound in his head while I made the sounds. He pulled down a pic, then I repeated it and he held onto the second sound. Then I repeated it and he held onto the third sound. It is strange to me that he has so much trouble with this, but he can hear and manipulate the sounds within words when he uses letters. The only thing I can think of is that the word has meaning, so he can hold onto it. Yes, when I look back on his notebook he does much better manipulating letters in real words than in pseudo words. I guess we'll go to all pseudo words for a while. 

I'm trying to picture what you're describing here.  So you're saying that if you say "sat" he can identify the initial sound (/s/), but when you say a string of three random letters (/s-d-p/) he cannot?  And your take is that it is his working memory, not his phonological processing, that remembering one thing ("sat") is easier than remembering three things (s-d-p)?  That seems like a reasonable analysis.  Even though he's only at 2-3 digits, that's where ds started.  And he increased.

 

So now you're seeing what you're going to have to do.  You're going to have to force him out of his comfort zone, and he's going to have to use that working memory in increasing amounts with more complicating factors.  So if 2 is comfortable for him, start at 2, but start adding in these distractions and real life things.  Turn on the tv in the background.  Toss a ball back and forth.  Have him play with a toy that distracts him and forces him to self-regulate.  When I did straight digit spans with him, I made sure he had a toy in his hands (legos, a fidget, playdough, something interesting) so he would have to balance his attention.  Can he color while you do digit spans?  

 

You can also use whole words instead of digits for variety.  Just shake it up with the words and add in distractors to make it harder.  So two words (eel, tennis ball), but done while the tv is on or he's coloring or chewing gum or putting away silverware...  Folding laundry, can he do that?  Sorting his socks and laundry?  Anything like that WHILE he does the memory.  And lots of ways throughout the day, not just one.   :)

 

We also did a lot of kinesthetic.  So touch a chair, jump 3 times, pat your head, sit.  That would be his sequence at 4.  We'd do 10 of those and on the 10th I'd have a prize hidden somewhere that he would find by doing his sequence.  And I made him REPEAT the sequence to build that auditory memory and ability to motor plan (speech).  So we were working on them 3-4 times a day, but each time a different way, meaning he never caught on.  :)

 

[mellifera33]

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[PeterPan]

We only had the wisc and the wrat. Our insurance sucks and everything is self-pay. I think that the psych did more diagnosing from the way that P did the tests, and the characteristic mistakes that he made, than from the test itself. HIs wisc numbers were verbal 132, perceptual 75, working memory 80. processing speed 80. His wrat equivalencies were k and below for reading and writing and 1.0 for math. So she diagnosed dyslexia from the low wrat combined with the high verbal and the types of mistakes he made in reading and writing. Dysgraphia from the extreme difficulty he had in writing letters. 

I hope you don't mind me quoting this.  Yes, you have an extreme gap there.  In fact, they aren't even supposed to calculate a full scale or GAI (adjusted) when the gap is huge.  I'm not a numbers geek, but I'm just telling you that's HUGE.  I can't believe her eyebrows didn't go up.  Yes, you have a problem.  Yes, you need an OT eval.  There's a specific handwriting problem that goes with NLD (beyond the obvious things you're seeing), so you need to get him checked for that.  You want a good OT eval with someone who really knows sensory.

 

Are you having him listen to a lot of audiobooks?  Did she give you a full scale or GAI IQ or did she tell you she couldn't?  If she told you a full scale IQ and it sorta averaged out sorta normal and you've been sorta working on that, you might want to ignore it.  He's clearly gifted.  

[mellifera33]

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[PeterPan]

Ok, 4-5 letter words is okay. I was thinking that he would be building antidisestablishmentarianism with a different colored tile for each letter. lol I think we can handle breaking down syllables with tiles.

 

We just had an educational eval--he doesn't have an official adhd diagnosis, but the report emphasizes that he has a short attention span. She also mentioned that he likely has auditory processing problems--he had trouble repeating words back--he said brain for bring, for example. So after having a short eval, I probably need an eval at the adhd clinic at the local ped, at ot eval, and an apd eval. Yikes. Our medical insurance doesn't cover anything, and we had a big flood problem this spring that wasn't covered by homeowners insurance. I don't know how to do this, money-wise. :(

How about the low anxiety route?  :)  One, you can prioritize.  Two, an ADHD eval with a ped will tell you nothing.  A ped diagnosis is for dispensing meds.  That psych should have given you EF surveys and gotten it done herself.  Unless you want meds, I wouldn't bother with the ped at all.  So that saves you some money.  

 

OK, on the APD, what you actually do is start with a full audiological eval and the SCAN3.  The psych (again, laying this back on the psych) COULD have run the SCAN3.  That's their fault for not being thorough, because it's something psychs run.  My ds had an APD screening test (it's half phonological processing, which he failed at, and half something else, which he was fine at) and then a full audiological eval at a state university that has the proper booth to go ahead and do the full APD testing if it's needed.  Your ds is now old enough for full testing.  Thing is, it would be way more conservative to start with a screening, either by a psych, SLP, or audiologist, and THEN determine if the full testing.  This is something our state university handles easily, and the eval for my ds and my dd were only $35.  Seriously.  You can probably find $35, lol.  It's when it's $380 (private) that we cringe.  The university ran the SCAN3 on my dd during her audiological eval and it did turn up helpful information, so I definitely agree it's a good way to go when there are suspicions.  I'm just saying that's a way to make it affordable.  

 

Ok, if he has APD and it's not actually dyslexia, this could color some things.  Did this woman run a CTOPP or other test of phonological processing?  You are indeed correct that APD and these other things are going to overlap.  It would be helpful to get that screening for the APD moved up, so that you're aware of ALL the things affecting his ability to do Barton.  You don't want to think it's your teaching when it's really something else, kwim?

 

Yes, I'm sorry it's so expensive.  We have an HSA with high deductible, and while we like it (and like that we can AFFORD it and can choose our providers and...), reality is no one gets everything.  Prioritize.  If you can get that screening at a university affordably, I'd do it.  The OT eval I'd move up, because I think it's going to turn up issues.  And whatever that psych said, you might wanna consider as an incomplete picture.  A neuropsych would have spent 3-4 times as much time testing as she did, because that's what it takes.  But that's OK.  You never just test once, mercy.  You do it now, then you'll get a fresh psych eval in a period of time.  When you do that, you'll know to save your pennies and go with someone who can do the more thorough testing.  This round was your clue in round, and each following round you're going to gather more info.  Some of these things evolve and our understanding evolves.  You'd rather have that OT eval and APD screening.  

 

Have you considered at least just a basic, annual vision appointment (in our area $60) done with a developmental optometrist?  I would do it.

[PeterPan]

:) P is here, watching tv, so I called him over. I gave him three words, and he repeated them back, acting them out. Then he did four--fishhook, kitchen, car, pencil. He made a hook with this hand, ran to the kitchen, pointed to his sister's ride-on toy, and did the writing on his hand pantomime. Four different, unrelated things. Maybe it's about meaning? I don't know--he's a funny kid. Yesterday while we were walking home from the park I told him a story about when I got in trouble in school. This morning he asked me, "Mom, do you remember when you got in trouble for doing lesson 86 for two weeks?" He has such a strange memory. He can remember the details of outings we took when he was two years old--what he ate, what I ate--but other things disappear as soon as he hears them. 

Gifted, maybe NLD, lots of contradictions, how fun.  Your math and language are in different portions of the brain.  It's why you want to do things in LOTS of ways and in lots of contexts, not just in isolation.  

 

Maybe start reading about NLD, just to get you in the stream of "what if..."  It might help you make that transition.  NOTHING you'd do for it is going to hurt him if he's not.  Just remember to think GIFTED NLD, not regular  :)

[PeterPan]

Can he take the 4 words you just gave him and pull down single tiles as he says them?  Can he then close his eyes and tell you which tile when you say the word?  Can he (with eyes open) touch the tiles when you say the word?  Can he then slowly slide them up?  

 

I'm saying play with it and investigate.  He can pull down the tiles if they represent words but not letters or numbers?  Play around.

[mellifera33]

nm 

 

[PeterPan]

Oh that is TOO FUNNY...  7 yo goes into psych using Doctor Who references, lol.  

[mellifera33]

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[LaughingCat]

Ok, I didn't read the whole thread here -- but my DD definitely could not go right to the colored tiles within LIPS.  We spent a lot of time using the mouth pictures and just tearing apart words verbally.  Eventually what I did was have her do the colored tiles for syllables and then tear apart only one syllable with mouth pictures.

 

and I agree that LIPS and Barton imply they should be able to move to tiles quickly.  In fact I had just posted this on your other thread before I saw this thread:

 

Just wanted to add that I agree with OhE that it shouldn't be "do LIPS and then do Barton" -- it should be learn the ideas of LIPS and apply to Barton.  Overall I think there is an implication from both LIPS and Barton that once learned application would be easy (at most just a quick name reminder) and that was not my experience. DD picked up the idea very quickly however application took a lot of practice and repetition using the mouth pictures.   Note: I didn't actually do Barton, but I did something similar on my own because it was clear DD needed the extra work (I only got Barton 1 later and saw that it was a simpler form of the same thing I did --- what I did was more based on the LIPS program itself except continuing to use the mouth pictures when doing the work)

 

 

[mellifera33]

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[PeterPan]

Anything hospital or a clinic associated with a hospital will be wicked expensive in our area, like $350 an hour vs. $200 an hour private.  I've seen that true with several hospitals I've called and it totally disgusts me.  I say buck the whole lot of 'em.   :D

 

How could a big name place not have the proper booth for this?  I guess call around till you find a place that has it.  Do you have a major state university or a research university?  You could drive, because you just go for a couple hours.  Really though, you just need somebody to administer the SCAN3.  You could call your ps SN Coor and ask if they have someone who does APD screenings and who they refer to.  A psych, SLP, audiologist, they'll vary but any of those, if they have the test and the equipment, can get it done.  Your ps should know who they refer to.  

 

Go back to *1* sound and go through the steps.  

 

You say 1 sound, he repeats.

You say 1 sound, he repeats, pulls down face tile from limited field.

You say 1 sound, he repeats, pulls down face tile from limited field, trades face tile for colored tile.

You say 1 sound, he repeats, pulls down face tile from slightly bigger field.

You say 1 sound, he repeats, pulls down face tile from slightly bigger field, trades face tile for colored tile.

You say 1 sound, he repeats, pulls down face tile from slightly bigger field, trades face tile for colored tile, trades colored tile for letter from limited field.

You say 1 sound, he repeats, pulls down face tile from slightly bigger field, trades face tile for colored tile, trades colored tile for letter from slightly bigger field.

 

When he can do that with every sound, start over with 2.

You say 2 sounds, he repeats.

You say 2 sounds, he repeats, and pulls down faces from limited field.

and so on...

 

If he glitches, write down all the sounds he's glitching on.  What were the results on that audiologist test?  At $500 they probably did the whole gig.  Here, I could get a full audiological eval and the SCAN3 for $350 with a private.  Hospital would probably be a lot more. But the school, a psych, an SLP, anyone who has the stuff can run the SCAN3 for screening purposes.  It will be interesting to see, if you're very thorough, if there's a *pattern* to his errors that connects it to the sounds themselves.  It *might* be that it's SO difficult for him to process and discriminate the sounds that he is eating up his working memory.  After all, you're now down to the bits, the part where he REALLY has to discriminate and notice the differences.  With remembering whole words he doesn't have to do that so hard.  Psych 1 finally got back to me, and he said the EF (metalinguistics, noticing the bits) IS the explanation for the low language scores on my ds and it is the dyslexia.  So IF it's that your ds is working so hard to notice the details of the sounds, then you're going to have to back up to *1* and work up very slowly, incrementally, painfully slowly and tediously.  

 

That's how I worked with my ds, with each session just doing one more little step, never adding more than one tweak, so it was JUST WITHIN REACH of the previous thing he could do.  

 

Also, remember you can sort of twist things.  You could take turns and you do it (repeating, pulling down from a limited field, etc.) and make errors to let him catch you.  Or make up silly words and take turns making up your silly words using the faces, reading the faces and saying the sounds as you pull them down to make your silly words, kwim?  Like make a big deal of it, and make the silly word (would work better when you've built up to 3) and then write it in salt and illustrate.  Just have fun with it and twist it up.

 

But yeah, it's not too much to back up to 1.  When he can do 1 sound with all the steps, all the way, then go to 2.  Leave NOTHING to chance.  Teeny, tiny, incremental steps.  

 

Say I who've taught my big pool of one.  :D

 

[PeterPan]

Oh, and if you REALLY want to boggle your mind, I built up that slowly (2-5), starting over EACH WEEK when we began our new list of letters from Barton 1.  So we didn't do that for all the letters.  We did all those steps, starting at 2 and building up to 5, for only the letters from Barton 1.  Then start back over at the very beginning (2 sounds, whatever) adding the letters for Barton 1 lesson 2.  Then start over at the very beginning adding in the letters from Barton 2 lesson 3.  It was the most tedious thing I've ever done in my LIFE.  

 

Trader Joes peanut butter cups are very good, btw.  They may help you.

[mellifera33]

nm

[PeterPan]

Oh that is hilarious.  I don't think he's going to get a spectrum label with that kind of conversation, so that's one thing off your mind, lol.  I've never heard anything remotely so adorable out my ds.  He usually says weird things about engineering or weapons.

 

Yes, evals are a horrible process.  You feel like they rip your kid up and dissect him, and it *feels* like if you skip the evals you're skipping the hurt.  What you actually want though is to go through the evals, come to the other side, figure out how to use that information, and about 6 months or a year from now have it come together in a more holistic, healthy way.  But just skipping the evals won't help.  The problems just fester, sigh.  You'd much rather find things now.  Sometimes it's not even stuff that gets diagnosed but just the relative weaknesses that are giving them trouble doing the things their intellect drives them to do.  I tell you again, with that IQ he's gifted.  That means those discrepancies and relative weaknesses are going to bug him.  

 

And you can always come here and talk about it with people who've btdt.  And you don't have to talk with just me, lol.  I tend to get a little enthused.  We all go through things at our own pace and in our own way.  It's ok to do that.  :)

[mellifera33]

nm

[PeterPan]

I'll work backwards here.  For pulling down the tiles, those are discrete sounds, yes.  

 

Focus Moves.  It is all the stuff you do.  I'm not sure that I've read the S'cool Moves book, so you'd be one up on me there.  I'm sure it's fine.

 

 

[mellifera33]

nm

[LaughingCat]

Well, he can remember 2 or 3 digits while we're walking. I don't think he's ready to go farther with digit spans yet. :) Yesterday when we were doing the three sounds exercise, he couldn't remember the first sound of s p m. I repeated it several times but he just couldn't remember it. I finally asked him to hold the first sound in his head while I made the sounds. He pulled down a pic, then I repeated it and he held onto the second sound. Then I repeated it and he held onto the third sound. It is strange to me that he has so much trouble with this, but he can hear and manipulate the sounds within words when he uses letters. The only thing I can think of is that the word has meaning, so he can hold onto it. Yes, when I look back on his notebook he does much better manipulating letters in real words than in pseudo words. I guess we'll go to all pseudo words for a while. 

Just wanted to say that my DD still has trouble with digit spans (remembering more than 3 digits - even when said as a number -- like 4,156)  but she does well with some other memory things.  For example, she's never had any obvious trouble with directions, she can play memory type games like Grandma's purse, Distraction etc without a problem. And it is a mixed bag for her -- when we worked on her manipulating letters in words it was painfully slow but slowly sped up. 

 

No advice on what to do though -- the only thing that has worked here is repetition in the exact area of need and that does not always help.

[PeterPan]

I'm sorry, I must have over-read into it.  We just have people come on who go to an LMB center and get told they need $6K in tutoring, get told to pay for evals, etc.  Then when they pay all that money, then they find out the school, the psych, etc. want to repeat the testing.  That's what I'm was trying to make sure you were aware of.   :)

 

The APD screening tool our SLP used on ds was half phonological processing.  It involved things she read.  The APD screening (SCAN-3) that the audiologist did was nothing like that looked at much more precise things that couldn't be confused with dyslexia.  So you can ask them what test they use for APD screening and then google it online.  

 

Part of the reason these tests are expensive is because they take an hour each to eval.  When your person charges $110 an hour (like our SLP, ugh), it gets pricy quickly.  Do you have a Scottish Rite near you?  They too can do dyslexia testing and tutoring, and it's free.  

 

I'm by no means an expert on this, but we've had kids come through who got an NLD label who also got a dyslexia (SLD reading) because it affected their reading.  We've also had people with NLD labels *not* get a reading disorder label, but did have really nasty issues with spelling, ability to hear components of words (metalinguistics), etc., go figure.  APD is typically going to involve issues with figure-ground (distinguishing voices from background) or competing words.  Those are the two sections they test in the screening section of the SCAN3.  The APD screening tool our SLP ran was half phonological processing, so it flagged as low because of the dyslexia.  However the SCAN3 isn't looking at that for screening.  

 

I'm saying if you're seeing issues with his phonological processing but NOT issues with figure/ground and competing words, then it might not be APD.  When it's just phonological processing issues, without the background noise issue, you're back to dyslexia.  When I had them run the SCAN3 screening portion on my dd recently, they basically said that the issues are there, that she ALMOST fails (like literally, right on the line), but that they attribute it to the ADHD.  A private audiologist told me she has cases with those kids where they go on the ADHD meds and the APD scores improve.  

 

So you mentioned that these diagnoses are fuzzy and controversial.  It's more like elephant and blind men.  Each practitioner is isolated, and they don't usually pull together and say this issue from another area is causing this other symptom in my area.  I think all the symptoms are happening, because we aren't blind or imagining things.  It's just whether they're severe enough that they hit the cutoff for a diagnosis and then what treatment/approach would get us some changes.  

 

[PeterPan]

Just wanted to say that my DD still has trouble with digit spans (remembering more than 3 digits - even when said as a number -- like 4,156)  but she does well with some other memory things.  For example, she's never had any obvious trouble with directions, she can play memory type games like Grandma's purse, Distraction etc without a problem. And it is a mixed bag for her -- when we worked on her manipulating letters in words it was painfully slow but slowly sped up. 

 

No advice on what to do though -- the only thing that has worked here is repetition in the exact area of need and that does not always help.

I was talking to the psych this week and he said to remember that even when ds *can* do the things, it's like walking through snow.  Makes a lot make sense.   :(

 

 

[mellifera33]

nm 

 

[imagine.more]

Everything OhElizabeth suggested and described is genius, go with what she says :)

 

I just wanted to add that between LiPS and Barton Level 1 you will likely see an increase in his working memory. We were told that working memory can't really be improved in any systematic or significant way but after Barton Levels 1 and 2 DD moved from a very low working memory to average. I can't even remember her percentiles but it went up from something like 10th to 87th in one year, no joke. And I can see how that happened, Barton is very gradual and systematic in exercising the working memory on specific activities. DD's working memory for other things didn't increase as much but there was overall improvement and in letters/numbers her working memory made that huge leap. 

 

Also, we didn't start ADHD meds until this year (DD is 13) and wow, there's  a big difference in her accuracy while working in Barton on or off the meds. I can tell if she forgot her meds that morning just after her trying to read a few words. Barton worked fine without the meds but I see better and more consistent improvement with the medication. So it might be worth a one month trial to see if that enables him to block out the external stimuli long enough to exercise his working memory. If not you can always stop, the nice thing about adhd meds is there's no adjustment to get on or off of them, he can even just take them Mon-Fri if you want and skip weekends without it affecting the effectiveness. 

[Citrusheights5]

2 things, the school will give you good raw data but, no help in interpreting it. They can only tell you what they can help with. But the Raw data is usefull.

 

Also my son still has problems with more than 3 items and memory. And it is apparent now that we are working on blends with him saying FLAP. Fap. Or FlA. Or some combination of only three sound when there is supposed to be 4. It IS increasing the more we do it. Because it tied to something concrete and real. It's not an abstract thing of why chose 3 5 6 to rember and repeat. The more we work on it the more his memory is expanding. I still need to repeat the words more often than I would like especially when doing phrase dictation, because there is just too much for him to hold on to. BUT he can remember the first few words and break down the spelling.

 

I would definitely start Box 1 with Lips and work them together. the act of working on it will help his memory.

[PeterPan]

I don't see why your school would give you a hard time.  You already have the psych testing showing he has a disability.  The school also can administer the CTOPP and CELF-4 or CELF-5 and they can do it for free.  You just have to show justification for why they NEED to.  

[PeterPan]

I just wanted to add that between LiPS and Barton Level 1 you will likely see an increase in his working memory. We were told that working memory can't really be improved in any systematic or significant way but after Barton Levels 1 and 2 DD moved from a very low working memory to average. I can't even remember her percentiles but it went up from something like 10th to 87th in one year, no joke.

Yup, just because someone says it can't be done doesn't mean it can't be; it just means they don't know how.  :D