DD7 struggles with writing

[LolaT]

(I was going to post this in the curriculum board but thought I might get more insight here. She's not really special needs although she does have ADHD and is currently medicated and SPD. I feel her concentration has been suffering greatly the past three months or so).

 

It took almost two hours for DD7 to take two paragraphs she had previously narrated to me, from dictation and write them down. This was for STOW1. She also has a very hard time summarizing. She will either give me the whole story with too many details or is stuck and unable to say anything at all. She completed FFL2 and WWE2 in June. She's also completed about 2/3 of WWW3.

 

She otherwise does quite well in reading and math. She enjoys STOW and usually does fine with review questions but struggles a lot with the narration, particularly with the writing. She doesn't really do any other writing unless it's for FLL or WWE. She doesn't write stories and the few thing she writes on drawings are very poorly written, I feel, for her age.

 

Any advise on what I could do to help her better?

[Seshet]

First, if she has ADHD, she is technically a special needs student.

 

Second, writing is often very difficult for people with ADHD. There are often difficulties with getting things into a logical sequence. It is also very common to have difficulty learning what the important things are when summarizing, which is why they may either give too much info or none at all. Plus, there is so much going through their heads that it can be very hard to get it out before the next thought comes along.

 

My eldest (ET1) chose to do a book report once, in 2nd or 3rd grade. I made her stop writing it when she finished the 4th page of the report. :lol:

 

The best thing will likely be to use an incremental Writing program, maybe at a slower pace. They can learn to write, it just may take longer. Because ET1 has ADHD, Writing is the most challenging subject ET1 deals with. We have made lots of progress, though, by working diligently.

 

Writing is often easier on the computer. So, maybe she could do her narrations & other Writing assignments on the computer. I don't have any experience with either FLL or WWE, so I can't comment on them, specifically. Something that will teach Writing in a very step-by-step way would be your best bet. First, pre-Writing skills. Then, proper sentence structure. Next, paragraph structure. Etc. This really helps with the sequencing issues. We're using the Stack the Deck program for ET2, who also has ADHD. So far, ET2 has a much easier time with Writing, which I'm sure is partly do to this Writing program.

[ssruckman]

Can you tell me if you need the teacher manual with Stack the Deck? I think I may start this with ds9.

[FairProspects]

It took almost two hours for DD7 to take two paragraphs she had previously narrated to me, from dictation and write them down. This was for STOW1. She also has a very hard time summarizing. She will either give me the whole story with too many details or is stuck and unable to say anything at all. She completed FFL2 and WWE2 in June. She's also completed about 2/3 of WWW3.

 

Wait, 2 whole paragraphs? I would venture to say that is a problem for many 7 y.o.s in general and may just be too great of an expectation. Many (I'd venture to say most) users of SOTW 1 are having their students write a narration that is no more than 1-3 sentences.

 

That said, with the SPD, has she done any OT for fine motor problems? Those issues frequently go together as well.

[Seshet]

Can you tell me if you need the teacher manual with Stack the Deck? I think I may start this with ds9.

 

So far, I've seen no need for the teacher's guide. I got it for Discovering the Deck, but never used it. So, haven't bothered with them after that one. I may reconsider once ET2 hits the high school levels, but I'm not sure.

[LolaT]

Wait, 2 whole paragraphs? I would venture to say that is a problem for many 7 y.o.s in general and may just be too great of an expectation. Many (I'd venture to say most) users of SOTW 1 are having their students write a narration that is no more than 1-3 sentences.

Well. She had done the narrations, one short paragraph for each part of the STOW chapter on two separate days prior to today. (We ran out of paper). Today, we started the day with putting these down on paper with dictation one sentence at a time.

 

I know, sometimes I feel that the summarizing is really hard and I've been giving her time to grow into it, I guess. But today, tasked only with the dictation part of it and it taking so long, I decided, she must be struggling with this more than average. (She's also close to being eight [October], and done with second grade level curriculum in lang. arts).

 

That said, with the SPD, has she done any OT for fine motor problems? Those issues frequently go together as well.

She did some OT for SPD last year. It was not geared toward fine motor skills and it proved to be a giant waste of time. The only result was that she was hyped up (hello ADHD) by the end, and then really tired and cranky by the time we got home. She was a bit slower with fine motor skills such as manuscript and cutting in Kinder but nothing that great. She learned D'Nealian manuscript, and cursif this past year without issue. Her manuscript used to be very neat, now it is atrocious. Once, she doesn't actively think about something and uses her auto pilot, the auto pilot seams to drive like an irresponsible drunk. :tongue_smilie:

 

 

Still not sure how to help focus her energies with writing in general. I've noticed a decline in her ability to concentrate and focus for the past three months or so. (She's been on [not Adderral] Strattera and low-dose Concerta for almost a year for ADHD). Maybe, this is the area where it shows up the most since it may be the most difficult for her. I would just expect her to be able to write down a sentence at a time at a slightly quicker pace without so much erasing and forgetting.

Edited July 18, 2012 by LolaT
mistake on med name

[Seshet]

Well. She had done the narrations, one short paragraph for each part of the STOW chapter on two separate days prior to today. (We ran out of paper). Today, we started the day with putting these down on paper with dictation one sentence at a time.

 

I know, sometimes I feel that the summarizing is really hard and I've been giving her time to grow into it, I guess. But today, tasked only with the dictation part of it and it taking so long, I decided, she must be struggling with this more than average. (She's also close to being eight [October], and done with second grade level curriculum in lang. arts).

 

 

She did some OT for SPD last year. It was not geared toward fine motor skills and it proved to be a giant waste of time. The only result was that she was hyped up (hello ADHD) by the end, and then really tired and cranky by the time we got home. She was a bit slower with fine motor skills such as manuscript and cutting in Kinder but nothing that great. She learned D'Nealian manuscript, and cursif this past year without issue. Her manuscript used to be very neat, now it is atrocious. Once, she doesn't actively think about something and uses her auto pilot, the auto pilot seams to drive like an irresponsible drunk. :tongue_smilie:

 

 

Still not sure how to help focus her energies with writing in general. I've noticed a decline in her ability to concentrate and focus for the past three months or so. (She's been on Adderral and low-dose Concerta for almost a year for ADHD). Maybe, this is the area where it shows up the most since it may be the most difficult for her. I would just expect her to be able to write down a sentence at a time at a slightly quicker pace without so much erasing and forgetting.

 

If she's been on meds for a year & they seem to be not working lately, it may be time to up the dosage a little. You should talk to her dr about that (the fact that the meds aren't helping her attention lately) at the next visit.

[LolaT]

If she's been on meds for a year & they seem to be not working lately, it may be time to up the dosage a little. You should talk to her dr about that (the fact that the meds aren't helping her attention lately) at the next visit.

He up-ed it about three weeks ago. Improvement is minimal, side effects are problematic (picking, over-emotional). Not sure if increasing Concerta more will benefit. She was on a higher dose before we tried [not Adderall] Strattera and the tick side effects were too much. ???

 

I will be looking into the curriculum you mentioned though. Maybe, I can at least find a better fit for her. I also just saw a thread recommending No More 'I'm Done!'There seams to have been a lot of hype about it. I ordered it. I hope there's something uselful. I don't want to confuse her further by flip flopping the curriculum on her and introducing different methods for writing all the time either.

Edited July 18, 2012 by LolaT
mistake on med name

[PeterPan]

I know, sometimes I feel that the summarizing is really hard and I've been giving her time to grow into it, I guess. But today, tasked only with the dictation part of it and it taking so long, I decided, she must be struggling with this more than average. (She's also close to being eight [October], and done with second grade level curriculum in lang. arts).

 

 

She did some OT for SPD last year. It was not geared toward fine motor skills and it proved to be a giant waste of time. The only result was that she was hyped up (hello ADHD) by the end, and then really tired and cranky by the time we got home. She was a bit slower with fine motor skills such as manuscript and cutting in Kinder but nothing that great. She learned D'Nealian manuscript, and cursif this past year without issue. Her manuscript used to be very neat, now it is atrocious. Once, she doesn't actively think about something and uses her auto pilot, the auto pilot seams to drive like an irresponsible drunk. :tongue_smilie:

 

 

Still not sure how to help focus her energies with writing in general. I've noticed a decline in her ability to concentrate and focus for the past three months or so. (She's been on Adderral and low-dose Concerta for almost a year for ADHD). Maybe, this is the area where it shows up the most since it may be the most difficult for her. I would just expect her to be able to write down a sentence at a time at a slightly quicker pace without so much erasing and forgetting.

 

Well it's that dangerous time of the morning, before my brain fully wakes up and I say things that get a little wordy and crazy, but here goes. :D

 

One, she's definitely SN. :)

 

Two, her age grade is rising 2nd but she's advanced academically. As you're finding, ADHD does not mean DUMB. ;) Guess people think SN means dumb. Tell that to poor Einstein. Anyways! *Because* she is bright but SN, you're going to need to take some *extra care* to make sure you separate out what is appropriate for her IQ and mental readiness, what is appropriate for her physical readiness, and what is appropriate for her executive function readiness.

 

I just said three things there, and those can be all over the board, all in one child.

 

IQ. Did you get a full eval with a psych? PS or private? Did they explain all the scores or give you any feedback on what to DO with them? Or was this an adhd diagnosis from a ped with no psych eval? Just asking, because that information makes a huge difference in how you proceed. (If you didn't get the psych eval, I'd STRONGLY encourage it. If you aren't happy with the amount of feedback you got and went ps, then get some more feedback privately or post the scores here for feedback.) Anyways, this is totally obvious after you think about it, but just because a dc is functioning at a certain level academically/intellectually does NOT mean you take all the fine motor and EF developmentally-related tasks for that level and make the kid do them. There's no way to do that with this type of kid, at least not happily, lol. You segregate them out. For this coming year my dd will do her strengths using 9th and 10th gr curricula, her physical/weaknesses with 6th, and her things related to EF on or slightly below age-level, certainly not above.

 

Summarizing is EF. If I could tell you, my great sadness when I read your post was remembering how long and beautiful my dd's narrations USED to be at that age. I got caught up in that stupid trap of thinking they were supposed to become summaries, and I "worked" on them. HUGE MISTAKE. There was something else going on with those long narrations, and it was honestly giving them the chance to work on their expressive language and their ability to get things out. PLEASE don't make her summarize. PLEASE let her keep going with long narrations. See what can happen is these kids go from being verbose like that to just looking at you with a "huh?" when you ask the to retell. So don't do it. Just trust me. Let her keep talking and you keep writing. You can work on summaries later. Don't screw up what you've got.

 

Dictation is using working memory. The psych should have quantified that for you. It's something you can work on using some of the materials we've mentioned on the boards here. Maybe you're new and haven't found those threads yet? Well read on SN here a while and find them. There's an auditory working memory workbook I just got, the Linguisystems EF workbooks, a game called Fistful of Coins, etc. etc. Whatever SWB says about dictation and how they ought to be doing it, just ignore. Just do what she can do and stretch her *slightly*. Keep it pleasant. If she hates the sources in WWE, use something else. Dictation is valuable, but torture is not. This should not be war and conflict. This should be athletes doing gentle stretching.

 

EF. The EF they calculated on your dc in the psych eval should have an age equivalent. Also look at your dc's processing speed. You may have a huge gap between IQ %-ile and processing speed %-ile. That may explain why certain things seem to take forever. Because it takes so long, sometimes their impulsivity (in that EF portion of the brain) will kick in and they write super-fast chicken-scratch. So that's why it's beautiful and slow or fast and illegible. If she can tolerate music while writing (mine can't, Callirobics does it, drives her crazy), then you can try to work on that tempo and self-regulation. But at least you know what's going on and can work on it. You could do some (better) OT to work on the sensory and working memory to see if she can get to where she can tolerate the music to work on the tempo, haha.

 

On the erasing, her handwriting may not yet be automatic. Or she may be impulsively flying ahead of what she's thinking. When I dictated at that age, I gave small chunks and would actually stop and ask her after each word whether she knew how to spell and punctuate it.

 

Back to EF for one more minute. The way our np explained it, EF and that lower processing speed make them work harder than other kids. He encouraged us to be very, very efficient, to teach her at her level but keep the times more in fitting with her EF-equivalent age so she has energy left to do her creative stuff.

 

On the writing, I think as you do the EF workbooks from Linguisystems, etc. you'll find that much of what people are calling writing curriculum is actually therapy or regulated by EF. Most of these kids are going to be at least 30% behind on EF. So you can either fight that or just redefine writing for a while. Most of the people I read on the hs board (and IRL) seem to say that the things they fought and struggled over started happily much more readily in 9th, 10th, or 11th. It makes sense when you add 2 or 3 to 7th grade. Some things are just going to come later. That ability to summarize that WTM labels to begin in 4th might come better for our kids in 6th (which actually was our experience, come to think of it!). She could *do* it before, but it *clicked* later.

 

So whatever, I'm out of time. Those are the issues though. You just have to look at your scores and then start applying them. Anything requiring EF just back off to fit her EF-equivalent age. Anything you can bump with home-implemented therapy (working memory, etc.) get working on. You can also work on sensory at home. You might be able to find a new OT who would work with you once a month and give you homework. Look for someone who does Interactive Metronome, and maybe they'll be better. You can hang a single line swing in your home and make your own weighted collar. We did a single line swing EVERY. TIME. in OT, and after a while you wonder why you're paying $100 a session for it when you can buy the swing for $100. :lol:

 

The swing is called a SkyChair.

Edited July 17, 2012 by OhElizabeth

[LolaT]

Thank you so much for all of your experienced knowledge.

 

I initially took her to an ADHD "specialist" but he was a loony so then I had to take her to her reg. ped. Neither did a full psyche eval, I guess. So, I have no test results. She did go to a charter school last year half time. I did not ask for an IEP or anything so there was no eval there. I wasn't sure if ADHD was considered SN but I do not think SN means dumb. I just tend to feel kind of funny thinking that she has special needs when in her charter school class of twenty-eight, there were at least eight kids with Autism and it seemed to me that most of the rest of the class had severe ADHD. :tongue_smilie: How can you (when I say "you" I mean me) expect others to consider your child's special needs when the majority of the class seems to be in the same boat. Anyway, all that to say, I have no bias about SN. But, now I feel more comfortable posting on this board.

 

Her executive function EF, is it, is definitely an issue. I do feel that she used to have an easier time retelling stories when there weren't any rules. Summarizing seems to be hindering her creativity and just making the process unnecessarily difficult. I'm not super fond of it, I was just trying to stick with it until we saw results. The reason she has two paragraphs to write is because that's what she narrated back to me, one paragraph for each section and that was after I told her we couldn't write a whole chapter. So her long winded narrations give her more writing to do.

 

I think you're right. I will have to go away from the summarizing to some extent. I don't see how it's benefitting her to practice this at this time. I'm trying to look for a better fit in a writing program at this time too but I still want to keep doing STOW. I guess, I'll let her say what she wants and then only have her write down the beginning and I'll have to write the rest.

 

But thank you for mostly helping me have a better perspective on this.

[PeterPan]

Yeah, you need the full scores from a psych eval. Even the ps typically does the tests for working memory, IQ, processing speed, etc. A LOT would make sense to you if you had them.

 

You know what she might really enjoy is Writing Tales... It's going to build toward summarizing, keyword outlines, etc., but it alternates weeks of straight retellings and creative. It really unleashes some kids and gives them permission to have fun. :)

[PeterPan]

Lola, I'm bumping this because for some reason your thread here The slowness is killing me - The Learning Challenges Board - The ...  

Is she still on meds?  Did you ever get a psych eval?  She may have a very low processing speed. Sometimes the meds can have side effects.  Anyways, if you get that psych eval, it might help you target some things to work on.  Interactive Metronome (or the hack free version), throwing in digit spans as well, and see what that does for you.  Neurofeedback.  OT.  

 

Also, I mentioned it before and you didn't seem to like it, but a grade adjustment *or* using the developmentally appropriate work times with brain-appropriate level of materials can help.  So you do 4th grade math, but you do it with session lengths more typical to a 1st or 2nd grader.  In fact, basically our psych said that her EF is 30% behind, meaning her work amounts should be typical of someone multiple grades younger.  Amounts lower, brain challenge on level for her.  

 

So no I would not do 2 hours of math, no matter what.  Do 10 minutes with a timer and stop.  You may need to switch to a whiteboard.  What component is slowing her down?  She's at a good age to use a math table for her facts.

 

Get some evals, try some therapies, see if the meds are off, shorten the sessions (even if the work isn't done).  You know just as an observation, if you wear them out one day, well, they're worn out the next.  You might need to take a week entirely off school, do nothing but field trips, then come back to it fresh.  At that point set a timer and use it RELIGIOUSLY.  10-15 minute sessions, no more.  Math can be done in 3 sessions like that.  Stop after she has done 2 hours of that, whether the work got done or not, then let her read, craft, listen to read alouds/audiobooks, or do what gives her pleasure.  Next day repeat.  Is she doing anything physical?  

[Pen]

).

 

It took almost two hours for DD7 to take two paragraphs she had previously narrated to me, from dictation and write them down. 

 

 

Sounds like she is/was doing an excellent job for a 7 year old--esp. given her special needs!

 

I cannot access the thread that is posted by Elizabeth above.    ?????