Citrusheights5 Posted March 22, 2015 Share Posted March 22, 2015 Hello! I've posted here about my son Miles, but I just don't regularly contribute. So What i know- Miles is 10 and a 4th grade, He has ADHD Inattentive. Without concerta- we make no progress. He also has Dyslexia. In our journey of growing up, Miles and I have come to many understandings, and just recently found our groove. We found curriculum that work for both of us- and really feel like he is making progress. to what end who knows, but I honestly feel fairly confident about his ability to be out in the world, to figure out how to find his own path, and be the best Miles he can. We are using Barton's for reading (started in December), and while we are going exceptionally slow..he is getting it. We are about to start Box 3, and I am already amazed at his ability to read nonsense words since I believed he would never be able to do that. For Math we use Teaching Textbooks 3, because it will read the problems to him and he can figure it out himself with a calculator, or manipulatives. He's currently about a year behind in Math (and then the extra year TT seams to run behind), but I am happy with his understanding of concepts, and he is beyond thrilled that he can do the whole thing independently. We finally ditched- memorization of facts, and I just let him use either a calculator, chart, etc. He needs concrete. Conceptual will just fly over his head. He has 2 part time jobs, one working down at fish and game on once a week, helping the hatchery men with the fish, and interacting with the public. And the other is giving a little girl a ride home on his bike (he is friends with the brother and when the family car broke down and they were short a seat they tapped Miles for a ride.) He gets paid 5 dollars a week to give the girl a ride home. Our charter school wanted to do a full workup of Miles for their records and have an IEP in place for him. We agreed, and went through with the testing. I've also had him re-assessed at our local Scottish Rite and received these results. The thing is I have never hear of any of these Tests other than the CTOPP. Please let me know what these results mean if you know. What is your impression of this child, and what does it mean to you. From Scottish Rite: CTOPP-2 Standard Percentile Age Grade Elison ...........2 <1 5-6 K.4 Blending Words 4 2 6-0 1.0 Phoneme Isolation 5 5 6-6 1.4 Pa Composite 60 <1 Memory for Digits 2 <1 Nonword Repetition 3 1 Pm Composite 55 <1 Rapid Digit Naming 5 5 6-9 1.7 Rapid Letter Naming 5 5 6-9 1.7 RN Composite 70 2 Oral Language: Picture Vocabulary (WJ-III) 77 6 6-4 1.0 Oral Comprehension(WJ-III)89 23 8-9 3.4 Story Recall (WJ-III) 76 6 6-10 1.5 Receptive One Word Vocabulary Test ROWPVT) 109 73 12-1 FROM OUR CHARTER SCHOOL Wide Range Assessment of Memory and Learning - II Verbal Scare 80 Visual Scale 82 Story Memory 7 Picture Memory 8 Verbal Learning 6 Design memory 6 Attention/ Concentration 76 Working Memory Finger Windows 9 Verbal Working Memory 4 Number/ Letter Memory 3 Additional Sub tests Story Recognition 9 Sentence Memory 6 Story Memory Delay 8 Overall recall of verbally presented material was below average. His Ability to recall orally presented stories was borderline. While he could recite some details: he often forgot key details and general ideas from the story. While his recall was borderline, he could typically recall more information that initially shared after a delay. It appears that Miles may need additional time to process and make sense of information that with his initial exposure. Cued recall for the story also slightly improved his recall overall (scaled score from 7 to a 9 ) Miles ability to recall lists or unrelated words was below the average range. He was able to recall three items with the first and second trail; but then increased to eight items with subsequent repetitions. General memory for repeating sentences was also below average. Visual memory was below average overall. His ability to recall details from a picture was average. However, his ability to recreate a design, which includes visual-spacial memory was below average. NEPSY-II Attention/Executive functions Animal Sorting total 3 Auditory attention total 5 Auditory attention combined 6 response set total 6 Inhibition- Naming time 5 Inhibition naming Combined 2 Inhibition- Inhibition Time 4 Inhibition- Inhibition combined 2 Inhibition Switching Time 10 Inhibition Switching Time 5 Inhibition Total Errors 1 Language Phonological processing 2 Speeded Naming Total 2 Speeded Naming Combined 2 Development of Visual Motor integration VMI- <45 Which is moderately delayed for his chronological age. While his drawing indicate significant difficulties with basic design structure, angles and integration of designs ; he also struggled with overall impulse control . Developmental test of visual perception. Miles scored a 69 which was borderline for his age. He was unable to complete the task in the time allotted(36 of 30 designs) and made many errors in the more detailed drawings. Whew!! That is a lot. So I've read them over and over again. But I am not exactly sure what it means, and what I can do to incorporate these results into what we are doing.. Any thoughts or ideas would be great. Thanks.. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeterPan Posted March 22, 2015 Share Posted March 22, 2015 Congrats on getting evals!! It looks like they gave you a lot of information!! Was there a processing speed in there? I can give you some low-hanging fruit observations. Definitely dyslexic. You might try working on RAN/RAS specifically, as it could get you some improvement in how he functions. https://www.dropbox.com/sh/ptoslzrb366en6o/AABzFfXNyRWjq6M1BMKoAJIta?dl=0 Here's a link to my RAN/RAS pages in my dropbox. Dropbox is free if you sign up. You can download them, print, and place in page protectors. Do a couple every day and do variations like working on speed, reading them to a metronome, etc. RAN/RAS is DIRECTLY correlated to reading success and it's something you can actually improve with 6 weeks of effort. It's one of the easiest things you can do to help him and it's free. :) Here's an article that explains it well. http://schoolmoves.com/can-ping-pong-help-children-learn-read/ His working memory is quite low, which is probably affecting his progress. He would be a candidate for Cogmed or you could look for less expensive alternatives to get you to the same place. Anything to work on working memory. It would be interesting to get him eval'd by a developmental optometrist (COVD.org) to see what they'd find. Sometimes you can get child medicaid to cover VT. I don't recall what financial situation you're operating under, so I'm just throwing out things ideas, don't know how practical they are for you. That IQ is on the lower side of normal, not in the ID range. I'm wondering whether those weak vocab scores are connected to a speech problem or due to the dyslexia? I was told even a gifted student's IQ scores will drop over time because their peers will pull ahead due to ability to read, etc. I'm saying I would teach him where he is but not *assume* limits. There may be some depressing of that IQ score due to disability, not so much aptitude. That's fabulous that he's finding ways to work and that people find him so trustworthy! I think those mentoring relationships will be very motivating and valuable to him. I would continue to work on Barton as much as he is able. I'm a little concerned on the math. Perhaps his developmental vision problems are affecting his visual memory, resulting in low retention of facts? Overall, now that you've confirmed the disabilities, you'll want to keep plowing on your interventions, keep his day balanced with positive things that DO work for him the way you're doing, and see what else you can make happen. He should qualify for audiobooks through Learning Ally, National Library Service (Bard, which is free!), etc. If he doesn't have technology to listen to audiobooks and use ereaders for texts, you might see what you can get to make that happen. Your library will also have ebooks and audiobooks available that you could load onto the device. If the charter can use funds for you to get an ipad for accommodations, that would be fabulous. He could read his texts as ebooks with immersion, use Inspiration software, listen to audiobooks, etc. Our charters around here will use funds for technology for accommodations, so definitely ask. If they would fund a math tutor and OG, I'd be asking about that too. What you're doing is working, but I'm just saying ask, ask, ask. Maybe this year they fund the ipad, next a laptop, and so on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Citrusheights5 Posted March 23, 2015 Author Share Posted March 23, 2015 Thank you! I saved the Dropbox info, and will be reading and looking into it. I will also be looking into the cogmed or similar. Right now everything we do is audio book or read aloud. He currently has stolen my Ipad mini, and it is his tool for life. He texts his friends with it (using the voice control) and having the texts read to him. For language arts we are using the same curriculum that the PS uses, except for we have the complete online version and the whole thing is set up as audio books!! He also has that set up on the ipad. He was evaluated years ago by COVD, and was going to vision therapy. We reached a point when he was 7, where we were just not seeing a benefit. That was pre ADD meds, and Pre Dyslexia diagnosis. So perhaps its time to look into that again. Miles definitely has some speech problems, and has attended Scottish rite for speech therapy. I did not include the results of his speech evals, that were given through the school. I could include them if you like. They gave the GFTA-2, CELF-5, ROWVT and EOWPVT. What is in the report and what was told to me in the meeting, is that he is very aware of his errors and when given minimal cues he was able to accurately produce all sounds in error is all positions of words at the phrase and sentence level. The lead speech teacher said she does not think further speech therapy would be of benefit but she did put down an hour session a month, so that she can give me things to work on until it becomes more automatic with Miles. I don't have anything on processing speed. I double checked. Also I will be looking into Learning Ally and National Library Service. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PeterPan Posted March 23, 2015 Share Posted March 23, 2015 You could argue that speech OUGHT to be in his IEP because his having to focus on articulation, when he also has low working memory, is adding to his cognitive load, affecting his ability to do his school work orally. As a dyslexic, he has to read aloud for his work with you as a major portion of his education. His articulation issues increase his cognitive load, making his dyslexia intervention harder. Therefore the school should fund adequate speech therapy. At least that's what I'm arguing for my ds. Mine still qualifies for straight articulation (they don't know enough about apraxia to really explain it that way), but cognitive load IS a valid way of qualifying for speech therapy and you should consider arguing for it. And I'd argue for more than an hour a month, mercy. But then I argue and argue. :D I'm just saying you're not crazy and do have a valid argument. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Terabith Posted March 23, 2015 Share Posted March 23, 2015 I don't see an IQ there? The Wide Range Assessment looks like a specialized memory test. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Citrusheights5 Posted March 23, 2015 Author Share Posted March 23, 2015 Elizabeth, I definately will push for speech if we stay with the charter next year. Right now they want to push for him to site based school, but I am going to remain homeschooling.. I really never thought of his cognitive load making it so much harder to work with everything else. Changes the way I think of it all, and makes me that much more impressed with his progress in the last few months. There is no IQ. I could not get them to administer him the WISC as he is 1/4 african american and apparently in California it is illegal. My other son had his paperwork changed so now all 3 are down as just white and hispanic. Miles file is already flagged so I cannot undo it. That is why all I have are weird tests. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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