My son is 7 and diagnosed as highly gifted but has dyslexic and dysgraphic tendencies. We started at one school and it was a disaster and have moved to another school which has a high percentage of gifted children. He finds school very boring, struggles greatly with reading, writing, and spelling and maths to an extent, and his behaviour deteriorates during term time as a result. His school report shows that he is very average for his age and that his effort is minimal and needs to be improved. I've been and talked to his teacher and head of the middle school numerous times. The teacher says that she can't extend him as he doesn't have the skills to function there. The head of the middle school has put him into two extension classes but they're extra classes for science and creative writing, not curriculum extension. I'm not sure what to ask/push for - I understand the teacher's point of view, but if it's so boring for him then he just switches off and of course doesn't learn and then tests badly. It seems to be a catch 22 situation.
I've read that it's best for twice exceptional children to be placed where their intelligence is, not where they perform which is inhibited by their learning difficulties. What are the experiences of other parents with twice exceptional children? Do you put them where their IQ suggests they should be and support the areas they find difficult, or keep them where they function daily and extend where and when you can?
Re: Twice Exceptional - other parents experiences?
Author: mumofthree
Date: 19-07-12 21:45
I am not an expert, but I think it is good to provide extension in only thinking/problem solving and creative areas in this situation. If the science has a discovery learning angle in which he can use his more advanced ideas he may get more excited about school and he can use his abilities in thinking outside the square. The problem with over extending in core areas such as reading, writing, maths etc is that he may just feel more pressure in the things he is already finding difficult and may lose confidence or get frustrated. Also, if a child is pushed ahead early on, and they are not ready they can end up struggling, and also finishing school early without the maturity to go on to further education etc. Of course some very bright kids are advanced all round and can cope with that.But many are very asynchronous in their development.
Also, at age 7 they are still very much a work in progress. My son was diagnosed SLD or "twice exceptional" at about that age, at which he was struggling with reading, writing etc, despite having an advanced vocab and all the signs of being bright. We got him a few SPELD lessons where they taught reading from a strong phonics approach, and he also did exercises for visual problems (prescribed by an optometrist). His reading then did really improve out of sight, and since Year 3 he now scores stanine 8s and 9s in all the core areas (top 4 to 10%%ile for year level). He is 10 now. So, my 10 cents worth is, give him time and support in the reading and maths, and try to keep him excited about the things he does enjoy about learning, as school can tend to be all about the 3Rs and sometimes that just isn't how the very bright kids tick.
Good luck! Your support is very important to your son's future.
Rachel, from our experience, the main thing to remember is the parent sets the curriculum for their children of which the school is part of. The school doesn't set this. Most of the issues on this forum revolve around school not matching the needs of our children, of which I agree with these sentiments. But if you take learning as a life time experience school issues tend to be not as raw. For example our child struggles socially and doesn't care too much about fashion. But as an adult we know to be excepted into a social group you either have to be similiar or look similiar. If your child plays basketball, find a cool basketball shirt to wear, if they play with trading cards wear an Anime t.shirt etc. Change the clothes/symbols for each social group. Don't give other people any more ammunition to shy away from your gifted child. Our child's art is very adstract and has been put-down continuously by teachers about it, so we introduced our child to Dali and since that time our child has never had any issues with put-downs about their art. Another issue we came across was the lack of confidence schools give to children in tackling complicated problems or complicated tasks. For example hitting a nail with a hammer correctly, understanding the size the hammer how to hold it and the nail and to hammer straight. Who teaches this? We do. Its part of our carriculum. Take the calulations, the formulas and the equations out of the classroom and apply them to a piece of wood takes your gifted child to a new level, this smashes boredom. Theory without application is useless. This has been our experience.
Re: Twice Exceptional - other parents experiences?
Author: Tiz Me
Date: 21-07-12 16:03
I am in a similar position with my grandson although he is really thriving at ODS - the school sees fit to blame his "lack of progress" on him being away one day a week (hes been struggling with reading the whole year - has been to ODS 4 times and ODS must be interferring with his progress? On what planet is THAT logical).
The lack of logic does NOTHING to inspire me with confidence - nor does their clinging what I know to be NORMATIVE rather than ideographic research findings (most of which are studies involving overseas children anyway).
Second fall back position "I mustn't be doing regular reading with him at school" because ..... get this "They always tell students who do their readers at home regularly because they make good progress".
Here's the thing though - I not only DO the readers with him at home (but draw the line in doing battle to get them read) I also borrow readers for him to read during the holidays AND get an extra one for the days he isnt at school. What I am noticing is that on the days when they have done reading at school, he will more often struggle ..... but the ones he and I do independently (without having read them in the class) he actually reads quite well. If he doesnt know a word I simply tell him what it is ..... and he remembers what they "look like" very well that way .... if he does know it but doesnt think he does - I tell him he knows it already he looks at it a bit and usually remembers what it is. When I tried to replicate how they teach at school it didnt work well at all.
It seems to me that however they are teaching him in school is just confusing him and thats a bit of a worry. But, at the same time I try to look ahead and I keep in mind how much technology has become part of our lives and how rapidly it is changing ..... but the time these kids are adults, they will probably have complete freedom of choice as to whether they read or listen to absolutely anything at all. Similarly "handwriting" will probably be a complete none issue a decade from now ..... heck they may not even need keyboard skills either!
My own school reports always contained criticisms of my "effort" ..... and the adults at home bought into it quite happily ...... net result I dropped out of school ..... since my efforts were never good enough - I just didnt see the point of being there. The school environment did nothing for me .... so if I couldnt even gain approval from being there - there was no reason to continue to waste away years of MY life in "education".
Just because a child doesnt fit some stereotype of what "trying looks like" - it doesnt follow they arent investing all the effort and energy they can and for children who dont learn the way they teach in school it can take an extraordinary amount of effort and energy just to perform for a very short time.
Re: Twice Exceptional - other parents experiences?
Author: Linda
Date: 21-07-12 21:32
My second born suffers in the shadow of the HG sibling ahead in the school system. Testing discovered giftedness AND dyslexia markers --explaining the lack of progress in reading. Reading recovery at school with a tutor that had the benefit of the psychologists report resulted in great improvement and therefore improvement in general confidence at school and surprisingly in general behaviour too. I would recommend extending the interests and supporting the child through difficulties. That is working for us with 1 x 2E and 1 x straight HG.
Great to read other peoples input on this topic. We are just starting down the school journey with our 2E son (5yrs old). He struggles hugely with writing and reading and numbers too actually. It is so hard to know how to help these kids best. My son has an excellent vocabulary and creativity etc but it is so tough to motivate him to work on the things that he is not so good at. He finds the readers at his level so dull.
I'm trying to bring the reading into things that really interest him like figuring out what it says in a newspaper or ingredients on a packet of biscuits. Every day he tries to tell me what temperature the heater is showing first thing in the morning. I also try to write stories down for him that he dictates so that he can express is totally vivid imagination without being constrained by his writing disabilities. Hanging out for some more input on this thread!!
With your childs writing, check to see how he is writing. We found our child was writing from the shoulder and not the wrist. This resulted in slow hand writing and being very tired because of having to write, we even pin pointed back problems from shoulder writing. This is a rubber pencil grip shaped that can help with finger positioning.
There is a very good picture book called Weslandia. It is about a kid who is different that creates his own community during the holidays. This develops independent thinking.
We have just got in contact with an amazing lady called Carina Voges. She specialises in helping 2e kids - it's her passion. She runs a place called Train the Brain in Christchurch. She offers assessments, individual or pair tuition and is really great just to talk to or get some advice on the phone. I talked to her for about 20 mins about our son who is 2e and I felt so much better afterwards - understood, relieved and hopeful. Tel 03 331 6391 email info@trainthebrain.co.nz
Just had my son assessed last week and he may have dysgraphia - although the psychologist is leaning more towards a processing speed issue.
All I know at this stage is that when he types his work he gets down twice as much, more ideas, and more fluently than he does when handwriting and his handwriting is messy and hard to read.
I am possibly going to need to take him to a behavioural optometrist.
Re: Twice Exceptional - other parents experiences?
Author: H
Date: 28-02-13 18:57
Hi, sounds like my son. Most helpful thing I've done with him is send him to touch typing lessons. Helps him get his ideas down quickly, enables him to finish his school work and when he is older he will be allowed to do his work on a computer at school (he's 8yrs at the moment). Hope this helps. :o)
I have a 2e son, age 8. For me the most important thing is to keep him emotionally well, and passionate about learning and life. School was a disaster to the point of depression at age 5. For us, the option was home school. At home, we have been able to relax, give him time to develop some maturity, work within his areas of strength and passion, while developing his areas of weakness in ways that he enjoys. (For example, we used to write letters on the trampoline in chalk, and he would "bounce out" words to practice spelling. He loved it!)
There are lots of good specific ideas above. Best of luck to you.
Hi H,
I often recommend touch typing for the gifted children I teach at ODS. I wonder if I could ask what programme you used so successfully? Having fast fingers to match their fast minds is so useful! Thanks.ef032
Re: Twice Exceptional - other parents experiences?
Author: H
Date: 11-03-13 21:56
Hi Sandi, The touch typing course we go to is the one at the Seabrook McKenzie Centre. The other thing I'm looking into at tne moment is maybe getting a dictaphone (or the modern computer equivalent!) so that Mr 8 can get his ideas down quickly, then type them out at a later date. Hope this helps. :o)
My daughter Miss 8 is 2E as well and writing is..... well I am sure you know. Look at a program called WordQ. Predictave text, dictation function and it reads back to you. It works across pc programs in the background, she even uses it to type in Google searches.
She has started to use it at school on the class computer and iWordQ on her iPad. If you compare what she puts out on pen and paper to WordQ typing you realise what a fantastic tool it is :-)
Re: Twice Exceptional - other parents experiences?
Author: Laurie
Date: 16-04-13 07:29
Hi - another alternative people might like to try -
our hg eldest struggles with writing which was causing huge problems and massive lack of self-esteem, yada yada yada. We were about to do the keyboard thing when someone suggested getting an occupational therapist (or "OT"). The OT did an assessment that included sitting in at school as well as a formal testing process, he gave private lessons once a fortnight for two months and voila! We don't have great writing BUT it is now legible, whereas before I actually could not read a word and the boy himself is so much more confident.
We'll probably still move to a keyboard in a year or so, but we'll do it not having "failed" writing, and frankly, our boy can do without any more failure in his life, thank you very much, school system. It is totally heartbreaking, esp those idiot teachers who say he can't be bright since he doesn't produce . . .
I haved noted since Caspar tested in 2001 and went to GKP that they need love, inclusion, space. We put them into classes of similar kids - we do not expect performance. The best class is at home.
