DW_a_mom wrote:
I'm going to make a clumsy effort to pull all this reading discussion together: whether or not there is reason to worry depends on the unique child. My son wasn't reading in first grade, but was doing enough for me to understand what the road blocks were, and get a solid sense that this was his developmental time line. He had some tracking problems, and some visual problems, but mostly he had a patience problem, because learning to read was hard work that meant going through books he found boring content wise (he wanted to read Harry Potter, which I was reading to him). For a child like that, I tell parents not to worry. I know I got really worried when it wasn't kicking in by third grade, but I forced myself not to, because the same signs were there. In that situation, the classic advice is to keep reading to the child, keep encouraging him, and he'll catch up. My son rocketed on the reading between 3rd and 4th grade; he did more than catch up; he zoomed past the class. Some of this may be at play with the OP's son because, like mine, his interest level and verbal level is so far far above what he can read by himself.
It does sound like the OP is seeing a little more, however, that has her concerned. In that case, further investigation and testing is warranted. As a parent, sometimes we need someone to tell us, "that is within the range of normal development" because there is the chance you'll hear "that should be looked into," instead. My son had some real tracking issues with board to paper that the school discovered and worked with him on. I would never have figured that out; it was too easy for me to assume that his issues with copying were the same as with writing, but it turns out they weren't.
I think all parents need to constantly check themselves on the pressure for rapid education and development, but once that pushy instinct has been put into check, if there is still something nagging, you may have something.
I figured he'd pick it up rather quickly once he was given the formal tools in Kinder, but when he asked me last week to spell "NickJR" for him, I found myself starting to say to him "you should know this by now since you have been playing on it for years." I was like say what? Why hasn't this kid, with a grasp of infinity, memorized it? Then we had a surprise IEP meeting during his teacher-parent conference. She stated that at the beginning of the year he refused to even put pencil to paper. I was like what? I said he was always drawing and spelling his name (after I wrote it for him) over and over again. She then mentioned that at the beginning of the year he only knew 1 letter "sound", I was floored because he says words like teleportation and uses it appropriately. He can watch a history show and then come and repeat it back to me almost word by word. With his eloquent command of the oral language... why is this kid who thirsts for information not able to put the words he sounds out back together again?
I found an excerpt from a book(
Handbook of Child Psychology: Child psychology in practice By William Damon, Richard M. Lerner p.435), although I am not sure I am allowed to post URLs. Basically it stated that a low PIQ score warrants a close look for a reading disability. That a severely low PIQ score matters even more than the IQ. That if there is a low PIQ score that indicates more of a genetic dyslexia vs. a child who is more easily re-mediated and only has low achievement scores.
12 Nov 2010, 6:06 am
