Why are so many UMC average students "Learning Disabled"?
![[Post New]](/jforum/templates/default/images/icon_minipost_new.gif){kind=icon}
Anonymous
I realize ADHD is not specifically considered an LD. But it can be used to receive accomodations in school and extra time on the SATs (although not always). I have heard different things about slow processing speed. Some people say it's part of IQ. Others say the part of IQ that matters is the GAI. If the processing speed is signifcantly lower than the GAI, it's seen as something along the lines of a learning disability. Sometimes in school, these kids are given the label OHI - which seems to be given when you see these unequal scores in iq and there is nothing specific it can be attributed to. |
Anonymous
Would you not consider tutoring to be a form of accomodations? Are you really telling me that a kid with a flat iq of 90 wouldn't perform better if they received tutoring? |
Anonymous
No. Dyslexia is not a function of her general intelligence. It has nothing to do with intelligence. |
Anonymous
if the person with a 90 IQ is performing to the level of somebody with a 40 IQ, you would want to figure out why. But a person with a 90 IQ is not going to perform the same as somebody with a 120 IQ with tutoring. |
Anonymous
It does not affect her intelligence it affects her ability to receive information from reading. |
Anonymous
| What about ADHD people? It might not be an official learning disorder, but it's something that kids can get accomodations in school for. And then there's OHI, which is given when the kid doesn't fall into the one of the official LD's. |
Anonymous
Yes, but with that accomodation they have the ability to increase their performance. Couldn't you say that a person who is not receive tutoring and is not performing at the same level as someone with the same iq who is receiving tutoring, is being denied an accomodation that is keeping them from performing to their potential? |
Anonymous
| It’s a bit scary to think all this relies on IQ tests. My child had a 30 pt variance. |
Anonymous
So if someone is a genius but legally blind, the fact that they will do poorly on a written test without accommodations shows that they are mediocre. Got it. |
Anonymous
LD affects the perception of a person's intelligence when they are not offered a way to demonstrate their true intelligence. If you took PP's glasses away and had her drive in a simulator, she may do very poorly at it. As an observer, you may think she's an awful driver and should have her license revoked. Yet with glasses, she drives just fine. Without a diagnoses and appropriate intervention, remedation, and/or accommodation, someone with LD may be perceived to be stupid, lazy, or acting out. Many highly intelligent people who've gone on to lead wildly successful lives (Walt Disney, Charles Schwab, John Irving, ...) were labeled as stupid and unlikely to amount to anything in elementary school because of LD. LD is orthogonal to IQ, but it can profoundly affect the ability of a person to express their intelligence in a traditional school environment. |
Anonymous
Dyslexia isn't a function of her general intelligence. Her IQ doesn't cause dyslexia. A brain malfunction does. It is part of her intelligence because academics in our current culture are read-to-learn, and her ability to read-to-learn is lower than that of children without dyslexia, but with the same intelligence profile otherwise. Just as I get glasses to compensate for my bad eyes to the point where I can safely drive, my child with dyslexia gets audiobooks or the ability to compose on a computer to compensate for the disruption dyslexia causes in her brain. No one who ever taught my child thought she was an average intellect. And no one who taught my undiagnosed but probably dyslexic cousin in the 70's thought he was an average intellect. Both are clearly above average. My cousin, however, dropped out of HS and was thought to be an underachiever, a behavior problem, and a problem student. My daughter benefits by being diagnosed, and was fortunately diagnosed before she got the labels my cousin got. If you think children with above-average intelligence with LDs look like students of average intelligence, you probably haven't been around many kids with LDs. The LDs are often limited in areas, so you'll have a student who seems amazing when she is able to hear what she's supposed to be learning and respond verbally (my daughter), but who when expected to read and then write an answer is incomprehensible. You'd never match the two together, if you didn't know they came from the same student. Or you'll get a child who can't understand a verbal instruction to save his life, but given written directions is extremely capable. Often, the reason these disabilities are identified is because they cause a performance so uneven that it is noticeable, especially by UMC parents who have the time and energy to be involved with their kids education. Given the percentage of students estimated to have dyslexia or language-based disabilities, it's the school system failing these students. Not UMC parents demanding our children are appropriately supported. I got glasses because of vision screening in school. But apparently, I shouldn't have glasses. I should tough it out because otherwise I'm just flexing my, er, middle class background. |
Anonymous
Should a kid on the low-average side of athletic ability be given physical therapy to participate more effectively in PE and school athletics? Is a kid on the low-average side of athletic ability in the same situation as a kid with CP who gets physical therapy through the school system? |
Anonymous
Tutoring isn't an accommodation in IEP parlance. It's something that you can do at home with your child or outsource if you have the money. In early ES, my severely dyslexic son did 5+hrs a week of additional instruction in structured English literacy after school. Over 14 months, he gained 2.5 grade levels in reading. If you'd taken a student without dyslexia and given them the same instruction, their reading level would probably have gone up some just from the extra practice. Their reading level would probably have gone up about the same amount if you'd just had them read for 2 hrs after school every day. The type and intensity of instruction needed for my son to decode on grade level would be complete overkill for someone who is not dyslexic. There are kids who are at the opposite end of the spectrum (I'm actually one) who learn to read with virtually no structured instruction. I found structured literacy intriguing and kind of fun because I learned there were rules behind the things that I knew, but it would have been crazy to add 2 hrs onto my school day a child to teach me how to decode and spell. Rather than being upset that schools aren't offering this to normal readers, you should be upset that they aren't offering this level of intervention and remediation to ANYBODY. The most I've heard of any student receiving is 2.5 hrs a week in a small group setting with the reading teacher. Most students with dyslexia receive far, far less in school. And, btw, pull outs are in place of other in-class instruction -- so your choice may be between your student receiving instruction in reading or your student receiving math. My DS never received any scientifically evidence-based decoding instruction in school. Many other students have dyslexia and are never even diagnosed. Yes, I'm sad that while are financially fortunate enough to help DS, many other families are not able to do nearly as much for their kids. The answer isn't to bring everyone down, though. |
Anonymous
|
In answer to the OP's original question, I think a parent needs to be relative well educated to pick up on when their child is having issues, and figure out, "HEY, something is not right here." I really do think an educated mother can make a huge difference in a child's life. A less educated mother may not pick up on something which is not normal or on target. For example, even though my daughter was in speech therapy, and was learning how to say specific sounds, I kept having the feeling that she then had NO IDEA where to PUT THEM in her words. IE She had very low phonological awareness. When I raised that with the SLP, they did some simple testing along those lines, and said basically, 'Yep, her phonological awareness is way behind so let's increase our working on that particular skill for a while" and her awareness improved (assuaging my worries that she had dyslexia, which is often marked by low phonological awareness in the pre-reading years, but she improved so rapidly, that it seemed she was merely delayed, but not intrinsically "disabled" in this area.
Similarly, after that got cleared up, and she continued to work on speech, I said something to the SLP, "You know, her enunciation has gotten a lot clearer, but I am still concerned about her continued grammatical and syntax errors. Is this normal? OR does she does this more than she should at this age?" So, SLP did some testing along those lines and, guess what, DD's understanding of sentence structure was in the toilet, but her understanding of word structure and expressive vocabulary were normal. So, we are now working on sentence structure. So, really, my point is: an educated mother (or father, but often times, mother) can make a load of difference in recognizing if and when a child's development may be off target, and therefore be the first line of "defense" in catching something and pushing for further investigation. |
Anonymous
That's a false statement. I hate myself for reading this thread. |