Reply to Expressive/Receptive language disorder

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]Same as dyslexia?  A subset of dyslexia or thing unto itself?  DS Diagnosed on Friday and still trying to understand. Functionality effected is around reading accuracy and writing output- translating high cognitive ability and inference towards written and organized output. He’s a voracious reader, yet tests way below average on phonological recognition etc.

I am not sure exactly what I am even asking or if it matters - just trying to understand if they are one in the same, categorically distinct?

Also, how much to share with him?  5th grader. Smart. Finally feeling more confidence about school but challenges are likely ahead.

Thanks. 
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How are other aspects of reading -- fluency? comprehension?  spelling?

I think you can have MERLD without dyslexia.  How was the phonological weakness assessed?  How does it impact him -- speech?  spelling?  or seemingly not at all?

I would definitely share.  By 2nd grade my DS could already see that he was different from peers, that really ate away at his self-esteem because without an explanation, he assumed he was stupid.  When we were able to explain, that provided a lot of relief and an explanation for types of instruction for DC that were different from how other kids learned, but which worked for DC and showed him he could learn to read too.  Our explanation was simple -- the doctor did a lot of tests that showed us how your brain works.  Your brain is good at X, Y and Z, but you have to work harder to do A, B, and C.   School is a factory which is organized to teach A, B, C kids, that's why you need your own kind of instruction that's good for X, Y, Z kids.  Everyone learns differently.  Everyone has things they learn easily and other things they have to work hard to learn.  If the person who did your assessment offers a read-out to kids, I would definitely take them up on it, as a kid might take the news better from a Dr. than a parent and be more willing to ask questions.

Who did your assessment -- SLP or psychologist?  Do you have any suspicion of ADD/Inattentive or executive dysfunction?  That is an underlying aspect of our DC's MERLD.  I think MERLD and reading issues can be tough to sort out; there's a lot of overlap, especially if there is a phonological deficit.  IME, a very bright kid can compensate in reading for a long time without reading by phonics.  Sometimes they collapse at later stages when words become more complex.  I would have expected to see that by 5th grade, as your kid is presumably reading unfamiliar multi-syllabic words.  You really have to look at reading closely -- is he really getting all the nuance and detail?  Is he reading about stuff that he doesn't have any background knowledge and can't use that to fill in gaps but still understands everything in detail -- that's a good sign.  Or is he reading about stuff he already knows or series books that are very familiar and he just gets the overall plot but not subtleties and detail.  My MERLD kid is smart, and he fooled teachers about reading for most of elementary.  I could see subtle difficulties which are now much more problematic in HS.

Another aspect of the MERLD, IMO, is the impact expressive difficulties have on social relationships.  This increases with age.  At 5th grade, boys are still playing sports and games together, but as they grow older, there is more talking and negotiation and subtle social signals in language that my DS misses.  That has caused a lot of problems at school and with other kids and parents.  But, since DC is bright and has a great vocabulary and is willing to talk to strangers, when DC doesn't respond appropriately to a conversation, people assume it is some kind of disrespect or malingering, instead of a language problem.

Look carefully at the language testing.  For us, that explained a lot of the detail in how DS's MERLD impacted writing specifically.  First, he has terrible handwriting and poor letter formation, so writing is effortful. Second, the poor phonological knowledge impacted spelling.  Then, the ADD/Inattentive and executive dysfunction impacts the organization of writing.  The expressive deficits affect the ability to brainstorm ideas for writing and to easily paraphrase what has been written in text and to vary sentence structure.  Also, weaknesses in semantic categorization make it difficult for DC to actually see which topics or ideas go together in one paragraph.  The executive dysfunction makes it difficult to put writing in a logical sentence or paragraph structure.  And, problems with reading comprehension mean that DC has difficulty relating a prompt to the text, especially if the text is longer than a page or so.  Novels or other book length readings in MS and HS are hard because he cannot remember enough of the text, and he lacks the ability to go back and skim for information (probably due to phonological/decoding weakness).

Not sure where you are in school, but we really found that public school (MCPS) does not know at all how to educate kids with dyslexia and dysgraphia.  Although i recommend you get an IEP if you don't already have one, because it provides legal protections and accommodations, I would not rely on public school for effective special instruction.  Look for a tutor who is skilled in teaching phonology, decoding and spelling (if the latter is an issue) and someone else who can teach writing.  It's much better to remediate that NOW and in middle school or high school will be much more difficult than need be.

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