Our 9yo DS with Aspergers has this problem. Very smart, and an amazing memory, but enormous difficulty retrieving information and formulating a response when he's put on the spot. For him I think it's a combination of very slow processing speed and anxiety probably brought on by knowing how difficult it is for him to perform under time pressure. You should consider doing an IQ test to see if there is a big gap (like ours) between the processing speed and other scores. We ask his teachers to give him advance warning when he's going to be called on, so he can formulate an answer in advance and bring his anxiety down.

Do you know his processing speed or have you assessed word retrieval skills? Anxiety can affect either of these and either of these can affect anxiety. Complicated! Perhaps extended time on for written and oral responses would help?

Hi - my 9 year old son seems to shut down when he needs to orally give or write an answer down on demand. We are thinking this is some type of performance anxiety. Anyone else deal with this?