The Frustration Profile: Strong Verbal Skills with Slow Processing Speed

Glen* is a third grader who was brought to testing to determine the best teaching style for him.  Testing revealed that Glen’s overall intelligence and academic skills were in the Average range. However, great variability exists within the tests. Glen demonstrated excellent Verbal Comprehension skills, while his Processing Speed Index and Perceptual Organization Indexes fell significantly below his other indexes. Glen’s cognitive and academic skills are inhibited by his weak organizational skills and slow processing speed.

This is what I call the frustration profile. The child has a good vocabulary and is able to answer questions verbally, but due to difficulties with fine motor skill  (drawing/writing) it is very hard for him to write down his ideas.  Glen’s speed of processing is significantly lower than his verbal comprehension abilities, which cause him to need extended time in order to demonstrate his true abilities on any written assignment. Generally writing skills are the greatest academic weakness in a child with this profile.

Glen’s weak Perceptual Organizational skills make short structured writing tasks much easier for him than open-ended assignments without structure. Building language organization skills (the ability to mental manipulate ideas) will help him in projects that require him to structure the material independently.  Posing questions, researching answers, organizing information, and expressing ideas clearly are higher order thinking skills that depend on the ability to use language to analyze, compare, judge, and connect ideas.

In addition to limiting him in open-ended, abstract work, Glen’s organizational difficulty also restricts his good working memory for concrete material.  Because he does not easily organize ideas into related–thus memorable–chunks, the quantity of information Glen can store actively in mind while working on other steps in a complex task is limited.   As a result, his good memory skills quickly become overwhelmed, and multi-step problems become taxing for him.  In other words, while his basic memory function is fine, his difficulty categorizing verbal and visual information places undue stress upon it. Teaching Glen how to make information meaningful to him will facilitate his learning.

Another element in Glen’s challenges is his relatively less developed executive functions of plan and initiate, —the ability to start, plan, assess and adjust his actions and thinking.  As a result, problems with many steps or ones that require mid-process assessment and adjustments shake the self-confidence Glen has in more structured demands.   As he advances in school, more assignments will expect exactly this ability to structure and express material on his own.

RECOMMENDATIONS

Processing Speed

  • Allow longer response time for Glen to:
    • respond orally to questions in class
    • complete seatwork assignments in class
    • make decisions when offered a choice of activities
  • Allow extra time for tests, usually time and a half.
  • Shorten assignments so they can be accomplished within the time allotted.
  • Provide copies of notes rather than requiring Glen to copy from the board in a limited time.
  • Build Glen’s efficiency in completing work through building automaticity.
  • Train Glen in time management techniques to become aware of the time that tasks take.
  • Emphasize accuracy rather than speed in evaluating Glen in all subject areas.
  • Replace timed tests with alternative assessment procedures.
  • Provide a scribe or voice-to-text software to record Glen’s answers on tests to accommodate for slow writing fluency.
  • Use test formats with reduced written output formats (e.g. multiple choice, True / False, fill in the blank) to accommodate for slow writing fluency.

Writing Skills

 

  • Teach brainstorming, clustering and mind mapping skills.
  • Teach editing skills.
  • Allow the use of a computer.

Fine-Motor skills

 

  • Use Retrain the Brain to build fine motor skills.
  • Use Handwriting without Tears to enhance letter formation.

Visual-Perceptual Strategies

  • Use of graphic organizers to depict information visually and increase his retention of ideas.
  • Exercises to sharpen his ability to attend to visual detail and to express similarities and differences between images.
  • Use the Snap Cubes and Visualizing/Verbalizing Programs to facilitate his ability to conceptualize and process visual information.
    • This program focuses on strengthening a student’s ability to mentally manipulate objects, improving visual- spatial skills, and whole-part relations.
    • Use logic puzzles to teach sequential thinking skills, cause and effect, and how to identify and provide missing information.

Executive Function/Memory Skills

  • Build strategies to help him analyze, prioritize, and execute specific steps in a given assignment.
  • Break down tasks and follow the order checking work along the way.
  • Rehearse new information to help encode it.
  • Use his verbal strengths to talk himself through tasks.
  • Teach Glen strategies to help him recall information, such as PAR.
    • 1. P= Picture it.
    • 2. A= Associate it
    • 3. R= Review it.
    • Teach Glen to recognize common words for ordering a sequence of instructions, such as “first,” “next,” and “finally.”
    • Teach Glen how to effectively follow written directions by underlining key words, numbering steps, and crossing off tasks when he has completed them.
  • Teach Glen to use graphic organizers such as checklists and timelines for breaking down assignments, as well as classify and categorize information.

* Note: The student profile above is a composite of students with similar learning styles.

 

Learn about our Writing Workshop for students with strong verbal skills and slow processing speed.

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Brian Kessler

I have a 132 verbal iq and an 87 performance iq. I’ve worked for over 40 years as a writer/attorney but have always had problems with organization. . Shocking, huh?

Lulu

I shared your article with a friend whose daughter has these issues, thank you.

I came across this searching for help with my own son though but can’t find any information on how to help someone like him.

He has done WISC-IV twice- once 2 years ago and again recently. We have no diagnosis.

His IQ is 130 (two years ago it was 132) and he has the opposite issue than this article.

His processing speed is 150+ in the 99.9 percentile. But his verbal comprehension is just average. They say this is likely to do with the fact he is bilingual (English and Japanese) but in Japan that is the quick assumption for any child that is biracial or mixed race in my experience. All other areas of the test are high average except the processing speed which i think in English is classed as exceptional.

He does not have learning difficulties as such but we suffer from outbursts at home, violence, frustration etc.

He will be 12 in December. Do you have any articles that talk about this that you can link me to? Or any further reading I should do.

Thank you

Lulu

Thank you- i will read the link you posted. I appreciate it.

minami

Dr. Mullin,
thank you so much for this article.
This is like finding a treasure box.
My child, 9 yo., just got tested, because I was struggling with him throwing tantrum almost every time I ask about his homework, and when he is frustrated he hit himself.

His WISC-IV result are:
FSIQ 118
VCI 143
PRI 111
WMI 97
PSI 94

I live in a country with a rigid schooling system, many standardized tests.
Would you like to give me advice to help him dealing with this?

Tosha

Your article and feedback on the comments are very helpfu And interesting. I just had both my sons evaluated and I cannot get the psychologist to return my phone calls or emails. Both boys are bright and have great verbal skills. Both had significantly lower processing speeds. My older son hit the mild range for Autism on is SRS-2 but it wasn’t discussed. He had VCI 146 Fluid Reasoning 128 working memory 112 and processing speed 95.
My youngest VCI 118, VS 122 FR 103 wm107 and processing speed 80 . He was labeled with a mood disorder that doesn’t fit, I suspected dyslexia but that psychologist who did the exam indicated he couldn’t have that “ because of his age” just turned 6. I feel a lot of the emotional issues we see from them are frustration due to the mismatched processing speed. I’m looking for how I can assist them. Any recommendations?

coder

Hi Dr Mullen,
I’m a 44 year old healthy male and was little slow in daily activities 
Recently , I got myself tested for WAIS -IV and found some odd patterns .
Folowing is the break up

VCI 103(SS-9,VC-9,IN-14) 
PRI 98 (BD-7,VP-14,MR-8)
WMI 117(AR-15,DS-11)
PSI 81(

FSIQ 100
Although the VIQ and PRI were understandable . But there were huge discrepancies between the subtests
for e.g in VCI i scored 9 in SS and VC , but scored 14 in IN .(Could it be because english is not my native language?)
Similarly in PRI I scored 7 in BD , 8 in MR and 14 VP(I was little confused during BD and it was spoiled )
On MR subtest I’m surprised that despite having reasoning as my forte , I did so bad there .(Can it happen because it was timed 
and I have low processing index of 81, which depressed the scores)
Surprisingly WMI was 117 with (AR 15, DS 11). I’m a computer programmer and felt down after seeing these abysmal scores.
Is it possible that performance is depressed by low processing speed in the tests?
Also , I feel that I have a fairly high logical reasoning skills as I have noticed.
Can you please share some insights on this ?

I’m considering to diversify in data science as I have keen interest in statistics and data modelling
Should I stop thinking about the transition after seeing this score?

Thank you in advance  

Last edited 3 years ago by coder
Kate

Hi Dr Mullen

I found your article very interesting. My 14 yo son has just been assessed. There has been concerns about him on and off for years. When he was 7, the school said they suspected aspergers as his social skills were poor but the assessment came out negative. He was however diagnosed with sensory processing disorder. (He has since developed a great sense of humour and has great friends so definitely not asd).
We brought him to an educational psychologist when he was 11 as his written work is poor and he had found it difficult to learn to read. He was found to have weak spelling but his overall literacy was above the cut off for dyslexia.
I still believed that he was dyslexic as he is still have difficulty with written work and poor organisation. I’d also been noticing that while he can follow conversation when focussed on it, it always takes a while for him to understand you when you initially speak to him or ask him a question.
Anyhow we went to a different psychologist last month and a more thorough assessment was done. The problem seems to be processing speed and poor working memory. I’m worried for him now as i had assumed all along mild dyslexia but is the issue a more far reaching one?

His scores were:
Working memory 5%
Processing speed – 2%
Verbal – 95%
Fluid reasoning – 87%
Visual spatial – 96%

Have you any advice for a child with scores such as these?

Thanks so much!

Kate

Thank you very much that is so helpful.
We went to OT to rule out dyspraxia a few days ago and she said no, no dyspraxia but has advised us to go for ADD assessment. She seemed pretty confident that that was an issue and psychologist had mentioned attention too so youre right there.
His spelling and writing speed are both at 5%ile so she advised he will get an extra 20 mins break time in exams and be in a different room but where we live we don’t get time and a half like you recommend which would be great.
We will book in for an eye test too thanks for that. I wonder does he have irlen syndrom as he is very light sensitive.
Delighted we are getting the help needed now but still a bit shocked at his scores.

za za

I would look into Auditory Processing Disorder. It is similar to dyslexia but impacts all language processing (verbal and written). Kids with APD are very bright, creative thinkers with great sense of humor but they struggle with traditional academic skills.

Ticiana Maloney

Hi Dr. Mullin,

We have just received the evaluation results for my 9 year-old daughter. Her WISC-V results are:
VCI: 130
VSI: 114
FRI:115
WMI: 107
PSI: 80

She loves reading and reads a few grades above grade level, but really struggles with spelling and writing. And she says she doesn’t like math. Getting homework done is a struggle too. She has no behavioral or social issues and her grades in school are average, but at the same time she is clearly struggling in the areas above. There is also a huge discrepancy between her higher and lower results in the in the Woodcock-Johnson IV. For example, oral language/reading comprehension/reading vocabulary results are all above the 90th percentile (superior/very superior range) but she scores in the low average/low range for written language (PR 31), spelling (PR 21), math facts fluency (PR 2)/math calculation skills (PR 15), and word reading fluency (PR 16). How can she have oral language/reading comprehension in the superior range, with such low results for these other areas? Is this because of slow processing speed? Should we ask for more targeted testing? I am wondering if she might have dyslexia, but flies under the radar.

We have our IEP determination meeting with the school CST coming up (fingers crossed they offer her an IEP), and I am wondering what services would be helpful for her. Would you have any suggestions or advice?

Thank you!

Chandeep Singh

Hi Dr. Mullin,

I’ve been reading your answers to all the questions here and they have been very informative. Thank you ♥️

I have a quick question myself if I may.

Would I fit into the frustration profile? To what degree?

I am 32 years old, undergoing ADHD treatment and going back to school after that.

My Wais 4 score is:

VCI: 123
WMI: 129

PRI: 105
PSI: 100.

From your article I can relate to:

1) generally writing skills being my biggest weakness. (in addition: generally expressing myself, being too literal and detail oriented with words, hard time generalizing).

2) short structured writing tasks much easier than open-ended assignments without structure.

3)multi-step problems were an issue. (I assume now b/c of ADHD and not focusing enough to learn)

4) poor plan and initiate: (I also assume From ADHD)

OH

Hi,

I’m an adult in my 30’s who was tested recently. My Processing Speed is a 76 on the WAIS-4 and my other scores are: VC-102, PR-92, WM-100, and Full IQ-92. Am I dyslexic or have some of dyslexia? One of my favorite hobbies is reading although it does take a long time to read big books and ones that are not young adult novels. What are some careers I could look into? I just graduated with a degree in Liberal Arts after 10 years of trying to get a Bachelors.

OH

Nicole

This is incredibly helpful. My son was just diagnosed with ASD at age 14. His processing speed was in the 2nd percentile and his verbal comprehension is in the 99th percentile. Seeing that made me realize how exhausting school must be for him. I’m hoping his 504 can be really beefed up with some of these ideas.

Kimberly Rutledge

I have just had my 5 year old son tested at a facility due to a hellish year in Pre-K. He really struggles with behavioral issues and meltdowns on a day to day basis. He either gets super overwhelmed by his work & refuses to do it or gets hyper focused on it. Then we struggle with moving on to the next task. Any corrections typically make him fairly angry.

I have the results back now & met with the facility to go over them but really feel like they did not explain anything as to what these mean. Can you shed some light for me on these scores & how they relate to my son? He was officially diagnosed with ASD (high functioning), ADHD, AD, and DMDD. I really feel that his is highly intellectual but don’t see that reflected in these scores. On test day he had a tantrum for the first 1.5 hours of the session. He does not do well with unfamiliar settings or people. How accurate do you feel this testing is when under distress?

Verbal Comp105
Visual Spacial 86
Fluid Reasoning 111
Working Memory 82
Processing Speed 91
Full Scale IQ 90

Sorka

My son is very carefree and tends to slip ‘under the radar’ a lot. He is very bright and does well in class but does struggle with getting his words out in to paper and socially misinterprets what people ask him, and then appears not as smart as he is. He takes everything very literally and struggles with social skills. He resells stories but gets lost when talking and often the point is missed. He also has trouble remembering things from only 5 minutes before. he had the WISC IV assessment performed 2 years ago and his results were:
VCI 47 percentile rank
PRI 84%
WMI 91%
PSI 58%
FSIQ 77%

It was noted that there was a significant difference in verbal and comprehension and perceptual reasoning, perceptual reasoning and working memory, and working memory and processing speed. He had some problems understanding the letter number sequence subtext so the arithmetic subtlest was substituted.

Are you able to let ,e know your opinion in where he stands and how we could help him? We have other children with Autism (high functioning) and ADHD also.

Thanks in advance,

Vee

Hi Dr Mullins,
Last year my 6 yr old ID twins underwent the WISC-IV. (Now 7 years old)
We are now having behavioural issues with one twin (the one who scored slightly higher across the tests). He is refusing to write in class ‘it’s boring’, and is being disruptive to other children. He excels in Maths and reading, and can spell. He will use ipad or computer to write stories, and will write at home if he desires to. He gets frustrated very easily. He experiences anxiety in the classroom and in the playground if things aren’t going his own way or people aren’t abiding by the rules. He is so focused on tasks, it is very difficult to break focus and move to next activity. He does not cope well with a change in plans. He has no motivation to achieve. He loves to read and would do this all day if he could. His test results were:
– FSIQ could not be interpreted due to significant variances in index scores.
– GAI 113 (81%)
– VCI 100 (50%)
– PRI 123 (94%)
– WMI 138 (99%) (high in Letter-Number Sequencing)
– PSI 100 (50%)
– CPI not interpretable due to variances

The school is suggesting we undertake further assessments, including occupational therapy. I don’t feel like it is a fine motor issue, as I said, he can write, he just won’t. I wonder if this is do to his anxiety, or the fact that other things like maths and reading come so naturally to him whereas writing requires effort. Do you think his test scores give any indication as to what might be going on for him, or do you think this is purely a behavioural issue? I am reluctant to manage it as though he is being naughty, if there might be something that might be underlying for him.

For comparison, his twin tested
– FSIQ 114 (82%)
– GAI (77%)
– VCI 102 (55%)
– PRI 117 (87%)
– WMI 120 (91%)
– PSI 106 (66%)
– CPI 85%ile.

I would appreciate any strategies or insight you might have.
Thanks

Frederic

Dear Dr. Mullin,

Thank for all your efforts in answering all previous messages during the last years.

I just did the Wechsler Adult test and frankly speaking I am a bit lost on how to interpret and act upon my results. I may put you out of your comfort zone since I am a 30 years old adult.

Giving a general IQ number in my case wouldn’t make any sense since I have heterogenous profile.
In perceptual reasoning and processing speed I am had average scores, respectively 99-112 and 91-109 with the particularity of scoring high for 3d reasoning than 2d. On working memory I scored between 110 and 125 with an “everest effect”: the higher the difficulty was the higher I scored.
As for verbal comprehension I finished with 140 to 150 and above, since the test couldn’t find my limit in this area.

This wide gap clearly had some negative externalities regarding my childhood development as well as my work life.

What would be your professional suggestion? Obviously I do not need a full explanation rather tips to put me in a path to move forward.

Looking at all theses parents doing test for their children (all the above messages), I am shocked how far behind my home country is in regards to testing children.

Kind regards,
Frédéric

Jennifer

Last year I had to work hard to get an IEP for my very bright son who has articulation problems. WISC IV was part of the process and it revealed that his Processing Speed and Working Memory are significantly lower than his other numbers:

FSIQ: 135 (99%)
Perceptual Reasoning: 145 (99%)
Processing Speed: 103 (58%)
Verbal Comprehension: 140 (99%)
Working Memory: 107 (68%)

I was told by the school psychologist not to worry about the lower processing speed and working memory because they are “still average”. My son, age 7, is now in 2nd grade, and we’re seeing how the discrepancy may be an issue for him. His teacher recently started a “Mad Math Minute” sort of program, and my son has struggled greatly with writing the facts down in the allotted time. Verbally, however, he is completely fluent (he entered kindergarten doing these facts). His teacher offered to talk to the school about getting a 504 to give him extra time on tests, knowing this could be an issue in later grades. I thought she would be taken more seriously as a highly experienced teacher vs. me, “that mom”, but she was told the same thing that I was: “He’s still average”, and therefore probably wouldn’t qualify for a 504.

These roadblocks are very frustrating for me because my son is unable to show his full potential. The school does little if anything to support gifted students as it is, but he is unable to show what he is capable of. If it were not for his IEP, I doubt he would have been identified as gifted. I’m worried about his self confidence taking a hit. Based on his numbers, do you think I’m overreacting, or should I pursue a 504 for him?

Erika

Hi,

I came across this page when searching “discrepancy between Verbal and Perceptual Reasoning scores”. My 8 year old son took the WISC at 7, and got 98 (45%) on Verbal but 108-70%(123-94% scoring without Picture Concepts included). I can’t find any information on why there would be such a discrepancy between these two scores and what it means. His full scores are below. He was diagnosed with Dyslexia, Dysgraphia, ADHD (primarily inattentive)- all Mild. The Psychologist said he learns well visually but has significant delays in processing speed, concept formation, expressive language, auditory and long term visual memory, visual-motor coordination (73% ability to perceive visual stimuli but 18% in motor coordination to copy visual stimuli) and attention controls. We tried Concerta for his ADD but we didn’t see a difference on the lowest dose so we upped the dose. He had a very bad reaction to this, to where he would cry if anyone spoke- his already sensitive hearing became a million times worse on the medication, so we stopped. I’ve been looking into Aspergers, APD, twice exceptional—anything I can try to find to figure out my son. I’ve wondered about Aspergers but thinking he doesn’t fit the high Verbal IQ profile (maybe because of his Dyslexia or Expressive Language issues?) I know he’s so bright but his learning differences hold him back. He’s only in 2nd grade so he’s doing well in school with his accommodations but not sure how he’ll keep up when things become more challenging. He’s only receiving OG tutoring for his Dyslexia at this point, which has brought him back up to grade level on reading. Any insight you can provide would be helpful and much appreciated!

Verbal Index- 98 (45%)
Similarities- 8
Vocab- 10
Comp- 11
Info (general knowledge)- 6
Percep Reason Index- 108/123(without picture concept) 70/94%
Block Design- 14
Pic Concept- 8
Matrix Reasoning- 12
Pic Completion- 15
Working Memory- 91 (27%)
Digital Span- 8
Letter Number Seq- 9
Processing Speed- 85 (16%)
Coding- 8
Symbol Search- 7
FSIQ- 96 (39%)
GAI- 103 (58%)

WIAT-III

Receptive vocab- 45%
Comp of Oral Conversation- 47%
Expressive Vocab- 81% (noted that his expressive language deficits occur at the syntactic level)
Early Reading Skills- 45% (skill were not automatic though)
Word Reading- 9%
Pseudoword Decoding- 27%
Oral Reading Fluency- 30% but oral reading accuracy 23%
Reading Comp- 34%
Spelling- 9%
Sentence Composition- 9% (sentences contained words of higher language level than he could spell)
Math Problem Solving & Numerical Operations- 25-30%. Difficulty on timed tests 18%

Thank you!

Erika

I should add that his Dad has wondered if he, himself has Aspergers. He has an IQ of 145. I have Dyslexia and probably Dysgraphia, and Raven’s test put me at about a 130 IQ.

will

Hi Melissa,

My 13 yr old son drives me nuts. Here are the WISC4 results from a year and a half ago:

WC +166 (sim +20 voc +22 info +20 comp +20)
PR 108 (block 43 pic 10 matrx 11)
WM 120 (dig 11 arithm 16)
PS 112 (cod 11 symb 13)
FSIQ +135
GAI +144

He despises hand writing but loves drawing, writes horrendously but draws in great technical details, holds pencil with both hands yet types extremely fast.
He is a walking encyclopedia in certain topics, yet constantly struggles with the simple task of keeping track of what and when the homework is due.
Gets easily distracted during homework – ADD style – and blatantly lies about school work, despite clear consequences, just to gain computer gaming time.
Poor work ethic (although can focus under supervised Pomodoro method) yet will dive deep into his favorite subjects of interest.
He is extroverted, a natural speaker and very social, yet has very few friends.
Can talk incessantly transforming a conversation into a monologue, while walking in circles and not keeping eye contact. Also seems to have reduced awareness of surroundings i.e walks on sidewalk looking down.
Resists practice and repetition, thus being average in math.

The above issues were pointed out to him hundreds of times in the past two years alone, yet there is very little progress. I made a lot of attempts to help, and it’s getting to be a discouraging task to say the least.
I am glad I stumbled over your article as it made me dig up the WISC and discover new angles of approach.

Your input would be greatly appreciated

Thank you

Susan

Hello Dr. Mullin, I am finding your site very helpful. Recently my 2nd grader (girl) was evaluated. She was diagnosed with Double Deficit Dyslexia. I have never heard of this before and have been looking for information on it and the best way to help my struggling daughter learn. The evaluator’s who gave her the test suggested we put her in a LD school, she currently goes to a private school and besides the reading part (ha ha) she seems very happy with school and has a wonderful network of friends. I am trying to understand what is the best method for her to learn. I have scheduled a outside tutor to start 3 days a week using the Orton Gillingham method. I am not sure this is the best method for her Double Deficit diagnosis or should I be looking at other methods of helping her? I should also mention that ADHD and ADD were not diagnosed but NOT ruled out.

Her WISC-V scores are as follows:
Full Scale 118- 88%
Verbal 95-37%
similarities 8- 25%
Vocab. 10- 50%
Visual Spatial 126- 96%
Block Design 17- 98%
Visual 12-75%
Fluid Reasoning 97- 42%
Matrix Reasoning 11- 63%
Figure Weights 8- 25%
Working Memory 132- 98%
Digit Span 18- 99%
Picture Span 14 91%
Processing Speed 120 -91%
Coding 15- 95%
Symbol Search 12-75%
Ancillary Scores
Nonverbal Index 121- 92%
General Ability Index 105- 63%
Cognitive Proficiency Index 132- 98%

Any guidance on the most effective methods to teach my daughter would be greatly appreciated.

Darrell

Dr. Mullins,

I want to join all of the other parents who have made posts here, in thanking you for aiding in parents understanding of what we are receiving as reports on our children. The Frustration Profile fits my son, very well. My son, now aged 8 in Grade 3, has had diagnoses of both ADHD and Sensory Processing Disorder. He is taking medication to aid with the ADHA (although we as parents are not fully certain of its effectiveness!). He has received OT support for the SPD, but the strategies have never been fully integrated into the classroom – as several of his teachers have not ever heard of SPD. His behaviour at school and poor organizational abilities have had him flagged for IEP from the first grade. Recently, he has undergone testing using the WISC IC, GAI, Canadian Norms) for potential placement in a “gifted program”

The report we received gave us very little information to work with – especially in understanding what the results are to mean and/or how there are to be used. I share with you the “FULL DETAILS” of the report we received below:

Behaviour Observations
XXXX Presented as an alert and cooperative student who appeared to put forth his best effort during the assessment. The
assessment is considered to provide a valid estimate of the current functioning.

Assessment Findings
Tasks within the Verbal Comprehension and Perceptual do minas of the WISC-IV were administered. A combination of these two
domains yields a GAI in the High Average range (86th percentile). His Verbal Comprehension was in the High Average range
(82nd percentile). His Perceptual Reasoning Index was in the High Average range (82nd percentile).

That’s all we have from the School Psychologist – and just reading through the posts of other parents I can see that we are lacking a complete profile.

Can you please offer some guidance for us as parents moving forward? How should we prepare for the discussion with our school’s psychologist? How do we guide this discussion so that strategies for program supports are developed for our son and that we do not come off as “too knowledgeable” for the school team – for they seem to be nervous of parents who are aware!! I actually want us to be prepared with questions to guide the discussion in a positive way – but not to appear to be the experts in the room. Our bottom line is how to we move to the place of finding strategies to assist XXXX in reaching his full potential.

I look forward to your response.

Cheers,

Darrell

catmikk

Dear Doctor Mullin:
Thank you for all of your work. My son has this profile as well, and we finally took him out of public school and put him into a dyslexia school, where he’s doing great. I was tickled pink that you referred people to the Retrain the Brain product — I used it a long time ago and liked it and the Waldorf form drawing things.

I am finishing my first book, which is meant to be an overview to the entire experience of having a LD kid for parents. As part of that, I’m spending time today trying to research something that I could swear a school psychologist told me years ago. My son was about 130 verbal and 80 working memory/processing. I think that the professional told me that if there was more than 10 or 15 points between different subtests, that it invalidated the IQ test results. Can you please talk about that?

We ran into this as a problem because one professional said that the full IQ test number was invalid, so they just used a subset result. Another professional (different year) simply added the numbers together, told us that our child’s IQ was around 100, so any troubles he had were just because he was … dumb.

Yup. They said that. And he entered that school with a full diagnosis from Stanford’s Children’s Health Center, that they chose to overlook.

So: 1. Wide range in results invalidates IQ test? For WISC? Woodcock Johnson?
2. Would you be interested in being a reviewer for this book (series?)

We aren’t selling a service or product. We’re referring different thought leaders, and are just concerned with giving parents information that they need.

thanks!
Cate

lisa

Good evening

My daughter is 15 years old and recently had a full neuropsychological evaluation exam. I noticed when she started taking HS classes in 8th grade she began having great difficulty. She was diagnosed with ADD one year ago and is on medication. I still notice her having difficulty retaining information and comprehending what was said. Her grades are not consistent and trying to get her to stay on task and study is becoming harder as she gets older. She will be 16 in February. She will have to take the SATs next year if she wants to apply to colleges.

Her scores from WISC-V IQ test-

VCI 98
VSI 84
FRI 91
WMI 79
PSI 108
FSIQ 91

Is it a possibility she just didn’t put effort into the testing? It was broken up into 2 sessions.
Is that normal to see a higher PSI score with ADD?
We are having her 504 meeting in January and I am bringing the results. Do you have any input and anything I can recommend at the 504?

Thank you

Annie

I am also very relieved to have found this website. And I would also like to thank you for shedding light on all of this. My third and youngest son is now age 10. He had been noticeably unhappy with schoolwork in his (Irish Language) school from age 6 to age 8.
He often felt stupid, so his self-esteem suffered. His teachers felt that he didn’t always try his best, so he didn’t always have their support. When he was turning 9 I got him assessed privately and was amazed to find that he was 3 years delayed on his English reading. I brought this back to his school. His learning support was intermittent, as the teachers found him to be reasonably intelligent and not a severe (therefore deserving) case. In order to access better support for him I subsequently requested that he be formally assessed. This was recently done through the school.

He was found to have a mild SLD of a dyslexic type.

Having gotten the results I now realise that I hadn’t fully understood the scores of the test or how to apply them, nor what they mean for my son.
Thankfully I found your website through researching the WISC scores on the web. It is so helpful in decoding the report.

His results on the WISC IV are:

Verbal Comprehension 126 96pc
Perceptual Reasoning 106 66pc
Working Memory 104 61pc
Processing Speed 85 16pc
GAI 119 90pc

His reading has improved since the report was done however:
On the report his spelling is at 16 percentile, and his word reading is 19 percentile.

I had previously done a lot of work at home to help with his literacy, we followed on online daily programme and his reading had already improved significantly. One of his current difficulties is with maths. He cannot retain the tables enough to use them to calculate problems for fractions. He works very well one on one, but this is not possible all of the time.
Now our time in the afternoons is taken up with an hour’s homework. He would never get the full amount done but his teacher is aware of this now. He also would require my full attention during this time.
Thankfully he is very happy in school and has a lovely group of friends. I do worry though at how slow it can be for him to grasp new academic concepts in school. And worry at how this will impact on him when he moves on to secondary (High) school. His subject range then will be a lot bigger, and he won’t have the support of the smaller group of good friends. Your profile of the child always being slow with the output fits with him perfectly…
I did get him seen by an Opthalmologist, and he has some pattern glare but nothing major otherwise.
What I really would love to get is advice as how best to help him at this stage.

Thank you.

Kim

What are your thoughts on slow processing and French Immersion, currently re-evaluating if this is appropriate for my 8 year old son who is wanting to remain in French however reading/writing are falling behind in both English and French.

barb

I hope someone can offer me some insight regarding a high school student of mine- she is respectful, attentive, bright, seems to TOTALLY understand the concepts we learn in class, will correctly answer questions in discussion, offer great observations and connections. And then….. on written tests, quizzes and other assignments her responses and explanations defy understanding- Where is she getting those numbers she writes, they are not even in the problem she was given? Why are her words not even forming sentences, or even making sense? Why does she sometimes not even spell her own name correctly on her papers?
Doesn’t seem to be dyscalculia. Or dyslexia. I’ve been looking online at dysgraphia and I thought that was it, but after further reading my take on that is that it’s more of a motor skills or speed type issue., But this seems to be a real disconnect between mental processing and getting those thoughts physically written on paper.
Please Advise! What should I be researching? Recommend websites? Books? Articles? Thanks so MUCH for any advice so I can figure out how to better teach and assess any student with this problem.

Marie

My son is 11 and was given a WISC-V. His scores were as follows: VCI 118, VSI 117, FRI 97, WM 94, PSI 92, FSIQ 108, GAI 113. My understanding is that there is a significant difference between his FSIQ and GAI, but what does it mean?

I keep thinking this “qualifies” him to be a twice exceptional student. However, I had a meeting at the school the other day (not SpEd- because he doesn’t “qualify” he’s too smart-per the school) and all the teachers say he is not completing work because he is too busy talking with his friends, being a class clown, being lazy. Every teacher said he is fully capable to do the work but that he is choosing not to do the work. How can I interpret his scores and get him the educational setting he needs/unless they’re right and he is defiant 🙁 . He was also given an achievement test the WIAT-III, composite scores were higher in oral language (109), total reading (99) than in written expression or mathematics (89, 94, 96). These were not done for or within a school setting. What does all this mean? Any input would be greatly appreciated!!!

Also, his pre-AP math teacher said she would not recommend any type of SpEd services as this would give him “an easy way out” or “Make him lazy when he is fully capable”.

I am at a loss. If he truly is fully capable and is just being lazy I would like to know.

Wendy Consoli

Melissa this person’s message regarding their son is very similar to mine. I had left a reply before which you answered.. but I have another question. We had my son’s 504 and the team decided to look more into executive functioning skills so a handful of us filled out the BRIEF. He doesn’t exhibit traits of outbursts, not being to sit still etc.. it’s all in the areas of unorganization, forgetting to write down assignments, bring homework home, studying, losing things, etc. Is executive functioning problems a form of ADD and does medication help with improving those areas that he struggles with.. Medication is the last thing I want to do, but if he could feel good about himself by not feeling like he is a disappointment to his teachers because he doesn’t know why he doesn’t do those things.. he isn’t being defiant. I know his brain works differently. I am anxious to see what the psychologist will recommend after she gathers all the information on the BRIEF. Thanks

Struggling but not enough

My child is 7 and had testing recently. Overall he scored lower then I expected. He seems to really understand things like concepts and books for kids much older then him with perfect comprehension and he is good at building things and connecting information from different sources. He is very perceptive, intense and passionate. He remembers an incredible amount from books that are read to him. He seemed like a twice exceptional kid and his teachers even comment on how brilliant he is but that is not what testing shows.

His scores are VCI 127 with extremely high scores in the vocabulary subtext
Visual Spatial 114 Fluid Reasoning 103 with high average in figure weights and low average in Matrix Reasoning which seems off. WM was 94 and PSI was 80. I knew his processing speed was going to be really low. He scored low average in all areas of processing speed. They gave me a full scale score rather then a GAI.

He can read at grade level barely but he is not interested in reading books at that level so he does not like reading. He rather listen to books at a higher level. His real struggle is spelling and writing. He is failing all his spelling tests and writing tests and does not retain what he learns in that area. He writes slowly and really sloppy. He has basic phonemic awareness but he cannot remember all the rules for spelling or when reading. He had a lot of the dyslexia signs but he has good phonemic awareness so I do not know if that is the issue. He does not qualify for help even though he is really struggling with spelling, finishing his work and going off task but I need some way to help him.

Struggling but not enough

There are definite attention issues. He does have a hard time focusing on school work and in class. He can hyper focus on topics of interest. Rapid naming scores were around 37 percentile and that does seem to be an area of weakness. His backwards naming part of working memory was also low. There are no tracking issues. He was checked by an eye doctor who does vision therapy. Regular OT sessions are not an option due to cost. It is not a stand alone service in schools here.

Kathy Carlson

My son is similar to yours. He’s ten. We’ve been homeschooling him for two years now, so as his teacher I have had to come up with strategies to overcome his weaknesses and build on his strengths. Your school will probably not be able to help you with this very much. First, the Common Core curriculum, if that is what your school is using, will focus on the skills where he is weakest. Second, they will avoid helping him until he is so far behind that they will have to mark him as learning disabled, which will happen in two or three years. In the meantime, your son will probably learn to think that he is stupid or somehow less than others, will can deeply damage him. This is why we pulled our son out of school. He cannot write because he does not have the “bandwidth” to think his thoughts and do the physical task of writing. Last year and the year before he dictated to me. Now I want him to learn to be more independent in his writing, so I purchased Dragon, which types his speaking. We are just starting that, and it is frustrating to him. But as he masters using the program, he will be able then to focus on how to write by himself. It’s baby steps, and that’s okay. For spelling, you want him to learn the word by seeing it rather than trying to use phonics to spell it. He has a tremendous visual memory, use it. He will be far more successful, less frustrated, and armed with skills with how to cope in a world where most people learn differently than he does. With spelling, I have my son practice writing his word list once every day, Monday through Thursday, then the test is on Friday. He has a 98% in Spelling. Reading comprehension is tough. We do a fluency testing every day. It’s just practice. His regular reading I read aloud to him. His comprehension soars when I do that. Your son likes more advanced books, than use those. Base your spelling lists on the vocabulary in them, and that will help his fluency. Have him read one paragraph a day to you from the big books. Time him for a minute. Have him read the same passage for another minute. He’ll always do better the second time, which will make him feel successful. But what you are trying to do is get him to practice reading. It will help build his skills. For Math, I gave up on Singapore math. It was just too crazy for him. I use Math-U-See. He spent a whole year just on Multiplication. He soaked on it. This year it’s just Division, and he got it instantly. Because he was allowed to spend loads of time in Multiplication and mastered it, his highly visual and intuitive brain instantly understood division. We will be done with this math program before February at his current pace, and it’s supposed to last the whole year.

I am not a teacher, I am a marketer. When we brought Tim home, I had no idea what I was doing. I learned by doing, experimenting, and talking to a friend who had walked this path before me. Plus my school is extremely supportive and helpful. Whenever I have a question or a problem, they are right there to help me. I am happy to share with you anytime. This is a tough road, and supporting your son properly is key for his success as an adult. My name is Kathy Carlson, and my email is kathyjcarlson@gmail.com.

wscottboyer

Hi,

My son just took the WISC-5

His scores:
Verbal Comprehension Index: 118
Visual Spatial Index: 86
Fluid Reasoning Index: 69
Working Memory Index: 87
Processing Speed Index: 75
Full Scale IQ: 84

He does has done great in all subjects execpt math, but is now having trouble in other classes. He is in 7th grade. Organiztional skills are clearly lacking. Is his issues simular to you article above? Thanks!

Martha Little

This is a perfect profile for my 33-year-old son who suffers from depression and is unable to keep a job for more than two years. Since he has not learned how to handle his frustrations and his slow processing ability still continues to be a problem. As his parents what would you advise us to do?

Wendy Consoli

I came across this article when searching for information for my son’s 504 meeting. I am wanting to give teachers some good strategies to work with him so he can be successful.
He currently is an 8th grader, and I had him tested in 3rd grade. The following were his scores:
verbal comp: 120
working memory: 88
percetual reasoning:106
processing speed: 88
full scale IQ: 105

achievement:
basic reading 107
reading fluency 106
reading comprehension 110
math calculation 96
math reasoning 99
written expression 112
listening comp 98
oral expression 107

He continues to struggle with math and writing. His self confidence is an issue. Last year he was allowed to redo assignments but could only receive a 70.. this year I am requesting that he is able to redo assignments and tests for full credit. I worry about his note taking, although it has improved over the years. Organization is a mess.. notebooks, reports, etc.
He is smart but I don’t think the teachers are seeing what he is capable of. Teachers will say he knows he can come to me for me to check if he has the assignments started right, or if he needs help. He will not seek this out on his own and I have asked that they seek him out to make sure he is on the right track. He does not write assignments in his planner, so then he isn’t prepared.
I really want a 504 written this year to support his strengths as well as everyone to work on his self esteem and confidence when it comes to academics.
Any help you can provide will greatly be appreciated.

wconsoli@esu1.org
Wendy Consoli

Wendy Consoli

Thanks for your help. We will be having his 504 soon as well as updating his testing information. I know he is frustrated and his teachers are frustrated. I find myself frustrated and then feel guilty.

STEM Graduate

Despite it being over 20 years ago, I can still remember being an elementary school student and facing this choice: write neatly but never complete in time or leave an illegible scrawl. To copy a whole page of notes before it was erased required so much concentration that it prevented me from actually committing enough to understand the content (again, a trade-off was required).

I also share the weakness in writing (condensing verbal thought into written/typed form), organizational skills and executive function of the hypothetical student.

Until finding this post (searching for a reason for poor performance on visual psychometric tests), I could never find an explanation for this particular combination of traits. Thanks for writing it and leaving it up.

Stephanie

Unbelievable to learn there are others who have difficulties very similar–if not identical–to my 12 yo son who has been “diagnosed” with so many different entities since he was 3 yo. His psychiatrist is ordering genetic testing to R/O Williams Syndrome. So frustrating just not knowing how best to help our son with his struggles. He’s also been diagnosed with EBD and is on Abilify to help with behavior and stability. I am motivated and interested to catch up with this conversation…just stumbled upon it tonight and now must go to bed!

Linda

So happy to have come to this site! I have been looking for answers for a very long time for my son, but have had little success. My son is going to be a 10th grader and my heart has ached for him this past school year. He studies and works on homework from the second he comes home from school until after midnight each evening. The weekends are much the same, as he spends at least 10 hours on Saturday and another 10 hours on Sunday on homework/studying. He is pretty driven and wants to excel (I never have to tell him to study or do his homework), however, everything in regards to studying and completing homework takes him SO much time. He does enjoy school, but he continues to be frustrated at never being able to finish tests and quizzes given in class due to time constraints, even though he knows the material (usually gets an A+ on the items that he completes but a less than great grade since he misses everything he has not attempted). He does have an accommodation plan in place (which allows him 1.5X, but it doesn’t appear to be enough time. We’ve advocated for more time, but it was denied). Additionally, he has ADHD (combined type) and is on medication, which works great.

Anyhow, here are his recent assessment results:
WISC-IV: (standard scores)

Verbal Comprehension Index: 128
Perceptual Reasoning Index: 135
Working Memory Index: 99
Processing Speed Index: 73

Full Scale: 116
GAI: 138

Academic scores which aren’t times fell in the above average range, but when a timed element was added, he falls below the 1st percentile.

Have you ever heard of allowing students more than 1.5X time on tests/quizzes? Do you have suggestions? His processing speed seems to be crippling. I always knew things took him extra time, but with a 73, I think things are much more significant than I ever imagined.

Thank you very much!

Ruth Hartje

Melissa,
I finally had the high school test my son, who just finished his Freshman year, for learning disabilities. The results were exactly what this article was about….very, very low visual spatial abilities and great oral comprehension, with struggles in basic reading. I’ve done a lot of intervention with him and was glad to know something was actually wrong.

Your suggestion for time and and half testing would be great if I could use that on the ACT, but they (the ACT) are very strict about accommodations for disability. It must be a diagnosed learning disability.

They wouldn’t diagnose him with one since his combined IQ was upper 90’s and the difference between expected performance and actual was not over 20 points difference.

However, they did say they didn’t know how his extremely low visual spatial (3%…on a scale of 0 to 100) would affect his other abilities.

Do I take him to a professional, who will test him in more detail?

Or should I just be happy that he’s average and leave it? Not really what I want to do.

Any help would be amazing.

Thanks,

Ruth

Rca

Melissa, I have been reading through your posts to try and understand the assessment. The numbers are percentile and do not seem to match up with the other types of numbers I have been seeing. I kids are frustrated, but I have to be honest that I am really frustrated. This child is English but is attending French immersion. She is good at soccer and doesn’t seem to have issues with pen to paper and so I am having difficulty matching the test with what I believe of her ……. But not really understanding the test. Wisc-iv Canadian English though she goes to school in French
FSIQ 42 percentile
VCI45 percentile
PRI 55 percentile
WMI 42 percentile
PSI 34 percentile

Verbal skills 63 percentile
Word meanings eng 37th percentile
Verbal meaning 37

Receptive language TTFC -2 97th percentile

Auditory memory skills
Digit span 50percentile
Letter number sequence 37 percentile

Verbal learning WRAML2 63 percentile
Verbal learning recognition 97 percentile
Story me more 97 percentile
Story memory recall 84
Multiple choice 75 percentile

Visual memory
Short term 50
Total score su test long term visual memory 63 percentile
Long delay 93 percentile

Processing speed
Symbol search 37percentile
Coding 37 percentile

Special and nonverbal reasoning
Visualization 25 percentile
Matrix reasoning 63 percentile
Abstract categorical reasoning 75 percentile

Visual motor integration 42 percentile
Visual perceptual abilities 14 percentile

Phonological skills this was done in French and it was average with no numbers given

Attention issues

Please help. I am reading a ton of things to try and understand this!

Randy

HI there,
I am wondering if you can help me my daughter recently had the WISC-IV test done. There is a large gap for her and I am just trying to understand it.
VCI-102-110-117
PRI-68-74-85
WMI-68-74-84
PSI-76-83-93
FSIQ-79-84-90

She is a 9 year 8 month lively young girl. These numbers are shocking to me and I am having a hard time finding resources for this type of split.

Lauren Carter

Dear Melissa,

I am trying to reference you in my paper for university but I’m sure you know how much they drive home “only scholarly articles”!!! Have you written anything I might be able to find in PsychINFO or even a government education website? Or could you guide me to some scholarly articles that say the same thing as you’re saying about the reasoning behind the strong verbal comprehension and slow speed processing? I have been searching and searching with no luck whatsoever. Any help would be very much appreciated.

Thanks so much.

Sincerely,

Lauren Carter

Mindy Rauch

These post are very helpful. As a child I struggled with dyslexia it was not until I had my own child that I found a helpful tool. I know this my not help everyone but if it can help one person it makes a difference. I found reading my daughter Dr. Suess books out loud to her greatly improved my understanding of letters in words. The extreme concentration I had over the constant rhyming but ever changing words caused me to look at the words differently. Then the reading out loud was an auditory way to keep my pace and not just skip over text. It’s not a fix but I felt it helped and I just wanted to share with others.

Tried Everything

Hi Dr. Mullin,

I have been told that my child is adhd – combine, dyslexic, dysgraphic, dyscalcula and motor coordination issues. He is smart and very perceptive of people, their feelings and the world but it seems like his abilities don’t translate into academic performance. He is actually doing okay now but he is in the slowest classes and his reading, writing, spelling skills aren’t the best. I’m concerned he won’t be able to keep up as the academic expectations increase. He does receive speech, OT & vision therapy. I’m not sure if any of these services have or will work. Perhaps we are looking for a magic bullet but we haven’t seen a lot of improvements yet. He does have some interventions in place at school but I’m more interested in improving his weaknesses vs. accomodations. Are there additional programs or services that could help my child? Thanks.

VCI – 86%, PRI – 50%, PSI – 4% (Coding 16%, Symbol 1%)
WMI – 21%(Digit 16%, Letter 37%, Arith 16%)
Full -39%, GAI-75%

CELF – Sent Comp 16%, Word Struct 37%, Word Class 5%, Following Dir 25%, Form Sent 84%, Recalling Sent 25%
EOWPVT – 45%, ROWPVT – 86%
TAPS – Word Disc 9, Phono Seg 7, Phono Blend 14, Num Mem Fwd 8, Num Mem Rev 6, Word Mem 8, Sent Mem 8, Aud Comp -11, Aud Reasoning 12

@dychopsynamic

Excellent post – I had been wondering about how someone might get on with a strong VCI but more average scores in other areas. I really like the clarity and style of your report – it makes complex concepts very straightforward to understand.

Thank you!

Ted

I just found your site and think it might be a game changer for my 13 yo son who struggles most with the easiest homework assignments on a daily basis. He gets so frustrated and sits in dread of doing homework for hours. Once he actually gets started on the task though, he can complete it quickly. But it takes him several hours to just get started!

His school will not give him a 504 plan because he gets good grades. The good grades come at a considerable cost to him though. Although I explain in our meetings the struggles he has, and his therapist also attends and does a good job advocating for him, the school will not give him accommodations – based on his grades and the fact that he is accelerated.

Perhaps you can help me articulate to the school about my son’s learning profile so that they might give him the accommodations to help him. He does have a diagnosis of anxiety and ADHD – inattentive type. He takes medication – adderall which he self reports helps with paying attention in class but not at all with output. He does not find the content at school challenging at all. He never studies. What IS challenging to him is the work.

Here are his WISC-IV scores:

VCI – 142
PRI – 131
WMI – 116
PSI – 121
FSIQ – 137

Similarities – 16
Vocab – 18
Comp – 17

Block Design – 13
Picture Concepts – 16
Matrix Reasoning – 16

Digit Span – 12
LNS – 14

Coding – 13
Symbol Search – 14

Block Design No Time Bonus – Raw Score – 42; Scaled Score – 13
Digit Span Forward – Raw Score – 11; Scaled Score 13
Digit Span Backward – Raw Score – 7; Scaled Score 10

LDSF – Raw Score – 7
LDSB – Raw Score – 4

Thank you for any insight you can provide.

Mandy

Can a student who has average academic abilities but a low processing speed (75), all other cognitive abilities are average, get an IEP ? He is diagnosed on the spectrum. However how can autism relate to low processing speed? I am in NYS.

emmaschremmer

Hi Dr Mullin,

Thanks for all your interesting replies. They have give me plenty to think about. My 8 year old son has recently completed a WISC IV. He is a fun, confident boy with an very active, enquiring mind (with his current interests being gems and minerals and all things wizard! ). He has an aptitude for mathematics and science and makes remarkable insights about the world around him (last week he told me that he had been thinking about curved lines and had decided that curved lines were simply made of a series of straight dots of elements!?). He is very advanced reader, but a laboured writer/homework completer. He is also very strong willed and has previously been diagnosed with SPD. He can be very inflexible and has trouble controlling his emotions at times. He actively tries to avoid teamwork at school, as he doesn’t value his peers ideas. This has caused a few problems for him, in terms of generating close friendships. At age 3 1/2, he was observed to have delays in gross motor skills and some problems with fine motor skills. In his Griffiths developmental scores that he undertook at age 3 1/2, he was found to be approx 6 months developmentally delayed (mostly due to gross motor delays and self-sabotage!)

His WISC scores were:
VC -136 (Similarities – 18. vocab -15, comprehension -15)
PR – 119 (Block design 16, picture concept, 10, matrix reasoning 13)
WM – 83 (digit span 11, letter-number seq 14, arithmetic -13)
PS -83 (coding 7 (not included), symbol search 6, cancellation 8)

(Arithmetic with questions repeated and with paper for one answer – 18)

Apparently the scores above may be deflated by lack of readiness to do the tests, lack of concentration and arguing about how best to do them! I am thus wondering whether or not he needs to do anymore tests. In particular, are we getting the full score in the VC? I am also concerned that he is telling me that his mathematics class is boring and too easy.

Any insights that you have into my son and how best to support his development would be appreciated.

Slow But Right

I have a “frustration profile”. I have a high verbal IQ and “very superior” abstract reasoning abilities, but I have slow visual processing speed (runs in the family), and writer’s cramp in my hands, which leads to an over all slow working speed and low performance IQ with respect to my verbal IQ. I used to get infinitely frustrated as a child because I would start on a task and people would not give me the time I needed to finish. They would either think I was having difficulty and “help” me by interrupting me and trying to tell me or show me something I already knew, or they would not permit me to finish my work because time was up, and then treat me like I was not proficient in the subject matter. This caused me to develop a lot of frustration and anxiety which I still experience as an adult. I have a hard time working in groups because I’m constantly distracted by the people around me, expecting them to interrupt my thought process any moment. This also makes it impossible to demonstrate my working knowledge on the spot, and the thought of a potential employer asking me to solve a simple problem during a job interview terrifies me.

When time constraints are removed and I am promised I won’t be interrupted, I rise from the 3rd percentile in math to the 99th percentile (I am in a STEM field and have a degree in mathematics), and 2nd percentile to the 98th percentile on the Nelson-Denny Reading comprehension test.

I was held back in mathematics in Jr. High because of my slow speed, and forced to do timed multiplication tests every day, despite my insistence that I understood higher mathematical concepts. I never got any faster at the tests, and holding me back greatly delayed my college education (which wouldn’t have been possible at all if not for extended test time).

The first learning assessment test I had when I was 7, and the last one I had was when I was 27, and my learning profile and scores have remained surprisingly consistent throughout my life. What’s even more surprising is that my brother and father have almost identical learning profiles, and difficulties to my own. I’m guessing this implies that, in our case, they are caused by certain inherited physical neurological attributes.

I think the best thing that people can do when dealing with a child with the same or similar learning profile to mine, is to not interrupt them. Let them finish their work on their own. We are not sitting there having a hard time with something. We are simply sloths in a world of hummingbirds.

Daniela

Dear Melissa,
Thought I would let you know my son’s story as it fits this profile exactly. We have just had him retested having gone through a nightmare few months. What I have learnt is that the way in which a young child is tested is so important.
At 7 years my son was struggling in reading, writing, spelling and maths. At 4 years he had a great kindergarten teacher and family friend who was previously a primary school teacher specializing in gifted and talented. She noticed my son’s advanced knowledge and verbal skills, but also noticed he was struggling in other areas. She suspected he was developing asynchronously and warned me that once he started primary that he may be misunderstood.
Fast forward two years and we are asked by his school to do an Ed Psych assessment to deal with the above as well as his (non-ADHD like) daydreaming and inability to sit still. We were urged to do a full report including questionnaires on his behavior etc. which his teacher said was not a problem. We were told he socialized fine and there were no problems in this area.
We took him to a clinic where he had to sit in a white room with no windows and do a full battery of tests (the full 14 WISC IV as well as additional tests) carried out on three separate occasions, as well as fill in countless forms on his behavior. We also had him assessed by a therapist who noticed problems with balance and we started exercises. It was too much for him and he developed anxiety symptoms, such as facial movements and started to wet the bed gain. In the meantime his reading skills had soared and he now in fact has above average reading abilities.
The Ed Psych tests and report took over a month to complete and there were many exaggerations. We were also told that my son had not understood instructions in the perceptual reasoning and processing speed categories. Therefore his results were superior VCI, above average/average perceptual reasoning and working memory and below average processing speed. The psychologist said my son had average literacy skills, and the real reason for referral must have been behavioral, so she sent out an additional GADS form to both myself and his teacher. She said it was most probable the teachers suspected autism. She said my son was probably in the top 5% of the spectrum.
(While our behavioral questionnaires came back showing our son was depressed, the teachers forms came back showing significant behavioral and social problems, and his teacher was quite perplexed by this.)
While I have no prejudice against autism, I have a big issue with mis-labelling, and do not believe my son is autistic. I was now stuck with a report that both my husband and I felt was just not the kid we knew. I found your article and knew I had to do something to ensure my son got the help he needed.
We have since had to see developmental pedeatricians to get out of this mess (who say he is not autistic but has specific right-sided fine motor issues, and strongly suspected dyslexia). We decided to retest my son this summer.
The test was quite different to the one we took in the spring, carried out at my house with me present, and every test explained very clearly to ensure accuracy. We scored the tests together, and it was a wonderful experience for both my son and I. My son did not recall that he had taken the tests before, and the psychologist did explain that he felt for a 7 year old this was not an issue. The great thing about doing the test this way was that my son, who by now had very low self esteem, could see that while he does have slightly below average writing and spelling, his reading was high average. His VCI and perceptual reasoning scores were expected in an 11 year old or older. By contrast, his working memory and processing speed were both average for his age. The Ed Psych said that he had relative dyslexia and required a challenging curriculum with allowances for his literacy skills.
The wonderful thing about this assessment is that my son’s anxiety symptoms have stopped and now that he no longer thinks he is stupid (his words) he has a renewed thirst for knowledge that he lost in the first two years of primary school.
Term has just started and we are meeting with the INC next week. Fingers crossed he will get what he needs to be happy and healthy and interested in school!

Daniela

Jack

Dr. Mullen,

I have a similar profile to the one listed in the article. What would you suggest for someone in college. Are there any restrictions on the fields that they can go into? What if math has always been a large issue?

Daniela

Hi Melissa,

I have been reading your site with great interest! We have recently completed a psycho-educational assessment, but both myself, my husband and the teachers have been disappointed with the diagnosis feeling that it does not quite fit my 7-year (now 7 1/2) old son. The Ed Psych diagnosed him with very high functioning autism (aspergers) and dysgraphia. She said his eye contact was poor and he talked like a little professor.

We have had subsequent visits to a university hospital where my son was born premature, for a developmental assessment. The pediatrician said he had right side hemiparesis (with muscle weakness in hand, not dysgraphia), and has asked for further tests to carried out, including an MRI, and ordered occupational therapy. He did not believe he had aspergers either.

By way of background, six months earlier, we heard from his teacher that he was very behind in reading and spelling. He began the Lexia reading program and made good progress. His spelling is now quite intuitive. He worked on Lexia for three months, but became more and more frustrated with homework. We were then called in and told that he was also struggling greatly with maths and writing and fidgeted a lot, but did not appear hyperactive. We were asked to get an Ed Psych assessment. We were also told that he was introverted at school and rarely spoke up in class. At home we noticed that he often slumped and slided across the sofa when reading, although he was always well-behaved when eating dinner.

We went ahead with the assessment but also hired a learning therapist who suggested he had trouble crossing the midline and with tracking, and had low muscle tone. We began exercizes to help him. He had some nasty side effects from the therapy (dizziness, tinnitus, irritability, obvious facial movements and bed wetting) but we pressed on and his coordination improved considerably. His behavior also improved dramatically, and he no longer has angry outbursts (never tantrums) with regards homework.

There were a lot of tests because our Ed Psych said she couldn’t find any significant disability. In contrast my son’s teacher feels it is impossible that he could have scored within the averages to high averages in any tests other than VCI)

The scores of his tests were scattered as follows:

WISC IV
VCI 128/ PRI 106/ WMI 104/ PSI 85

(Subtests: Block design 12, similarities 17, digit span 10, picture concepts 10, coding 14, information 12, arithmetic 12, letter-number sequencing 12, matrix reasoning 11, comprehension 13, symbol search 1, vocabulary 14, picture completion 10, word reasoning 12)
NB The Psych said he had trouble scanning the rows on the symbol search and may have misunderstood the instructions

WJ-III Cog
Long term retrieval 104
(visual auditory learning 100, retrieval fluency 109)
Delayed recall 101
(story recall-delayed 106, visual-auditory-learning delayed 97)
Processing speed 82
(visual matching 87, rapid picture naming 95, decision speed 78, pair cancellation 99)
Auditory processing (incomplete words) 95
Short-term memory
(number reversed 80, auditory working memory 114)
Visual-spatial thinking (picture recognition) 111

Note: some of the following tests were carried out on the day my son was experiencing side (dizziness and weakness) effects from his therapy:

WJ-111 ACH
Reading 109
(letter-word identification 114, reading fluency 108, passage comprehension 101, word attack 113)
Mathematics 96
Calculation 88, math fluency 90, applied problems 106)
Oral expression 116
(story recall 115, picture vocabulary 113, oral comprehension 113)
Written language 116
(Spelling 116, writing fluency 106, writing samples 118)

CTOPP-2
Phonological awareness 116
(elision 11, blending words 17, phenome isolation 9)
Rapid symbol naming 95
(rapid digit naming 9, rapid letter naming 9)
Alternative phonological awareness 79
(blending nonwords 5, segmenting nonwords 8)

My son reached his motor milestones late but was an early talker. However, he never spoke in phrases. He is sometimes awkward in crowds and either gets very excited or anxious, sometimes covering his ears. Prior to and during kindergarten, he had an incredible wealth of knowledge in areas such as animals, dinosaurs, prehistory and earth evolution. He did not appear obsessed, and the books and videos were sought out mostly by myself after noting his interest. He was not recognizing his numbers age 4, and was right-hand dominant around age 5. He was always very reluctant to draw or write and to learn his alphabet.

His kindergarten teacher previously specialized in gifted and talented in an international primary school. She thought my son was twice gifted specifically conceptually. She warned me that he would also have learning difficulties and to pay attention that my son did not appear to be big headed or he might be rejected by his peers. After we spoke to him that his latest interest, history, wasn’t anything his friends might understand (this frustrated him) he stopped talking about it at all, and we later learnt that even in classes where he had a wealth of knowledge he would rarely speak up. He said he was either ‘keeping it secret’ or that ‘someone always spoke up before him.’

He is now doing very well with reading, but is struggling with mental arithmetic. His handwriting has improved considerably, but is still well behind his peers.

Apologies for the very long message. This is a little complicated and we are very confused! Hope you can shed some light on this.

Daniela

Dear Dr Mullen,
Just wanted to let you know that my son DOES in fact have visual problems, just like you said! Not just tracking either – in several areas including figure ground which I understand can explain some difficulties in the plaground and ‘busy’ worksheets. He was mostly assigned visual work last year as he was considered a visual learner.
He is currently working through visual therapy and it is doing wonders. After just five sessions he is writing most of his numbers in the correct direction.
He’s progressed significantly in all areas and is so happy! He is one of the first in his class to learn his times tables, and his reading, despite his tracking issues, is very advanced. He’s still struggling a little with cursive writing, but he is now able to get most of his thoughts down on paper in a timely manner. It also helps that he has a fantastic teacher this year!
He’s been through many medical tests and there was nothing significantly wrong, albeit a minor vestibular issue which we are focusing on. I understand this also contributes to eye weakness.
He has made so many friends this year, it just shows that when a kid gets help – that is the right kind of help – it can do wonders for their self esteem.
I wish you were here in Hong Kong! It is wonderful how you are helping people. Even remotely you are getting it right.
THANK YOU!

Daniela

Dear Melissa,

my son (8) has recently taken a Wisc iii. He is a very bright, sociable and funny kid. He is a quick thinker with a great sense of humor. He’s bilingual Italian-French. He was referred to a speech therapist in September after his teacher pointed out the discrepancy between his cognitive capacity and writing skills, in particular poor spelling. He has been seeing the speech therapist once a week but with no significant results.
After speaking with both his teacher and the speech therapist we took him for a complete check up including the wisc test, with a view to apply for a Special educational programme.
I don’t have all the breakdown, however he scored 139 verbal and 130 reasoning but only 85 processing speed. He was also diagnosed with dysorthography. Also the neuropsychiatrist underlined that his fine motricity skill are a little poor but not alarmingly so. I must say i never noticed as he loves and is very good at drawing.
The psycologist suggested increased speech therapy for a few months but to stop and move to compensation strategy if this doesn’t work.
I am worried for my son. His notes are good for the moment, although not as good as they could be. How can we help him? Thanks
Daniela
N

Daniela

Dear Melissa,
as I have now the detailed results of my son’s WISC IV test, I was hoping you might be able to shed some light and recommend some plan of action.
Verbal 134
similarities 17 vocab 16 comprehension 14
PR 139
block 13 picture concepts 19 matrix 16
WM 103
digit span 11 letter sequencing 10
PS 85
coding 6 symbols 9

A further intensive speech therapy course was recommended, which he completed. His writing and spelling seem to have improved although he still makes mistakes in particular if tired.
We also found somebody to help with his homework as they said it’s best if it’s not his mum helping him.
I am not sure what his finemotricy issues could be or how best to help him there.
He enjoys drawing and is very precise and good at it.
Also this year he will start writing in French at school. Does that mean that he will need speech therapy in French aswell?
Thank you for any advice you might be able to give and for your helpful website.

sarah

This article is the perfect description of my 13 year old son. He is dysgraphic, not diagnosed until 11 because he had great penmanship and is so bright. He did four months of vision therapy for some tracking and convergence issues. I thought it had helped, but I had him tested recently for the first time in six years, and here are his scores: WISC IV
Verbal Comp-155
Perceptual Reasoning-135
Working Memory-144
Processing Speed-92
GAI-155
Processing Speed Subtest Scores:
Coding-8
Symbol Search-9
Cancellation-10

Visuospatial Perception-Motor coordination 60 percentile

He avoids all written work, even math. His executive skills actually came back all in superior range.I am at such a loss at how to help him.

Thank you,
Sarah

Kathy Carlson

Dr. Mullin, my son is bright, energetic, and loads of fun, and he is terrible at school. He’s in third grade, and he’s always behind. He thinks he is stupid, gets frustrated very easily, and cannot write a sentence to save his life. The school and we have worked together with Tim, but he is drowning at school. We brought him home to school here, the school has provided access to the curriculum, and I have started him at the beginning of second grade to fill in the blanks. It’s been five months now. I have gotten a very good handle on what Tim’s skills, strengths, and weaknesses. He is a super-slow processor. He is highly visual. He is very imaginative. Math is no problem for him given personal attention and time to get the work done. Spelling is a piece of cake when we do lots of practice seeing and writing the words. Reading is improving. Writing, however, is killing both of us. I’ve not only broken writing down into outline format, and graph format, literally explaining what each sentence does and is for, but write for him so he doesn’t have the stress of trying to physically put words on a page. Yet, we have problems. He cannot figure out what is important. Looking at a few pages on, say, volcanoes makes him cry. He doesn’t know what is important even though we’ve written down the questions. If I glean the information for him, he has no idea what to say. He just wants to regurgitate the bullet points I have written. Creating a sentence is worse than pulling teeth because you can actually pull out someone’s teeth. Pulling a sentence out of Tim is more like raising a herd of unicorns, impossible. Example sentences don’t help. Giving him ideas doesn’t help. He just freezes and cries actual tears because he has no idea how to make his brain work. He’s tired. He has to go to the bathroom. He feels sick. He has the hiccups. He stares off into space, thinking…forever. On and on and on. It’s incredibly frustrating for us both. I’d skip writing, but I can’t skip writing. He needs to learn how to write. Do you have any ideas on how to help me get him to form a sentence? Thanks!!!

Kathy Carlson

Thanks Dr. Mullin! I appreciate the feedback. There are so few students like Tim, there aren’t many resources for knowledgeable help.

Jack

Dear Melissa,

I recently took the WAIS as part of a psychodiagnostic evaluation and I had this profile. I am 51 years old and suffering from depressions, for which I receive counceling. Allhough on the outside everything looks fine – I have a PhD and am teaching at a college – it took me years to finish high school. College and grad school were a mess, but I somehow got a PhD and tenure at a college. Unfortunately, because everybody myself included was already happy that I finished any college, any grad school and a phd at all, not much thinking went into choosing what kind of degrees I should or could get. Basically I always chose easy topics. Because my high school performance was so bad, it seemed the safe choice when going to college. The result is that I’m now stuck with degrees in topics I do not really lke, and teach topics that do not really interest me. I love the teaching itself, so there I find compensation, but I cannot help thinking what would have happened if I had taken the WAIS or any other test at high school. My learning difficulties might have been recognised and with some help and management I could have taken degrees I would have liked. Now my learning problems were explained by lazyness, unwillingness, or maliciousness. After all, I seemed smart enough, was creative and intellectually ahead of my peers, so if my schoolwork was bad that must have been intentional. It frustrates me that a few easy tests could have given a different perspective, so I encourage every parent to seriously evaluate learning difficulties in their children. I recognize many things parents write here – I was one of those smart but unorganized children with extremely bad handwriting that somehow couldn’t get his act together. It was extremely frustrating and depressing.

It took me more than 30 years to find out what went wrong at school, and I finally realize that is was not my fault. I’ve decided to go back to college and get the degree I always wanted. I hope my story encourages parents never to stop searching what is wrong with their children. Not everyone might get a second chance 30 years later.

Jack