do any of you have or know of a kid being identified as LD in Kindergarten?

[BethSLP]

Hi mamas,

I am an SLP in the schools and have posted responses (which are hopefully helpful? ;P) in this forum.  Now I'm asking for some info from you experienced mamas.

My nephew is in Kindergarten and a young Kinder (his bday is right before the deadline to enter school).  I have never tested him, but based on our visits (which are infrequent), I would classify him as moderate/severe language delay and severe articulation impairment.  He has been receiving speech therapy services since around age 3.  I am no expert, but I also believe he meets criteria for ADHD although it has not been diagnosed.  His attention span is very limited. 

However, he is quite good with mechanical things (much like his father who is a genius with computers and all things mechanical). 

I will admit when he was younger I thought he was more of an NCEC, SI kid (non categorical early childhood, speech impaired) than a SI only kid.  At the time of his early childhood eval, they only qualified him for speech.

My brother recently told my mom that at his last ARD meeting (or IEP meeting to the rest of the country, we are in Texas), they told him they want to request additional testing to see if he has a learning disability. 

In my district, this is almost unheard of, and kids need a few years in school before being tested for LD (because they need educational opportunities, time to mature, and many interventions need to be tried first).  I usually don't see kids getting tested for LD until at least 2nd grade.  What I HAVE seen from time to time is a child that appears so low functioning, that testing is requested at younger ages with the suspicion of MR (mental retardation).  Usually they tell the parents they suspect "learning difficulties" until the test results reveal the answer one way or another. 

My mom sees my nephew much more often than I do.  I quizzed her a bit on his abilities.  He can write his name and do basic math.  He struggled for a long time to learn colors.  He does not know his letter sounds.  Quite honestly, as a child with a language impairment and an articulation impairment, this does not surprise me.  Learning colors is heavily language based, and its difficult to learn letter sounds with a severe artic impairment.  That said, there is no separating language from academics.  They claim we should put modifications in place to make sure a child with a language impairment is not penalized for their errors, but only so much can be done without compromising the whole academic lesson. 

To make matters more complicated, my brother has not talked to me about this situation at all.  I've offered my help over the years, but I think he feels funny about it.  In my dream world, he would trust and consult with me on these matters and I could attend the IEP meeting as his advocate to make sure everything is on the up and up. 

The more I think about the situation, the more concerned I am about what is really going on.  Sooooo, to make a long story short, do you know of any kids who get identified as Learning Disabled at such a young age? 

XOXO

B

[Peony]

Not a lot of time at the moment, but yes I do. My DD1 was dxed as dyslexic in K at age 5, she was just a few weeks shy of being 6. It was very obvious an LD was her problem to me anyway, others were not so convinced. She had SPD, some anxiety, slight speech delay, was smart but yet was unable to recognize her written name. I can not tell you how many times I was told off about being a pushy mom, she was immature, give her more, time, etc... but I had know for years she had an LD. She could count to 10 by then, it had been apparent to me for eyars that she did not learn things like other children did. Needless to say, I fought and traveled, and eventually found a clinic that would look at her. It has been exactly 2 years now, she is reading some now! She is considered to be a beginning 1st grade level, and that is after jumping 4 reading levels already this school year. I am SOOO thankful I listened to myself and that she got dxed at a very young age, had we waited, I don't even want to think about how she would be today. All this improvement is after 5 hours on one on one time with a therapist a week, year around, it is going to take her a long time to be at grade level. 

Your nephew sounds different in that it would be other things. Have to run now...

[stik]

Early Intervention in AZ sets kids up with IEPs that start at age 3 if they continue to need services once they age out of the EI system.  Many, many conditions that require educational services and accommodation are diagnosed before age 5, so it makes sense that a kindergartener would be evaluated for special ed services and might have an IEP.  THe hope is that with early services, problems can be overcome that will make services unnecessary later on, so it makes more sense to do an IEP early than to wait and try a lot of things informally and let a problem get more severe before intervening.

[KCMichigan]

I taught Spec.Ed (resource room) and worked primarily w/ students and LD or ADHD.

Out of the hundred or so students w/ LDs I worked with only two were kindergardeners w/ LDs. One was a retained student and the other was from a family with a very heavy history of LDs. I did have one Speech K student that was also NOT identified as LD (did not qualify), but struggled mightily and I did reading support. Most kids were referred for LD testing in 2nd grade after interventions were not successful and/or the student was not showing improvement with standard instruction.

It would be unusual but not impossible. Does that area do RTI or a more traditional discrepency model for qualification. Different areas use different 'ways' to determine LDs. Most are moving toward RTI where some interventions (tiers) have to be documented and in place and 'not work' before a student is evaluated. That is hard to do w/ a K student. 

It would be hard to determine a large enough gap between age appropriate skills and a 'large delay' (usually a 20 point spread or 2 standard deviations) at K age, especially if he is young for his grade since it is age normed. A young 5 would not be 'that' far behind on standardized testing (as in enough to qualify under an LD dx) for not knowing his letter sounds though in most suburban areas he would be struggling in a standard K class since the standards and expectations are that K kids know them. 

Could they be suggesting Resource Room support w/ a Speech diagnosis? I know some of my older kids got support  in the Resource Room w/ only a Speech dx due to the severity and how it impacted academics. They often were close to grade level but had trouble with spelling, communication, and/or reading but not enough to qualify as LD students.

ADHD is often served through 504 plans if it is the only dx around here. It also is usually not an official dx until age 7 or later due to the blurry line between appropriate developmental behaviors and true ADHD.

If he has had an IEP since 3, he should be up for a reeval soon (3 year) and they should redo all the assessments. That would help pinpoint his progress/lack of progress and areas of concern/weakness. A lot can change in 3 years.

Could he get an ECDD dx? (Early Childhood Developmental Delay) I know that the ECDD dx can be used up to age 7 for delays that are not identifiable as a specific learning disability, but are there. Often ECDD dx turns into a MI (mentally impaired), LD , NVLD (non-verbal learning disability), or ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) dx as the student ages.

Per the color names-- have they checked to see if he is color blind? It is actually more common than people think and occurs more in boys than girls. 

[BethSLP]

Peony, I'm surprised they could discern dyslexia as young as kinder (when kids are still doing reversals normally in their writing and are just learning to read).  But that is great that you were able to find it early.  It sounds like her services have helped her thrive.  In our state, dyslexia services are part of General Education (not Special Education), so LD is a different category from dyslexia all together here.  I don't know if its state by state or nationally that way though.

Stik, my nephew did have the early childhood services starting at 3, but they only qualified him for speech.  At this point they are going for additional testing.  I don't see how they can possibly have enough data yet to diagnose.  This is why I'm concerned their end goal is not LD but MR.  and I think its odd, since he did not come up with any concerns except speech a few years ago.

If MR was on the table, I would have expected an NCEC label back then in addition to SI.  And the kid essentially potty trained himself, so I don't think adaptive skills are in question 

KCMichigan, thank you.  This was exactly my thought.  To my knowledge, all of Texas is using the RtI model now.  Which is why I found it suspicious because how much RtI could be done with a K student?  He was in PreK at the same school, so maybe they are counting the lack of progress last year too, but I fail to see how as PreK and K are not mandated by the state of Texas.  Theoretically a child could walk into first grade as his first enrolled grade.  Of course, no one does that, but they could.  So often I've heard some districts won't retain in Kinder since Kinder is not mandated to begin with.  

My suspicion is that they think MR otherwise testing at this age is likely to yield nothing.  That said, you raise a good point which is that he is probably up for 3 yr re-eval now and perhaps thats most of the "additional testing" they are referring to.  My brother *did* say specifically that they are testing for LD.  But its possible in my mind that they discussed his 3 yr re eval for speech and are talking about RtI interventions for the areas of weakness academically.

I do not believe he's color blind, as he knows them now.  It just took him forever to learn.  

I put a bug in my mom's ear about this to see if she can get him to call me about it.  But I do take comfort in the fact that most all services are in the general education classroom in the state of Texas now.  so even if they did diagnose MR, he would likely not be placed in a restrictive placement.

XOXO

B

[Lisa1970]

I think he is too young for LD testing. A child really needs until 7 for there to be a gap that can truely be measured. My kids who were in the gifted program were not reading by 6. I know my son, when he started kinder, he was almost 6 with a November birthday, could not write his name, any letters, and could not even say his alphabet. By 5th grade, he tested in to the GT program that required 96th percentile and above in all areas, including reading. He was actually at 99th percentile for reading. (he does have other special needs though, but the point is, it is not learning disabilities).

If I were the parents, I would say no to learning disability testing. If they want to test for something else that the parents suspect, fine, but not LD testing.

And see, there is something else that gets to me, a lot of people do not understand what a learning disability is and how it is different from other special things that affect people. It really bothers me when an educator thinks something is wrong, and then tries to blame a learning disability, even though the child is too young to have one yet! (technically, they have to measure at a certain level overall and then a certain number of standard deviations below the average of where the child ranks, in one area, so, for example, if they are over all at 100 for all their skills put together, they will need to be at 85 or 70, depending on if they need to be 1 or 2 standard deviations away, but it is usually 2, so it would have to be at 70 or lower.) 

I have a child with autism spectrum disorder, no learning disabilities, I have another who was hearing impaired and then diagnosed with a reading learning disability, no other problems. She no longer tests with the LD. Then I have a child who has ADHD and PDD-NOS, no LDs. I can understand when general people get confused as to what is an LD vs other thingd, but it ticks me off when someone confuses them who is supposed to be a professional in education. I hate it when someone says "she has a learning disability so she is slow and not smart." People with learning disabilities are usually quite smart and simply have a deficit in that one area (or sometimes more than one).

[carrotsprout]

Originally Posted by BethSLP 

... my nephew did have the early childhood services starting at 3, but they only qualified him for speech.  At this point they are going for additional testing.  I don't see how they can possibly have enough data yet to diagnose.  This is why I'm concerned their end goal is not LD but MR.  and I think its odd, since he did not come up with any concerns except speech a few years ago.

I

XOXO

B

I'll chime in on this one.  I have a set of twins in second grade.  One of them is having absolutely no problems academically.  She gets the "exceeds standards" on every standardized test, etc.

However, this child has an IEP that she has had since 3 years old due to low muscle tone and speech difficulties.

Next, her sister:  this child is struggling academically.  She reads and writes phonetically  She has to be remindeed very frequently to put spaces in her writing.  It sometimes takes a committee to understand what she was written if you know what i mean.  Not saying she isn't smart--her math abilites are really really good even though she can't even meet the standard on the testing (Reading instructions and filling in marks are very hard for her)...

We recently had the parent teacher conference.  Their teacher said she was going to have the learning team (don't know if i got that right) come in to observe and start helping her.  If things didn't improve soon we would consider an IEP evaluation.  (My kids go to a charter--they hate IEPs).   clearly recall her saying that my daughter should be tested now that she is in second grade.  Of course I asked about why the sister could get her services so much earlier--she explained that since "baby a" has physical and speech issues she is much easier to qualify for services.  Since "baby b" has normal muscle tone (and therefore speech--other child's speech issues are low tone issues) she has to qualify basically by academic standards.  In this state they have to be two years behind to qualify.  Before second grade that is nearly impossible to get.  She was referred last year, but did not qualify because (in late first grade) she scored at beginning kindergarten level on most things.  It is frustrating, she can do higher level math quite well (such as 3000  x 200 type stuff in her head, she squares, adds and subtracts fractions) but she can't understand the instructions.  When looking over her test scores her teacher was amazed that she got all the higher skill level questions in math correct even though she missed most of the questions in several lower level categories.  Of course, it just depends on which ones require better reading comprehension skills.

With your nephew, i wonder if it is because he already has an IEP--maybe his team is thinking they can get him some help now instead of having to wait that dreaded two years for him to fall back enough  to get the help he needs..  I am confident that if my IEP-bearing 2nd grader had the reading issues that her twin does she would be receiving services for that already.

[beenmum]

My daughter was dx'd with Dyslexia and is using Irlens overlays right now. She is 6.The dysleixa dx is not a concrete dx, however based on her diagnosis of Cortical Visual Impairment and her symptoms, it seems more likily then an overall LD or reading disability.

My oldest girl was dx'd with Mental retardation by the time she was 2.

I worked with children who had special needs, and I do know that testing for certian things are best left until the child is older. However. lanugage based LD's are foten dx'd earlier then most recommand due to, I guess, the thought that the earlier it is addressed the easier it is on the child.

[beenmum]

 I find it very difficult to times b/c dyslexia seems to have become a cathc all phrase for any LD that involves reading. So when I ask other parents on line."SO your child wriotes things backwards or loses their place while reading..." I will get "No, he cant read at a level 7 yet." or "He has trouble with knowing Piece from peace."

Here, its still ..the child writes letters backwards dx. Which of course is normal until about age 8 unless there is a known disability, then they often dx sooner.

[LauraLoo]

Reading with interest.  

I think that some of the confusion on what is and isn't an LD, and the approach depends on the US state that you live in.  For example, from what I understand, dyslexia is not recognized as an LD in the state of Washington, but it is in the state I live in.  However, in the state I live in, schools can not dx dyslexia because it requires a medical evaluation.  The schools can provide their own testing and implement a course of action, but they won't be able to label it "dyslexia" unless an outside eval. is done.

My son should have been dx'd with an LD in Kindergarten, but because the "mistakes" he was making then were age appropriate, they let it go despite the fact that it was not consistent with his cognitive abilities.  Four years down the road, he's making the same mistakes and we are now faced with going down a path of additional testing.  In the meantime, he has learned compensation techniques that are now failing him and his self-esteem is taking a huge hit.  I know that some people don't necessarily want a label too soon - and I get that.  The flip side is if a child needs some additional help and it's structured appropriate, it can be extremely helpful in keeping the child's sense of worth and esteem intact.  There's nothing worse than for a child to really be trying to the best of their abilities but be told that they aren't trying hard enough when something else is really going on.