[warriorprincess]

My daughter, 7, has never been to school. I am becoming convinced she has a minor LD. My reasearch suggest she has dysgrahpia. Her ability to express things in writing is not congruent with her reading level or her verbal expression. I myself have an LD (I was diagnosed with discalculia in 9th grade) and I know they run in families. A large part of me feels she deserves to be evaluated and recieve services, but I am wary of putting her in the system. Note: even with insurance, I can't afford independent evaluation and therapy. The co-pays would require us to pull her form ballet, which I would never do ( evenb if I had to give up eating to afford her classes!). I would appreciate any insight.

 

[Lillian J]

First thing I'd do would be to google "dysgraphia," and see what resources are available outside of the system - like good books and free resources that can give you tools to work with. The Gift of Dyslexia, for instance, has been a wonderful took for a lot of people - and cost under $20. There might very well be such resources for dysgraphia.

Although, it would be my inclination to wait till she's 8 or 9 to see whether it's simply a developmental issue that works itself out.

Lillian

 

[warriorprincess]

Thanks for the book recce.

My instincts are really warring here so it's a tough decision.

 

[Lillian J]

We are literally almost out the door for our trip, but I just had another thought. An educational consultant - and I think she might have been an occupational therapist, as I remember - who is retired now but used to give talks all over California, after working in many schools, used to say that the most effective thing she'd seen for improving handwriting was to regularly swing from hand to hand along a row of monkey bars!

Off and running - Lillian

 

[Dar]

I would wait. There are a lot of developmental skills involved in writing that aren't necessary for reading and speaking. In my experience, it's typical for children who read well at young ages to not be able to express things in writing at anywhere near the same level of complexity, and often they're not interested in writing more simple things. My daughter had some fine motor issues and really did almost no writing until she was 10 or 11, although she read well at an early age. When she finally did begin writing her language skills were on par with her reading ability - her very first piece of writing was the beginning of an intricate novel, and her second piece was the beginning of a script for a rock-musical based on a David Bowie album.

I personally would not diagnose learning disabilities in children under about 10, or perhaps 12. Many of them seem to disappear by then... you can encourage keyboarding, and fine-motor activities like working with legos or clay, and you can encourage your daughter to dictate to you... but I wouldn't do more than that.

For the record, I was a special ed teacher with a specialization in LD, and my younger brother was labeled as LD all through school... and I firmly believe that had he been given a few more years to mature, he would have outgrown it by 12. As it was, he was in his early twenties.

dar

 

[warriorprincess]

Thanks again for the insight.
I really like the swinging on monkey bars idea.