Question about Hyperlexia & intervention

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Question about Hyperlexia & intervention
2
Sat, 05-06-2006 - 7:34am

My DS (9) is PDD-nos (thinking more so on the Aspie side of things) -- have known since he was 4.5 years old that he was on the autism spect. -- I suspect now that he is hyperlexic -- never had him tested for hyperlexia but sure seems like he fits the bill (ie: has always been obsessed with numbers and letters -- ask him how old you are based on the year of your birth and he will tell you -- has done that since around the age of 5 or ask him to recite his ABC backwards and he can do that too -- always read from the time he was around 4 -- never spoke full sentences until around 3.5 -- which put him in the PDD-nos bucket) Anyway, you get the idea.

Finally getting to the root of my question. What other services would they offer us if Adam were dx as hyperlexic? Right now he will be going into 4th grade, will be in a normal mainstream class without an aide (first time since kindergarten) just discharged from OT because he is off the charts -- but will be working with a consulatant teacher on autism (worked with her this year and wow what a huge difference) -- he will have a push in from the Special Ed teacher but really just for observation purposes only -- also school counseling 1x 30 min. per week. His teacher for 4th grade has a 5 year old son that is PDD-nos and is so similar to Adam we felt and she felt that she would be the most logical teacher for 4th grade -- I hope she is right -- she is currently going for her masters in spec. ed and knows more than most do about the spectrum. I think we have a good fit. Sorry, back to my inital question -- with all that the school is offering us now, should I push for anything else for Adam? I don't really know what else could be given to us if we had a dual dx of hyperlexia. Right now I feel we are in a great position for Adam to only grow from here -- he is extremely smart and is maturing so much. His outbursts are few and far between anymore -- we do have him on Tenex due to suspecision of ADHD that a dr dx with biofeedback -- I think that the Tenex controls the impulsive feelings that Adam may have. 4mg seems to do the trick and only seems to make him more tired around bedtime.

Anyway, if any of you can offer me suggestions on the subject, I would love to hear them. I have been living this for so long -- I just seem used to it and we keep taking it one day at a time and diffus any situations we might come up against.

Thank you all for taking the time to read my post!

Amy

Amy
 
iVillage Member
Registered: 10-03-2004
Sat, 05-06-2006 - 11:09am

Dear Amy,

Hi and welcome. Our kids sound alot alike, although we have him in a small private special needs school for bright, high-functioning kids instead of mainstreamed. Our ds (9 this summer) is also PDD-NOS/hyperlexic. But as hyperlexia is not a recognized educational dx category, I suspect if you got that dx added, you would not see any additional services. I'm not sure what services you would want added for him at this point.

It does sound like things are going very well for him educationally. Now in the upper grades, the demands for independent thinking and planning will be higher and the work itself will be more challenging. I sure do understand your worry, but with educators who know what they are doing and pay attention to where he needs help, he should continue to do well. The support at his school sounds terrific!

You don't mention how he does socially with the other kids in his class, which would be my worry more than how my son would do academically in mainstreaming. As our kids gets older and other children's social skills leap ahead, having friends and keeping up with interactions becomes the bigger issue, IMO. This is one area we feel better about with ds' school, as social skills is an integrated constant part of the curriculum.

Anyways, others here will know more, but I have never heard of a hyperlexia dx getting more services than a PDD-NOS, etc. And services, of course, should be based on the individual needs of a child, not the dx.

Stick around, I'd love to hear more about how things are going. My son has lots of very neat friends just like him, the coolest kids on the planet!

Sara
ilovemalcolm

iVillage Member
Registered: 03-26-2003
Sat, 05-06-2006 - 11:42am

That sounds alot like my DD Cait. She was language delayed and didn't speak in coherent sentences until she was about 4 or so. Started having conversations at 5. At 3-4 she would say things like "Blue lunch want I" meaning she wanted lunch on a blue plate, and "white truck yellow house" which meant she wanted my friend with the white truck to come to our house (yellow). Woe to me if I couldn't figure those out which often took me a while and a meltdown. She is also hyperlexic. I always thought she fit the discription of semantic pragmatic disorder as well.

Her language "caught up" to within normal limits by 7 and she was re-daignosed with Aspergers. I think that is in part due to the fact that we had a new neuro who had never seen Cait with the language delay.

The only thing that looking into hyperlexia will help that I know of is in treatment planning and understanding. For instance, many kids with hyperlexia have comprehension skills behind what thier decoding skills are. So he may need some supports in reading comprehension. Also, kids who are hyperlexic tend to be very visual and so when making modifications to the classroom they need lots of visual structure.

Cait was mainstreamed up to 6th grade. She still is for academics but is in a specialized Asperger program so is considered full inclusion special day class.

When Cait got to 5th grade things really started to get tough because of the visual verses auditory thing. In the upper grades there is alot more auditory information than visual and it can really be a challenge for this kind of kid. Don't know that you need a hyperlexia diagnosis per se. It isn't a medical dx but rather a speech/langauge dx. But with the understanding that this is how he learns it may help to get him more visual supports vs. auditory if it ends up a problem.

Renee

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