test for dyslexia???

Here in WA state the school psychologist will test for
Specific Learning Disability in Reading and Writing.

They will not test for dyslexia as they state that it is a medical term
and SLDRW is the educational term.

All a matter of semantics.

When we wanted to get a better handle on our son's
disability we (on the advice of a school pyschologist
friend) took our son to a neuro-psychologist.

The neuro-psychologist diagnosed him as
developmentally dyslexic, meaning he was born
this way and did not become dyslexic due to an
injury to the brain.

He administered several different tests. The testing
went on for a couple of days. He then brought us
in and we discussed his strong points and his weak
points.

Like many dyslexics he scored very high on things
dealing with spacial design, applications in 3-D, high
in math. The NP was very impressed with our son's
ability to hold a complex design in his memory and
reproduce it almost flawlessly 10, then 20 minutes
later.
It was worth the test to be able to point those things
out to our son. Getting placed in honors math probably
saved him this year. (Moral of the story, really build
on the child's strengths.)

The NP ended the report with several suggestions that
are familiar to many of us - strong, sequencial instruction
in phonemic awarenss - how letters combine to make sounds,
and in a multi sensory approach.

A good book to read is DYSLEXIA, RESEARCH AND RESOURCE GUIDE
by Carol Sullivan Spafford and George S. Grosser. Published by Allyn & Bacon
(Simon and Schuster CO.) 1996
and
THE HUMAN SIDE OF DYSLEXIA by Shirley Kurnoff
Published by London Universal, 2000 (which I ordered from this LD website).

Anne

I live in the SE corner of the state.

The doctor we saw is in Richland, WA.

His name is Dr. Scott D. Grewe. Younger man, very good
with our son and was willing to come talk to the staff if
we wished him to.

Phone number is 509-943-1091

The cost was $1200. And covered by our
insurance (thank goodness!).

Anne

Helping Children Overcome Learning Difficulties by Jerome Rosner, Published by Walker and Company discusses the tests used to discover if a child has visual or auditory processing deficits (i.e.. TVAS-testing visual analysis skills and Auditory Perceptual Skills test, etc.) The appendix has sample tests that a parent could use.