What does "out of the box" mean ? To some it means "different", to others it may mean "strange" but to me it means "a blessing".
When my son was born, he was just like every other healthy baby that enters the world. He crawled on time, he walked on time, he spoke more at two than my first child did and he was considered part of "the norm". Once he entered pre-school some differences were noticed, not big ones just little things like he wouldn't listen as well as the others. But then again he was a 4 year old boy at the time. Kindergarten came and other differences were noticed. He again would not follow directions and almost seemed lost at times.
His kindergarten teacher brought "the differences" up to us at his conference with the forbidden words of "ADHD" !! I immediately teared up not knowing exactly why except the fact I was hearing something was wrong with my perfectly healthy child. The school counselor suggested we visit a testing center up at OHSU (Portland, OR). So, I made the appointment and watched my 5 year old boy go through six hours of testing. He met with a pediatrician, an audiologist, a psychologist and a speech therapist.
The testing was not only long but it was standardized. What does this mean? Well it means it is test that is given for every age up until about 95. So, for example my son (at 5 years old) was shown a map. He then was given this scenario "if you are on a bus and get off here (points to a spot on the map) and you are told to walk north, which way is that? " This is when my 5 yr old looked at the psychologist and asked "what?" The psychologist repeated the scenario, my son randomly puts his finger on the map and they move onto the next question. Of course my son answered incorrectly because he is FIVE ! The test did have SOME age appropriate questions but honestly I was sitting behind a mirrored wall wanting to scratch my way through it. First off the majority of the questions are absurd for a child and with six hours of anything (let alone testing) he was beyond tired.
We left the testing center and immediately went out for ice cream and a new toy. Four weeks later the results come back stating he has a processing delay.
So, what exactly is a processing delay? In a nutshell it means information enters his brain but it takes a different road to the memory banks. Can he learn, can he retain information? ABSOLUTELY ! So, after taking the results in, processing them myself and speaking to our pediatrician we agree speech therapy is a must. On we go to find the perfect speech therapist which we have been seeing for about two years. Speech therapy helps build his word banks and connects the dots (so to say) so his retrieval and his inputting of information is quicker. I truly have noticed a big difference but who's to say that is not due to maturity and development in conjunction with the therapy.
Along with the therapy came the ADHD medication. ADHD is a huge umbrella for issues such as processing. The medication can help with the focusing and "working memory" which my son has the most trouble with. Working memory can be described as this: imagine a table in front of you and everything you are working on at that moment (speaking, the subject, listening, ect) are on the table but every so often something falls off. This is working memory and the medication helps keep everything on the table and allows the focusing to occur.
I was the mom who said "I would never put my kids on drugs". Well here I am eating my words. I have seen drastic changes in my son over the last two years. He can focus, he raises his hand in class, and he doesn't seem "lost" in the classroom. It took quite some time to find the perfect drug and the perfect dose and it has to be monitored all the time. It is not a quick fix, you need therapy and you need to be teaching life skills along with the meds. My hope is by middle school he will be off of them and know how to adapt his environment for his learning needs.
So what learning needs am I talking about? He is learning at age 7 that he needs things written down (instructions) because his reading is above average (along with spelling and writing) and lists are things he can revisit. Verbal language moves very fast and is hard to hang onto at times. He also needs to sit in front of the class (less distractions) and he needs repetition more than anything. Pre-loading of information is another way of increasing his learning. All this means is I go into the teacher and ask what they will be learning the following week, let's say I find out they will be studying zebras, subtraction with borrowing, and in science they will be talking about leaves. So, I go home and start talking to him about all of these things, and introducing the subjects. He goes into class the following week with prior knowledge of what the class will be learning and this speeds up his processing time.
Having prior knowledge of a subject increases EVERYONE'S processing speed. If I was to go into a lecture and they were speaking of oceans, I would process this much faster than if I was listening to a lecture on neurosurgery, this is only because I have prior knowledge of oceans and basically no knowledge of neurosurgery. So the pre-loading of information is essential in my son's learning.
We recently had him retested with a psychologist who does more age appropriate tests, he was wonderful and was able to pull out my son's weaknesses along with all of his strengths. He provided a list of tools to help us help him learn and more than anything he told him how smart he really is.
So, where is the blessing in all of this ? It is this.......... my son has the funniest personality and his thinking is so random it is entertaining. He looks at everything with a different set of eyes that most people have. He sees things many of us don't notice and his humor is beyond his years. He laughs constantly and is honestly one of the sweetest boys you will ever meet. You would never know by looking at him or talking to him he has a processing delay, you would only notice his sweet smile and his wackiness that he loves to show to the world.
I can honestly say with all my heart, I love my "out of the box" thinker and would not want him any other way.
When my son was born, he was just like every other healthy baby that enters the world. He crawled on time, he walked on time, he spoke more at two than my first child did and he was considered part of "the norm". Once he entered pre-school some differences were noticed, not big ones just little things like he wouldn't listen as well as the others. But then again he was a 4 year old boy at the time. Kindergarten came and other differences were noticed. He again would not follow directions and almost seemed lost at times.
His kindergarten teacher brought "the differences" up to us at his conference with the forbidden words of "ADHD" !! I immediately teared up not knowing exactly why except the fact I was hearing something was wrong with my perfectly healthy child. The school counselor suggested we visit a testing center up at OHSU (Portland, OR). So, I made the appointment and watched my 5 year old boy go through six hours of testing. He met with a pediatrician, an audiologist, a psychologist and a speech therapist.
The testing was not only long but it was standardized. What does this mean? Well it means it is test that is given for every age up until about 95. So, for example my son (at 5 years old) was shown a map. He then was given this scenario "if you are on a bus and get off here (points to a spot on the map) and you are told to walk north, which way is that? " This is when my 5 yr old looked at the psychologist and asked "what?" The psychologist repeated the scenario, my son randomly puts his finger on the map and they move onto the next question. Of course my son answered incorrectly because he is FIVE ! The test did have SOME age appropriate questions but honestly I was sitting behind a mirrored wall wanting to scratch my way through it. First off the majority of the questions are absurd for a child and with six hours of anything (let alone testing) he was beyond tired.
We left the testing center and immediately went out for ice cream and a new toy. Four weeks later the results come back stating he has a processing delay.
So, what exactly is a processing delay? In a nutshell it means information enters his brain but it takes a different road to the memory banks. Can he learn, can he retain information? ABSOLUTELY ! So, after taking the results in, processing them myself and speaking to our pediatrician we agree speech therapy is a must. On we go to find the perfect speech therapist which we have been seeing for about two years. Speech therapy helps build his word banks and connects the dots (so to say) so his retrieval and his inputting of information is quicker. I truly have noticed a big difference but who's to say that is not due to maturity and development in conjunction with the therapy.
Along with the therapy came the ADHD medication. ADHD is a huge umbrella for issues such as processing. The medication can help with the focusing and "working memory" which my son has the most trouble with. Working memory can be described as this: imagine a table in front of you and everything you are working on at that moment (speaking, the subject, listening, ect) are on the table but every so often something falls off. This is working memory and the medication helps keep everything on the table and allows the focusing to occur.
I was the mom who said "I would never put my kids on drugs". Well here I am eating my words. I have seen drastic changes in my son over the last two years. He can focus, he raises his hand in class, and he doesn't seem "lost" in the classroom. It took quite some time to find the perfect drug and the perfect dose and it has to be monitored all the time. It is not a quick fix, you need therapy and you need to be teaching life skills along with the meds. My hope is by middle school he will be off of them and know how to adapt his environment for his learning needs.
So what learning needs am I talking about? He is learning at age 7 that he needs things written down (instructions) because his reading is above average (along with spelling and writing) and lists are things he can revisit. Verbal language moves very fast and is hard to hang onto at times. He also needs to sit in front of the class (less distractions) and he needs repetition more than anything. Pre-loading of information is another way of increasing his learning. All this means is I go into the teacher and ask what they will be learning the following week, let's say I find out they will be studying zebras, subtraction with borrowing, and in science they will be talking about leaves. So, I go home and start talking to him about all of these things, and introducing the subjects. He goes into class the following week with prior knowledge of what the class will be learning and this speeds up his processing time.
Having prior knowledge of a subject increases EVERYONE'S processing speed. If I was to go into a lecture and they were speaking of oceans, I would process this much faster than if I was listening to a lecture on neurosurgery, this is only because I have prior knowledge of oceans and basically no knowledge of neurosurgery. So the pre-loading of information is essential in my son's learning.
We recently had him retested with a psychologist who does more age appropriate tests, he was wonderful and was able to pull out my son's weaknesses along with all of his strengths. He provided a list of tools to help us help him learn and more than anything he told him how smart he really is.
So, where is the blessing in all of this ? It is this.......... my son has the funniest personality and his thinking is so random it is entertaining. He looks at everything with a different set of eyes that most people have. He sees things many of us don't notice and his humor is beyond his years. He laughs constantly and is honestly one of the sweetest boys you will ever meet. You would never know by looking at him or talking to him he has a processing delay, you would only notice his sweet smile and his wackiness that he loves to show to the world.
I can honestly say with all my heart, I love my "out of the box" thinker and would not want him any other way.
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