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Pervasive Developmental Disorder (PDD)-not otherwise specified?
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<blockquote data-quote="Marguerite" data-source="post: 16845" data-attributes="member: 1991"><p>Lisa, first post on page 2 - she said it was a board-certified neuropsychologist.</p><p></p><p>But I do agree, unless we document stuff we forget some of the worst we've endured. I like to go back and read difficult child 3's old diaries, to remember just how much progress he's made so far.</p><p></p><p>Myfirstandlast, I do understand your not telling him his IQ. I've only recently told my (now adult) children. I remember when easy child was on a Gifted & Talented Enrichment weekend and was being hassled by another kid who was telling everyone his IQ and demanding to know theirs - because she didn't know hers, she couldn't tell him. She was angry with me for not giving her the information so she could have responded to him, but I explained to her (she WAS only 10 or 11) that comparing IQ scores is just plain wrong. I told her that this kid should clearly never have been told because he was abusing that knowledge. If she had known, and replied, SHE would have also been abusing her knowledge.</p><p>Intelligence is not a weapon.</p><p>I asked her what this kid claimed his IQ to be, and she said, "120." I just laughed. I couldn't help it. "You definitely had nothing to worry about," I told her. The poor lad she had met had been bragging about an IQ that was probably the lowest at the weekend school, a tutor really should have taken him aside and sorted him out.</p><p></p><p>I was talking to easy child 2/difficult child 2 this weekend about IQ scores and how, once you get much over 120, the scores are increasingly inaccurate. I first met this in my own school days - we had been graded according to IQ results, we were told (a very old-fashioned idea) but it was policy to never tell us our scores. The head teacher told us that all it was relevant for us to know was that everyone in the class was 120+. "Above 120," he said, "the scores stop making sense. Beyond this point you're all on the same playing field."</p><p></p><p>I explained it to easy child 2/difficult child 2 (because she is going to have to deal with this in her studies now). When IQ tests were first developed, they simply went to a lot of schools (full of nice, normal, kiddies) and applies their draft tests. They had no expectations as to how they would score - there was no "pass-fail" expectation. They simply graded the results of all the kids they tested. Normal, average kids. Extremely normal, if you think about it, because back in those days kids with intellectual disabilities, physical handicaps or anything outside the normal range were simply not found in mainstream schools.</p><p></p><p>They graded the results. Some kids scored low, some scored high. This was all analysed statistically. And when you analyse something statistically, you sometimes get the occasional odd result. What you generally get, and what they would have got this time, was a classic bell curve. The test would have been 'tweaked' until they DID get a bell curve, the peak of the curve matching IQ 100, by definition.</p><p>With a bell curve, anything too far from the middle score (more than I think 2 standard deviations, but I am a bit rusty) would be ignored as an anomaly. Example: you're testing Grade 3 kids to see how far they can shotput. But somewhere in your testing, the shotput coach, a former Olympian, has a turn. His score would be WAY outside the normal range and should be ignored.</p><p></p><p>This method of testing is all well and good, if what you aim to do is grade like with like and put all kids with matching IQ scores into the same class. But if you try to read too much into it, it simply doesn't stand up to that degree of scrutiny.</p><p>There are many reasons why IQ testing can fail. The biggest reason is if a child scores too far outside the expected range for his age. This can happen with an exceptionally bright child; with a child who has splinter skills but is being tested at a very young age (some of the tests reserved for older children will show up major discrepancies); or the test has not been administered under controlled conditions.</p><p>I remember as a kid, I read ahead in my maths textbook one day because I was bored (really bored). A few days later I was being tested by a psychologist - he showed me some simple diagrams and I had to pick the one which matched the word. Simply because I had read ahead, I managed to answer several questions more than I felt I should have been able to. Then the tester's reaction of awed surprise made me feel like a freakish prodigy and I was motivated to really concentrate to see more of this reaction.</p><p></p><p>Basically, abnormally high OR abnormally low results are outside the parameters of the original tests. Therefore that can be seen as an indication, but the numbers themselves are meaningless. getting full marks in an IQ test tells us nothing about what the person CAN'T do. And frankly, proper testing needs to find the LIMITS of a person's ability, to have any chance of a meaningful result. No limits (or no results at all) - no valid result.</p><p></p><p>If you apply the IQ tests to someone who doesn't speak English for example, or a deaf child, or a blind child, you will find an invalid result. In many cases, testing a child with learning problems is about as valid as testing a child who doesn't speak English.</p><p></p><p>More tests are being developed all the time, to try to get around these problems. And this is a good thing - the better understanding we have of our children's limits, the more we can help them overcome those limits and move out and beyond.</p><p></p><p>It was a high IQ score that justified easy child 2/difficult child 2's early enrolment in school. With hindsight, she should have been tested later and encouraged to repeat a year, six years later. Her early test failed to pick up her learning problems and her high intelligence made it easier for her to mask these problems for longer. This has made it much harder to help her, and now at 20 she is where she could have been and should have been three years ago, if only we had got her the help she needed. But we didn't know - the high IQ test result fooled everybody.</p><p></p><p>In Australia we don't have the same definition of the word "genius". I'm not even sure we HAVE a strict definition. We don't apply the label to our kids, but I gather if we were in the US, all four would qualify, based on their (I believe, invalid) IQ score.</p><p></p><p>Marg</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="Marguerite, post: 16845, member: 1991"] Lisa, first post on page 2 - she said it was a board-certified neuropsychologist. But I do agree, unless we document stuff we forget some of the worst we've endured. I like to go back and read difficult child 3's old diaries, to remember just how much progress he's made so far. Myfirstandlast, I do understand your not telling him his IQ. I've only recently told my (now adult) children. I remember when easy child was on a Gifted & Talented Enrichment weekend and was being hassled by another kid who was telling everyone his IQ and demanding to know theirs - because she didn't know hers, she couldn't tell him. She was angry with me for not giving her the information so she could have responded to him, but I explained to her (she WAS only 10 or 11) that comparing IQ scores is just plain wrong. I told her that this kid should clearly never have been told because he was abusing that knowledge. If she had known, and replied, SHE would have also been abusing her knowledge. Intelligence is not a weapon. I asked her what this kid claimed his IQ to be, and she said, "120." I just laughed. I couldn't help it. "You definitely had nothing to worry about," I told her. The poor lad she had met had been bragging about an IQ that was probably the lowest at the weekend school, a tutor really should have taken him aside and sorted him out. I was talking to easy child 2/difficult child 2 this weekend about IQ scores and how, once you get much over 120, the scores are increasingly inaccurate. I first met this in my own school days - we had been graded according to IQ results, we were told (a very old-fashioned idea) but it was policy to never tell us our scores. The head teacher told us that all it was relevant for us to know was that everyone in the class was 120+. "Above 120," he said, "the scores stop making sense. Beyond this point you're all on the same playing field." I explained it to easy child 2/difficult child 2 (because she is going to have to deal with this in her studies now). When IQ tests were first developed, they simply went to a lot of schools (full of nice, normal, kiddies) and applies their draft tests. They had no expectations as to how they would score - there was no "pass-fail" expectation. They simply graded the results of all the kids they tested. Normal, average kids. Extremely normal, if you think about it, because back in those days kids with intellectual disabilities, physical handicaps or anything outside the normal range were simply not found in mainstream schools. They graded the results. Some kids scored low, some scored high. This was all analysed statistically. And when you analyse something statistically, you sometimes get the occasional odd result. What you generally get, and what they would have got this time, was a classic bell curve. The test would have been 'tweaked' until they DID get a bell curve, the peak of the curve matching IQ 100, by definition. With a bell curve, anything too far from the middle score (more than I think 2 standard deviations, but I am a bit rusty) would be ignored as an anomaly. Example: you're testing Grade 3 kids to see how far they can shotput. But somewhere in your testing, the shotput coach, a former Olympian, has a turn. His score would be WAY outside the normal range and should be ignored. This method of testing is all well and good, if what you aim to do is grade like with like and put all kids with matching IQ scores into the same class. But if you try to read too much into it, it simply doesn't stand up to that degree of scrutiny. There are many reasons why IQ testing can fail. The biggest reason is if a child scores too far outside the expected range for his age. This can happen with an exceptionally bright child; with a child who has splinter skills but is being tested at a very young age (some of the tests reserved for older children will show up major discrepancies); or the test has not been administered under controlled conditions. I remember as a kid, I read ahead in my maths textbook one day because I was bored (really bored). A few days later I was being tested by a psychologist - he showed me some simple diagrams and I had to pick the one which matched the word. Simply because I had read ahead, I managed to answer several questions more than I felt I should have been able to. Then the tester's reaction of awed surprise made me feel like a freakish prodigy and I was motivated to really concentrate to see more of this reaction. Basically, abnormally high OR abnormally low results are outside the parameters of the original tests. Therefore that can be seen as an indication, but the numbers themselves are meaningless. getting full marks in an IQ test tells us nothing about what the person CAN'T do. And frankly, proper testing needs to find the LIMITS of a person's ability, to have any chance of a meaningful result. No limits (or no results at all) - no valid result. If you apply the IQ tests to someone who doesn't speak English for example, or a deaf child, or a blind child, you will find an invalid result. In many cases, testing a child with learning problems is about as valid as testing a child who doesn't speak English. More tests are being developed all the time, to try to get around these problems. And this is a good thing - the better understanding we have of our children's limits, the more we can help them overcome those limits and move out and beyond. It was a high IQ score that justified easy child 2/difficult child 2's early enrolment in school. With hindsight, she should have been tested later and encouraged to repeat a year, six years later. Her early test failed to pick up her learning problems and her high intelligence made it easier for her to mask these problems for longer. This has made it much harder to help her, and now at 20 she is where she could have been and should have been three years ago, if only we had got her the help she needed. But we didn't know - the high IQ test result fooled everybody. In Australia we don't have the same definition of the word "genius". I'm not even sure we HAVE a strict definition. We don't apply the label to our kids, but I gather if we were in the US, all four would qualify, based on their (I believe, invalid) IQ score. Marg [/QUOTE]
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