Low IQ - how is it manifested?Hi Micki, Thanks for sharing your thoughts. At the moment we're only providing him with logopedics and kinesitherapy (both 2x / week) while he's staying mainstream in preschool. Socially he's doing a lot better now at age 5 than at age 3, when he was often on his own in the schoolyard, walking around aimlessly. Now he's mostly with the other kids, although a lot of the time he's having one way conversations. He seems to have developed coping mechanisms himself, one of the obvious ones is copying what the other kids are doing. This year he's receiving birthday party invites from some of his classmates, which I think is very encouraging. He struggles at school to keep up, but at least he's socially accepted by the other kids (they all started out together at age 2.5) and some of them in his class are helping him when he has difficulty. The big problem is that he needs to pass a standardized test this year to be allowed into what I guess you would call kindergarten in the US. He's not going to make it. There are 2 options: 1/ We hold him back one year 2/ Send him to a special school He would really benefit from a special school, but the big problem is that the best local school for kids with learning disabilities is private and requires an IQ > 100. As most kids with normal IQs are mainstreamed, the special public schools tend to have children with IQs < 75 which means the level would be (too) easy for him. So we're leaning towards holding him back one year, but we fear the effect that's going to have on him. And will he be able to pass the test next year? We don't know.
High verbal-low cognitive is associated with Fragile X, was my first thought. My second is ... sometimes "low IQ" is NOT "detectable" on its own! A clinician friend of mine recently saw a patient and detected .. nothing cognitive, at all. Only after the visit, when she was reviewing history, did she read mention that the pt had a diagnosis of mild MR. ALSO, I heartily agree with Micki -- kids' IQ's can vary a great deal over time! I have seen arguments out there to the contrary ... IMHO, it is typically associated with a racist agenda, though.  Hi all, I have a 5-year old son who has been diagnosed with ASS, by two independent hospitals. I have several questions but I don't really know where to turn to, so I'm hoping some of you would be so kind to share your opinion. First of all, my son's behavior has never manifested the most common of autistic behaviors, namely the clear need for structure and routine. He's happy to just jump into the car and go with us to a crowded place he's never been before, showing his normal behavior the whole way. He doesn't have any rituals or specific routines he thinks are important. He's just happy with whatever. Does anyone here have autistic kids like this or is it really uncommon? Second of all, he's been diagnosed as having a low IQ (75), with cognitive 70 and verbal 86. This is based on specific testing for children with development disorders. However, although without any doubt he's now behind in his development compared to his peers in most areas, up until age 2.5 he had hit all the developmental milestones despite being raised bilingual. He seems to lack a 'natural' sense of how things work, which his NT sister doesn't have. For example, it took a long time for him to start matching shoes to the right foot and he still occasionally gets it wrong. When asked to do an exercise he has trouble following directions, like avoiding the walls with his pen when drawing a line through a maze. Because he's such a scatterbrain, it's really difficult to tell whether at the basis of this is his great difficulty at concentrating (autism?) or low IQ. Thanks for sharing your views... D's dad
Hi - first -my son is like that. He always struck me as really go-with-the-flow. He loves going out different places, did not mind moving several times, never asked for routines or structure, never created any structure himself like lining up toys. He is almost 10 now and I have come to realize that despite all that he does better in a structured environment. He is now in a more structured school and in many ways he is doing much better. I would have never predicted that when he was five. From what I read kids with asd fall into three groups as far as structure: when there is little predictability some kids (probably most) become very rigid and focused on rituals some kids withdraw into themselves and some kids become random. My kid is the third kind and when he is in a new situation he might 'like it' but his movements and behaviors (and thoughts) are much more random and unconnected. As far as IQ - not only is it hard to assess in kids that are not typical , even in typical kids it is hard to get something accurate before mid-elementary age. I am not sure what IQ test they used but kids with asd are unique in that they often have a large scatter of cognitive strength and weaknesses that many tests do not capture and that make their IQ appear lower than it is. Kids who just have a cognitive delay test pretty uniformly flat. Even beyond that IQ is somewhat fluid depending on how a child developes or how interventions affect a child IQ can change over the years. I have read from parent here that their childs IQ has gone up (or gone lower) significantly over the years. So try not to worry too much about the IQ yet -look where your son needs help and get him the right interventions -he likely will surprise you in what he can do. Coping other kids is how all kids learn, our kids just tend to do it later and that you son is able to learn and connect with typical kids just by being around them is a great sign. Not all kids with asd can learn that way, many need to be taught those skills specifically. What are you thinking of holding him back for? You could look at wrightslaw.com (a website about special education law) under retention. I believe they discourage it because it lowers the bar for the child as well as the services the district has to provide , it takes a year off services for transition and any gains do not last past three years. However there are some parents here who have held their child back in K and felt that those three years gave their child an opportunity to increase sef-esteem and connect. It all depends on your child and his needs. If you feel that the private school would be a great option you could ask for an IQ excetion -I believe I read a book by Dana Buchanan whose daughter has severe learning disabilities with an IQ that would test very low but she still did very well in schools that initially did not want to take her because of the lower IQ. I would be sure that the school has experience with asd since it requires some teaching skills that are different from teaching typical kids with a learning disability. Autism is social communication blindness... some kids overstep boundaries and others rely routines. The big problem is that he needs to pass a standardized test this year to be allowed into what I guess you would call kindergarten in the US. You can choose to give permission for a standardized test to be done. The educational system is legally mandated to provide LRE. Their "disallow" is only a matter of opinion and not upholdable by law; not allowing a child into a kindergarten is a violation of his civil rights UNLESS you agree with their opinion. IQ is not a concrete number and is subjective - it is directly inline with opportunities and goes up and down. Binet the guy who invented the IQ test also included rules of appropriate use (which are widely ignored) 1. the test score doesn't define innate ability or is permanent 2. it's a rough guide for identifying children who may need extra help not for ranking them. 3. low scores don't mean the child is incapable. Just some added trivia about IQ testing: the US Public Health Service report of low IQ effected congress in passing a law restricting immigration from low IQ countries which included Italians, Russians and others . 83 percent of Jewish people were classified as being feebleminded much to their detriment when fleeing Germany. Havard's study of million army recruits found that "white" americans had avg IQ of 13 yr olds - 1 year above "moron". They were also smarter than "darker" ppl.
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