the Halstead-Reitan Neuropsychological Test Battery & the revised Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children

Emery started his battery of tests today. It was a half day of testing today. We played hooky the rest of the day and went to Nordstrom. Seemed appropriate. He did incredibly well. I don't know if it's some ploy to put parents at ease, but they praised him up and down. The purpose of this is to rule out or confirm certain learning patterns, evaluate how he learns and to re-evaluate his Intelligence Quotient.

We've been through the Wechsler before and found his verbal IQ to be very high. Today he did some 'pre-college' work. I didn't ask the diagnostician, but it occurred to me, "Isn't everything pre-college?" I mean 1st grade is arguably pre-college. I tell you what, that is the kind of thinking that rendered me completely ineffectual on objective tests.

When we did the Wechsler at age 5, his performance IQ (read: everything that isn't verbal) was average or low. So, it was something to see about later. I didn't know there were 'non-verbal learning disabilities' but I'm the wiser now.

More and more I come to the conclusion that we don't have any of those issues staring us in the face. More and more I think we are just dealing with a gifted child who sees verbal gymnastics as games worth playing. I also struggle with how to raise children in this society where we have to teach them to be somewhat distrustful of adults and authority figures, and particularly adults who have opted to work with children: coaches and teachers are child molesters. So, how do you teach them to respect authority often but to question it when necessary using a judgment sensor that they just haven't developed. How to teach them to think, hmmm, something seems odd about this interaction - what does this adult person want from me? S/He's showing an inordinate interest in me...

It's a puzzle.