Auditory Processing Disorder

Dear RS,
I have 2 boys, not twins, and my oldest had auditory processing delays that we did not address until he was 9 (prior to 3rd grade, he was doing well in school and was bright enough to slip by unoticed.) At 9 years of age, his auditory proc. was equivalent to a 7 year old. Upon entering 3rd Grade his teacher was noticing problems in the classroom, and soon after, I began to acknowledge there was indeed a problem. After MUCH research of all the learning centers, speaking with counselors and our pediatrician, I discovered a program in Pineville called Learning Rx.

The owner, Dr. Vicki Parker, tested my son and we discovered that not only did he have an auditory processing delay, but he also had significant delays in his short term and long term memory, and most likely dyslexia. Our son entered their 6 month program and gained 3.9 years in his auditory processing and 2.2 years gain in his auditory working memory!!!....in just 6 months! He also gained 4.0 - 5.4 years in Auditory Processing Blends & Segmenting. You should also know that Dr. Parker's background prior to Learning Rx is in Speech Pathology! She has been an incredible resource for my two sons. We began the program last summer and graduated in January. My son maintained A/B Honor Roll the entire year, passed the EOGs, and received The Most Improved Fourth Grader from his school for Union Co.

Every child is different with special needs, but I know first hand that Learning Rx was our solution. They offer a free seminar once a month, and this also gave me a discount on the initial testing. They have worked with ADD, ADHD, Autism, brain injury, and many other cognition related issues. Everyone at Learning Rx is patient, caring and want the very best for every child and will go to any measure to help you & your sons.

Best of luck,
MMM

There is something called Integrated Listening Systems (try googling it and you can read about it on their website) which is based on the Tomatis method. My daughter is currently using this (for sensory processing disorder) so I can't yet speak to its effect (she just started). I will tell you it is supposedly WONDERFUL. There is a doctor in Colorado named Ron Minson who specializes in this and I"m sure he would speak to you by phone about this. If you want his number please feel free to contact me. Good luck!

I used to be a special education teacher. In our school we used a software called "earobics" to help kids with auditory processing difficulties. The kids thought it was a lot fo fun and made great progress.

My son who is 18 was diagnosed with Auditory Processing.He was also speech delayed as well as having to go to speech classes. He had a hard time with Language Arts in school and it caught up with him in second grade. He ended up staying back in second grade. At that time, I had him tested through the public school, ending with an Individualized Education Plan (IEP). This helped with the school as they are required to do things for those students with IEP's. I also had him tested by several others, Doctor's Vision, ECU, and Huntington. We ended up spending 2.5 years at Huntington where they took him all the way back to the beginning with phonics and I credit them for the success. It was a bit expensive, but when you weigh the outcome of not having done it, there is no choice. If you would like more detail on where I went for these tests, feel free to contact me. I recommend for your son to attend as public school as they HAVE to abide by specific laws for children with disablities. We also did a few years of private but they do not HAVE to abide by the laws. You may find one that works well or has the means to have specialized teachers. My experience has been when there are financial issues in private schools, those teachers are the first to go. My son has grown out of a lot of his problems which was stated when he was younger. I hope this happens for you. Best of luck.

Hi RS,
My daughter has auditory processing and memory difficulties. Some of the fall out of this is difficulty listening quickly the teacher can be on direction three and the child is still processing direction number one. Also, about 75% of the time auditory processing deficits are the root cause in reading deficits. The positive part is that auditory processing deficits responds very well to cognitive training and aggressive auditory discrimination, identification and manipulation work. My daughter is doing well overall in school now and her reading has sky rocketed! Besides being a parent I am a speech language pathologist. Best wishes.

V. Parker, Ph.D. CCC-SLP
Director, Learning Rx - Charlotte
www.learningrx.com/charlotte

My son did 3 years of Speech therapy and Auditory processing training. We bought "Ear-robics" for our computer at home, and I enrolled him in a private school that taught phonics instead of whole word. The worksheets the speech teacher used were mainly command type, "Put an x on the bear with the purple flower". She would then work up to more than one command at a time or with more than one defining characteristic" Put an x on the bear with the purple flower and circle the bear with the red flower", or " Draw a box around the bear that has a purple flower, red shoes, and is not wearing a hat". Being in speech, he was already learning the sounds for the letters, so that reinforced the auditory processing. It's so important that you are addressing this because it can impact their ability to read as well as their reading/listening comprehension skills many years down the road. My son is now 10 and going into 5th grade. When the teacher reads books in class, I make sure he has his own copy to follow along. In sports, I notice that he doesn't take oral instruction as well, either. I still notice the lag occasionally, but I feel like it is more due to him not being an auditory learner than a lag.

Yes...my son who is 6 years old has Auditory Processing Disorder. He also has a problem with focusing in school since he is unable to filter out background noises. We tried everything naturally, including fish oil and L-theanine chewable vitamins which can help with anxiety and focus. The only thing that has truly worked for us is a program called Learning RX which is an intense program to activate the part of the brain that is inactive right now.This is not tutoring...it is a series of one on one activities done with a trainer and it is wonderful. If you want to learn more, you can google Learning Rx. It is amazing that he can work with lots of distractions...seeing is believing. God Bless... By the way, Auditory processing is a look a like to ADD or ADHD...you cannot medicate for this but these programs can really help with Brain Training.