“How our Kids Learn, Part B: The controversy over learning disabilities and extended time” – with Dr. Marla Baum PsyD

Dr. Fox: Welcome to today’s episode of “Healthful Woman,” a podcast designed to explore topics and women’s health at all stages of life. I am your host, Dr. Nathan Fox, an OBGYN and maternal-fetal medicine specialist practicing in New York City. At “Healthful Woman,” I speak with leaders in the field to help you learn more about women’s health, pregnancy, and wellness.

 

All right. We’re back with Dr. Marla Baum who is a child neuropsychologist who was just recently on our podcast talking about her past and how she came to become a psychologist and a child psychologist and what neuropsychological testing is and why parents would do it, and we had a really interesting conversation about that. And I said, “Marla, doing it again. Welcome back.”

 

Dr. Baum: My pleasure. My pleasure.

 

Dr. Fox: Excellent. I wanted to jump right in to where we were before. And the first thing I just wanna ask you is, all right, so I’m the parent I’m listening to this. I’ve got a couple of kids at home. No one’s ever mentioned to me anything about neuropsychological testing. My kid seems to be doing okay in school. I don’t know, she could be doing better in this or whatever. How would I know if I need to bring my child to you? Is it something that I should be looking for or only just wait if the school mentioned something? Who would need to come for this testing if no one told them about it?

 

Dr. Baum: That’s a great question. If you don’t get direct guidance from someone at school or one of the doctors that you take your kids to, if you don’t get direct guidance but you just have a sense that something’s off, or wrong, or something “not clicking,” you know, that could often mean that there’s something that the child very well may be compensating for up to a certain point. What I tend to find is that a lot of times those kids do hit some sort of wall at some point where it really impacts them. So, you know, you can look at your child’s report card, you can see if there are real peaks and valleys and how they do. Like, for example, if they always do really great in reading but their math scores are not where at the same level that they should be at, because, you know, theoretically a child is supposed to achieve sort of generally the same across domain.

 

So if you see real peaks and valleys in your child’s report cards or how they view on statewide standardized tests that they give in the public schools or the ERB tests that they give in the private schools, those are really good possible indications. I mean, those are really good sources that you can look at to see if there maybe is something going on, but, you know, a lot of times parents come in and they just say something’s not clicking. And they can’t articulate it. And they’re not sure what it is, but they have what I call mommy sense, which is something I learned from another colleague. It’s a great term because parents, they usually know their kids really well. And if they see that something’s not clicking, that can often mean that there’s something going on and it would at least more the conversation to see if there’s something we need to pursue.

 

The other main things that parents should look out for is if the child is very distressed about school. There are a lot of kids out there that will do fine in school but then they come home and they’re weepy, or they’re anxious, or, you know, they’re just irritable, not regulating themselves well. Sometimes that’s a signal that maybe something is going on for them during their day that’s hard for them. And, you know, these kids, they have to go to school and do all the work, whether they’re good at it or not, you don’t get to self-select what you wanna study until college So you could be, you know, not a strong math student, but yet you still have to push through and you have to go every day and think it, and do the work. And if that’s stressful, that could lead to some, you know, possible anxiety and things like that. So I would look for that last though.

 

And then the last thing I would say is if teachers say, you know, they’re really distractible, they’re really not paying attention, that to me is a real flag that there’s something going on. It might not be an attentional issue. The kid can be going through a lot of different things and it wouldn’t look like an attention issue. There’s oftentimes where you come in with a possible attention issue, and it’s something else entirely, and the child is just trying to deflect the attention off themselves in the classroom by being goofy or impulsive. So, you know, those types of things that just don’t seem right, “could often really be an indicator that something’s going on.”

 

Dr. Fox: Right. Now, if the school has a school psychologist, that would be the first person to turn to. Correct?

 

Dr. Baum: Yeah.

 

Dr. Fox: Excellent. Yeah. And if the school does not have a school psychologist and parents feel like there isn’t a person in the school who is either capable or willing to, or whoever has the time to discuss this, then maybe they would seek out someone like you directly.

 

Dr. Baum: Yeah. Or, you know, a lot of pediatricians, especially in New York, but, you know, pediatricians, they all have lists of psychologists that they refer to and the pediatricians are usually really good at teasing out, you know, if this is something real that, you know, might warrant some further evaluation and intervention. So if you don’t have someone in the school, either the school psychologist or sometimes the schools will have clinical social workers and staff or the head of the learning support services at the school, those are usually good places to start. But, you know, I think the listener should just know that if your child is in public school, my understanding is that they are really not supposed to recommend something like a neuropsychological evaluation for different political reasons, but besides that, you know, people…in private schools and outside the New York City public schools, I think the schools are much more able to, you know, refer for a neuropsychological evaluation. So if your child’s in public school in New York City, I would start with the child study team, you know, whoever is there that’s in charge of services for the children in the school.

 

Dr. Fox: Got it. And then I was curious what your thoughts were. Let’s take cost out of the equation. Let’s say this were free. Is there any reason why every child shouldn’t have neuropsychological testing? Like is there a downside to it potentially? Or is it something that like, yeah, it’d be great if every kid got it, but who has the time who has the money type of thing?

 

Dr. Baum: Right. So the thing is, is that these evaluations are very comprehensive and they peel apart every skill that the child needs in order to be able to learn. So if you test every child, you are gonna see some variability. At some point, there will be something that will be challenging for that. Now, if there was no reason for referral, so to speak, there was no presenting problem, it could be good information to have, but, you know, it’s sort of like those cancer screenings, like if you’re healthy, do you go find the information or do you, you know, live until you have a symptom and then you see what’s going on. It’s the same, it’s the same sort of thing. You know, I’ve had some parents come in that they just want a good study on who their child is as a learner. And that’s completely fine. But if your child’s not outwardly having any sort of issue, I don’t think it’s something you necessarily have to put them through. I mean, the kids will find it mostly very reinforcing, you know, it’s just something a lot of time out of school for some people it’s cost-prohibitive. So I wouldn’t recommend it unless there’s, you know, a specific issue.

 

Dr. Fox: Okay. I guess that makes sense. And what you said before is actually gonna lead to my next series of questions. And I think this is such an interesting topic. And, you know, all of us who are parents now and are living in the world today, we all know that there is a truth that compared to when we were kids, there are so many more kids with diagnoses right now than… Like we’re going up, no one had anything, right? You were either allergic to peanuts or you weren’t, and that was it. Right?

 

Dr. Baum: Right.

 

Dr. Fox: And now everyone’s got something. And so my question is, you know, people look at that differently. Some people say it’s great, some people lament that, you know, everyone’s got their own view, but do you think it’s a function of more testing or is it…or have kids changed or has the school or the world changed that’s sort of bringing these out? Like, why do you think that is? I’m curious because you’re in the middle of it. So what do you think?

 

Dr. Baum: Yeah. So my perspective is like, when you and I were growing up, you know, I, myself got flagged for, you know, some reading comprehension issues and I remember going to this room in the back of the cafeteria at our school Navy and sitting with one of the learning specialists. and doing some work on reading comprehension strategies.

 

Dr. Fox: Yeah. I had the same thing but it was all behavior. Like this kid can read great, but he’s a pain in the ass. And so we got to deal with this behavior. I actually had to go to speech therapy. You know why? Because I talk too much. I needed therapy to tell me to shut up. So and I said, “You know what? I’m gonna grow up and I’m gonna get a podcast. I’m gonna turn this into a strength.”

 

Dr. Baum: There you go. There you go, Natie.[SP] See, it’s always about finding your strengths and using them.

 

Dr. Fox: No joke. I talk too much and they send me to speech therapy. Genius.

 

Dr. Baum: You know, I think what ended up happening is that there is this piece of legislation called the IDEA Act, the idea act. IDEA Act is basically put into law that schools are required to support children with disabilities, whether they’re learning disabilities or medical or physical disability. So I think what came out of that is this push to have to document which kids need help and which ones don’t, which then, you know, got the psychologists involved because we are the ones who have, you know, we have authority over the domain of testing. So, you know, we have all of these standardized measures. Many of them have been around since the ’50s and, of course, they get re-norm and updated by our ethical code. They have to get updated every 10 years. And so we had to start to assess kids in order to identify what these learning issues were and, you know, what qualifies as a learning disability in terms of the statistical analysis or a clinical interpretation of the data, and then schools became responsible for providing the services and then over time it’s evolved and I definitely think, you know, people are more apt to test their kids now and identify what the issues are. But I also find that kids end up feeling more empowered in school because they’re actually getting the help that they need. You know, I know plenty of kids, as I think some of them were your friends maybe in our high school and definitely some of my friends that, you know, they definitely had attentional deficit, but when we were growing up, there was nothing to really do about it except punish them.

 

Dr. Fox: Punish them. Right.

 

Dr. Baum: That really engendered a real sense of shame about these learning issues. And, you know, I’ll be sitting in my office with parents and they’ll say, “Yeah, but you know, I got through it. I got through it.” And I’ll say, “Well, how did you feel about yourself when you were going through school?” And they would say, “I felt very badly about myself. I didn’t really feel very effective.” So I think that a lot of what we’re doing here is really just helping kids realize that there are different ways to learn. And, you know, certain schools are better than others or more able than others to differentiate and individualize for a child, how they learn and, you know, it’s really just to protect their kid’s self-concept.

 

Dr. Fox: So you’re saying that basically if we went back in time to when you and I were in elementary school and we tested the same number of kids we would probably have the same number of diagnoses as we have today?

 

Dr. Baum: Yes. So like when it comes to the autism community, a lot of people say, “Well, are there really more kids with autism, or are we testing more?” My theory is that there’s a combination of multiple factors.

 

Dr. Fox: It could be both.

 

Dr. Baum: Yeah. I think it’s both. You know, when you go looking for things, you find things. It’s the general rule of thumb and a lot of what we do. But the idea is, is whatever you find, you know, is it impinging on the child’s functioning to a marked degree where you wanna intervene so that they don’t become unduly stressed or they don’t lose their self-esteem as a learner, as a student. So, you know, we’re testing more, but, you know, my personal opinion is that the kids are better for it because they get a sense of who they are as a learner and what their strengths are and what their weaknesses are and they use those strengths to compensate.

 

Dr. Fox: Maybe some of the discomfort people have with it nowadays for those who do have discomfort is the idea that… What you’re describing is just sort of variation in how people learn. And everyone has strengths and everyone’s weaknesses and they’re sort of identifying it, but like you said, it sort of has to get labeled as a disability and that calling, you know, someone who’s weak in a certain aspect of reading, let’s say, to now like label that as disabled, I think some people get uneasy with that concept. And when we were kids, you know, you weren’t disabled, you just, you know, something was harder for you. And some of it is semantics, obviously, but I think that… And it’s understandable, you’re saying, because you need to have that label in order to qualify for services and there’s like reasons to have that label. But I think that maybe some of the language that’s used is why there’s a disconnect maybe between the people who think it’s a good thing versus people who think it’s a bad thing.

 

Dr. Baum: That’s interesting. So, yeah. I have a couple of comments on that. So yeah, there’s definitely a lot of people, our age, a lot of parents out there that think that there’s a real stigma to being labeled. Now, in my experience, the only reason I use diagnoses, per se, is for insurance purposes and applications to special schools because they need to sort of know on a broad level what types of applicants they’re getting. Otherwise, it’s more about what are the child’s strengths, what are the child’s weaknesses? What is getting in their way of achieving and how can we overcome it? The labels themselves, I agree with you, they’re mostly semantic and a lot of parents are worried about the label per se, but when they see their child get the support that they need, stress about the stigma starts to melt away because the child is happy and they’re achieving, and they feel productive, and they feel effective when they’re going to school every day.

 

Dr. Fox: Yeah. I don’t see the kids as finding a stigma, I mean, I look at, you know, my kids…our kids are all varying ages and them and all their friends, they’re all very open about this. No, it’s not a stigma for the kids, it’s only stigma for the parents. We’re the ones who need the remediation because we’re all the crazy ones. I mean, the kids are very open and they’re very…I don’t wanna say happy, but I think that they do feel some sort of validation that, yeah, there’s a reason I’m struggling. This is the reason, I’m working on it. And they’re quite open with each other typically about all of this.

 

Dr. Baum: Yeah. And, you know, it’s funny because every now and then there will be a parent in my office that even if they have their own mixed feelings about what’s going on with their child, they can usually put that aside and still do what they need to do for their kids. And if they have their own feelings about it, you know, we can address that. You know, sometimes I’ll talk to the parents two or three times after the testing is done because they just need some help sort of coming to accept this, right? I really worry about the parents that can’t put their own feelings about it aside and just do what they need to do for their kid because of their own block, because there’s something that they’re worried about in terms of the stigma. But again, it doesn’t happen that often, but unfortunately I have seen it happen. And it’s sad for me to see. The parents that are open about their feelings, about the stigma and whatever the implications are of the results of the testing, as long as they’re open about it and they can put it aside in order to give their kid what they need though, that’s the best way for parents to cope with the process.

 

Dr. Fox: And I think one of the interesting things, and this is something that I learned from my wife, you know, in her professional sort of experience is that a lot of this sometimes is also just a function of the environment. And what I mean by that is, you know, you can have a child who has, you know, an average or high average, or, you know, a totally normal IQ and testing and this, but it’s only difficult when they’re put in a very competitive and challenging school system, right? Sometimes you go to school and they expect, you know, whether it’s a dual curriculum or longer hours, or they really push the kids, and so for that child in that school it’s gonna seem like he or she has, you know, “a disability.” But if they go to a different school where they’re sort of learning at the same level, they’re gonna achieve and, you know, feel great about themselves. And so that’s a choice the parents have to make, what school do they want their child in.

 

Dr. Baum: Yeah. I’ve had that conversation with multiple families over the years, that there’s actually nothing wrong with your child, they’re just being asked to achieve two and three grade levels above what developmentally they’re supposed to be doing. So some colleagues of mine have coined the term a curriculum disability, but there’s not that there’s anything wrong with the child, it’s just the school is pushing them to achieve two and three years ahead of what their brains are supposed to be doing, and therefore there’s a problem.

 

Dr. Fox: Right. It’s like someone doesn’t get through Navy seal training, it doesn’t mean they’re out of shape. It just means they can’t get through Navy seal training. Like that’s, you know, most normal people can’t.

 

Dr. Baum: Exactly.

 

Dr. Fox: I also wanted to touch on, and it’s the same conversation, obviously, is extra time. Right? And I know this comes up all the time and the idea that certain children, based on either testing with someone like you or for whatever reason, qualify to get extra time when they take tests in school or on standardized tests, or for projects, or other, what we call accommodations. Can you just sort of explain, you know, how does that work? Who gets those? Who qualifies to those? Why would someone qualify versus not qualify? And then we’ll talk about sort of all of the meta-conversation about this afterwards.

 

Dr. Baum: You know, this is a controversial topic, really hot topic. [Inaudible 00:19:27]

 

Dr. Fox: Camera. That’s why we’re here, man, this podcast. We’re doing it.

 

Dr. Baum: The thing is about extended time. Some kids are deserving of extended time because of learning issues that they have. Some kids are deserving of extended time because of emotional issues that they have. I think the biggest issue that has really muddied the waters in this field in this particular issue with extended time, is that… And it’s really the board of Ed, whether in New York or New Jersey, I’ve seen it constantly in New Jersey also, that no matter what the child is presenting with in elementary school that might necessitate an evaluation and some services, they always get extended time as just part of the package from the board of education. So what ends up happening is that all of these kids that maybe don’t need it are granted it, you know, kids with ADHD, so to speak, for example. You know, the board of Ed, like in Bergen County, for example, where I also have an office and where I live, the board of Ed automatically gives extended time to any kid that presents with a problem.

 

And a lot of times the kids don’t need extended time and that’s not what’s going on and that’s not what’s gonna help them, but they are now slated as deserving of it. And so that ends up being a problem when a kid comes along with a real learning disability and also needs it, and it breeds a lot of tension and competition amongst the parents, “Well, but your kid could have spend time, mine cannot.” You know, “Could my kids benefit from it?”The idea about extended time is that you can give kids all the time in the world and if they don’t do any better on whatever the task is, even with extra time, then they’re not deserving of extended time. That’s my clinical opinion. Unfortunately, this issue has gotten really murky and yucky because the board of education is just giving it to every kid that has any sort of issue. In my opinion, if your child does okay at a time test but with extended time does better, that to me is something to potentially pursue because with extended time they were able to do better. Whereas like, let’s take the SAT, let’s take the reading comprehension portion of the SAT. If you’re a bright child but you can’t finish within the time and with extra time you finished and you’re able to show what you can do, then I think that makes you a candidate for extended time. Whereas you might have someone that finishes and they might not benefit from getting extended time, those kids should not be getting extended time.

 

Dr. Fox: But why would they want extended time? I mean, why would it be an issue if they’re granted extended time if it doesn’t help them?

 

Dr. Baum: Well, that’s exactly the issue for me. If extended time doesn’t help the child, then that’s not what the child’s issue is and they shouldn’t be getting it.

 

Dr. Fox: This is a really…I mean, as you said, it’s a hot topic. I always tell my kids, like based on the number of kids of extra time, I think it’d be easier to just give everybody more time and take the few kids who are really high achievers and give them less time. Say, “You, you qualify for less time. You know, you get to finish quickly.”

 

Dr. Baum: Exactly. But what is this issue of time? Why are we…

 

Dr. Fox: Yeah. Why do we care so much? I think that there’s two sort of separate issues and I think one issue is sort of the, you know, the ethics of it and sort of the idea of who has access to this and maybe some kids get it because their parents paid for testing and another kid got it because their parent’s a little more savvy about it or another kid got it because they went to a psychologist who’s more lenient about, you know, recommending it. So there is this sort of idea of like justice, like maybe that there’s an unfair distribution of which kids get it and which kids don’t get it. And that’s its own conversation, and I think it’s a problem, but that’s its own conversation. But I think there’s a second conversation about even if it were completely fair, so to speak, like all those problems were, you know, solved, just the idea of why do we care how much time it takes, like for most tasks that we have to do in life, you’re not timed. And so it seems to me like why wouldn’t all tests be untimed unless you’re being tested for something that needs to be done quickly? So, for example, like if I were to do a, like an aptitude test for doctors, you know, doing something quickly would really only matter if they’re gonna become like a trauma surgeon or an emergency room physician. Whereas if they’re gonna become a radiologist or pathologist, who cares if it takes more time? Like what’s the difference? Or, you know, someone’s going to law school. If you’re a trial attorney, you probably have to think on your feet quicker than if you’re a tax attorney. And so for the first, you definitely need to know who can do it quickly and for the latter, you don’t care. So I think that the tests have been timed, I think for logistical purposes, like you need to have some sort of time limit, otherwise, kids will sit there all day, but the fact, that like exactly who cares? Just let everyone have extra time.

 

Dr. Baum: I agree with you completely. The only profession that you really need to be fast are exactly what you said, trauma, doctors, air traffic controllers, pilots…

 

Dr. Fox: Right. You don’t want anyone with extra time in that job.

 

Dr. Baum: Right. You don’t wanna sell a processor who’s controlling the air traffic over JFK. So this issue have kind of come up because we have these standardized tests and, you know, so what happens is that kids with dyslexia can’t read quickly. So they’re at an actual disadvantage because they can’t finish because of their dyslexia. And then if they can’t finish and they don’t score as well, that can have implications for where they get into high school, where they get into college and whatnot. So this was born out of… This whole thing was born out of a really, really legitimate issue, which is that kids with learning disabilities and sometimes with language processing issues are really added disadvantage in these situations because they don’t work quickly. They need more time.

 

Dr. Fox: But they’re not at a disadvantage sort of for other things. I mean, that the tests that they’re using as the gatekeeper is the disadvantage, but they can do just as well when they get into college because they have time to do stuff.

 

Dr. Baum: Yeah. But I do also find that these kids, they do need some help in terms of figuring out where to spend their time, what to focus on, where to cut corners. Like there are some things that they need to know for their life. If they’re gonna be a trial attorney, they’re gonna need a lot of help with time management so that they’re not up all night writing their, you know, the briefs and whatever. So the issue, it’s gotten very muddy because, you know, almost any medical doctor can write a letter saying, “Please give the child extended time because of A, or B, or C.” And because of the Individual Disability Educational Act, the IDEA act, if there is a documented disability…

 

Dr. Fox: They have to grant it.

 

Dr. Baum: They have to grant it. They have to grant it. And sometimes it’s very legitimate. It can be, you know, a child that has like a traumatic brain injury and all the, you know, all of a sudden needs extended time because they’re gonna get headaches and have other sort of symptoms if they’re pushed too hard. You know, those situations, you know, they all make sense. But I agree with you, there are very few things that we actually need to do quickly in this world.

 

Dr. Fox: Right. I have a friend who works for the College Board and the college board oversees, you know, SATs and, you know, AP tests. And I asked them this question. I said like, “What’s the deal?” And he said, “For us, we’d be perfectly fine making the SAT unlimited time.” He’s said, “We don’t really care how much time people have.” He said, “It’s purely logistical.” He said, “Because if, you know, you’re talking about, you know, a million-plus people are taking this test and if you have the test is all day, you need to have twice as much time proctored.” Right? So the clause money and you’re gonna have to probably provide lunch for kids. And he said, “It’s a big deal to double the time of the test or triple the time of the test. It may have to be over several days.” And he goes, “It’s a tremendous clause.” And he said, “And that’s right now, the main reason they don’t…” Which is why they’re very…I don’t wanna say relaxed, but they don’t fight too much the extra time because it sounds like they care from an educational perspective, it has to be… And it’s interesting because I think a lot of people recognize this, but like in school, how would you do that? How would you say, “Okay, you have a math test? Take as much time as you want.” But like, “Well, I got chemistry and 45 minutes, I need to finish it.” And I think that there’s a lot of logistics that have to be worked out in order to do that and maybe we just have to change how we assess kids. I don’t know.

 

Dr. Baum: Maybe. You know, I’ve also told many parents that, you know, they come in thinking the child needs extended time and I’ll say, you know, “Based on the results, that’s not what’s gonna help your child. What’s actually gonna help your child in their life is to actually learn how to take a test in a more organized way.” There’s other strategies besides extended time. You know, everyone just thinks, “Oh, you have all the time in the world. You can do it.” It’s not the case for a lot of kids. You can have all the time in the world but if you don’t know how to take a test, you’re not gonna do well no matter what. So it’s not this panacea that everyone thinks it is.

 

Dr. Fox: Good word. I like that.

 

Dr. Baum: Oh, thank you. Yeah. You know, it’s not a panacea. It doesn’t solve all the problems. And if you ask me, it can actually train kids to not be efficient. It is important to be efficient in this world no matter what we do. You know, you have to be able to do things quickly enough because we don’t always have the luxury of all the time in the world. You know, it’s a little bit different than what we were just saying, but, you know, it’s not necessarily always gonna be so great for the kids to have the extended time.

 

Dr. Fox: Right. I mean, it’s obviously somewhere in the middle of those two. You can’t take forever to do things, but you shouldn’t always be pressured for time. It’s sort of that balance. Do you find, just in your clinical work and in your experience, do you find a lot of parents who are trying to game the system, or do you think that just, this is the system and that’s how the chips fall?

 

Dr. Baum: I have definitely encountered parents that try to gain the system. I have encountered pants where I recommend that they don’t need it, but yet the school grants it two weeks later and I don’t know why, you know? There are definitely parents that try to game the system and they’re not helping, they’re not helping the situation. I can’t blame them because, you know, parents wanna do whatever they can do to support their child’s success. So the intentions are usually good, but it doesn’t actually help their child. I’m thinking of one case, in particular, he didn’t need it. He didn’t need it. I told him he didn’t need it. It wasn’t recommended in the report, but I don’t know what they said to the school or whatnot, and the kid got it. And I think the kid’s gonna be worse off for it because he’s not actually learning anything about, you know, how to be more effective, how to be more efficient.

 

So I definitely think parents game the system, especially in New York City, you know? I think there’s a lot of competition. You know, Manhattan is a very unique place in terms of education for children and, you know, there’s a lot of competition and there’s a lot of wealth and that can lead to some real, you know, discrepancies or lack of assessability, like what you were saying before. I’m sure there are parents that have written checks to schools in order to get their kids what they want for that. You know, it happens. Most of the time it’s legitimate and most of the times the parents, you know, they really just wanna know, what is it that’s going on? And it’s not, you know, they get extended time or not, as long as they know what’s going on and what the child needs, you know, then it usually works out fine.

 

Dr. Fox: I just think it’s so fascinating because so many people talk about this and like I said before, I think it’s fascinating because, on the one hand, there’s the issue of, you know, whether it’s being done fairly, for lack of a better term. And that’s a huge issue and people talk about that and argue about that. But again, I just think on a higher level, this idea we’re talking about, whether it’s even appropriate to have this metric on tests, of finishing it in a certain amount of time. And maybe in some instances, it is the right thing to do and in some instances, it’s not the right thing to do. And I think that, you know, we’ve been, you know, the way my kids take tests is the same way we took tests. And you got to think some things…we’ve learned something since we were kids, right? And maybe that has to change in how we view evaluations and assessments and testing in general. And even if you wanna change on the third level, how do you do it? Like practically, it’s very hard.

 

Dr. Fox: I’ll give you one example of like…to compare two different situations. So child number one has a significant dyslexia. Very, very difficult to decode, very disfluent when they can decode. That type of child, I feel very strongly should get extra time because they would be at an undue disadvantage because they just can’t get through the test fast enough versus child number two, who has an anxiety disorder who is so obsessive about every question that they’re doing and that’s what’s causing them to run out of time, I do not think that type of child should get extended time because all that’s gonna do is give the child the chance to ruminate and obsess more. And from an anxiety disorder standpoint, that’s the exact opposite of what you wanna do for the child. So that child, I would not recommend extended time, I would recommend therapy to learn how to contain their anxiety so they don’t get into an obsessive loop in the middle of a test.

 

Then there are some clinicians in some schools that feel, and that’s like a cultural thing. Some schools feel they don’t want this kid under such distress and they would rather give them the extended time so that they stay calm and they don’t have a panic attack, you know? But I think there’s room, I think there’s room to work with the school in that instance, and, you know, come up with a way to assess the child while you’re trying to, you know, teach them how to not ruminate and obsess over each test question and eat up all their time. So, you know, that’s just one example of how it can be really appropriate versus really not appropriate. But, you know, sometimes it’s about the school personnel and what they think and sometimes it’s literally about the numbers and if the school already has, you know, too many kids for their quota getting extended time, then maybe they would have to say no, you know? There’s so many factors involved and it’s… I agree with you. It really might be this sort of self-induced, you know, sort of thing, because for most things in life, you can have more time. There are very few jobs where you just have to be so fast. So why are we valuing speed so much? You can be the fastest person in the world but if you can’t learn, then like what’s the point that you can do it quickly?

 

Dr. Fox: Right. It would seem to me that the ideal sort of standard…if you’re gonna do a standardized test, and there’s reasons to say not to do them, but let’s say you’re gonna do them, is to sort of have like, you know, the four sections, you know, one is reading, one is math, one is, let’s say, whatever, logic or something and the fourth one is speed. And so you get assessed in all four and okay, and so kids know, like there are certain things I do well and, you know, because I’m not timed and there’s other things, you know, in terms of speed where I don’t function. Other kids function very well in speed, but maybe not with the others. And it just seems like it’s another measure of, you know, how they’re gonna perform, and when they get shuffled together, you have to…we spend all this time trying to separate them apart because we put them together to begin with.

 

Dr. Baum: That’s right. No, actually on the IQ tests, it is separate. Those are two of the five factors. One of them is processing speed, another one is, you know, your actual abilities in the verbal domain and yeah, they’re different cognitive functions. So if you ask me, you know, we shouldn’t be worrying about speed so much unless it’s from like an efficiency standpoint like a logistical issue, like what your friend at the college board was saying. You know, only if the… Like I, for example, I am a slow processor. I’m a slow reader. You know, I knew that I couldn’t go into a profession that I have to read very quickly. I would not be able to do that. You know, if you don’t have good special skills, you shouldn’t be an architect. You know, if you don’t have good hand-eye coordination, you’re gonna have the trouble being an athlete. You know, to me, it’s more about learning who you are and what you can do. And this time issue has really, all it’s really done is engender a lot of stress and a lot of tension. And it should really, in my opinion, be reserved for those kids with significant learning challenges that is just not fair to ask them to read as quickly as the kid that doesn’t have an issue reading quickly, because what are you measuring? Are you measuring speed or are you measuring ability? I think that goes back to what you’re saying. You know, what are these tests really about? Do you have to be fast in order to have an ability?

 

Dr. Fox: Marla, that’s awesome. You’re the best. I’m so glad to know you.

 

Dr. Baum: Aw. This feeling is incredibly mutual for sure.

 

Dr. Fox: Wonderful. Thank you so much for coming on and spending all this time talking to me.

 

Dr. Baum: You’re welcome. Thank you for inviting me.

 

Dr. Fox: Wonderful. So, Marla, you are a psychologist. You practice on the upper west side and in Cresskill New Jersey and you have a website which is www.drmarlabaum.com. That’s D-R-M-A-R-L-A-B-A-U-M.com. And obviously, if anyone’s local and wants to see you, they can find you through your website. And I obviously look forward to seeing you around town.

 

Dr. Baum: Wonderful. Thanks for having me, Natie.[SP]

 

Dr. Fox: Thank you for listening to the “Healthful Woman” podcast. To learn more about our podcast, please visit our website at www.healthfulwoman.com. That’s H-E-A-L-T-H-F-U-L-W-O-M-A-N.com. If you have any questions about this podcast or any other topic you would like us to address, please feel free to email us at hw@helpfulwoman.com. Have a great day.

 

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