Joy-Anna Duggar Opens up About Son's Learning Ability Struggles

Joy-Anna Forsyth (originally Duggar) gets vulnerable as she gives her fans an update on her son Gideon's learning skills after she shares he was "little bit behind" on the family's YouTube Channel FollowtheForsyths. "We went ahead and scheduled a screening test for Gideon," the young mom said in the video uploaded on Feb. 19, noting that the parents would be taking their son to visit a specialist for some answers. "For a few months now, I've kind of had a few concerns about his learning. I feel like he's a little bit behind."

She goes on to admit that "it's not great to compare him to other kids" when evaluating her toddler's abilities. "I also know he's 3 years old and I don't want to, like, have too high of expectations, but I just want for my peace of mind and for him, to go get it checked out," she said.

The expert performing the cognitive screening on 3-year-old Gideon is the Duggar's family friend. "I know my sister Jessa took her son Henry into get screened about a year and a half ago," Joy added. "He was a little bit behind, but they took him in a year later and she had used all the different tips that our friend had told her to do, and he was, like, ahead, [and] doing great."

Upon finishing his examination, Forsyth recorded his results saying he "did really well with expressive [language]." Though, she mentions his receptive language "could use a little bit of sharpening." She and the instructor then went over helpful exercises to help work on building his weaker skills.

Last December, the Counting On alum opened up about homeschooling both Gideon and her 1-year-old daughter Evelyn, going through the list of their regular lessons. "We normally sing the alphabet song, say our numbers, shapes, and colors," she said. Gideon, she noted, "learned his shapes really quickly," but was "still struggling a little" with some of his other shapes.

"We've been talking a lot about goals for this next year, what our plans are," she said on her Instagram Story in December 2021. "Something we decided to do this next year is at the beginning of each month we're going to talk about our goals for that month, and I think that'll help us stay more motivated on our long-term goals as well."