About 10 or so years ago I was told by my two's primary school teachers that a) D needed to write more, that he was bright enough but letting himself down by not writing enough, possibly lazy, and b) K was a daydreamer who could write more if she didn't spend so much time staring into space. Both kids were working at above 75% of the rest of the class so there was NO possibility of any special needs - ok, so you can see where this is going, eh.
Fast forward to 5 years or so ago, and after a year or two of home educating one or both of them the penny dropped that all wasn't well. I had many rows with D about his 'laziness'. In the end I took my concerns to my GP who referred us on to the community paediatrician - who complained that he was 'too old'. Maybe if school had said that things needed investigating then we would have been there years earlier, but hey I'm only a parent who expected the school to KNOW if things were a bit off.
D ended up with a diagnosis of dyspraxia (general motor clumsiness) and dysgraphia (issues with the mechanics of writing). We've since added some dyslexia to the mix as his spelling and pronunciation can be interesting/unique. He's happy as he has an Educational Psychologist (EP) report giving him permission to use a laptop in class and exams plus 25% extra time in exams.
K can be quite jealous of D getting my attention so at the time all his diagnostic work was going on I got a book out the library and read out some of the possible SpLD (Specific Learning Difficulties - not to be confused with learning disabilities) that were going on with him to help her understand why he needed my attention at that time. At one point I read out about Irlen Syndrome - where the written word flies around the page, rather than keeping still - and she said "You mean, writing doesn't fly around the page for you?" The poor girl thought it was normal for this to happen so, of course, she'd never mentioned it. Cue a visit to the optician for some colorimetry testing (using different colour lenses till you find out which colour makes the writing stay still) and £100+ for the right pair of glasses. Not long after, I took her out of school as she wasn't coping with changing classrooms and the work load.
K has always been 'different'. Even now I'm not sure which planet she's on but it's not always this one. Her take on reality is not typical either but she tries hard to stay in this one - when it becomes too much, look out! Anyway, K found cursive writing too hard. All those flicks and ticks to get in the right place, especially when you have to work out how to join it to the next letter in the word. So, once she was out of school, I 'made' her print instead. She was much happier, and even more so when I passed her my laptop and told her to do it that way. She thought we were cheating till I told her I'd rather she'd be able to edit it till it looked right without any 'messy' comments that her teachers were happily doling out. Besides, who'd know. Plus her confidence needed a boost, and the ability to produce good, neat work was important to us all.
K also qualified for 25% extra time and the use of a PC/laptop in exams. This enabled her to get a C at Cambridge IGCSE English (similar to the old English Language O-Level in content) a year early. I only entered her to give her a taste of what was required. We were all gobsmacked with her result. By 16 she had added Edexcel IGCSE Chemistry (C), Edexcel GCSE Maths (A) and OCR GCSE Biology (C) to her tally and off she went to college, full of nerves (lots of people) and high expectations (AS's in Double Science, Philosophy and ICT). She soon made friends and her confidence and self-esteem grew.
I'd pre-warned the college's Learning Support Unit (LSU) as to what to expect. They were willing to help her with support in and out the classroom, essay writing workshops, etc. Unfortunately K decided that she was fine and didn't need the help. In January K had a full EP assessment done which she told me suggested dyslexia and dyspraxia - no mention of the Asperger Syndrome which I suspected might be in there somewhere. At parents evening her teachers gave me the impression that whilst she wasn't A grade material, she wasn't totally useless either. Unfortunately her AS results brought her crashing down to Earth big time (an E and 2 U's).
So I have spent the last week holding her and drying her tears. She was ready to quit college because she was stupid (something I hadn't heard in a while). To be honest I was very worried about her, hence another reason it has been quiet on here. On Tuesday of this week she had her course choice morning at college. Whilst she was in the hall having some lecture or other (Welcome back, here's how to fill in your UCAS stuff, etc) I collared the head of LSU and asked if I could see K's EP report as I hadn't had a copy. She said that Kshould have had a copy to give me but for whatever reason I never saw it. Anyway, we sat and went through it (I have my copy now) and it was a real eye opener. K's verbal and non-verbal skills are up above 90% (as in 90% of people her age are equal or worse than her). Her processing skills (as in what her brain does with the information she reads/hears) is 2% (as in 98% of people her age are better than her at processing the information). That is one hell of a discrepancy - in fact, less than 1% of the population would have this size defecit. Bl**dy H*ll!!!
It's no wonder she made such a bad job of her exams. To be fair to the college the LSU are not allowed to frogmarch needy students into extra support, unlike at school where they can (but getting them to admit there's a problem in the first place is damn near impossible if you're smart with it). As it was explained to me recently, if you are predicted C's then schools won't bother as you're hitting the league table requirement. It's only if you are predicted D's/high E's will they make an effort to boost you to the magic C and that all important tick in the 5 A* - C box in the charts.
We are currently researching assistive software/hardware that will enable K to get the most from her next 2 years at college. She needs something(s) to help her organise her written work (intro, middle, end), take notes in class (dictaphone, pre-made notes from the teacher, notetaker in class), make sure she has correctly interpreted what she is supposed to be doing (class assistant, follow-up in LSU), and honest feedback from her class teachers instead of "oh, she's lovely". K has totally changed her courses. Now she is doing a Level 3 BTEC in IT (continuous assessments that she can re-write to improve) and AS Photography (she's decent with a camera but time will tell whether she's arty-farty enough). Both teachers are aware of her individual needs - one of the teachers is dyslexic too so says she understands (we'll see) - so I'm hoping that things will be better.
The college has a policy that for each subject you drop you have to replace it. The double award Applied Science counts as 2 courses so she was expected to replace it with 2 new AS's. The head of LSU and I both agreed that, for K, this was NOT an option. The head of LSU said that if the curriculum management team wouldn't budge then she would play the disability discrimination card and to send them to her if they were awkward. Needless to say, all is now well for K and she has replaced 4 AS's with the equivalent of 3 AS's plus plenty of time in the LSU for dyslexia assistance/confidence building/essay skills/show us what you're doing and we'll make sure you're on the right path help/etc.
The EP report suggests possible assistive stuff and we are looking to try before we buy. I'm also hoping the LSU might have some to play with. Now I've had time to digest the report I'll be contacting the head of LSU to see if I can get an appointment for a week on Tuesday (K has to go in to get her bus pass/timetable/etc) so that we can start the ball rolling on some of this stuff. I've looked it up on the internet and some of it seems a very good idea - shame it's so darned pricey, which is why I want to get K to try it first. If it really is going to benefit her she can have it, I'll make the necessary sacrifices, but I'm not forking out hundreds of pounds to find it doesn't help her.
So ladies and gentlemen, should you find yourself in the position I found myself in all those years ago - kids aren't producing the work at an appropriate level/volume but are very clever and therefore can't possibly have special needs (according to the teachers) - make sure you get them assessed. Fight the school, LA, go to your GP. Whatever you do, don't think that the teachers know what they're talking about.
I feel that, in a way, I wasted the 4 years K was home educated as I didn't push a lot of dyslexia therapy at her. With D, all he needed was an alternative recording method (typing) and he was able to play on a level field. With K, she needed more and I missed it! Don't let guilt get you.
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