Wibu to pull my daughter from certain classes

I think there are a rash of issues to address here

1. Your own diagnosis and experience - you need to separate this from your daughters and deal with it yourself and not conflate the two
2. The ADHD - OK you spotted it first, the school were slower (more evidence based perhaps?)
3. English negative comments - poor and should be more balanced - HOWEVER the outcome has been a recognition of ADHD markers and possibly steps towards sorting a diagnosis. SO in some ways by highlighting things the English Teacher is with you on the assessment of your child. I would feedback about the comments and the impact you think they are having but also recognise that they have been the source of the schools eyes being opened and build on that and get them to stand with you to get other stuff sorted. I would try and use the English Teacher as an ally, but still feedback objectively the impact her phrasing of the comments has had.
4. You need to drive the school to come up with a plan for DD for recognition of her issues and struggles, a diagnosis process, some support.

You need to keep yourself strong and objective in this and unemotional

This is what I'm increasingly seeing at work with younger colleagues. Their lack of resilience is ultimately making them very unhappy because they feel they have a "right" for everything to be as they wish but the real world isn't obliging. So it's a vicious circle.

What do you consider a demotivating comment?

Does she have a different teacher for English? I don’t understand why the negative comments would be there only in one subject. Her ADHD wouldn’t be noticeable in just one subject (I have a child with ADHD).

Stay on the nhs pathway - it will prob take forever as do so over subscribed (use chose and book anywhere in country to get shortest referral time) - if she ever needs meds or mh support - a nhs diagnosis and access to camhs / psychiatrist will save you a fortune. And being ‘in the system’ helps.

in the meantime - beg, borrow or steal (joking but you get the point - somehow find the money) to get a decent private neurodevelopmental assessment . (Not just adhd - someone looking at the whole picture not just a yes or no to one diagnosis esp. as co-morbidities are so common) Use someone recognised in field / who also works for nhs . The sooner you know for sure what you are dealing with - the sooner you will have a report with recommendations and strategies that you can take to the school and ask them to implement.

ask senco to get her assessed by Ed psychologist- if she is academically able they will resist this referal - schools often only get x amount of referrals to the La Ed Pschyologist and they will prioritise the least achieving / most acting our children. Not fair but with limited resources it is the way of the world. Push hard for why she needs this assessment. I would again also look to pursue a private Ed psych assessment as information is power and will help you and the school to help her.

ask senco to put her on special needs register and ask for regular meetings with targets etc to support her around time management / concentration etc if the adhd is affecting her completing work.

personally I would not stay at a school that I feel are not listening. Moving one of my children with sen with the best thing we ever did for them as the previous school would not listen (even though there was reports coming out of our ears as they had a statement - now EHCplan.). They treated her terribly and ignored all the specialists recommendations / they didn’t want a child like mine in their perfect / high achieving school. I moved her to another local school who embraced her and did all they could to help her to learn and thrive. Sometimes you have to cut your loses and go elsewhere as some places you are just banging your head against a brick wall.

try parent parent ship (SENDIASS ) at La to get parental support with talking to school / going to meetings.

sos sen and ipsea are both superb sen charities - both websites have copious amounts of info on their re sen law / how to get support and both have helplines you can phone. Both gave me amazing advice (was a while ago as mine are grown up now - but they helped us so much)

no one cares for your daughter like you do. You have to be prepared to fight for her - not by being rude - but by being calm and assertive - asking for the right things and following up to get them implemented.

e.g. On camhs waiting list for assessment? Have you told them you will happily take a short notice cancellation. Are you calling them regularly to ask where she is in the list? Have you highlighted if she is deteriorating in anyway (e.g. if self esteem plummeting or behaviour getting worse…) no one else will push for things in the way you can. school will have countless children they have concerns about and 1 senco can only do so much chasing… you can be her greatest advocate by highlighting concerns and asking for support for her.

sen Suoport is meant to be based on need not diagnosis but we all know a diagnosis tends to make schools sit up a bit more than vague concerns. Currently you have no diagnosis - pursue one. But also highlight concerns - don’t go on about ‘suspected adhd’ - they will discount you as it is only your opinion. (However right you may be). Highlight your concerns with ‘time management, staying on task, messy hsndwriting, blurting out answers in class…’ whatever the concerns are - name them - if and when a diagnosis comes you can agree then it is part of ‘adhd’ but for the moment ficus do let in what she is struggling with and more importantly how and what they are doing to help her.

@PepaWepa I think you might be overreacting. you don't say what kind of "negative comments" are in the book so it's hard to know whether this is a real problem.

The school is praising her verbally.

Schools often provide WWW and EBI after pieces of work. WWW (what went well) and EBI (even better if) tell the pupil what went well and then give them feedback to improve. Does your school do this? If so that is normal and other schools will be the same.

Assuming she is just being given EBI feedback, then this feedback is how pupils improve. If she is not getting enough work done in the time then they do need to tell her (and you). Otherwise she will think that slow pace is acceptable, which will affect her whole education. Also year 3 is a step up from year 2; expectations are going to be higher.

Its not the top 5%. Around 20% of kids get greater depth and in some schools over 50% of kids get greater depth in their yr6 sats.

I wonder if parents think about what this results in in 20 years time. As a former manager I saw this time and time again - demand from employees for special arrangements, special treatment, lack of resilience. Imagine not being able to provide feedback on what someone did wrong. These were not the people who progressed in their career and they were never happy.

It won't even be a question of 'not going' to the English lesson as, in year 3, it will be in the same room and the same teacher.

1 you have no right to withdrawn her from anything other than RE & sex ed

2 how do you think it would work? In primary school English is taught daily- are you going in to withdraw her & and supervise her?

3 have you thought about the impact on her psychologically from being the only child in the school withdrawn from this subject

I think there is a degree to which you are projecting your experience of school onto your daughter which is not helpful to either of you - you need to sort that out.

Make an appointment with the senco & class teacher to discuss your child & their needs & how you can support the school & her.

What you see as negative comments could, in fact, provide a trail of evidence that point to ADHD. Before anything happens regarding a diagnosis the teacher will be asked what they have done already and they can say they have repeatedly asked her to sit and finish her work or whatever the comments are. Everything in school needs 'evidence' these days. Regardless of this, the school marking policy probably requires a comment as to how the child's work can be improved, there will be a similar, targetted comment in every child's book.

You can’t “remove her” from English. Imagine the chaos if every parent did this. What do you envision? Telling your daughter to just not go to her English lesson? And go where exactly? You’re being ridiculous and the school won’t tolerate it for 5 seconds. If you don’t like the school, find another school. Not to mention that drawing attention to her by ‘removing’ her from a class will likely single her out for bullying.

Tbh, I think you’re projecting some of your unresolved issues on your daughter, is it you who wishes that you had been removed from English lessons? My first point would be for you to seek councilling for yourself a round this. I get it, I really do. I have late diagnosed adhd and it’s very easy to have anger snd frustration over what might have been if you had been diagnosed and treated appropriately.

The next step is to discuss this with the senco and your daughters GP. Can you afford a private referral? If so speak with your GP over what would be recognised in your local area. What outcome do you want? Do you want medication or just recognition for educational purposes?

My thoughts exactly... and also maybe using this as a lesson for you DD in resilience?
She will probably come across much harsher comments in her life than what you might have seen in her book...

If she is only in year 3 it would have been highly unlikely for school to have highlighted ADHD concerns before then unless they were really serious. When children are younger lots of them show ADHD traits so it’s only really age 6 or 7 onwards that things may start to really show and then it needs to be observed and recorded before school will raise alarm bells.

Well could you answer what the comments were and why they were so demotivating?

And it’s all well and good to say “I just want my child to be happy” but if you don’t have the requisite grades, including in English, the job market is largely closed off and many people in minimum wage jobs are not happy or fulfilled. She sounds very bright with her reading so it would be awful to deprive her of the opportunity to do well at school and the undeniable benefits that will bring for her in life.

She hits greater depth but she could be extending things more. Her writing could be even better, she could write longer pieces with more detail rather than procrastinate starting, rushing and writing half of what she could do. She could get 100% on maths questions rather than always forgetting to complete a question or two or skimming the question etc.

I appreciate with 30 children in a class she's not a priority but it is frustrating when you can see she could be so much better if she could just focus. And I suspect it'll catch up with her in secondary when procrastination and bad organisation won't fly.

You can't remove her from English because there's no provision in England for children to be withdrawn from specific subjects. And it's impossible practically. What would she do when everyone else was doing English? Who would supervise her. I think you said you would, but again how would that work practically. You won't get anywhere with school if you suggest it. Also how would she feel, if that happened. She would immediately be different everyone else and children really don't like that. I think you need to go back to school and talk more about what's going on. Ask to speak to the SENCO. You could think about moving schools. You could think about getting a tutor.

What are the negative comments? I've never seen any negative comments in my dd's books, it's always framed in a positive way. So if they are demotivating I'd be making a formal complaint to the school.

Is the ADHD only presenting in english lessons?

The school can't diagnose ADHD. If it's just presenting in English lessons, it's unlikely to be ADHD. If you're really worried, book a meeting with the SENCO and discuss your concerns.
The school will have a marking policy and they will be marking according to this.
You still haven't given an example of these "demoralising" comments.
You can't pull her from a subject. All you're going to do is ruin your relationship with her teachers.

This.
I'm not, however, disputing that your daughter has ADHD. Diagnosis for girls is much harder to come by, due to their struggles presenting differently from boys. Less disruptive to others for example.

Have you thought about supporting the school and telling your daughter to try and focus a bit harder and get on with her writing??

💯 agree with this!