Sort fof looking for advice but posting with AIBU for visibility.
My nine yo is dyslexic, and can struggle with school work. She generally gets there, but we have to take a bit longer to embed the knowledge. She particularly struggles with tests and has very low self esteem when it comes to school work.
We have found some private schools we would really like to send her to as we feel they would be the best environment and support for her, and have the means to do it.
They are not super selective, but they still have tests and an interview. The only one I have found with no test, we would have to move to send her to as we are not on the bus network and that presents several challenges.
She was asking me about the schools and I explained there are tests and an interview so we should do some prep for them, but they are not like the grammar tests. She flipped out about it.
She got very upset, said she can't do them, that she is worried she won't get in. Complete meltdown. We said it doesn't matter, if you don't get in it won't be the right school for you.
But we do really believe these are the right schools for her and we really do need her to sit them with the right attitude and to try her best. I would like to do soft prep, not talking major tutoring, but 2-3 half hour practice sessions a week on Atom or something.
She also frankly needs to be doing this amount of homework to keep up at school and I don't want her to fall too far behind.
But I worry the more I push her the more she fights it and her self esteem seems to take a battering.
She goes to a compeitive, test focused school where 70% of the kids will go to top grammars and they have high levels of greater depth across KS2 sats. We don't actually live in a grammar area, but next door so these kids really do get high marks. They are also all hyper aware so lots of comparison at school between results and some of the kids are quite mean to her about her results.
So, the second part of my question is, should we take her out of this high pressured environment and put her in the private school earlier (she still needs to do test and interview, but no other children will be doing it so less competition I guess). She does not want this as she wants to stay at school with her friends.
Any tips on how I can foster a more healthy approach and attitude to homework and tests and help her self esteem? I should add she is brilliant at other things including art, sport and non verbal reasoning. But she still always fixates on how she thinks she is still not the best at these...
I have bought her journals, spoken about how everyone has things they find hard and easier, spoken to her teacher about the way tests and results are handled in school and focused on her effort rather than her score when she does do well.