I think my dd is clever, school say she is really struggling. I feel like a knob.

[SewhereIam]

I have a 5 year old dd in year 1. She is my PSB, as my PFB is 13 years older and there are 6 miscarriages inbetween them, and PSB was a very poorly foetus and very poorly baby.

As a bit of background, I was a high achiever at school, went to Oxbridge, and PFB outshone me in her GCSE's and A-Levels, and is currently at a red brick university with hopes to do a masters PhD at Oxbridge, so academia means a lot to me and I put a lot of time and effort in to making sure my girls have everything they need to be able to suceed. (This is my problem, I know, there is more to life than academics).

DD2 has always had issues with her motor skills, and has had medical investigations for a suspected brain tumour and mild cerebral palsy when she was younger, but we have been very lucky and she is fine. She is incredibly quick, can outsmart me at every turn, is very self assured, loves word play and puns, and is on the pathway for ASD diagnosis. She has a fantastic vocabulary, a photographic memory and usually gets concepts first time (which is just infuriating 😂). I know I shouldn't say this, but out of the three of us I would say that she is mentally the quickest.

School have said that she is really behind. Her writing and numbers are very clearly wobbly and usually back to front and very shakey. We have done a lot of work on fine and gross motor skills from pretty much day dot, but she is still finding it really hard. School have said she needs a lot of extra support and we need to do more at home with her, which is fine, but they also suggested that she is far below average intelligence. Apparently they see "glimpses of great ideas in there but they just don't translate".

What can I do to help her? This isn't the dd2 I know, but maybe I have been blinded by her being my precarious child and my last baby. I feel like such an idiot, and like I have failed her terribly. Where do I start? I feel terrible.

I have never heard anyone say they went to ‘Oxbridge’. Tends to be a term people talk about before they decide where to apply, not once they have been to one or the other.

My DS sounds a bit like this.
He only figured out how to hold a pen in pencil grip about a week before starting school, only figured out how to spell his name in Yr1 and regularly swapped two of the letters until the end of Yr2.
He really struggled in KS1 but has flashes of brilliance and we got him assessed by an EdPsych in Yr2 as the school were so confused by how he presented. The EdPsych assessed him as being completely average!
He's now in Yr6. He's been racing through maths for the last couple of years and at a recent Parents' Evening his teacher (who also taught him in Yr4) commented that his writing has finally caught up with what's going on in his head. He always had ideas but struggled to put them down on paper and saw punctuation and accurate spelling as something which was just there to cause him more problems.

You haven't failed your child and you are a great parent. From experience it is difficult when your DC don't think or learn exactly the way you yourself do / did. That's ok, but it's time to put that big brain of yours to work, not to beat yourself up. I think school essentially tries to hammer many different shaped pegs into the same sized hole. They don't always fit perfectly. Due to resources / training etc it's difficult to make adaptations to each individual but it's way better than it was in our day for possibly ND Dc. Observe your child and how she learns, read widely around the specific LDs as you identify them and implement some practical steps to help in areas of struggle. And remember, Rome wasn't built in a day.

I was labelled as stupid at age 5 and played up in class. Took me much longer than anyone else to learn to read. I did struggle at reading/comprehen

This is shocking, for someone who proclaims to be intelligent. She’s five. It’s too early to tell. Focus on helping your child and stop making it a competition about who is cleverer. For goodness sake.

OP, I know it's hard, but I'd really try to forget all about what you've done, and what you other daughter has done, and just focus on loving your younger daughter and supporting her in whatever way she needs supporting. She may be cleverer than you; she may not be. In the end, that doesn't matter. What matters is that she is allowed to be the best version of herself. You can't know where her real strengths lie when she's just five.

BTW, there is a world of difference between academic qualifications "then" and "now". When I did O level (not GCSE), Oxbridge applicants were expected to have a minimum of 5 As. Now they are expected to have 9s in everything. Grade inflation is a massive problem, so your older daughter's "achievements" are not comparable to yours. And your younger daughter's potential "achievements" are not comparable to yours or to her older sister's.

Please don't compare here with your first child or with yourself. Seriously, if she ends up working in Tescos, with poor GCSEs, it really doesn't matter as long as a) she tried her best, b) she is employed as something, c) she is a good person. I know it's hard. I am and was very academic too, and having to change my chip and not project my ideals onto the kids is hard.
She is still only 5. She will find her talents along the way. Help her, do all the extra homework, give her all the support she needs and she will be fine.

I don't understand all your abbreviations but she is only 5 !!! There is lots of time to learn I wouldn't worry about it atall

So school have said she was working towards the bottom of the class and needed a lot of extra support. and you've turned that into they also suggested that she is far below average intelligence

OP you really need to take a step back and stop focusing on academic ability. it's not the most important part of a person, and your over the top focus on academics and being the celverest is going to be having a negative impact on your DD.

@funrunning , I went to Cambridge for 7 years, just wanted to make the post a bit more generic just incase someone knows it's me, but if they know me well enough then the dd's ages and dd2's medical problems would out me anyway.

It's like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. Not every child will shine in mainstream education. Hopefully she will get some help. Maybe look at other schools for her that have a good reputation with additional needs.

This child is 5!!!! 5 for goodness sake. I haven’t read all the posts but I have older children and have worked in education.

Do you really believe all children are great at writing age 5?

My eldest has a diagnosis of ASD. An EP also suggested that he has a condition that is associated with white matter brain damage.He spent a long time in ICU, and has several operations. He has always struggled with both fine and gross motor skills.

He has developed many strategies for masking his difficulties. He is often described as very bright, but his IQ is actually quite low. He is the loveliest, kindest, most patient and fantastic boy. We are trying to support him as well as we can to pass some GCSEs. I am not sure what he will go on to do, but I do know that he has a huge amount to give, and he makes the world better every day.

You ideally need to consult an independent Educational Psychologist.
My child is dyslexic, ASD, adhd and is behind on everything but has well above average verbal comprehension and reasoning so very intelligent but struggles with the basics such as reading, spelling, writing, times-tables etc. So needs extra support at school now but will quite likely end up at university given the right support now.

I’d ask paediatrician for referral to OT. They should work with school it sounds like she might benefit from input and equipment.
She sounds lovely.

Posted too soon! I struggled at reading/comprehension but I was always brilliant at maths and science, my parents were told I was just lazy as I seemed to know the answers in class yet my writing didnt reflect this. I realised as I got older that I couldn't read/write as well as other people at school so I hid it. I still managed to get high grades at gcse and a-level but I always ran out of time in exams, i often wonder how much higher my grades would have been with the added time allowance. I went to uni got a degree, a masters and then whilst doing my PhD I was tested for dyslexia and hey presto, a lifetime of embarrassment and struggling explained. My teacher at aged 5 probably didn't have high hopes for me, I guess I was "slow" compared to other children. I'd get your child assessed by a psychologist then you can help support her, just because she struggles to get ideas from her head onto the paper now doesn't mean she can't achieve big things.

This was me as a child! I used to write my numbers backwards and have atrocious gross motor skills - like really, really terrible. So bad that the PE teacher told my parents something must be seriously wrong and I had to go to the doctor for an assessment. I also got assessed for Dyslexia, Dyspraxia and Dyscalculia but didn't meet the criteria for any of them anyway.

School came up with various things from bone idle, so doesn't apply herself, to daydreamer as a diagnosis. Turns out, it was ADHD but I wasn't diagnosed until I was 34! According to the psychiatrist it's almost textbook for girls to be assessed for everything except ADHD because we tend to be daydreamers as opposed to disruptive.

Also, I went to Oxbridge, even though I wrote my numbers backwards and can't do a cartwheel or ride a bike. I'd look into ADHD and take a deep breath - your child has plenty of time to blossom.

Fwiw I was also taken by surprise when my child struggled so acutely at school. I found academic work relatively easy/straightforward at school - was always near the top of my class. I hadn't really considered my children could struggle because I never had.
It's been an education for me!

You went to Cambridge, and your 5 yr old is mentally running rings around you?

The trouble with them concentrating so much on fine motor skills means that yes, she will get further behind. But that isn't her fault, it is theirs. They need to start stretching her in set work that can be done without needing fine motor skills - in the same way they would treat a child with a physical disability.

If they continue to treat her as someone working at the bottom, she will get very discouraged by being continually asked to do very simple stuff.

Aside from that, in my personal experience, some teachers just don't 'get' some children.

i have a child with a similar ‘patchy profile’ excels in some areas and waaaaaay behind in others. Waiting for our first appointment with community paeds. Something I would suggest is that she might be to work on her core strength as well as her fine motor skills. Things like Tummy Time, crawling games etc will really help build the strength she needs to then focus on fine motor skills. Our LO has OT and that’s been the key message from there. Go back to basics and build the gross motor skills/core strength before thinking about fine motor skills

She sounds very bright. Maybe dyslexic?

I agree with all of this. She's 5! Take your foot off the gas and let her breathe

Is her photographic memory and the capabilities she has with this not aligning well with the teaching process? Obviously it should be a benefit, but may allow some children to skip methodology and expected learning concepts.

Is there something else going on, like anxiety, so she cannot put across what she knows?

Hoping the school is adequately helping her with fine motor skills, so she can also focus on the lessons and enjoy being part of the class.

It often comes as a surprise when bright parents don’t have overly intelligent children. I’ve seen this countless time as a primary school teacher. I expect she’ll catch up if there is nothing wrong. I think teachers can quickly gauge children’s intelligence & it doesn’t always match with what the parents think.
It sounds like you are doing all you can to help which is great.