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.

*She is 5 years old - please try to remember that the UK is very very unusual in expecting 'formal learning' and attainment of this age of child!

In most European countries - including countries where children do better academically like Finland - children start reading and writing at 7!

Your child is a baby - compared to most children globally she would still be in kindergarten working on her GROSS motor skills (we make the mistake of expecting small work before the big development of throwing catching/ climbing trees!)

please let go of your unrealistic expectations of a 5 year old with some delays and perhaps a neurodiverse mind and just let her play more!*

Completely agree with this. The bones in a child’s hand aren’t fully formed until around the age of 7. They’re handwriting doesn’t need to be perfect at this age. The education system we have here doesn’t take this into account at all.

Don’t push the handwriting. Get her practicing fine motor skills and strengthening her hands. My DD is also year 1 and on ASD assessment pathway, also struggles with handwriting but is excellent at reading, and I also know I put too much focus on education at times (I did a masters in education so I’m probably worse!). I try to follow her lead. She loves ‘doh disco’ on YouTube and asks to do that most days, or a stress ball is good as well. Also, you can play games where there’s some level of writing (shopping list, restaurant menu, class registers). Get her practicing letter formation without writing with a pencil, like using her finger in a tray of flour/shaving foam.

It will come with time, just remember that our education system expects more at a young age than the majority of countries, that doesn’t mean it’s better either. Also, she may turn out to not be as academically gifted as her sister, but she may well have other strengths in areas her sister didn’t.

There's a teacher at grandchildren school who teaches the five year olds. If she decides they're SEN they don't have to do the lessons but play with the toys all day. There's a hell of a row going on at the moment with the parents. She's a new teacher so the headteacher has to deal with this. Luckily another teacher clocked it too

I have dyspraxia and so my fine and gross motor skills were poor as a child. Even to this day I can trip over an entirely flat bit of ground and have a tendency to slitter drinks. I have a high iq and have always had a reading age above my own age but have never been academic. When I was 9 my teacher told my parents not to expect me to achieve any standard grades (GCSEs). With supportive teachers I did pass them all but not with high grades. I got grade 3s which is a general level pass. I never went to university but I can challenge my DH who has two degrees in architectural technology and building surveyor.

Your daughter is too young for a label on future academic performance but push for a diagnosis though as the sooner you know the sooner support can be put in place.

Schools can be strange places - and I work in one and think this even more so now than when I was just seeing it from just a parents point of view.
I got friendly with my child’s teacher in primary school and one day asked her (maybe inappropriately) why he was in the bottom set for maths when he was really good at it. She told me unofficially that it was done more on his personality being a better fit to be in a small class and the higher sets had bigger classes. She said when he sits the SATs he will automatically be placed into top set maths at secondary school, which turned out to be true. Yet this was never formally communicated to me by his school so as far as we officially knew, he was in bottom set maths purely based on his ability level.
Schools don’t communicate very well with parents at all in my opinion, and I see it all the time now I’m working asaTA in a secondary school. If you think something doesn’t seem right, it’s definitely worth challenging it.

My son was exactly the same seemed very academic but had slow and messy writing and number formation and poor motor skills. His school were actually the opposite of your experience. They didn't think he was struggling as verbally he presented as bright so they thought his writing skills and organisation would eventually catch up at some point. They thought the fact he could lose concentration or get overloaded with too many instructions was a maturity issue as he was a summer baby.

It was eventually at an unrelated GP appointment that our doctor said she suspected there was a reason he was struggling with his motor skills. He was diagnosed with dyspraxia at 10 and the help he could access due to his formal diagnosis has enabled him to flourish academically.

My autistic child’s writing is mostly illegible and he only got an average level attainment in maths due to his back to front numbers and unwillingness to writing down any working (sigh!). However his grasp of mathematical concepts is amazing, his has encyclopaedic knowledge of certain animals and is very articulate.

Having areas of struggling amongst areas of doing really well is very common for neurodiverse children (and adults). It doesn’t mean you or the school are wrong. You are just talking about different aspects of her.

My son is very bright with a high IQ but is bottom of his class. He has visual and auditory processing issues and is autistic and possibly dyslexic, and has some physical difficulties too. It's tough for him, and us. But he's empathetic and original and thoughtful and affectionate.

The thing that struck me about your post is that you know your DD has loads going for her as you list it out. Focus on that. Is she at a pushy school? Getting letters the wrong way round and having wobbly writing doesn't sound particularly out of place for a 5 year old.

Also to add - "dyspraxia" is the outdated term. Most occupational therapists and similar refer to DCD, or Developmental Co-Ordination Disorder.

I can sympathise with how you're feeling OP. I was in a similar situation when DC1 was around 4. I always considered him to be super sharp and smart, he often blew me away with just how quick his mind works, his understanding of new concepts, mental maths and he worked at a much higher level than the age appropriate school curriculum. But he struggled at school (still does but we are trying to build in coping mechanisms for him).

It took a while to get to the bottom of it as he wasn't displaying any obvious signs of a learning difficulty and most of the things I identified were considered to be within the normal range for that age group. Long story short, we finally discovered his eyes were not tracking correctly, he has dyspraxia (including oral dyspraxia) and hyper-mobility in his hands which made school life totally miserable and exhausting for him. We investigated special schools but nothing seemed to support his particular needs. Instead we kept him in mainstream and arranged support around the side with OT, touchtyping, handwriting practice, creative writing etc. Despite his intellect, he always comes across as 'lazy' in school and I often have to intervene to ensure he's placed in the appropriate sets otherwise they would keep putting him in lower ability sets. I'm hoping he will come into his own when he no longer needs to write by hand. His Ed Psych assessment report came out with an IQ score of 132 so we used it to get him a membership to MENSA as a little ego boost for him (he has low self esteem due to his condition).

Knowing DS's potential, I can't bring myself to just let him coast along at school. It's exhausting and heartbreaking supporting a child who is bright but struggling to demonstrate their knowledge in written form. He has to work twice as hard as his peers to get the same results and a lot of staff don't really understand what dyspraxia is and just assume he is slow/lazy. I try to stay positive and work with him at home to cover material beyond his school year curriculum just to give him the challenge that is missing at school. I also read to him so that he isn't missing out on literary classics due to his eye condition and he can continue to build his vocabulary. He's on the school quiz teams for tournaments with other schools, the school chess club that also plays tournaments with other schools, maths challenge etc. Its all helping to build his confidence as he grows. He'll be sitting the 11+ next year, fingers crossed he can type fast enough by then.

You need to get your DC an Ed Psych or paediatric assessment to identify any underlying condition and then look at how best to support them. And you have to be mentally strong and not give up. It's hard and exhausting but no one else will support or understand your DC the way you do.

I was shit at writing in primary school. I couldn't get my thoughts out and I was really slow at it. Aged 15 I started writing for fun (and got good at it, although my handwriting is still a bit messy.) Time can work wonders.

Thanks for sharing this. It's sad that OP feels she may have "failed" because her daughter is not top of the class.

I am a teacher and I would NEVER feel that a child was ‘far below average intelligence’ just because they struggled with some things, like writing! Being good at writing is not an indicator of intelligence, just like doing things early is not an indicator of intelligence. Some children are fiercely intelligent and brilliant but struggle with some things. You don’t need to be perfect at everything to be intelligent. It sounds that the things she struggles with can be worked on and improved with some time and perseverance! In fact, there is a student in my class (5 years old) whose writing is very wobbly and he writes numbers and letters back to front, too, but he has other traits that absolutely astonish me and I’m quite sure he must be the most intelligent child I’ve ever taught! It never crossed my mind that his poor writing might mean he wasn’t intelligent or was behind - we work on it, of course, but goodness. He’s so intelligent! Please don’t worry too much about the things your daughter struggles with. By all means work on them, but please know that it doesn’t mean she isn’t clever and I’m sorry her teacher made you feel that way!

Yep get her assessed. It’s quite possible to be bright with a learning difficulty.

However, you know your fixation on academic achievement is unhealthy, so take this opportunity to sit on letting it go.

Yeah but we all know what dyspraxia means but no one outside of the relevant professionals would have a clue what DCD is. Too many acronyms and unnecessary changing of names that confuse rather than help!

Your child might actually be gifted and find school just hard to deal with . Have you considered this

Kids seem to be judged more on their life skills (toileting/ taking coats on and off/ concentration levels) than their ability to learn and retain knowledge at this age.

My dd has a disability (which I spoke to the school SENCO about before she started nursery). She started with what I thought was a decent level of knowledge for a 3 year old (could count to 20, could recognise all letters and most shapes/ colours). But I was told she was behind for everything quite harshly at the first parents evening.

We have a diagnosis for her medical issues and an EHCP now and she has a 1:1. It's much better for all of us and they are starting to recognise how smart she is and how lovely. Before this it felt like they thought she was just a problem to them and they were missing everything great about her that everyone who knew her could see. I hope the diagnosis path gets you the help your dd needs too op. Xx

School are full of ballloon juice.

It is absolutely normal for a five year old to write letters and numbers back to front.

And wobbly writing is normal too.

I feel for your DD here

what does “low intelligence” mean? Since when do we assess intelligence by the ability to write at age 5?

and even if someone is an appalling writer, or dyslexic or whatever, it’s not due to “intelligence”. Although that in itself has many meanings

many childen take longer to do certain things and neuro diverse children even more so.

I would relax and just let her “be”. Read to her as much as you can, focus on wellbeing and see where she is in a year.

in terms of hand dexterity, would you consider piano lessons?

Do th

Does the school know her background? Some schools don't seem to understand that they need to work from where a child is, rather than where they think they should be, and don't realise that it's their responsibility to support the child's needs.

Other than that, it's great that you've taken on board some of the words on here. The main thing is that your child has experience or things she enjoys and that she has chance to play.

it took till year 5 before the school realised just how bright my son is. He writes like a much younger child with fine motor skills being poor.

She's five! Five!!! She'll be fine. School sounds clueless and if they haven't really spent any time talking to the person who knows her best - you!

She may or may not be super clever. Who cares? As long as she's happy.

I'm pretty academic (great exam greats, first from Cambridge etc). But I couldn't really write properly until I was about 9 or 10. My handwriting was appalling and no one could read it. So for me at least, it wasn't a question of intelligence, but motor skills which for some reason took me years to master. Perhaps this is the case with your DD?

So sad the school have labelled your DD at such a young age.

If you can afford to see a private OT they will give you exercises to do (normally through play) to improve fine motor skills.

Are you in London? I know a very good lady in London. Let me know if you want her details.