How to get a 9 year old/Year 5 organised before Secondary when they hate organisation?

[HatesOrganisationSoWont]

DD is 9, Year 5. Has Dyslexia, Dyspraxia and a medical condition.

She hates being organised. We’ve been late to school because she absolutely refuses to be hurried or rushed.

She won’t use a bag at all, we’ve tried different kinds she just refuses to put anything in it or carry it – now she’s Year 5 it’s starting to get difficult for her. She now has to carry water bottle, lunch box, PE kit (which is also not in a bag, she literally carries her tshirt, joggers and trainers) and sometimes an instrument as well (last year it was a glockenspiel, this year it’ll be a violin – these are provided by the school) she just doesn’t have enough hands and it’s unsustainable.

The schools I’ve looked at for her for after Primary don’t have lockers or they have lockers for Year 11 only. Not that I think she’d use it as she refuses to use her tray at school then gets upset when stuff goes missing. She will use her peg for her coat (which basically gets carried to school, hangs on her peg and then gets carried home again even in the depths of winter).

Consequences don’t work. We tried letting her drop things while she was walking and she just walks on and doesn’t care, if we let her get in trouble for not having the right stuff she just shrugs and doesn’t learn from it.

School are stumpted. Usually by this point in Primary they’ve learnt or found a bag they like or another way round it.

At home she’s the same, will leave her toys, rubbish, anything on the floor and literally doesn’t care if I take them away. She does Scouts which we thought might help but it doesn’t help. Her room is honestly so bad I can’t even open the door. She also sleeps with about 1000 million toys on her bed and doesn’t care, she either just dumps them on the floor or leaves them. If I tidy it up it’s messy again the moment she sees it tidy.

She is fine getting things out of drawers/trays/toy boxes but won’t put them away.

Do I just have to let her get on with and sink at Secondary? What will Secondary do that might make her take notice? I don’t think she can easily carry all her books + PE kit + food tech ingredients etc. for a day and walk the 1.1miles (or more) to the nearest secondary.

Any tips?

And is this normal?

Why does she say she won’t carry/use a bag?
Does she use pockets?
your bag?
the glove box?

@Ohthatsabitshit She will hand things to me to carry, and let me put them in my bag but never asks for them again. It's like she forgets they exist

Does she realise she may have a lifetime in detention if she doesn't find a solution?

DS could be unorganised so we had doubles of equipment, so 2 calculators, so one stayed in his school bag when at home and one on his desk at home. So reduced chance of him forgetting to take it to school

Would it be possible, that school could find an area for her to leave some of her stuff, so doesn't have to carry it all, and like us have doubles of some things so some stay at home

How is she at that memory game where you put ten items on a tray and show them for a few minutes, then cover them up and have to write them down?

Has she been assessed for ADHD?

Sorry in typical fashion I had not actually read the post

I think collaborative problem solving might help here (from the Ross Greene books - Explosive Child or Raising Human Beings), and I'd start just with the "transporting items to school" issue.

So you would open the discussion saying something like "I noticed that last year, it was difficult for you to transport all of your needed items to school, can we try to make a plan for that?" You could even break it down further into e.g. books, PE kit, pencil case etc and try the CPS process on each item individually.

Forget solutions for now - this kind of bag, that kind of bag, storage space at school etc - just focus on finding out what she says is hard about transporting items to school. You can't realistically find a solution anyway until you find out exactly what it is that stops her from using a bag.

My favourite tips for finding this info are:

• Reflective listening. Whatever she says (e.g. "I don't know, it's just hard") reflect back to her "It's hard." and then add "Can you tell me more about that?" (or e.g. "Tell me more about [what's hard].")
• W-questions but NOT "why", as clarifying questions. When/Where/What/Who. So for example, if she says something like "it hurts my arm" you could ask "Where on your arm does it hurt?" Avoiding why is really important as it tends to lead to her giving the answer that she's heard other people assume is her motivation, not what she's actually experiencing.
• Thinking about a situation where it's not so hard, and trying to find the differences. "Last weekend, you helped me carry the shopping to the car. Let's see if we can figure out what was different about those two carrying situations. Hmm." (Then brainstorm with her to find out what was the same and what was different - the differences will often give you a really key piece of info).
• Summarising when you think you've found everything "So, carrying everything is hard because there are too many things and you only have two hands, and carrying a bag hurts your shoulder, and when it rains the books get soggy." and then adding "Anything else you can think of?"
• Offering an imaginary perfect scenario. "So let's imagine for a moment that your books are perfectly weightless, you have enough hands to hold everything individually, and it never rains ever again. Do you think that you would be able to transport everything to school in that situation, or would something still be hard about it?" (Then: If she says yes, in that situation I could transport all my stuff to school, then you have all of her barriers neatly listed. If she says no, it would still be hard because.... then you know you still have more to uncover).

Only once you have ALL of the barriers clear and on the table should you add the criteria which are important to you, e.g.

• Required items X, Y, Z must be available for use at school daily (and at home, if necessary)
• Items must be moved from room to room so that other students can use that room
• Solution must be independent of mum, as mum is (at work)

These are meant to be pared right down to the parts which are essential, you don't need to explain them/get her to agree with them/understand them, they just need to be present so they can be factored into potential solutions.

Don't be tempted to "solve" any of her barriers individually and immediately, explain them away, reason them away, dismiss them (as silly/oversensitive/nonsensical) or say that she isn't allowed to have that barrier. Just note them down for now, to be factored into the eventual solution. What you quite often find IME, if you're presented with an impossible-seeming list, when you start looking at solutions is that they say things like "Well... I suppose that it WOULD be easier to have three items contained into one" and you have to bite your tongue because you've been telling them that for five years, but they just needed to see it for themselves.

I feel you do really need to start working more with the school and her to get to the root of what is going on while you still have time to trial things before secondary. If she really is going to struggle long term then the new school will need to know and put support in place. She will have to remember stuff, pe kit, cooking ingredients, art things so you need to start making plans so that she can get the support she needs.

I wonder if OT could help as she has a dyspraxia diagnosis? There will be a reason, it could be executive function, could be that she struggles with zips, poppers etc and needs some external support and practice to feel confident using them.

Just to say BTW it's not object permanence people are describing, it's working memory. Object permanence is something babies develop at about 6 months old, it's why they are endlessly delighted by peepo and hiding things under a blanket, because they literally do not understand that things they cannot see continue to exist.

Forgetting what you have and e.g. not bothering to look for a pen, but borrowing your mate's, or leaving your bag at home/on the bus, because it's not immediately visible when your focus is on the board, or on leaving, is not object permanence, it's a working memory issue. Very common with dyspraxia and ADHD. Working memory is the brain function that allows us to hold a task-in-progress in memory so that when we are interrupted, we know "Ah yes I was folding the washing" and get back to it, rather than leaving piles of unfinished laundry all over the floor.

OT would absolutely be beneficial but is that even accessible in the UK?

@BertieBotts super useful info.

I would also say that when you look at your non negotiables, start off really pared back - for instance, if the school don't care if she does PE in her school uniform, then maybe she does that for a bit until you've got on top of carrying everything else in a bag?

And to give you hope, my child with executive function problems has really turned a corner aged 10 and a half so sometimes you might just have to wait.

This doesn't sound like 'doesn't like organisation' it sounds like 'has a particular issue with putting things in bags'. It sounds like a can't not a won't.

And that that could be something you could do some detective work on to work out what exactly is the problem for her. And work on together with school.

For example, to start with, could you put things in the PE bag in front of DD, hand bag to TA, TA helps DD to get her things out when it's the PE lesson. So she can practice seeing that it works and nothing gets lost or hurt. And at home what about some work with a small paper bag and some chocolate buttons or something?
You need school's help here. Her teacher or TA need to understand there's a major issue going on. You need school to support her to use her PE kit out of her bag, not let her do PE in her uniform, not use school spares. If you're in England it's the start of a new school year and ideal time to talk to her teacher and work out a plan together.

You need school to support her to use her PE kit out of her bag, not let her do PE in her uniform, not use school spares.

I’d agree with this as well - school should a) know she has an issue with not looking for her existing kit in its bag and b) remind and support her to get the bag and look inside it for the kit.

Just because there are no other issues at school with behaviour or learning doesn’t mean this issue isn’t part of something they should support her with. Clearly it is not typical for a child her age, and the usual expectations aren’t being met, so they need to scaffold her more.

Sorry OP but why would she struggle with a bag if she has a mum doing everything for her?

Let her fail, gradually, she will start developing strategies to cope. I am not saying that she would get 100% like the other kids, mine didn’t and still is far from perfect in his 20s, but learning from his mistakes and that teen pressure they put themselves through in order to fit in was what made the difference.

TooOld I'm not sure you have read all of the OP's posts. This isn't laziness.

@HatesOrganisationSoWont what happens after she leaves her bag in the road or her stuff mysteriously disappears? Do you just buy her new stuff?

You say she doesn’t care about the consequences of you taking her stuff away - what happens when you don’t give it back to her?

What happens if you remove and donate half the toys on her bed if she doesn’t tidy up? And if you keep removing and donating half her soft toys if she still refuses to tidy? You say she doesn’t care but is that because she knows you will give in eventually?

Does she experience the cumulative consequences of her actions or do you always step in/give in?

She literally doesn't care, I've emptied her room and our house of toys before and she just shrugs. I don't replace the toys, she gets them for her next birthday or Christmas of course but she just doesn't care.

How much do you torture a child before you admit it's can't not won't? (ETA qn to mumsanetta)

Cutting down on the number of soft toys in her room is probably sensible regardless, to make things easier for her. 9 is a good age to clear out and just have one or two with particular sentimental value. Wash, dry, airing cupboard, bin bag in the spare room and wait a few months to see if she's actually bothered by any of them being absent before you donate.

What have you tried with the tidying up? Is there anything she can do, even if at the level of you handing her an individual lego brick and asking her to put in in the tray?

It is available but like most things in the NHS it's scrapped back to the very bare minimum.
That said, there are lots of independent OTs who specialise in paediatrics

You've got 2 years. Kids change a lot at this age. I'd just take all pressure off and see what happens.

Thank you everyone, some fantastic suggestions I will be using this thread to refer to.

She actually quite likes Maths at school, I've just remembered her teacher at parents evening last year and then in her report saying that Maths is her strong point.

School don't do computing/IT but both me and ExH have degrees in that so I might teach her some basics to see if thats an option for Secondary school. I know about cloud based storage etc. as I use Google Workspace all the time, so Google Classroom is definitely something to look into. Would also help me to help her as I could check what she needs to do etc. and direct her subtly.

Thank you so much again.

It should be. My autistic DC is getting support for some specific areas even though she doesn't meet the criteria for dyspraxia. I guess as with everything NHS there's regional variation but I think it's worth the OP asking for a referral.

Sorry that was a reply to @BertieBotts who said OT would absolutely be beneficial but is that even accessible in the UK?

Not sure why the reply function didn't work for me.