Anyone who knows about dyslexia around?

[Flowersforbees]

DD is 7 and her spelling and writing is way behind her other abilities, SATS showed near 110 for reading and maths but low 90s for grammar, punc and spelling.

She finds spelling very difficult. Mixes up letters, still some backwards letters and very messy. For reading she makes many mistakes but seems to be on an appropriate book band for her age (white) but she is extremely reluctant, says it's difficult. She uses a purple overlay when at home but forgets at school and this makes a big difference.

She really struggles with organisation, has lost loads of things since the beginning of term, on one day this week there were 5 things she came out without: cardigan, coat, bottle, new book and snack container. Despite many reminders it doesn't occur to her to think about brining these things home.

School are keeping an eye on it and have screened but say results are good. I've attached the screen results and I'm thinking that whilst working memory is technically 'good' it's a lot lower than the others.

I'll happily pay for an assessment but feel everyone is telling me wait and see. But I feel if she does have dyslexia / dysgraphia knowing this might help more with understanding and self confidence and adjustments might be made.

Any advice from experts or parents who have been through similar would be much appreciated.

@Copperas same with my dc, another huge reason why wait and see is not at all a good stragety.

I agree that an ed psyche might be a good idea - might be worth writing down everything you can think of since she was born that was in anyway unusual or different. It definitely sounds like she is ND but there could be more than dyslexia. Poor working memory/executive function is so typical when you are ND, I write notes to myself all the time, ds writes on his hand.

Depending on whether you can afford it and what comes up with the ed psyche I would then consider a dyslexia assessment as well if that will give you more detail in that specific area. From what I understand 7 is the age where they start assessing dyslexia and like everyone I else I absolutely say the sooner the better. I wouldn't rely on school for anything in relation to this, they don't have the funds or the staff.

Thanks again for all the great advice. I will start by arranging a meeting with the Senco at school to see what they suggest. All meetings so far have been with the class teachers. And see whether they can offer any further support in school.

Homework at the moment is all website based - times tables and spellings on apps and it feels like we're trying to put a square peg into a round hole with these techniques. She did some spellings yesterday. With the letters available she got 10/10 - great, I asked her to immediately write them down and she got many of them completely wrong. With the times tables I feel she needs to understand the theory behind the calculation rather than rote learning.

Does anyone know how much I would expect an Ed psych assessment to cost. Are we looking at £4/500 or £1k +. I have no idea.

We paid £650 for an Ed Psych report. There were cheaper options at around £400 but they were "dyslexia assessors" whereas we wanted a professional qualified to be aware of a range of things in case there was something else going on.

Because the word has no contacts for her.
Try a different way.
My dd was getting poor spelling scores under 5 for years until someone's told me what I've passed onto you. Then it was 8,9,10

Context

@Flowersforbees

Just be aware that school are most likely going to tell you to do nothing, or watch and wait because they won't want to have to go to the expense, or work, of putting in any advised interventions.

They will probably tell you there is nothing to worry about either, or that they can't see the issues.

This is speaking from experience and knowing what others have also been told.

I paid £600 for Ed Psych report including dyslexia assessment.

It picked up on other issues for my DC too.

This is where the CTOPP2 ( chronological test of phonological processing) comes in .

She sounds very similar to my DD.

I raised dyslexia when she turned 7. School said she's not necessarily dyslexic. Wait and see. School said a diagnosis wouldn't change anything. She passed but the phonics test and the nessy screener.

I got her privately assessed. £650 for Ed psych report. 26 page report with loads of recommendations/ideas tailored to her needs. Waited 9 months for her to be assessed after choosing assessor. Change in her self confidence has been huge. Now exceeding expectations across the board. Y6 this year.

Also good at gymnastics. Has trouble hitting a ball. Disorganised. Cannot read time. Has got lost a couple of times. Very empathic. Loves books and reading. A perfectionist. Never completes a craft project.

I agree with getting an assessment sooner rather than later. My dd2 is dyslexic, primary school didn't want to know so I paid for a private screening test. Fortunately High School were much better and she had support from Year 7 onwards and they did a formal assessment later on when GCSEs were looming.

The primary years were a major blow to her academic confidence and she's still not recovered from that.

I'm a bit old school on this OP but that test seems to indicate high scores on the tests assessing phonological processing and I myself would say that means dyslexia is less likely. Poor phonological awareness certainly used to be considered the hallmark of dyslexia.

There does seem to be a bit of a challenge with working memory, especially as it contrasts with the other higher scores, but whereas that certainly can feature with dyslexia I would be less likely to think that diagnosis is right in the light of the high scores on the phonological processing tests.

But I guess if you go to a good assessor they can look at the patterns of strengths and challenges and give specific recommendations to strengthen areas accordingly.

Fab advice! As others have said, if you want to look at “just” dyslexia, then a specialist assessor is a good route as they have real expertise and are often cheaper. Looking more broadly at things, an EP. Do share your concerns and ask what the practitioner can look at when booking as even EPs have different expertises.
An Occupational Therapist is often the route for fine motor / dysgraphia - there is a lot of discussion about who can assess for this.
keep communications open with the school and all the best.

DD1 has dyslexia and dyspraxia.

We paid privately to get her assessed at 8 years old.

Her reading has always been fantastic, her spelling, organisation and writing atrocious. School did the assessments they could as I repeatedly asked at parents evenings. They definitely suspected but the tests available to them were pretty basic. They said she had a spiky profile though.

When I said we could afford to pay school were delighted because they didn't have the funding available for an academically able pupil - she just wasn't 'bad' enough.

You need an educational psychologist, 6 years ago the cost was about £600 and the assessment very comprehensive. She now has pink paper and most valuable, extra time in exams.

Incidentally, DD was an early, very steady walker (and climber), but her fine motor skills aren't great and she is still a bit clumsy.

I strongly suspect she has ADHD too, possibly ASD. There's often overlap. We can't afford to go private these days so on the long waiting list.

Good luck! It was posting on here that convinced me to get her assessed in the first place.

Hi OP, here’s our experience which I hope may be of help. The suspicion of DS’s Y2 teacher that he may be dyslexic was correct - we tested him privately by an Ed Psych (approx £600) at the age of 6 1/2, too young by some standards, but it helped immediately. I absolutely agree with other suggestions of Toe by Toe, it absolutely changed the way he learned to read and he got back on track, although it took him nearly to the end of Y3 to catch up with his peers.

When it came to Y5 we got him retested for the purposes of applying to secondary schools and sitting entrance exams. Only time will tell whether we need another assessment for GCSEs, but we’ll take advice from Learning Support at school.

For us as parents it isn’t necessarily easy to watch him go through school. He’s still disorganised and has to be prompted to prepare for things that aren’t homework, which he doesn’t like. He still loses things, asks us for school items the night before (thank goodness for late opening supermarkets!) and gets frustrated because someone’s ‘moved something’. Patience, tolerance and understanding are definitely required in buckets.

All the very best!