Help us to understand a ed psych report please?

[MatildaTheCat]

This is in relation to my dneice, aged 10, in year 6. I am, and have been, very involved with her educational progress for some years at her parents’ request.

For background, she was slow to read and had/has real trouble describing what she has been reading about. This has continue even since she became a more fluent reader. She struggles hugely with staying focussed. Her spelling is very poor. Her maths is below average and she has had a LOT of additional help at school (and with literacy). She talks incessantly, needs to be centre of attention and struggles with friendships a lot. Never gets invited for play dates or parties and hangs around on the edge of groups at school.

In the past she was very prone to impulsive behaviour and did some very naughty things such as throwing someone’s wallet away and hiding car keys for hours. This seems a bit better. She would NEVEr admit to these crimes even when there was direct evidence.

She has recently been assessed again( was borderline dyslexic at age 7) and yesterday I was shown the draft report. I have to say that I felt it was a highly accurate picture of her. Her parents somewhat disagree which is understandable. They essentially wanted a diagnosis to qualify for additional time in her SATs. They honestly struggle to see many of her other issues and, for example, blame the friendship issues on the other girls’ all being mean...

Here are some of the key findings:

A lovely child who speaks all the time and appears very anxious.
Scored well in terms of vocabulary and described as having an adult turn of phrase.
Scored very poorly in non verbal reasoning.
Showed little insight into text she had read, couldn’t describe the book she was reading although she says she loves reading.
Spelling poor. When observed in class doing some unsupervised work she wandered around, chatted, fiddled and wrote three lines in 40 minutes.
Was very confrontational at times, seeming to put other children off.
Was described as falling into the dyslexic category.
Was described as a ‘spikey’ Profile that teachers would need to carefully consider regarding teaching methods.

So, and sorry this is long, what, in reality does all this add up to? She clearly struggles with most aspects of school but tries very hard. She really is a tricky child in some ways...I love her dearly but she can be extremely awkward. Her parents are tending to minimise a lot of this and think she’s misunderstood. They are obviously following it up with meetings and advice on supporting her. I’m keen to work on social skills with her as she goes to secondary school soon and it’s a golden chance to make some friends ( her dm feels it will happen without further support ) ).

Finally, her mother is from a culture where loud and assertive behaviour is the norm which makes some of her traits slightly more normal to them. She is also quite dyslexic. They are time poor and prefer lots of experiences to doing school type work at home. All fine but one day a week I am tasked with helping with all of this and am a bit overwhelmed. It’s like they pushed for this report and now they don’t want the contents other than the dyslexic label.

Phew. Sorry that’s so long but I don’t want to drip feed. Any thoughts on this complicated little girl whom I love very dearly?

PDA
Attachment issues.

Both of those spring to mind, but I'd need to read a few times to get a better clue.

Processing issues, impacting on literacy and numeracy
Inability to follow instructions independently
Lack of impulse control and distractability/poor focus
Social difficulties
Spikey learning profile suggests strengths (like verbal skills) and weaknesses in an uneven pattern.

Tbh it could add up to many of the Spld (such as dyslexia, dyspraxia, adhd) or Autistic Spectrum Disorders, as they often overlap. What has Ed Psych suggested? Are there any physical issues such as hypermobilty or with fine/gross motor skills which could affect concentration and writing?

Realise that I’ve never met the child, but if she was a child in my class and displayed all of this I’d be leaning towards ADD/ADHD

Thanks. So far not much by way of recommendations other than an adult at school to discuss worries and continue the additional support in literacy and numeracy. I’m sure they will meet and get more info though.

No medical conditions and no fine motor skill issues as such but her writing is below average. However, to speak to her she presents as very bright and can regurgitate large amounts of info ie from a museum visit. If she is interested!

I fear she’s probably classed as pretty irritating at school though she’s lovely one to one.

OP, I have to say that I would be utterly devastated if my sister gave this information about my child on an online forum, anonymous or not.

*posted this information

Have a Google about non-verbal learning difficulties. Combined with poor impulse control, this might explain many of the issues. Would have expected EP to come up with some strategies.

Non verbal learning difficulties

Could also be unlucky enough to have dyslexia as well.

Hope you asked your sister if you could post this level of information about her child. Spikey profile is very common in children with an ASC.

I'd say an adhd profile with dyslexia. She has many traits of my adhd son. Medication has worked wonders for his school life

It doesn't seem like a very helpful report really. Describes some issues but gives no insight into why your niece might have those issues or what might help. 'Was described as falling into the dyslexic category' for example is very unhelpful. Surely part of the purpose of the assessment is to know whether or not she has a disability like dyslexia (might be described using a different term) and needs accommodation?

We had this experience a bit with ds. He had one assessment done at 7 which really drilled down into his strengths and weaknesses and helped reassure us about some of his behaviour whilst signposting where he needed extra help. Then he had another assessment before going to high school which was almost purely descriptive and not helpful at all. The first was done by an fully qualified educational psychologist and involved a good few hours of tests and conversations and a long report. The second was done by the SEN lead at school, not sure of her qualifications or what tests were involved but it seemed like a very surface assessment. Luckily ds's teachers have tended to take one look at his handwritten work and then agreed he can type instead as his writing is very difficult to read and doesn't reflect his ability so he's not needed a formal diagnosis. Now he has started university we are going to have to pay for another full assessment as they only use handwritten exams.

From what's been written though it seems less likely to be dyslexia and more something like ADHD which might be outside the scope of the assessment.

Dyslexic (can also include the maths issues due to poor working memory) with autistic traits.

EHCP?

Who wrote the report? I have found that EPs can be horribly vague. It is not good enough because their recommendations do need to be clear as to who is doing what and when.

Check out QB test - good indicator of adhd.

Don't see any issue with this being posted. OP could easily have swapped genders, moved the age a bit and be a sister an aunt or a neighbour. None of which impacts on the question.

Whatever the situation, this could be the description of thousands of struggling children around the country, the poster is obviously concerned and trying to help and MN is full of a lot of people/professional who have this kind of experience and helpful insight to impart making it the perfect forum.

Having a snide pop at her is point scoring nothing more nothing less.

You don't need strangers in the internet in this situation. The ed psych should be making recommendations to the school to help meet your nieces needs. The school should be making provision for her regardless of any formal diagnosis. The ed psych cannot diagnose.

Your sister/brother? need to approach a GP armed with the ed psych report if they want a referral which may lead to a potential diagnosis - if they don't want to do this that is their perogative. You can help your family be listening and supporting, trying to diagnose via MN is probably not the way to do this, though I am sure you have the best intentions.

She sounds a lot like one of my children, who is extremely intelligent but also has extreme dyslexia. The lack of concentration, the fiddling around, the great verbal skills and the lack of ability with written work. It's just like my kid.

In my experience the school might well do lots of assessments and claim to give great support but in reality they'll do very little. Because if the child is intelligent enough to make some progress, that will be enough for them.

We paid through the nose for years to give our child specialist tuition, and without that they wouldn't have been able to read or write. The school didn't care so long as it ticked all the boxes.

And yes, the ed psych should be giving recommendations but in my experience it's not enough. Schools don't have the skills or resources.

I’d say she should be checked for adhd. Impulsive hiding car keys for no real reason, hyper, wandering round the classroom, inattentive, 3 lines in 40 minutes.

I’m not a doctor, but I do have adhd.

Please get her to a sympathetic GP as soon as you can, so it can be diagnosed or ruled out. Early help might make a lot of difference to her success at secondary school.

If you fill in this it might help the doctor.

ibergmanmd.com/uploads/3/0/9/3/3093942/parent.pdf

Hiya, EP here. It is so hard to tell from just w summary what the author of the report means. From what you have said it seems that they found some non verbal reasoning difficulties and potentially some literacy difficulties. Children with these difficulties can often be distracted in class and if she was unsure what she needed to do it is possible that this is why she didn't do a lot of writing in 40 minutes. Ch with non verbal reasoning difficulties can struggle with making connections, recognising patterns between objects/numbers etc. Could also impact on social skills if she finds it hard to make connections

Did they do any exploration of social skills during the assessment and did they gather child's views as well? Were any social skills interventions or recommendations made for the school? Do you think her social skills are influenced by the way she has learnt(if parents see this as normal behavior is it just that she has not learnt any differently)

If I write a report I always offer to meet with parents or at least with school to explain it-i can see that parents will e following this up so that will be a good time to ask any questions and really understand what is going on within the report-they can then hopefully find out what is going to be put in place and can then support at home (as can you).

Sorry if this is not much help, and sorry for so many questions-

I do agree with pp who said that the EP who wrote the report will be best placed to answer all the questions. As they will be able to explain exactly what they did and why and also what hypotheses they have based on the info

Also I know it is frustrating not to have an official diagnosis or label for some parents but in many cases, particularly if is first assessment there may be several areas of weakness that need to be supported by school rather than one simple explanation

The BPS( British psychological society) definition for dyslexia which a lot of Ed Psychs refer to also notes that for dyslexia to be formally recognised it needs to have occurred over time and there needs to be evidence of good quality intervention (sometimes schools have this, other times they don't have the evidence that they have supported through structured programmes)

I hope you get the answers that you are looking for x

Some of this is similar to my son (who has dyslexia, dyscalculia and issues with auditory processing and working memory). I paid for a private ed psych evaluation, which was indepth and offered a lot of suggestions for moving forward.
But some of the symptoms (especially the impulse control) seem to suggest something else such as adhd or asd.
Schools seem very reluctant to diagnose these days, perhaps as they then have to fund support where a diagnosis has been given. I now home educate, and the difference in 2 years 1-1 learning is astounding.

ColdTatty
Schools can not diagnose as they are not medically trained and they should not even be suggesting diagnoses. If they are concerned they need to refer to the appropriate professionals to explore this

With regards to funding, in the area I work diagnosis does not impact upon funding received as one child with a diagnosis may need minimal support and another without a diagnosis may need a huge amount of support. Schools need to show the level of need to obtain additional funding

It is awful how it varies so much from area to area. I think everything needs a huge look at to make it much more consistent and to have specific pathways for understanding and also diagnosing and then support offered to everyone regardless of age/school/area

Hi OP. My eldest child is dyslexic and also had a few of the other issues you mention. I got a specialist reading tutor for him and OT for dyspraxia. The tutor helped enormously.

Not being able to read well can have a huge effect on behaviour. I was signposted to this website to help explain the behavioural and pychological impacts. I found it really helpful to understand how children react to this kind of problem. It's a US site but it applies to all english speakers.

www.childrenofthecode.org/

If you know how to, please feel free to message me for more info. Happy to share what I learnt over those difficult years.

for your niece - it's hard. And well done for being a lovely aunty!