dyslexic child

[dogsrock15]

my year 4 child has dyslexia. school were not interested until I payed for a diagnosis last January. The schools senco has being pretty good since then and has put him a support plan together. she also went on training with the teaching assistant who was in with my sons class at the time. ( she has unfortunately not moved up with him)
he has since gone into year 4 I have being assured teacher is great and everything will be passed on regarding learning needs.
anyway the spellings he brings home are aimed at year one, the plan was to assess weekly to see whether he can go on to harder spellings. This is fine by me. Anyway spoke to his teacher for the first time since starting back just to check which ones he was meant to be learning and she was a little curt. said in front of other children how he is on year one spellings and said the ones he gets wrong she will be asking all parents to go over at home ( absolutely fine by me) but then she said how we can't be going over the same spellings and need to be moving at a pace.
This comment just seemed a little off? Am I being over sensitive or should I mention this to her? Senco? It just makes me wonder whether she is dismissive to the fact he is dyslexic? he has a support plan for a reason. I'd love for him to be able to learn and remember the spellings but unfortunately it is not that easy.

Op welcomed to the fur hideous navigation of a system that can only seem to cater for middle average dc.

It's going to be constant work and filling in the gaps. It sounds like no handover has been done so I would ask the Senco if a handover has been done because x asked z question.

it's a nightmare I think we are getting somewhere, the senco has being brilliant and I wish she could be his teacher. The school are teaching him touch type which I never expected them to do but now my first impressions of his teacher is that she is dismissive to the fact he is dyslexia and she is expecting him to be moving at a faster pace.
Problem is I'm worried about mentioning it in case they think I am that annoying parent and maybe im just being too sensitive and I need to leave them too it.

I'm dylexic....but 1980s so no help...now as an adult who can read and write I'm grateful I'm dyslexic as the long hard road has taught me so much. I think differently so been huge benefit now as an adult. Not helping you know op but letting you know the end not that bad. Op now I'd be onto the school chasing and tbh I'd sell everything to pay for private diagnosis. Wishing you all the best. Your child is lucky to have you fighting for him or her x

You're absolutely not being over sensitive.

I'm dyslexic ( & also had an 80s education) & so are both my daughters (now 21 & 19).
From my experience some teachers are very dismissive of dyslexia. They seem to think that by going over and over spellings/multiplication/punctuation enough times that something will miraculously "click" and a dyslexic child will suddenly be able to spell/know their times tables/use punctuation correctly.

This could happen with some things as every dyslexic child has differing learning issues.....but equally they could still be struggling with certain spellings/multiplication/punctuation when they leave secondary school......and that's not a failure on their part, its just how their brain works.

This teacher needs to understand more about how dyslexic children learn. They don't work at a nice steady pace. Some things they struggle with, some things they are great at....and no amount of "cramming" will suddenly make them "catch up". It just causes them stress and makes them feel stupid.

At my daughters' school they wouldn't let them write with a pen until they'd mastered cursive script. They both had to do this bloody stupid rainbow writing where they traced over the words neatly in 3 different colours. My girls would cry because they just couldn't manage it. They also had to do "catch up spellings". They felt singled out and said that everyone could see that they were stupid. Their teachers didn't seem to understand why they couldn't write "nicely" nor why they couldn't just "try harder with their spellings".

I worked there as a TA at the time and eventually I had a very "tense" meeting with in which i said that I wasn't going to make them do rainbow writing or extra spellings anymore as it was causing them more harm than good and shaking any confidence they had in their ability to learn.

If your son has a support plan & a great SENCO (my daughters didn't have either) then keep pointing this out to his teacher. Keep reiterating to her that he is not on the same level as his peers at some things and may never will be.....and that this IS NOT HIS FAULT.

Also, can I recommend a book called "Creative, Successful Dyslexic" by Margaret Rooke. We may not all grow up to be as famous as the 25 interviewees in the book, but their stories are inspiring & hopeful.

It would be worth asking for a phone call with the teacher. Their manner with you sounds off, but it doesn't necessarily mean there was no handover or a lack of understanding. It might have been a poor choice of words at the end of a long day.

What does his support plan say about spellings?