Teacher gave us SNAP-IV form out of the blue - AIBU?

[primmy713]

I have a child in year 5, and since she was little, we have always been told by teachers that she often day dreams in class. We are very well aware, and sometimes getting her to sit and start her schoolwork can take a few prompts, but she always completes it and does very well. Her test scores over the past few years have been very good, and she enjoys school a lot. She's quite social, and like any girl her age chats to her friends (and sometimes in class!), but other than that we've always been told she's a good, kind and respectful student, and her tests scores prove the same.

She has a teacher this year who I always thought was just OK. But we never complain, we just get on with it. At our first parent teacher conference this year, she complained how our daughter fidgets in class and struggles to focus. We worked really hard with her over the past month, and now she's nailing all her subjects and one of the top performers in her class.

Last week during our parent teacher meeting, her teacher presented us a SNAP-IV form and said she believes our daughter suffers from ADHD and can't sit in her seat. She said that she often will get up in a lesson to sharpen her pencil, and it takes a few prompts to get her to start her school work, and somehow she always manages to finish them.

She never shared her answers for the form, but my husband and I filled one out ourselves and met with the SEND coordinator who reviewed our two forms, and said that the teacher had 18 marks against her vs our 7, so she probably wouldn't quality for ADHD support, but all agreed that her taking her time to start assignments was a red flag. She asked about her reading ability, and I explained that she's an avid bookworm who can read fluently. Her last set of state test scores show reading at 125 and grammar at 121.

So I am really not sure what to do with this information, besides explaining to my daughter to take school more seriously by not leaving your chair during lessons, and disrupting the teacher by talking to classmates etc. I am a bit angry and annoyed, why did she wait to share this? Is this normal behaviour to spring this on a parent with a SNAP IV form?

That’s not entirely true - i have asked for many years and her teachers have always said no. But probably bc she didn’t tick enough of the “boxes”.

Do I have a right to be angry in the way it’s been handled? Absolutely. The teacher was late, rushed, distracted. We had our sons parent teacher last week as well- and his teacher (who had my daughter two year ago) took her time- gave us good feedback, and then reminisced about the years she had my eldest too….

Our GP argued that if we went private- we’d def get a diagnoses because you’re essentially paying for it (she worked privately for a few years before going back to the NHS).

Our paediatrican is an NHS consultant who also works privately. She would absolutely not have compromised her reputation to provide an unwarranted diagnosis and it would be against the Hippocratic Oath to prescribe a medication (particularly to a child) that was unnecessary.

I'm shocked that a GP would advise that.

Do nothing. If your lovely daughter is doing well and achieving then she’s doing fine. Do not lump her with a diagnosis.

Think you should go back a few posts before you make assumptions! We love the school, we love the teachers. It's been nothing but a positive experience. Our children have learned and grown so much, and have had so many amazing opportunities. In fact, we always send a glowing email at the end of the school year praising the teachers for pushing our children and bringing the best out of them.

I think because she's a friend outside the practice - she was very blunt. Otherwise she would have never said this to anyone else as her reputation would be on the line. And as a good friend, I would also hope she would be truthful in telling us that our DD should be referred etc for her own benefit - but you never know!

DS1 has ADHD and consistently scores 90% and over across all of his subjects (Year 8). He is medicated though

I’m a SENCo and I would only flag this with parents if I were convinced it merited further investigation.

The teacher is doing there job, would you rather they did nothing?

ah that's great news - how long has he been medicated, and how long ago was diagnosis? and how was he doing academically before medication?

It’s a stupid and ignorant opinion frankly. Just because she’s a GP doesn’t make her qualified to pass comment on these diagnoses. My child wouldn’t have qualified for a referral on the NHS because he was getting by just fine. Teachers just queried why exam marks were never as good as his classwork, but hopefully he’d pull out the stops for GCSE they said. They weren’t to know he had never been able to revise for a test or exam, ever. His brightness was masking his difficulties. As he gets older, it gets harder, even with meds.
you are lucky this teacher has raised it early and you can be alert to the signs. Senior school is often when you really start to notice.

No - absolutely not. But medication isn't a one size fits all is it?

She may be really clever and just bored in class, if she can do the work in less than the time allocated I can understand why she gets fidgety. Why does everything have to have a diagnosis these days?

Good point. I will get in touch with the school and see how it's affecting her since we barely had any time to discuss. Just because she's sailing now doesn't mean she will in secondary school.

She gets tutored twice a week at the moment, which is probably why she's 'ahead' for now.

yes of course, we had noticed at home if we asked her to do a task, sometimes we had to ask a couple times. If she didn't like the task (like decimals) we'd have to sit with her and get her to focus on it.

So during her past 5 years at the school, we have asked the teachers about her focus in class. They would often tell us that sometimes they would see her looking out a window or not paying attention, so they would either move her close to the front, or call on her when her hands wasn't raised and ask her a question to make sure she was paying attention. So I repeatedly asked if this was ADHD over the years, but all her teachers had assured us this was very normal for a lot of kids. I think it was always dismissed because she always did everything she was asked to do, good test scores, and behaved in a way the teachers approved.

This was my initial reaction too. A lot of my friends claim their children are the same - so I am not sure if it's some form of inattentive ADD or she's bored/ tired/ hungry.

He got his diagnosis at 8 and started meds straight away. He was always ‘ahead’ academically but fell off his chair (dangerously) at least once per day, shouted out, interrupted, got up and walked around. Now, he just locks in and gets it done.