dyslexia traits - would your school offer help at 9.6 yrs?

[firstchoice]

Hi

If there was a child at your local primary aged 9.6 with traits of dyslexia / semantic pragmatic language disorder (ie spelling age 6.5, trouble with handwriting, stumbling over basic words / name etc)

would they be offered any help or would you just be left to find private tutors (and would that be a good idea / enough)

please?

You can try, IME schools are pretty useless at help.

Senior school is ok about extra time in exams and understand, but not concrete help.

Yes my DS's definitely would. Any child that far behind would be assessed for dyslexia and get some focused help to see what could be done. Absolutely appalling if nothing's being done. Is it your child? What have the school said?

Just so you can compare, my son's teacher told us he was dyslexic in year 3. His spelling/ writing age were way behind. The school were slow in terms of getting him assessed as it depended on the LA sending their Ed Psych, so we paid for a private assessment through Dyslexia Action. Since then we've had to push a fair bit, but the report helped and he's had 1:1 intervention, small group work and a whole heap more understanding in class. On tutoring, I think a lot depends on the school and how much help they're prepared to give. We're incredibly lucky with ours, but also in that DS goes to a local charity after school twice a week. It's like a special club which he adores. He gets 1:1 sessions in a hugely creative way and it's been utterly brilliant for him.

well, after speaking to the Senior Education Officer of the LEA last week (who was evasive on actual help whilst promising 'all that could be done'), child has come home today telling of CT 'holding his work up to the class and saying it was worse than children 3 years younger and how he must try harder'. This is AFTER a formal complaint to the LEA!

Firstchoice, that is disgraceful! DD1 had a running war with her dense TA over reading out weekly spellings, but her CT was lovely. Even if it took to the very end of Y6 to get her problems formally recognised.

I'm not sure what you do if you have already formally complained.

I have had very patchy support in private schools as well. The problem is that some teachers have had very little training in Specific Learning Difficulties, so you do encounter downright ignorance. We were lucky enough to be at a school at 6 that implemented intensive intervention even before diagnosis on the basis that if DD was falling behind then the help she needed would be the same regardless of the reason. We had one session a week at school together in school, it was using a scheme called Learning Together but the Dyslexia charities will be able to recommend similar schemes, the rest we did in nightly sessions at home. She is 17 now and still uses the tools she was given then. If you can find a good tutor by word of mouth or via a charity it will be worthwhile but we have had variable experiences of that as well. I am afraid that as a parent of a child with Specific Learning Difficulties like Dyslexia and Dyspraxia you do face a challenge getting the support and understanding and in supporting your child yourself.

firstchoice, that's so awful. Could you write a non-ranty, intelligent letter of complaint to the Governors? If you just list what you have on here it's so obviously wrong they'd surely have to wade in?

Firstchoice that is awful. The school should be helping your DS they don't have to have a formal diagnosis before giving any help. DD3 is Dyspraxic and is now 22. When she was at primary school she was put on school action while waiting for the Educational Phsycholagist. She had some extra group work and one to one sessions with the SENCO. However we did have to fight for help at Secondary school. So my advice would be to keep pushing the school and complain again to the head

Hi again,
delayed reply sorry!
in Scotland so no senco, no board of govorners etc
only LEA - have already complained to Director of Education (who wouldn't see us) and to Senior Ed Officer.

I did go and see a school last week (50m away, out of our area, in fact in England!) which seemed very different. Small and caring. As I walked in, there was in HUGE letters in the hallway, a big sign saying: 'I am dyslexic, not dyslex - thick!'.
But it would mean a massive upheaval...