Dreamer of dreams,born out of my due time, Why should I strive to set the crooked straight. Wm Morris

[indignatio]

Hopefully the link from the other thread will work

My stats

ds is 4.5 - summer born
In reception class

Has issues with:-
Easy distractability (school work and practical tasks)
Concentration problems when not totally engaged by something (95% of the time)
Fidgeting
Getting "lost" in the middle of a complicated sentence/explaination.
Bossy manner
Isolation at school
Poor eye contact
Repetition of sentences until he hears the acknowledgement
No herding instinct

On the positive
Very loving boy
Exceptional reader for his age
Good at maths
Lots of "home" friends
If gripped by something, can concentrate on it for ages

dx:
teacher initially thought he might have dyspraxia - no longer thinks so.
I consider that he has more add traits, but would not go so far as to say he has add.
SENCO to informally assess him next week and then meeting to be arranged with parents, teacher and senco shortly thereafter.

Not sure what else I should put in.

That's very interesting Singersgirl, and not just because it supports my own hobbyhorse - one of the reasons I think ds needs the activity so much is because of his particular build (which is heavy-muscular): without activity he gets very noticeably sluggish. Your ds isn't like that though, is he? So it is interesting that running-around gets recommended for types other than the hefty sort.

Oh, very definitely not hefty - small and thin as a rake and never, ever still. Sluggish is not a word that you could ever apply to DS1 . He stayed with my sister recently and she said afterwards, "He drew for two hours and talked non-stop the whole time." Absolutely bags of frequently unfocused energy - so the idea is to get rid of some of it, leaving just enough to get on with the task in hand.

Now DS2 is the sluggish sort and very unwilling to move at all. Perhaps some movement would stir up him up a bit!

Lovely to see you all

That is so interesting about the physical activity having a positive effect. It is one of the things I spoke to DS's (Year 2) teacher about at parents' evening. I think help with physical activity will really help him in all areas. He still has trouble in the playground because he's not up to other's standards etc. She said they would concentrate on it but I think I might have to go down Bink's route and find someone privately to do work with him. Do you mind me asking how you found your PE teacher Bink?

Also, sadly, like indignatio's DS, teaching seems to have gone off the boil in Year 2. Their Year 1 teacher did amazing things to them all. The first thing his new teacher said to me at parents' eve was "DS has arrived in Year 2 in a position we hope the high achievers might be by the end of it". I had to bite my tongue from saying "So, your work here is done"! I guess it is all about SATS after all

castles - I found him on gumtree - perfect sort of job for gumtree (if you're in a gumtree-carpeted area like London - are you?). You have to target your pool of potential applicants carefully on gumtree though - I put my ad in the teachers-wanted section, in the dedicated PE sub-category. I said I wanted someone patient, encouraging, and with some special needs experience/interest.

It got me lots of applicants, most of them with proper qualifications; and including one that we didn't employ as he got snapped up for a very similar job. So clearly the supply (and the demand) is out there!

Bink - very interesting re Physical Education guidance... We had no specific advice, but I work at home, and I know that I work MUCH better when I have had physical exercise (eg a bike ride around Richmond Park, 100 bounces on trampoline ) and also when I have a deadline, and so with the DC we have alsways tried replicate those conditions where possible for the homework. Also, re Latin - I LOVED Latin @ school, and also Maths, becuase it had right answers, and now DS1 has started learning Latin formally @ school (he is a maths whizz - better than me, more like DH) and also has an affinity for Latin - glowing accolades from his teacher, and even DS2 is taking an interest in it, although sadly not taught at his school, because he also likes task oriented activities..

ps - lol re 'gumtree-carpeted' what an evocative expression!!!!!!

Hi there, can I join you all? Castles told me about this thread ages ago.

Ds1 has sensory processing disorder. He is also quite bright which tends to go with SPD and just makes the whole mix even more interesting IYKWIM. I seem to spend huge amounts of time either dealing with him and his various issues or thinking about the same. It's remarkable that ds2 gets any attention at all but I think we do a pretty good job at balancing it out thus far anyway. Ds2 is a sunny little soul who is my saving grace most days - and ds1's for that matter.

Hi jabberwocky, lovely to have a new joiner! (On this thread - not suggesting you are otherwise new.)

I think an element of SPD is something others of us will recognise, though perhaps at a sub-diagnosis level - my ds is wretchedly tickly (not fun) and has noise-sensitivities (forks on plates, hands on metal handrails) which go beyond the norm. And lots of us have standard-issue other children (I have dd, who's 8, and a focussed & altogether down to earth merry little person) which help to make clear that we didn't "give" our dreamers these problems - they came that way.

Tell us more!

Hi bink, thanks for the welcome. I had lunch with earlybird before I left TN and she mentioned that you and she had a meetup I think? Lovely person, earlybird. Too bad I moved away just as she came.

Interesting that you mentioned the bit about our dreamers coming to us this way. I think about it often and sometimes tell dh that ds1 got an overly healthy dose of both of our neuroses. We are currently doing listening therapy at home along with occupational therapy at school. I notice some improvements in things like doing up buttons (remarkably difficult for him) but then the outbursts and tears seem worse lately. He is 5 and in kindergarten (we're in the US). We moved to get him into this really wonderful school but the social strains are still a burden for him.

I read your post about the physical activity and it reminded me of a chapter in a book I just finished. It talked about children who have combination of over and under sensitivity. So on the one hand they can seem sluggish and lethargic and need to really move their bodies to get going but on the other hand can show sensitivity to labels on clothes, etc. The book is Sensational Children if you're interested.

Hello Jabber, good to see you. Your DS does sound remarkably familiar ...

Thanks for the info Bink. Yes we are in the gumtree-carpeted area of Richmond (so is MrsGofG by the sound of it?). I had a quick look at gumtree last night. I'm going to post an ad. I think it's an excellent idea. 1:1 is right up DS's street.

Hi castles, I'm glad you revived this thread. Headed out of town though so I hope it's still going next week when I come back. I could use a place to vent discuss ds1.

We are very close, too, then, Castles - Richmond as well.

Oooh, do you think there's something in the air in Richmond??

I'm so pleased you like my idea castles!

It was one of those lightbulb moments when I thought of it - dh had his life (and, ahem, figure) turned around a few years back by having some sessions with a personal trainer, and I thought - this idea is all over the place for sedentary/non-sporty adults so why not for a child? (PS it might be useful for you to know that while the going rate for an adult's personal trainer is £30-50 ph, I asked my candidates to quote & the range was £12-20 ph.)

Oh, incidentally, as ds gets better at the basic stuff we began with (like throwing & catching), I've started to think it would be good for him to share the sessions with another similar child - you can get a little bit more of a game going then - football skills are less easy to practice 1-to-1.

Just mentioning in case you find even more kindred spirits in Richmond ...

Thanks Bink. I was going to ask you about the cost. You read my mind! I was also just thinking of a fellow potential dreamer (whose mother isn't on this thread but should be ) who might like to join in with some of the football stuff etc. If anyone else locally is interested, let me know!

I talked with ds1's OT yesterday. There is a new gym in out town with a climbing wall. The OT agreed that it would be an excellent activity for ds1 with stretching, contracting, increasing muscle tone and strengthening core muscle groups. I'm hoping to give it a try this afternoon.

PS

There is some really interesting new research showing that some children are misdiagnosed with ADD when in reality it is a vision problem

here and here

Is anyone around? Just had nightmare morning with ds1. 30 minute tantrum over getting dressed for school that just kept escalating And then ds2 was being such a sweet normal little boy it made ds1 seem that much more abnormal iykwim.

Hi jabber, I'm here.
I'm here because I'm at home (ie instead of at work) because ds has been excluded for today & tomorrow

Long story ... but in nutshell I agree with the school's line (it's a new mainstream one, which ds has just moved to this year from his previous "unit" specialist school), and do believe them when they say they're doing the suspension because they are totally committed to making the school work for ds & are therefore trying to nip stuff in bud.

Anyway, if you're in a mood for commiseration I definitely am!

Hi Bink, I'm dreading the day when we have to keep ds1 home for the same reason. The OT and the teacher have both talked to us in the last week about ds1's behavior He just doesn't respond to the normal methods of discipline. He did at first but as the teacher says now he's starting to "figure her out".

I ordered a DVD yesterday that a couple made about Sensory Processing Disorder. Their son was initially misdiagnosed with autism.

Yep, "normal" methods don't work well with ds either.

In his case, it's to do with a combination of:

(a) memory problems, so he genuinely forgets stuff other people wouldn't (like tellings-off - hence repeating the same behaviours - the repetition is what he's been excluded for, rather than the behaviour itself if you see what I mean); and

(b) having a very weak grasp of consequences. This is a classic one - if you don't by nature develop the automatic habit of thinking & looking ahead, it's a really hard one to learn (or indeed teach - I'm still wrestling with how to).

However - ds is better at responding to the normal methods than he was. And, every now and then, grasping how much better he'd get on if he did try to "believe in" [his words] consequences.

A weak grasp of consequences... I've never thought of it in quite those terms but that could apply to ds1. He's such a complex little boy, I feel as if I spent 90% of my day thinking and/or worrying about him.

Just adding this to my threads. Bink, sorry to hear about the suspension although a positive move in the long run?

Cheery update on Bink's ds below. This will probably break my record for long, so that was the executive summary :

• at the end of the first day back from the suspension we had a Meeting, which was a very sombre one, about what schools can be expected to manage & what they can't. We discussed getting someone in to observe ds, and agreed that the short time till the end of term was crucial [sword of Damocles sensation]. I said my bit about thinking memory issues might be an underlying thing to look at

• ds and I devised, together, a Notebook, which is divided in rows down the page per lesson, and against each lesson three columns headed "content" "me behave" and "they think" [note the important requirement to see things from others' pov] and ds was to go through the day filling in each column of each row with green dots (= good) yellow dots (= OK ...) and red dots (NOT good). A portable behaviour memory, you see

• this worked LIKE A BLOODY CHARM - we had every single day filled in, teachers commenting on how he wouldn't do his free time till he'd finished his notebooking, ds even canvassed the other kids at break for their view of his behaviour (which they were sweet about - I think while he was on suspension a talk may have been given to the others about trying to help him). There was a red dot or two early on, and then there was nothing but greens, and even a silver or two

• and then on the last day of term he won (jointly, must mention that) the class prize for coming top in the exams!!

He is very happy it's the holidays, but also very very looking forward to next term. And during/because of the notebook period, he also decided two of the boys were actually friends.

all round

Final thing: I think the key to this is that it was his system, devised by him, and run by him, and nothing imposed from above/outside. I'm not sure he could have done it before the age he is now, but he has so completely proved he can do it now.