Nephew aged 7 behind in everything, sister worried, any advice please?

[fireflyfairy2]

Hi, I don't know where else to ask for advice for my older sister.

She has 2 boys who are 7 & 5. The 7year old is the youngest in his primary 3 class as he has a June birthday.

At first when he was falling behind the teacher & my sister put it down to his immaturity. In primary 2 he got extra help with his maths & was sent home different homework than everyone else. My sister didn't realise for a while that his homework was different, so the teacher had gotten him help & changed his work without telling my sister.

Anyway, at the start of October my sister just happened to see the teacher at home time & asked how he was getting on. The teacher said his concentration levels were at rock bottom & the day before it had taken him an hour to get 3 words down on a page.

Sister arranged a meeting with the teacher who told her he never listens to what he's told etc.. he plays with a bottle while everyone else is getting on with their work.

Anyway at the time my sister asked if they should get him assessed as she wanted him to get whatever help he needed. Teacher said he was already getting help with reading & maths & there wasn't really anything more an assessment could get them

Forward now to last week when sis had a normal meting with the teacher.. she said she was very concerned about his behaviour & was able to give her instances where it wasn't just immaturity.. they had a visitor in the class & her son sat under the table & refused to come out. My sis told the teacher she used to spend hours on his homework, but I posted on here before about that & the overwhelming advice was to give him a set time, let him do as much as he could & hand that in, this is what she has been doing. The teacher said this isn't good enough anymore. She wants to get an educational psyc in to assess him {what my sister suggested weeks ago} My psychlogy lecturer give me a number of an edu psyc who is good, but I also advised my sis to go & see her GP.

Also, teacher told my sis she had lost her temper with him one day last week: She had spent an hour with him one to one, trying to get him to understand 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 etc.... & she thought he had the hang of it.. she then asled him it 5 minutes after she had walked away & he laughed at her & started sliding off the chair & wouldn't do it. Sliding off the chair under the desk seems to be his thing.

Had another text off my sister last night saying she was talking to a lady who got help off her GP without having to see her ed psyc & that the HV was coming out on Monday as her son has been wetting the bed. He only never wets the bed when they aren't at home They stayed here a few weeks ago & he didn't wet the bed, neither did he do it on holidays or when they stay at my other sister's house

I am worried about my nephew & my sister. Her dh keeps saying "Does that mean he's stupid then?" He can't accept that the child just needs help & he would be better getting the help he needs rather than struggling along.

Can anyone shed any light on anything or give me some advice to help my sister?

Sorry for such a long post.

Oh, your poor sister.

Can't really offer any advice, but am glad that at last he's going to get an assessment.

Her dh should get involved in the meetings, imo, so the two of them are facing it together

my son had quite similar problems at this age. we had him assessed by a psyc ed (we had to pay for this) and it was very useful, showed a specific learning dificulty relating to spelling which he now has support with and is making good progress. i do thing that this is the way to go - he may also need a detailed eye exam and hearing test to look for things like dyslexia. there is loads that can be done, extra support in and out of school. im not clear what you mean about the hv and the bed wetting - the hv might be a good place to start looking at some of the broader issues. the gp prob wont be much help with this sort of thing ime and will refer on. her dh needs to get involved with getting help.

sorrt for typos must proof before posting...

The school have their own ed pscys but her dh wanted to go privately as it would be quicker. I chatted to my lecturer who lives in the same area as my sister & she give me this mans details. BIL said he would call & he hasn't.

As far as he is concerned it is my sisters fault . He said she has the children wrapped in cotton wool. My god, she is a good mother, what does he want her to do??

The child also hard dh yelling at sis & saying it was her fault & that's when nephew cried & said it was his fault.

There are a lot of other things at play her but I do believe my BIL is damaging his son. I have posted once before under a different name about trying to help her leave, but he talked her back into staying.

I guess I think the bedwetting might be related to BIL's attitude, but I don't want to say that. My sis knows I am here for her & will help her in whatever way I can.

Moopymoo, what age was your son & what class was he in?

Is it usual for this not to be noticed until he is 7?

Your sister sounds just like mine.

Her son, 6, is a little sweetheart but he is backwards in some ways. His concentration is poor and so is his coordination. When he was four, a doctor first suggested autism to her and since then she has been fighting against the diagnosis. He has been on every special diet and been to every form of alternative medicine imaginable.

My sister was worried that if he had a diagnosis, that the school would not bother teaching him, labelling him as unteachable.

Part of my nephew's problems go down to glue ear. He has repeated bouts of hearing loss and his consultant is cautious about the gromits operation and tends to go long courses of antibiotics which also help. Children with sub-hearing problems often show the behaviour you have been describing. It isn't always obvious and is definitely worth checking. My nephew can hear the word chocolate whispered across a crowded room, but he does have glue ear.

My sister's fears about her son being neglected at school have been totally unfounded. He was the darling of the special needs teacher, but since going into Y2 he does not seem to need the help. His reading has jumped on and I think he has been taken off the extra help.

I think a diagnosis should help your nephew. Hopefully it will also help your sister and her husband too.

Hiding under the table is something that my ds2 does when he is feeling overwhelmed or uncertain about a situation. He often hides when we have visitors, even when it's someone he knows well.

It may be that your nephew needs things to be explained and shown to him in a different way. Hopefully an appointment with an Ed Psych will give everyone a clearer picture.

hi firefly - ds was 6 in I2/class 2. I think it is probably unusual for nothing at all to be noticed before 7, particularly at home - I knew there was something adrift before then. However, it is not unusual for problems to become more apparent as school becomes more structured imo.it does sound, however, that the problems could simply be the child responding to a difficult environment at home. difficult for you to intervene though.
madsometimes, whilst your post generally has a caring tone, i feel i must object to your use of the word 'backwards' really really inappropriate and
up there with 'handicapped' in being outdated and unacceptable.

Thanks everyone. I do agree that it's very difficult for me to intervene, especially when sometimes an outsiders eye is all it takes.

After the first meeting, where the teacher told my sis it took J an hour to put a few words on the page, J begged her not to tell daddy.. so she didn't. It's like it's her & the 2 boys, a team against him.

I do think, however, if he had been made aware of the difficulties right from the beginning he would have been much more help & a good support. He comes from a very well educated family, all teachers/head teachers & I guess he is sturggling to think why his son is falling behind at school. He sees it as my sister's fault.

Also, he tends to be the stricter of the 2 parents, which is why I think my sister sometimes lets the boys off with too much, she is too much the other way, so they boys could be behaving the same way all day & they don't get reprimanded, yet when daddy comes home he will reprimand them.. making him the big bad wolf in their eyes.

It's all difficult & I think that maybe we have all seen something in his behaviour over the years, but as my children are younger I never felt qualified to appraoch the subject, It was just when she rang me worried that I felt I could voice my fears. I do believe he is hyperactive in some way, yet he eats all the right things, gets loads of attention etc...

Hopefully something will be done & he will get the help he needs at school.

Is he actually physically able to write more than that in an hour? I ask because my ds1 used to find it very hard. He could form the letters but his hands would hurt after writing even one word.

Has the school looked at other ways of getting him to write? My ds1 has a sloped writing board and is helped with his posture. For some children it can take a lot of effort to sit in a chair and write at the same time. Sliding off the chair is often a sign of that.

Moopymoo - Didn't mean to cause offense by post. My nephew has some difficulties and I'm not up to date with correct terminology. His school has estimated him to get 2c in SATs, so he is actually average. This is in part due to the early intervention of the special needs teachers. That said having glueear, query autism and dypraxia have caused my sister much anxiety.

Once parents and schools know what is happening, it is much easier for children to progress and not be labelled as lazy or disruptive. As I know from my sister though, this process is fraught with emotion and soul searching.

Coppertop I don't know if he can write more than a few words in an hour, sis never said. But that day he only wrote a few was when they were left to work alone.

I have just got a few texts from my sister this afternoon. She said that J showed her a pic this morning that he had drawn at school. He had written his own name & the name of his brother & drew a heart around them. The heart was all skribbled over though. He told sis that he wrote their names & that the heart was her name as he didn't know how to write it, but then his friend skribbled over it when he said he loved his brother & mammy.

She said this same boy keeps telling J that he's silly etc but that he is the only one on the class who will play with J as the rest of the class seem to think he is childish. A while back this boy was picking on J in class & my sis went to the teacher.. next day same boy punched J in his privates & said you don't snitch on your buddies & I'm you best buddy.

I told sis to go & see the teacher incase this child is bullying him in a way no-one can see & this may contribute to the bed wetting.

I also suggested that she & her dh go to relate or marriage guidance counselling as it can only help them. She said he wouldn't go & would never accept that any of it is his fault ie: the bad atmosphere at home.

She said she does know that her boys come first & if he doesn't agree to try & work at their relationship she will have to leave..