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[wicanwitch]

i have previously home educated my children before, but put them into school last september my daughter is in primary and doing great my son was at secondary and not doing well at all i have taken him out and have been home educating him since early feb
we have just had our first visit from the home ed team and all is well which i am very happy about.
my son is very demanding and suffers extreme dyslexia so any ideas on keeping him focused would be very helpful as although i am enjoying him being home it can be very stressfull

Hi, I Home Educated my D/S (with Selective Mutism) for a year. He chose to come out of school, and he chose to go back. It sounds as though you (rather than your DS) decided to embark on H/Ed. I understand this unilateral decision, but it can be confusing, especially for a dyslexic child. Have you considered a completely autonomous education - ie, totally child-centred. Your DS decides what interests him, and he learns about it, with you as a facilitator. If he is interested, he will focus himself and it will be less stressful for you. As a previous Home Educator, I am sure you are already aware that you can ignore the National Curriculum?

thanks for the advice i can understand that and i think it could be helpfull although trying to get him to write anything is a nightmare and his concentration is zero another question i have is haveif if you any ideas on how to help him retain the information as the type of dyslexia he has also means that he doesnt retain much that is taught to him as well as the reading and writing problems

What is he interested in? Get him to draw whatever it is. Then ask him to label it. Ask him to tell you about it/tell a story about it. Then ask him to write about it in whatever way he wants - story, newspaper report, draw it in a comic, dialogue, paint it, whatever. Hope this helps.
PS - dyslexic children often hate writing - they may prefer to type on a keyboard.

thanks for your help youve given me some great tips

My daughter had extreme dyslexia.
She didn't retain anything she was taught. She didn't recognise a word from one line to the next.

She couldn't read or spell even her name, when she left school aged nearly nine.

Instead of trying to make her read or spell anything, we backed right off and allowed her education to run ahead, by following her interests, going out and about to museums/art galleries/theatres as well as home ed workshops with the local groups.

We watched TV and DVDs together and talked and talked and talked. I read to her whatever and when ever she wanted me to. We got free story tapes from Calibre to encourage her love of novels-instead of fearing them, as most severe dyslexics do.

We did lots of crafts together and baking and science experiments. We took loads of walks and did gardening/grew our own food together.
We played with all types of kits that we got off ebay/charity shops/car boot sales and from Opitec

She finally began to get reading and spelling aged 13.

MSN was the best tool ever for our daughter to learn to read and spell.
It didn't matter too much if she spelled wrongly, folks might think she had mistyped or was using some form of text speak. It meant she didn't mind having a go. And it encouraged her reading-no teen wants their mother leaning over their shoulder reading MSN messages.

By the age of 15 she was reading and spelling well enough to start her first OU starter course at university degree entrance level.
She is reading all sorts of books now for pleasure.

She still has some trouble with physically writing on bad days-she misses out letters etc. This doesn't happen when she types. Getting her, her own laptop has set her free she says.

For her reading and spelling happened much later than for others-but with no pressure to perform to someone else's timetable (one of the true joys of home ed) it all came together when the time was right for my daughter and not before.

She and I are both still convinced that making her try and read/spell/write before she was ready would have been the very worst thing.

She is now trying to decide whether to do her whole degree through the OU or whether to go to FE college.

thanks for the websites they r great and we will be using the calibre im glad to hear your daughter has done so well i do wory about my son and the reading and writing he has made progress and although i dont pressure him he is so self-concious about it and when he's having a bad day his self-esteam plumets and its hard to make him feel better about himself and he gets sooooo angry and aggresive but im sure he will be fine in time
i wish your daughter all the best for her future

The self esteem thing is difficult to deal with.

Recently we needed a Piano teacher and I needed to explain about DDs difficulties to him.
Until recently words and letters will still jumping round on pages.
The same happened with musical notes so learning to read music was an impossibility.
It seems this jumping around has now stopped-hence her desire to learn to read music now.
But I needed to fill him in.
DD heard me talking and although she had given me permission to say it, hearing me say it out loud upset her deeply and reiterated how difficult things are for her.
She wept buckets for such a long time.

I try and get her to focus now on how far she has come and to try and be solution oriented.

It isn't easy though.