Starting high school with ADHD, dyslexia and huge learning gaps.

[LeisureSuitLarry]

Hi everyone I’m hoping to hear from other parents who’ve been in a similar situation, because honestly we’re feeling really worried and a bit alone right now.

I’m in Scotland and my son is 11, about to start high school after the summer. He was diagnosed with ADHD and dyslexia around age 8/9, and is currently being assessed for autism. He also struggles with anxiety and can be very negative about himself as well as quite oppositional/avoidant though no longer in an aggressive way since he started medication 3 years ago.

From ages 3–8 he had extremely challenging behaviour, and during COVID he missed a huge chunk of school learning (I’m a key worker so he was in keyworker childcare rather than doing the online classes his classmates had). Looking back, it feels like he missed a lot of the foundations.

What’s confusing is that in many ways he seems absolutely fine—he’s genuinely articulate, socially aware, funny, very sporty, and popular. He’s a natural leader and reads people really well. If you had a conversation with him, you probably wouldn’t notice anything was wrong.

But academically, he’s massively, massively behind. He doesn’t know basic things like the 2 times table, the days of the week, or even his date of birth. Today I asked him to name the days of the week and he said “July.” It really shocked me and brought home how big the gaps are.

We got him a literacy tutor at the start of the school year and his basic literacy is coming on. He is reading at maybe a 7 year old level and improving.

We feel like we don’t even know where to begin in helping him catch up, especially with high school coming. I spent some time with him this evening trying to learn the days of the week and he had zero clue whatsoever.

I’d really appreciate hearing from anyone who has been through something similar:

What actually helped your child learn the basics?

Were there specific resources, apps, or approaches that worked? He does love YouTube videos and loves telling me about stuff he learned on there. Usually crazy trivia.

How did you handle the resistance to learning?

Did things improve once the right support was in place?

Even just hearing that things got better would mean a lot right now.

Thank you so much for reading.

I can’t respond fully at the moment, but just wanted to say that I’m also in Scotland and my child is currently in S1.

She is dyslexic and has AuDHD and is also pathologically demand avoidant. She wasn’t diagnosed with any of this until P5-6.

she doesn’t know any of the times tables, probably can’t say the alphabet right through and often needs to think about months, spelling of her surname etc.

however, we know from her autism assessment that she is highly intelligent (“gifted”) - this did come as a bit of a surprise given her struggles. I was worried about high school but surprisingly she’s absolutely flying now.

more variety and independence is helping her and she has her own strategies to work stuff out. I eventually told her not to worry about time tables etc because she will always have a calculator and her mental maths is good albeit she takes a bit longer to get there because she doesn’t have a strong grasp of number bonds.

sometimes I look at her and am almost in tears of happiness because I was so worried about S1 and she’s enjoying it and actually in the top set for maths.

I’m not saying we won’t have a tough road ahead because I know we will, but I’m taking things one day at a time and so far I’ve been pleasantly surprised.

my advice is to try to focus on what your son CAN do and HOW he does it and see if you can support him to harness his brainpower that way. My daughter hated primary school but high school is completely different for her - I can hardly believe it myself

Hi I can't say I've been in this position however as an experienced teacher, I've been working on a learning tool for this exact purpose. I noticed that students with dyslexia & ADHD are stuck with learning gaps but are at a huge disadvantage when studying independently.

I've created a platform that allows students to study from very simple 'Flashcards' online - they are audio which reduces the dyslexia associated barriers to participation. Essentially the student can listen to 'decks of flashcards' online & take mini-trivia style quizzes using their voice to respond.

I'm not trying to sell as its completely free for students to use - Here's a video demo, if you think this could help the site is quizcards.co.uk

There's also a contact form on the site if there's quiz content that you specifically want e.g particular subjects / year group.