I am getting concerned about my daughter

[RyanLondon]

I have a daughter who is 10 years old, and she is in Primary School, year 5. She is an only child. When she was in Years 1 and 2 and 3, she always seemed at the top of her class. However, over the last year or two, we are beginning to get concerned about her ability or if she has any other issues.

I write this post very reluctantly because I am not big on labelling kids and stuff and I personally feel kids now study far more than we ever did. My wife is what I would call a pushy parent, academics is everything to her and she was very academic. Although I feel its important, its not everything to me, and even if she had average grades and was happy and a good person, I would be more than happy.

The thing that concerns me a lot is if she learns something today, in 2 days she will not remember how to do it, and will almost certainly fail most of the questions. We spend about £300 a month on private tutoring, plus we spend time going through stuff with her if she needs help and practice sessions. I feel she gets far more support than the average kid, so you would assume she would be able to learn and remember. By the way, she is in a normal school.

The thing is with all this support, she is still forgetting stuff she has learnt. Apart from that if you talk to her she is a smart kid. In some ways very smart. She is well balanced and likes the usual stuff girls her age like. She has a bit of temper tantrums, but I had the same, it just fades as you get older. But her ability to keep information in seems extreme to me. Its stuff that she has learnt many times, and then forgets in a day or two.

I have a bad feeling she has inherited some of the negative elements from me. Although I went to university, I was terrible at studies up until 16. I know if I was born in this generation, there would be a high chance I would be labelled possibly even medicated. But because I had other creative abilities, I managed to do better than my peers who were academic.

She also doesn't have many friends in school, even though if you look at her you wouldn't think it. Her personality is different from a lot of the other girls, so she doesn't do well in groups. She does better one to one. I was the similar, but I had a lot of friends.

But I don't want to label her because I was in many ways like her. She could be totally different and maybe I am unconsciously assuming she has my traits.

So I don't know what to do about her. She hates studying. And she can't absorb or remember much. I am wondering if I should get her seen by a specialist. The bottom line is, she is the most important thing in my life, so I want to feel that I have done my best by her!

Any thoughts advice or suggestions welcome. Are there organisations or charities I could talk to? Or parents groups?

If she is already trying really hard but strugging/failing then an incentive/reward would be an awful idea.

It sounds like there could be something going on if she’s unable to retain the information. That can happen when DC don’t fully understand the process so she could be learning it from short term memory without understanding WHY she does x,y.z to get the answer. So for example, she learns so do a certain calculation to work out a percentage but has no clue as to why she does it, so at the time she can do any number of the same sum correctly but a few days/weeks later she won’t be able to apply this again.

Reasons behind this could be processing issues, dyscalcula, dysgraphia.

I agree get her assessed, particularly in combination from what you said about her not having many friends and struggling in groups. You also seem to have a feeling/gut instinct that something isn’t quite right. Parents are so often correct with this.

In terms of your concerns over ‘labeling’ her. If she had diabetes would you be reluctant to ‘label’ her as ‘diabetic’?

In terms of encouraging her to tell you what she wants to do, she’s 10, let her be. Let her play, sit and relax, make good friends, encourage her not to worry about tests, etc (which I’m sure you do all this) but she’s only little once, remember she will never, ever get this time back.
You sound really supportive so I’m sure when the time comes you will encourage her to achieve whatever she wants but while she’s young, stop worrying about what place she is in class, tututing, etc.

Maybe she's stressed and fed up of all the pressure? Maybe she's saying she doesn't know how to do something to get you or the tutor off her back? Maybe there's nothing wrong with her and she's just not the high flier you would like her to be? Talk to her honestly, talk to the school and be prepared to back right off with the pressure before you put her off learning all together.

I am not sure how you know she is in the top 20 in the class if the school does not give you feedback on her progress and you definitely do not know the progress of the other children. Comparisons, therefore, are somewhat futile.

I would try and have a chat with her teacher about her progress later this term. You need a far more accurate picture of her school performance and what they think is happening. Progress is the key word. Has she plateaued or is she still making good progress?They must have an assessment scheme and they must evaluate the progress of all children. I think you want her to be high up in the class yet you seem very ready to dismiss what the school does. I would find out a lot more about her school progress and what they see at school.

What you see at home is switched off child and your comments seem to only be about tutoring and what you are trying to teach her at home. Mine would have hated being tested by me for recall all the time! You seem somewhat overbearing in your pursuit of her academic education and are you allowing it to dominate your lives? Perhaps try and find more hobbies and loosen up a bit?

Maybe the stuff you’re trying to teach her is just too difficult for her at this point.

Honestly, I feel sorry for her. All this academic pressure at such a young age cannot be good for her mental health. She’s so little.

I would stop the tutoring. Let her be.

At 10, 12, 14, or 16 I had no interest in where my DC were in class all I wanted was for them to be happy and confident.

You and your wife are focussing on education but your dd is struggling and it wouldn't matter how many hours of work she puts in she is never going to achieve what you want.

The trick is to find out what is going on, help her to adjust then find something she is actually good at and enjoys doing and throw as many hours at that and if she is bottom of the class who really cares.
If she is confident in herself then that is what will take her further than any mediocre GCSE results that have been obtained by a life of struggling.

Have you watched the programme about dyslexia .

It is a few years old but it featured an actress who said that she really struggled in school. She would look around at other children and wonder how they were able to get what the teacher was saying and doing and just get on in the lesson whilst she just sat there thinking she didn't think she was stupid but couldn't understand why she didn't pick things up like others did.

Maybe your dds lack of friends is because she is putting so much pressure on her self to be top of the class and failing

She could be going through puberty, my daughter is 7.5 years and has moodiness and forgetfulness of simple spellings and maths she learned in year 1 and 2. She herself said she doesn't know why she forgets and started to cry. She has no tutoring does swimming, dance and piano and plays with friends but her breast buds have started already. In year 5, puberty is much more likely...read up the signs it may reassure you...inability to concentrate, tiredness, forgetfulness...dietary tweaking may help but also plenty of rest, water and confidence boosting. But if you can afford to, it wouldnt hurt to try educational psych to make sure that any learning needs are supported with evidence of how she learns best.