Bright DD just diagnosed with dyslexia in Y3, what do I do now?

[Newbie1011]

My DD has been struggling with reading, writing and spelling since year one and we finally had her formal dyslexia assessment last week (she is Y3 now) having been on the waiting list a while.
The assessor confirmed DD has dyslexia. She said her IQ was well above average (95th centile) and she would expect someone of her IQ to be excelling at school. But in fact her attainment scores are all low average.
Apparently her problems stem from relatively weak verbal working memory and weak speed of phonological processing (her rapid automatic naming score was low average so a big disparity apparently).
DD was found to have good visual working memory and excellent short term memory capacity.
The assessor found she has been masking her problems to some extent by using her good vocabulary/ verbal skills and her visual ability (picturing whole words rather than working with sounds) to support her to read.
I feel overwhelmed by the challenge of how to help her and would love to hear advice from anyone who has navigated this successfully. At the moment DD loves learning and is socially really happy and settled at her current (state) primary so I would be loath to move her, but at the same time I'm slightly terrified by how much she has fallen behind in spelling and writing (her reading has come on a lot this year but it's been a major effort), and by the scale of the challenge we face helping her to overcome these difficulties in the context of an overstretched state system.
DD has a private dyslexia tutor at home already but it's only 45 mins a week (the tutor can't offer us any more) - the tutor is amazing but 45 mins a week feels a bit like a drop in the ocean. We also read together every night and practice spellings and times tables, but writing creatively/ expressing herself in writing is the thing she absolutely can't stand to do which breaks my heart a bit.
I already feel like we spend our lives doing school work with her and I want to make sure we don't put her off for life but I want to make sure we're taking the right approaches.

I can't thank you all enough for responding and making me feel less alone.
@ADifferentSong it's so helpful to hear your specialist view in particular. I'll definitely try all of the resources that have been suggested. We did a bit of Nessy last night on a free trial, she really enjoyed it but it seemed a little easy for her, so I'll experiment with Word Shark, Dyslexia Gold and some of the others.
@Guest12345555 I can see someone has already been along to offer great advice re: the assessment. I took a slightly different tack. For me, I felt really strongly that I wanted the school on board and sort of wanted them to be 'leading' the assessment as much as possible, so that when we got it, they felt sort of committed to/ invested in it. I felt like if I'd organised it privately and completely independently of the school and then presented it to them out of the blue, there could have been question marks about the findings and I was determined to avoid this.
So I actually pushed for a meeting with the school Sendco first, (I had to push a lot - I first asked in y1 and was brushed off, told she just needed more time, it;s early days with her reading etc... finally got the meeting at the start of year 3 when issues still apparent despite a number of school and home based interventions).
I told the Sendco that I wanted her to be assessed, and asked if I should get a dyslexia assessment or an educational psychologist. She said the former, because all DD's issues are literacy/ learning based - she doesn't have any attention deficit or behavioural issues.
I then said I'd pay privately, but I asked directly which assessors the school 'rated' and had had high quality, useful reports from in the past as I wanted to use someone the school felt confident in.
The Sendco said she wasn't allowed to officially 'recommend' someone in this way but she did sort of nudge me towards this specific assessor who she said had done an amazing job previously and been very helpful. So that's who I used.
I paid £500 for the full diagnostic assessment (this was in central London). I'm still awaiting the full report by the end of this month, but the assessor has given me the headline findings to share with my DD and the school. The day itself was great, my DD was made to feel very comfortable and really enjoyed it.

My DS is a few years further along the same journey after diagnosis at start of year 3 - he's now in year 6. Similar profile - working memory and phonological processing difficulties (the dyslexia...) plus 99th percentile general cognitive ability. He was doing OK at school pre-diagnosis as in, mostly meeting ARE but cracks showing in his spelling, writing and times tables. Do look up 2E (or DME as it's called in the UK) - it sounds as though your school is on board which is great, but it's good to be forewarned of the issues that can arise around getting support for children who have this sort of profile and can muddle along by compensating through their strengths. When it comes to SpLDs, the SEN system is geared to support children who are behind age related expectations so if they're compensating through their strengths so as to not fall (too far) behind age norms, things can look superficially OK and they end up with no support for either the difficulties or the strengths. But of course they're paddling furiously below the waterline to keep up, ans it's exhausting, frustrating, demotivating and can impact mental health enormously. Early diagnosis and the right intervention is so important and your daughter has that - and you - in her corner which is great. Just be aware that as she moves through school you might have to keep on advocating for the right support and for her difficulties.

Things that have helped DS (sorry for long brain dump):

• one weekly session with a specialist dyslexia tutor (that 45 minutes or hour does pay off, it's a marathon not a sprint)
• Word Shark - we also used a bit of Nessy
• focussing on morphology and etymology alongside the work on phonics
• Simultaneous Oral Spelling, making and sound buttoning cards, magnetic phonics letters including the digraphs and trigraphs - basically multi sensory learning and over learning are your friends
• audio books, and me reading aloud books at interest level to give him access to the good stuff and keep the love of books and stories alive
• paired reading was super useful
• Depending on reading level: Project X Code and Project X Aliens were good reading schemes in year 2/3, and he also used one of the Phonic Books catch-up reading schemes for slightly older kids plus accompanying workbooks, which are higher interest/lower ability and hit the spot with DS in year 3.

-Barrington Stoke do some great shorter "proper books by proper authors" for dyslexic readers.

• Kindle gives you ability to customise font and layout, add a reading ruler and other hacks. Caroline Bateman's website www.achievenow.org.uk and YouTube channel have some amazing resources on using all the assistive tech which will become more and more useful as she moves up through the school. Caroline Bateman is giving the Kingston Uni webinars mentioned upthread, highly recommend these as well.
• Touch typing is super helpful but I think there's a sweet spot age for learning which depending on your child, might be not yet, but is definitely before the end of primary. DS learnt in year 5, he has a good typing speed now and is (finally) allowed to use a laptop in school for longer pieces of writing which has made such a difference to him. Be warned schools often prefer to focus on handwriting for much of primary, so tpuch typing/laptop use might be a battle if she isn't massively behind age averages.
• don't just focus on the difficulties to the detriment of outlets for stengths and interests. P4he does some fab online weekly debate and philosophy groups for 6-8 year olds and 9-12s if she wants an outlet for thinking and talking about ideas that don't come up.in school. Preserve time for clubs, sports, music, things she enjoys - school is super tiring, and if extra homework squeezes put time for interests it will make her resent the dyslexia more.
• negotiate homework demands and get her dyskexia tutor talking with her teacher to join up and coordinate. We prioritised homework from the dyslexia tutor and reading for pleasure.
• other ways of recording work and praising and rewarding verbal contributions in school are important too.
• times tables - there are lots of tips and ideas but ultimately, she made need a workaround. DS uses a times table square (Google "Sheffield Dyslexia Centre times table square as a reasonable adjustment" for more info)

I also recommend Hit the Button. It's a handy one to have on a mobile phone [yours] or a tablet. We played it with both children [1 dyslexic] when we had a spare minute, usually on a bus, or waiting for food to arrive in a restaurant.
The nice thing is you can do timed games or run it without a timer so less pressure. It groups multiplication tables into the same sets they do in school (3, 6, 9) etc
We made it a family game and as the kids got better moved into timed they would include us into a competition. How are your 7 times tables ? 😂
Dd who is dyslexic sounds very similar. TT have always been an issue, that recall thing.
They used Lexia at school which is a whole programme. Nessy is also highly recommended
You can buy books in large text or use a kindle. Harry Potter really gave my daughter the reading bug though the books were as big as a phone directory of old.
Her English teacher in year 3 took the view that as long as they are reading anything at all it's good - dyslexic or just reluctant readers. So he had a huge collection of Tin Tin and other visual comic books.

There were some other small things that we were recommended.
For her teachers - to give her worksheets of whatever was going on the board. The processing delay meant that she'd spend the allowed time just writing the question.
For us - processing multiple instructions is tricky for her.
So "take off your shoes, run upstairs and wash your hands, and pull the curtains before coming back asap" would just mean she'd take her shoes off and womble off. Infuriating. We've had to learn to stagger instructions and not to get unfairly annoyed. It's got better as she's gotten older, there's definitely developmental maturity that comes too.
Tell her what she's good at. Boost her confidence so she's game to try anything. What does her assessment say? Knowing that you are a bit shit at maths times tables is fine if you know you are near gifted at maths that require spatial skills? We can't all be good at everything or we'd all be professional footballers. Practice, practice and more - we all have to do it at some things.

Definitely, confidence and self esteem are key. End of the day, all the assessment results just information for her about how her mind works and how she learns best, and that's hugely useful to know - tell her knowledge is power! And the strengths and weaknesses aren't predictions or limitations, just a heads up on where she has to work harder (or smarter).

Times tables can be a particularly tough one at this age as they prep them for the multiplication table check in year 4. Schools spend a lot of time drilling times tables and it can feel like fluent rapid recall is the be all and end all and they "can't do maths" without it... So FWIW, my dyslexic DH had to resit his maths GCSE and scraped a C, but he got an A the following year in his maths A level as he understands the complex stuff. Mental arithmetic under pressure, he's still crap at :-) And DS can't pull 8×7 out of his brain under pressure within 6 seconds, but he can ace a reasoning paper. So make sure she knows that you don't always have to be a good human calculator and get a high score on TTRS or the multiplication check, to be a good mathematician - that might be important to hang onto through the next couple of years :-)

Thank you all so much for this amazing info. I've been going through it all, processing and making notes. I feel like DD's dyslexia is a full time job (!)
If anyone is still willing to indulge me any further I have a few questions in my head I'd love your more experienced thoughts on...

Did anyone move schools for a better experience? Are independent schools better for dyslexia/ would she get more of the sort of teaching she needs? I love our state school and would hate to move her in many ways (not least financial!) but I feel like I'm asking a lot of them and I can only imagine what its like for them trying to manage the number of kids with SEND and I'm acutely aware that because, exactly as you describe so eloquently @Cockerdileteef, she is muddling through within 'age expectations', she is bottom of the list for help (even though she is not doing well in the context of HER general abilities at all). Also, I honestly think the way she has been taught in year three - the constant drilling of complex spellings and times tables - is actually making her worse and because of the way state schools have to teach between now and SATS I'm worried this will only get worse. Whereas in an independent school they might have more leeway.
On the other hand they say you never move a happy child- and she IS happy and her teachers care very much about her and in terms of pastoral care and wellbeing the school is fab and it's a lovely, supportive, local community.
Would love to know others' experiences and thoughts on this.
2.
How do you talk to your DC about dyslexia without damaging their confidence/ in a way that feels meaningful to them? I have been trying to stress to DD that she is very smart but I feel like she almost gets more frustrated because what's the good of her being smart in a way that doesn't show up at school with spellings, times tables and writing? Also, I want to reassure her that it's not her fault that she finds spellings so tricky. But I also don't want to give her the impression she will never be good at them or can just give up. But that's quite a tricky and nuanced message/ quite dispiriting: 'this is always going to be ten times harder for you than everyone else, but you have to keep trying'. Would love to hear your ideas.
3.
With writing, I'm very worried about DD's written work. It seems to have actually gone backwards - when it was ok to write and spell phonetically she used to write lovely stories with adjectives etc. But now her written work quickly loses focus and becomes jumbled and the sentences don't make sense always. A bit of probing suggests DD has become so hung up on spelling correctly that she is focusing on that and forgetting about what she is actually writing half the time! Should I tell her to just focus on the content and forget about the spellings for now? I honestly think the way she has been taught in year three - the constant drilling of complex spellings and times tables - is actually making her worse!
4.
Laptops and assistive technology. Some kids in her class already use this to do their written work, they dictate it to an iPad, the story gets printed out and stuck in their book. But I don't know... 7 feels early to migrate her to this, when she is still learning to write by hand. And it feels like she does NEED to learn to write by hand - it doesn't feel like something we should give up on. On the other hand I want her to be able to express her ideas... and if long term the tech is going to free her to achieve, is earlier adoption better?

Argh, so many decisions/ worries and they feel so fraught.
Thanks so much for any/ all replies.

Dealing with it can be overwhelming at this stage - you've been focussed on getting answers and now you've got them, there's suddenly a new mountain in front of you to start climbing, so just take it steady - one step at a time :-)

1. Independent isn't an option financially for us, fees would be a big stretch and on top of that you have to pay for the SEN support additionally, it's not included in the fees.

FWIW we have kept DS in his state primary and just threw some money at supporting outside school. If your DD is happy in her school, and pastoral support is good, that's worth a lot. You will get no traction with the fact she's not meeting her own academic potential as long as she's meeting ARE... but if the school care about wellbeing, they WILL care about the emotional and mental health impacts of her strengths and weaknesses going unsupported, once these are brought to their attention. So personally I would keep her where she is for now and advocate for the help she needs from the perspective of maintaining self-esteem, engagement with learning and good mental health, which should get traction and is what's important here. (And don't be fobbed off with just ELSA interventions for the symptoms once they emerge, what you want is for the root cause to be addressed.) I absolutely hear what you're saying about them having lots of kids with more obviously pressing needs and I know I've felt awkward about asking for support for DS, and I've found it almost impossible to advocate for support for the strengths until this year (wish I'd done it sooner). But for our kids, a lot of the support actually costs very little - just "getting" them, and saying the right things at the right time, and some small adjustments in the classroom, are pretty much free and go a very long way. As long as you're in a position to provide the 1:1 tailored support outside school, there's a lot school can do that should be within the art of the possible, without taking money and time away from kids whose needs are more obviously acute. Independent schools vary in their approach to SpLDs so you could be out of the frying pan into the fire depending where you go...choose carefully! We're keeping it in mind as a backup for secondary and will review at the end of year 7 if it's all going tits up by then, but we're in an area where there's always some movement between state and independent sectors so it might be different in eg London where it's harder to get places.

1. It's nuanced and tricky, like you say...

Is there dyslexia in the family? My DH was diagnosed at college so he's been able to support DS which is great as there's someone at home who absolutely gets it. If you can show her people - IRL or stories online from dyslexia advocates - who have got where they want to academically and professionally despite (or because of - DH always says because of) their dyslexia, she might feel more positive. Keeping trying with spelling is all about pragmatism in this house - acknowledging that yes it is 10x the work for 1/10th the results and some of them never stick in long term memory and yes that's *** annoying, but it's worth plugging away as it will improve slowly with work and repetition - DH's spelling is still improving at 50 - and the more spellings you know or have an idea of yourself, the more effectively you can use the assistive tech so it's still worth it in today's world. I tell DS it's like sports if you're not sporty (which neither of us are) - you don't give up on doing some exercise for health and wellbeing, but you have realistic expectations of yourself and don't believe you'll make the Olympic team if only you try hard enough, and you also don't decide it's therefore all pointless. For explaining dyslexia generally, the Nessy books explaining dyslexia and self-advocacy hit the spot with DS after he was diagnosed. Really important too that she has ways to contribute and have interests and strengths recognised in school and at home that aren't dependent on spelling and times tables recall, too. (Eg DS is a fab verbal communicator so occasionally taking writing out of the equation completely is a morale boost.) School have a big part to play there but it's a cheap and easy win for them, just needs understanding.

1. DS's written work went backwards in year 2 into year 3 too. In his case he was self sabotaging because it was easier emotionally to mess it up on purpose or not put much down, than try and deal with the frustration. Diagnosis helped massively along with occasionally having a scribe so he could let rip with his ideas.

If your DD's writing is suffering from over focusing on spelling, her teachers can change that by giving her permission to let herself off that hook (as they'll be the ones who put her on it) - for example, they can encourage her to make her best guess so as not to break the flow, and go back and underline the word she isn't sure about when she finishes the sentence, to review later. Then she can work on that tricky word in a separate session, which takes the spelling away from the creative part of writing - make it about editing, which is just a small part of the whole writing process, and help her believe she's still a "writer" even if she's a wobbly speller. There are some children's authors who are dyslexic so might be worth looking them up. It might be more than just the spelling though - the working memory difficulties can impact structuring and organising ideas, so she might need some explicit teaching of ways to help her compensate. Writing frames, post it planning, simple mind maps, etc. Her tutor should be able to help on that front, and might be able to guide the school too. This is important for the long term so she has a tool box to draw on as the writing load increases as she moves up through the school and on to secondary. They might not be tools the school automatically think of for year 3, but your DD might need them now so year group norms shouldn't wag the dog.

1. I think there are times when handwriting is helpful, so I'm woth you, she needs it in her toolbox for the future. I also think there's an optimum age for touch typing and it's counter productive to push them into it too early. Year 3 is probably too early - maybe more for year 5-ish? When she learns, she needs to learn proper touch typing so she can build up a good speed. I found for DS that a big concerted push in the summer holidays when there's no other demands and pressures and he could practice daily (heavily bribed) was the best way.

But for right now...if she can occasionally dictate into an iPad and that takes the frustration out of writing and allows her to get more of her ideas down, I think that could be really good for her? Practise and familiarity with "ear reading" and how to extract information from audio inputs is also worth starting young, alongside reading - she will need this skill for longer text in later school years and in the world of work. Assistive tech doesn't have to be all or nothing, it's about having everything in her toolbox including handwriting and reading the old fashioned way, and then in the future she can mix and match according to the situation. I'd really recommend exploring Caroline Bateman's resources on this area.

Hope that helps. Sorry for another long brain dump. Happy to answer any more questions, or if your DD has any herself for DS, that it might help her to hear the experience of a peer who's been through it, I can feed back his answers to you by PM :-)

Ugh - that was meant to say 1, 2, 3 ,4 not 1, 1, 1, 1

Anyway, there are links on this page to the 2 Nessy books we used when explaining it, Explaining Dyslexia and What Do I Need?

https://www.nessy.com/en-us/dyslexia-explained/understanding-dyslexia/how-to-explain-dyslexia

I don’t think independent is necessary a better option - depends on the local state school and in the independent school. Ours in state did far better for support than the one in independent - and we have had to fill the gaps as best as we can.

I think technology can be great but agree that it may be more useful further down the line. By university everyone uses it anyway but can be useful for some kids in secondary. We have done lots of trying things and seeing what works best!

Thanks so much for your helpful message @Cockerdileteef - I've read it over several times - so much useful info.
I am going to wait and see what DD's current (state) school say about extra support when we meet in two weeks to discuss the recommendations of the report.
My ideal scenario would be for DD to stay at the state school she knows and likes and where her friends are, but gets 1:1 support in school from the specialist dyslexia teacher who has been tutoring her a couple of times a week.
We would happily fund this but from the reading I've done it seems the school might refuse this on the basis that it creates a two-tier system - is that right??
If that is right, do you think they're likely to allow her to instead finish school early a couple of times a week to have this help at home?
I guess she could just carry on as she is at school and I could try and get the tutor to do additional evening sessions but I just fear it'll get so exhausting for DD to do full school days and then additional tutoring sessions several times a week at home in the evenings. I think at the moment she already feels she is being 'punished' for having dyslexia by being made to do extra work!
But maybe that's better than the 'nuclear option' of moving schools which I know she would REALLY hate, and which I fear would be so unsettling that it might even undo any benefits associated with smaller class sizes/ more personalised, dyslexia friendly teaching (assuming that would even be on offer.)
Anyway, I'm going to tour the two local independent primaries this week and will see what they say about DD.
Obviously if I get even a whiff of 'oh well if she's dyslexic she won't do well here' then I plan to run a mile - but so far they have both been incredibly welcoming and responsive. It's interesting, I do get the sense the Indies are used to this - being contacted by parents who wanted to have their kids state educated but feel at their wits end with the SEN support that seems to be in place....

It's so hard having to do extra work outside school when the school day itself is more tiring for them than their peers. Having the interventions/tutoring during the school day would be the dream but...while you can ask, I wouldn't expect too much. Firstly because school may hold the principled line that they provide intervention through the SEN support system according to need and it's inequitable to treat your child differently - and/or because, more practically, it will be more disruptive for the class teacher to juggle. Same applies to releasing your DD to see the tutor off site during school hours, with the added complications of absence recording: if it's an authorised absence it affects the attendance stats, if it's treated as educated off-site (which doesn't impact attendance) the school remain responsible for her safeguarding, welfare and education throughout which most schools understandably wouldn't accept the risk exposure of. So you will probably be stuck with having to provide the extra support she needs but the SEN system isn't geared up for, outside school hours, at least in the state sector.

Personally I wouldn't go overboard with tutoring hours. DS went once a week and with his tutor's guidance we did the "little and often" practice and support on the other days at home. Making it as fun as possible. It's a marathon not a sprint and if it's any comfort, DS is working at greater depth across the curriculum after a few years of that level of support. What we were able to work with his school on, was altered homework expectations ie ditching all the school homework so the work with/for his dyslexia tutor was the only homework he did. She had the weekly spelling list and teaching plan from school and wove that into her planning and work with him wherever possible, so it was all joined up and complementary. The only school homework he did through KS2 has been filling in the daily reading diary, but with the teachers' blessing that "ear reading" counts equally and that he can prioritise reading for pleasure at interest level in his bedtime "reading" as we all want to keep the motivation and enjoyment alive.

Good luck with the meeting when it happens, you've got this!

Yes, we changed schools but from one independent school to another which had a much better provision and actively welcomed kids with SEN. She had 2 x 1:1 30 mins sessions a week in maths and English and a couple of lunchtime sessions in a group where they'd do exercises and games and a bit of Lexia. The also had drop in sessions before school started - a Lexia club so children who were coming to breakfast club or could come in a bit early could do a quick 15 mins before registration.

I'll be quite honest, while it's been painful financially it's been life changing for her and it's allowed us to be very hands off as it's mostly all done during school hours. 8.30am - 3.50pm at year 3-6. We both had lengthy commutes so working with her after school wasn't an option.

It's a hell of a financial commitment to be honest though.

Laptops - we tried various options over the years.

Ultimately for school we ended up going with an iPad with keyboard case and e-pen.

It worked out a similar price to an okayish laptop but has lasted much better. More importantly it weighs a lot less, is more discreet, holds a charge really well so no need for cables at school (charge ipad overnight and keyboard once every couple of weeks).

The photo function means they can photograph the board, and also any graphs etc and then use the e-pen to annotate them.

We moved DD onto touch typing at the start of Y6 and she's had that for everything except maths ever since.

She has hypermobile fingers so there was also a pain issue with writing, but she's now a really fast touch typer and also incredibly good at making technology work for her - things like inserting images into word docs, knowing how to set margins, wrapping text etc. All stuff that is valid and useful for later life.

We also saw a massive increase in output - from handing in two hand written sentences to 3,000 typed words (poor teacher got a shock with that homework). We do use grammarly and editing software which is a bit double edged as you do get nasty surprises in exams when they don't have it.

Both my dds have dyslexia. One is a third year student nurse, the college course is 4 years in Ireland. The other got a 1:1 honours degree in Social Care and was asked if she wanted to do her masters. She declined as she's not fond of studying!! And she hated doing everything online during Covid! Their cousins also have dyslexia and college degrees. I admit I did cry when dd1 was diagnosed in fourth class aged 10. But as they are intelligent girls and very hard workers they have excelled. They scored very low in the same things as your dd op.

Thank you all so much you amazing lot for supporting me and helping me so so much. @Cockerdileteef that's so great to hear a small amount of tutoring has made such a difference and that your son is now working at greater depth, I've never heard that DD is doing anything but struggling to keep her head above water really so I'm very encouraged to hear that! I think she would benefit from two hours a week rather than one but mainly I think it would be great if the work she does with her tutor could be more 'joined up' with what she does at school (as you describe in your post) so that's something I'm going to push for whether or not they agree to the tutor coming into the school to support DD sometimes.
@OhCrumbsWhereNow that's super helpful on laptops, my instinct is that an ipad and keyboard would be simplest so I'm going to put that on my list, thank you!
And @Hollyhobbi thanks so much for this which is super inspiring and encouraging to hear - you must be so proud of your girls.

I don't have the full report or the meeting with her current (state) primary about he adjustments they're able to make until the week after next. They've been really good on communication so far and are clearly taking steps to support DD's confidence so I'm feeling fairly encouraged and hopeful.

I have however had a look around our two nearest independent primaries, since both of them have space in her year group and sound like they would be happy to take her and support her with her dyslexia. I was impressed with both the heads I spoke to, and both schools look amazing in terms of educational opportunity and SEN support. But I wouldn't say it was a no-brainer by any means. Both the Indy schools compared unfavourably with our current state primary in terms of outside space and lunch options (one was packed lunch only!) and I'm also struggling to get my head around how tiny the class sizes felt in the upper primary years - one year five class had just six pupils in it! - I don't know, I know some people think this is great because they get so much attention but to DD I think this would feel like her world was shrinking. They are both mixed schools with no uniforms and an informal feel (all pluses from my point of view) but both schools do seem 'boy-heavy' which exacerbates my concerns about how she would find it socially with such a small class size and whether she'd be able to make good friends.

Incidentally I contacted one other independent school and their reply was so outrageously patronising, snotty and ignorant about dyslexia that it made me seethe! I wrote them a very blunt email back saying they were clearly not the right school for us and they seemed very confused as to what they'd done wrong. Unbelievable...

Anyway thank you so much for the support - I can't say how much it means at the moment!

@Newbie1011 he started seeing the specialist dyslexia tutor once a week at the end of year 2. It was over a year before a class teacher engaged with the tutor - but the teacher told us she'd ended up learning a lot she hadn't known about dyslexia and ways to help, which she hadn't expected and said benefitted other pupils, so it was win win. Everyone wished they'd been joined up earlier.
By way of reality check on the "greater deoth", his spelling is still wobbly, he's never going to have fluent times tables recall, mental arithmetic under time pressure will always be hard yards, and his leaky working memory and slow processing frequently bite him on the bum and he will need compensatory strategies and assistive tech through education and life.

But the work he's done so far, and the skills and strategies he's learned from the tutor and with our support at home, have moved things from a child at the end of year 2 who wasn't worryingly behind but according to school "needed to work harder with his handwriting and spelling, and concentrate and push himself more in maths" and was actually exhausted, angry and frustrated....to a child 4 yrars later who's mostly at ease with his diagnosis, supports other children with their learning, is a real bookworm (counting audiobooks), is producing greater depth writing (since he learned to touch type and they finally gave him a laptop), aces tricky maths reasoning (despite not being able to pull 8x7 out of his brain automatically and the system's obsession with how vital that is), and got full marks on his practice reading comprehension SATS test (take that, dyslexia!). It still holds him back and causes frustration sometimes - and always will if DH, who's similar, is anything to go by - but slow and steady work with the tutor over the long term has made a huge difference already. I think you just have to buckle in for the long haul...but knowing her dyslexia has thankfully been identified nice and early, so she has all that time ahead during which she'll be getting the right support, with you in her corner.