DS, 6 years, not listening/understanding in class

[winterrabbit]

DS3 is 6 years old (7 in June) and in Year 2. He is a happy, well behaved and kind boy with lots of friends and enjoys going to school. However, his teacher asked for us to come into school yesterday and basically told us that she has concerns that he has issues with working memory and/or processing and he doesn't seem to understand what is being asked of him and if left to work independently either doesn't know what to do or does it wrong. The examples she gave were that he wrote a page and half of beautiful handwriting (she herself acknowledged that his handwriting is lovely) but without any punctuation. Another example was when he was doing a maths worksheet on charts, he coloured in all of the chart rather than the lines showing the quantity. Another time he volunteered to give an answer on the white board but when he got there he forgot what it was. He is not disruptive in any way and focuses for long periods on drawing, is very physical/good at PE etc. At home he loves drawing, playing etc and we don't see any signs of lack of focus. The teacher says he is very behind in Maths (he is having Maths support) and only scoring 2 or 3 out of 12. I did his homework with him this week and he did it well without much support. The teacher says is may be ADHD but I really don't see it (my eldest does have ADHD and it was quite obvious from an early age but with very different behaviours). DS3 is fully bilingual (english/spanish) so his speech was a bit late and the teacher doesn't think this has an impact. His reading is good and was meeting expectations (he's on level 7) but his teacher says even though his reading is good she is not sure he understands everything so he may not be meeting expectations in that either. I read regularly with him and don't agree with her but obviously she's the expert. We are both really worried and at a loss as to what it could be. Does anyone have an ideas?

Do you not think he may have ADHD that presents differently from his older brother, i.e. a form of inattentive ADHD? I strongly believe I have ADHD but no one would ever have suggested it as I am firmly the inattentive type typically seen in women, not climbing-the-walls, high energy (which is how my daughter presents). It's more common for women to present this way but it can be boys too.

Yes, possibly but it just seems odd that it's only in relation to one subject (Maths!). It seems really specific to that, at least at home, although the teacher may have a different view. Based on my limited knowledge I would have said dyscalculia but the ed psych said it isn't.

What about dyslexia? It effects my DD mainly in maths. She's fine, good even, when the teacher shows the class the method and sets them off. But falls apart with mixed questions such as in a test. Her brain has stashed the method away in a cupboard and she can't find the right one. Dyslexia can also effect things like working memory. There's a cross over with dyslexia and things like ADHD I think I've read. School should have access to a free dyslexia screening assessment that should tell you if it's a possibility.

Ed psych doesn't think so and neither do we but could that be that case if his reading and writing are good?

I would expect the ed psyche to know more than me!!! But if school could check for free it might be worth double ruling it out. Dds reading age is where it should be and good handwriting, loves creative writing. Can't remember spellings at all, it's like phonics gone mad. And starting to struggle with dense texts in older books. She's 10. But they're all different. ADHD can present very differently like others have said and as you know.

I hear you! I don't think he has it, bless him, but I know that it can present very differently across kids. Hopefully we'll get to the bottom of it.

Have you actually considered the teacher isn’t teaching maths very well? You seem to be searching for all sorts of things that are wrong with him which seems dreadful at age 6. He can do plenty of other things and yet there’s this hang up on maths. Just recap with him!

Extra support doesn’t necessarily mean individual support from an adult - schools just don’t have freely available additional staff. I would expect him to have adapted tasks and additional resources that he can use independently. It will be about strategies that enable him to be successful, rather than anything else. Definitely something to talk to the teacher about.

As somebody who had to grow up in the 'I'm not having any child of mine medicated' environment for ADHD and autoimmune conditions, it's exactly the same.

No it's not. I disagree with medicating a 6 year old boy unless it's there is an extremely good reason. ADHD is not an extremely good reason. There are other ways around it that do not require your kids taking drugs than screw up their domapine levels, neuropathways, sleep, growth and god knows what else. We need to start seeing ADHD as another way of being NOT an illness.

This thread is not about the rights and wrongs of medication so if you want to have that debate then go elsewhere. Nothing you say will make me medicate a child under 18 unless there is a serious risk of harm to him.

That has occurred to us and I wanted to ask a question about that for anyone who knows:

They seem to be teaching Maths in quite a non-intuitive/confusing way. For example, today we were doing his homework and he had to do 28 divided by 2, which I would have taught him by using partitioning, but instead they expect them to draw 2 circles and put an equal number of dots in each circle which seems totally bizarre and prone to error. Is this the new way of teaching Maths?

He sounds very like my DD who was eventually diagnosed with dyscalculia at age 12. Concerns didn't really emerge until age 9/10 but I think a very clued in teacher may have picked it up sooner. Maths difficulties were dismissed as a lack of confidence for years. She ended up scoring on first centile for processing speed and working memory in her psychological testing. Because she was a quiet and cooperative child I don't think it was picked up on.

Also of relevance is we also have high suspicion of inattentive ADHD. School did not agree but I feel it's just not seen easily in a busy classroom environment. The Ed Psychologist who did her dyscalculia assessment agreed there are red flags and recommended assessment. 6 seems very young to completely rule out a specified learning disability

Thank you Egg, very helpful. At what age did you get her cognitively assessed? Do you think our Ed Psy is right to rule it out at this stage? He has just turned 7 (Year 2). What is the prognosis/next steps for your daughter? How are they planning to support her? Does it warrant an EHCP?

Ex maths teacher.

division is normally taught initially as sharing.

so in reception they will use actual physical objects (beads, plastic dinosaurs, whatever) and physically share them out in groups.

there will be a lot of work on for example going on a picnic and having six cakes and sharing them between three people.

the circles represent the people’s plates and you physically put the stuff out.

the method you mention is where this moves from the physical sharing to using dots to represent to objects.

so say there are 28 biscuits and they need to be shared equally between two people. You can share them by putting one dot in each circle. Then count up - have you shared out the whole 28? If not, do another round.

this is intended to build an understanding of division as sharing (and also helps with fractions).

from there you’d move on to representing 28 as tens and units and share out tens first and then units. So you are still doing physical sharing and moving but with actual tens and units.

then you can draw the tens and units in and then finally you get to writing 28 as 20 plus 8 and sharing it out.

there’s a lot of focus in early primary in developing understanding of numbers and what the methods of doing division and multiplication etc actually mean.

I understand, however, isn't the first method of sharing out very difficult to do with numbers above 10, not to mention it must take ages. Is that a new way of teaching as I don't recall either of my older kids learning that way.

No, it’s not a new way of teaching.

been around basically forever.

No problem. She was assessed age 12 on the advice of her class teacher who was brilliant. I had asked previous teachers if they thought she could have dyscalculia but it was dismissed but this teacher said it was so obvious after 1-2 months of teaching her and was correct.

I'm not an expert but in our situation it took a few years to become obvious. If she had been assessed age 5-9 it may not have been picked up on. But as the maths became more challenging age 9+ she fell to pieces and actually regressed. And currently age 13 she is still only operating at maths level age 8-9. I'm working in ages rather than school years as not in the UK so not 100% clear on ages vs school year. So I can't speak to your question re EHCP. But she has got additional supports since diagnosis, not massively forthcoming from the school until her teacher took it upon themself to push for it thankfully. She ended up getting 1:1 special needs support during maths class (although this was a special needs support teacher designated to 2 other children in the class, she didn't qualify on paper) and withdrawal 3 times weekly for learning support. We are <1 year since her diagnosis. Her maths skills haven't improved massively but her anxiety and confidence have which is massive for her. I hope this has been of some help, I felt hugely at sea when I was trying to figure out how to help her.

But sorry also just to add the picture of not listening/understanding is so like her. She knows the right things to do/say to deflect from what is being asked but if you actually tune in and clarify with her you realise she hasn't processed/understood what has been said. She has just become very adept at masking it so I can see how something like that could be missed in a classroom. I wouldn't dismiss what his teacher is saying, they may actually be very observant and picking up on something that may otherwise be missed