Do you have a Y6/7 DD? Please be very honest with me.

[LynetteScavo]

Would your DD be friends with mine?This is an anonymous forum, and I would really appreciate honest answers.

DD is going to secondary school in September. It's highly likely she won't know anyone else in her year (she knows this, it's not a problem as she's looking forward to making new friends)

My concern is she is do dyslexic she can't text, and struggles to write anything someone of her she could decipher. Most Y6s can at least write phonetically, so their friends figure out what they're saying.

DD is very aware she's less able than other DC (also in maths) and puts on a bit of a front, acting very confident. For example, if asked a question she'll give any old answer, then justify it with long words (she has a wide vocabulary, tests say of a 14/15yo). Adults can see she's talking nonsense but other 10 year olds seem to be taken in.

Her best friends are the most able girls in her class. Very booky, bright girls, but when she texts them they reply with "???" because her spelling is so poor they can't understand the text. But they love her because they've known her since they were all 4years old, and "get" that she's funny and kind.

The school she's going to don't stream in Y7 and are 'dyslexia friendly". This is the 2nd day I've spent crying with worry about this.

Please be honest and not kind. Will my DD get left out of group texts, etc?

Hello,
Is the school her friends are going to out of the question? I am guessing it is.
All I can advise is having a good talk with the school re their support both educationally and pastorally.
Good luck...

My dd is older (yr 9), but her friend is similar & def. couldn't produce functional FB messages (they don't seem to do texts in their friendship group) when in yr 7. It didn't seem to be an issue, she's been friends with dd since primary, but she made lots of other new friends too very quickly :)

One of my DD's best friends from nursery (now 16/17) is dyslexic. She is also very bright. She got great and proper dyslexia support at primary and through GCSES and is now studying Eng Lit and is very good at it. She has lots of friends

I have a year 7 DD, texting is so last year to them, most of their communication is Skype. If they are texting does she use predictive text so it may help her spell the word right.
Finally she is dyslexic she almost certainly is very bright just her processing disorders are holding her back.
In short yes my DD would be friends with her.

I think my iPhone lets me dictate texts but I haven't tried it- might be rubbish.

Is the messaging thing something she'd work with you on or does that not help?

What extra curricular activities does she enjoy? Will she know anyone at her new school from those?

No, she won't. DS' school has a policy forbidding children to take phones to school, so there is not much need to text. If you think she will need to text, there are plenty of phones with dictation capabilities (she talks, the phone writes) so as long as she can read and understand their friends' texts and reply to them by dictating her response to the phone, she should be ok.

First of all, please don't let your DD see you crying! It won't help, and you have to be her rock.

Secondly, if she can compliment, make small talk, listen when others speak- she'll be fine.

Some of the happiest, most socially confident children I have taught have been dyslexic. It's all about how they make other people feel- can she make people laugh and feel good about themselves?

Also, taking time over appearance (boys and girls- I'm not talking make up) ensuring teeth are brushed, clothes are clean, you have all the equipment so you're not annoying people by asking to borrow stuff- all this helps.

My dd is in Year 6 and doesn't have a mobile phone yet. I doubt she'd judge potential friends on their texting ability, and tbh a friend's inability to spell would not be likely to affect friendship either. My dd is a very bright and rather bookish child, doesn't tend to hang out with the yr6 girls who are already into clothes, make-up and boy bands. She'd be more interested in being friends with a quirky, funny girl like your dd with a big vocabulary and plenty to say for herself, regardless of her maths or literacy skills. Although she might endlessly badger her about reading her favourite books .

iphones definitely let you dictate texts. And if she's using a computer, FB or other social media things have predictive text, which might help. Or you could help her if needed? I don't think most of the Yr7s that I know really communicate much by text anyway - they see each other at school, arrange things that way, some use WhatsApp or equivalents, but not that much, only to confirm stuff.

DD now 16 is similar, we got her a top of the range iphone in year 7 (after a trial in year 6 to see if she managed not to lose or break a cheap one)
I helped her with any tricky text situations for about 18 months. She can text OK now but far prefers snapchat had sent and received around 300,000 messages via that when I last asked, far more than most her age who prefer to text. Her dyslexic friend who only just got a phone at 16 can barely text so I think it was important for DD to learn those skills.
So poor text skills won't stop her making friends IMO but she may be left out of the gossip(possibly a good thing!)

Regarding the "putting on a front" with maths as the example you give, that would be considered bullshitting and would not make her popular with her peer group.

I use dictation on texts all the time. Sometimes you get odd texts but I usually send them anyway and let the recipient figure out I'm on about.

As far as my daughter was concerned at that age, if her friend was funny, cheered her up, wasn't spiteful and liked the same music, she would loved her, regardless of anything else.

Also, I'm pretty sure there were plenty of dc in dd's yr 7 that didn't do phones/texting. Admittedly it's a small rural school, but some of them were really very 'young' 11 year olds, there's a massive range.

I was going to suggest using the voice option for writing texts as well.6

My yr 6 dd has friends, gets invited to parties etc, but never texts friends or goes on social media . She just says she doesn't like it. I am also really worried she will be left out. However she would not even know that your dd doesn't text!

Dd is in y8 - they can't use phones at school, and in fact she never uses one, so no texting. As above, it's mostly Instagram and Snapchat. I'm sure she'll be fine, please don't spend the next seven months being this panicked

My year 6 DD uses FaceTime a lot with her friends and also voice messages just as much as texting. She would be happy to be your DD's friend.

More instagram than texts, that's true.

In DD's circle is a boy with ASD... DD finds him very strange (lots of odd behaviours) but not in an unpleasant way. He's firmly part of the group (brainy girls & cuddly boys). The other night he texted DD to say he liked her... using Morse code... then denied it when she politely turned him down!! No problems, .though.

My DS (yr 8) has a friend like your DD.

They don't text (maybe boys text less anyway).

If he does, he uses the voice to text thing? So you speak a text and the phone types it for you? (On i phones it is the microphone button on key pad)

Both my kids have friends with dyslexia, autism, various SEN. I find kids to be generally very non judgemental.

Try not to worry too much

I have a Yr7 DS, he is borderline dyslexic, although his reading is not affected.DS was the only child from his primary to transfer to his secondary.

He spends more time with girls as he is not a tough and tumble boy, definitely more cerebral.

DS's first week at secondary was tough (I'm not going to sugar coat this as I think being prepared is more helpful). He cried every morning. I spoke to the office and let them know he was struggling. They asked me to email, so it could be given to his pastoral tutor. His school were Amazing the morning after my email, his tutor gave him a "buddy", she assigned a girl as she had already seen he interacted more with the girls. She told me that the following day she was going to move lots of his class around, she would put DS next to his buddy, but the other moves would mean it wasn't obvious that this was largely done for his benefit.

They followed up a week later to see how things were going.

We have had one subsequent incident. The tutor was telling me it was "boys being boys" but I pointed out that if one of the boys didn't want to participate, it was bullying behaviour. Immediately sh accepted my point and sad said she would call the boys parents in. She told me that DS and the child actually had a lot in common and it was a shame the other boy had taken a dislike to DS, as she thought they would get on. They do seem to get on better since this shake up.

DH unhelpfully told DS he could move schools, I said I thought it was the best school for him, he agrees.

I forgot yo say, DS would be friends with your DD. He has a phone, but, as a result of the bulling in primary, I warned him about giving his number out, so he hasn't.

I've just turned 23. My best friend at school and still now was the most popular in our year and she was/ is dyslexic! Your girl will be fine