Morning! I’m struggling with my year 2 child and his reading/writing/spelling. This has been an uphill battle with school, at first they failed to notice that he’s left handed, then had him sat elbow to elbow with a RH child. He failed year 1 phonics screening, and is stuck on red book band (we have read absolutely every book the school has to offer and they won’t assess him to see if he should move to the next level as it’s ‘not his turn’). School CT says that school have a policy of not screening for dyslexia and they don’t ‘believe’ private screening either. Their approach is to support the child, which I support, if only they were actually doing that.
I really need to go back to the senco and discuss but at this point I’m fairly certain he is dyslexic. He hits every point on the list on the NHS website, and in addition he is naturally a very untidy, disorganised and disheveled child (seems an odd thing to write about your 6yo but he’s very different to my other child in this regard, loses everything, after tidying his room a few minutes later it’s chaos again). He also struggles with cutlery. So there is something to explore there.
School’s take is that he is ‘making progress’ so therefore fine. But he’s not fine, all the while the gap with his peers is widening. He’s doing well this year but that’s mostly because he’s in a mixed year group class with year 1 kids. Next year when he goes to y3 (in a class with y4 children) will be a car crash.
so whilst I am going to request further time with the senco I’m looking for what I can be doing at home. I’ve had a quick look at Nessy on a free trial and he seems to like it (based on a couple of days). It seems that rather than the in school phonics methods it is teaching old fashioned ‘rules’ for spelling, and I can see that that might work. To me it seems like the glorious BBC videos of my childhood, words and pictures, and look and read. Can I get those anywhere?
does anyone have any similar experience? Any words of wisdom? I’m at the end of my tether where school are concerned. I feel like I’m screaming into the abyss.