DD2 and homework - any thoughts?

[lougle]

Following on from PolterGoose's vids, I thought I'd upload the videos of DD2 doing her homework. They're quite long, so I don't blame you if you don't watch it all, or any!

takes just under 20 minutes to produce 'We were going to the shop today because we needed to buy food.'

It has her more erratic outbursty reactions.

was 12 minutes to produce 'Who are they? They look funny.'

It has her more 'happy flappy' behaviour.

I'd love any observations/comments/views, if you are bored and have the time.

lougle you said that these are things that dd has to learn. But some children learn things in different ways and by different methods. Trying to think up a sentence, whilst writing it out, might be enough to stop her learning anything.

I understand that, Swan, I'm just talking on a general level that avoiding homework is not going to help her in the future.

I've saved that, Polter.

DD2 says that driving in the car makes her feel poorly...but only when we go to DD2's school.

I have the Ed Psych on March 20th, but it's only a 'community bookable' appointment - 2 Ed Psychs come and talk with myself and the SENCO about DD2 - they don't see her, and don't observe/assess her.

I have a questionnaire to do prior, which I can email in. I don't know whether to go all out and give as much info as possible, hoping they'll strong arm the school into referring properly, or whether to give general themes, so they can get an overall picture...

I'm quite tempted to email the links to the video clip as evidence

Deffo email the clips.

I've taken it lightly, a little, but those two videos (sentence one and sentence two) are separated only by a 3 minute trip to the toilet. Somebody told me that there was such a contrast in her presentation between the two clips that they felt it indicated an emergence of a personality disorder.

That's a bit unlikely, isn't it? (Putting aside the fact that you can't be dx with personality disorder until you're 18 anyway).

I saw the two clips as different presentations of anxiety provoked avoidance. She'd done the shouty tantrummy everything-is-wrong-and-there's-nothing-you-can-do-to-fix-it, so moved on (probably subconsciously) to the oh-look-at-me-what-a-funny-girl-I-am-I-can't-possibly-do-any-writing-because-I-can't-even-hold-a-pencil

Personality disorder? No no no no no no no. Just no .

I havent even watched both vids lougle but I can tell you the Dd3 can be like 2 different people. She can completely lose it and be raging mad one minute and then asking me whats for tea the next!!

She is 2 people everyday, its how she gets through school. She puts on her mask as she walks into school and takes it off again when she walks out.

Do I think she has a personality disorder.... No I dont, I think she is a girl with Asd/Aspergers.

Thanks polter the research thing needsa proper read, but I am sure you are right, the gap between Dd3 and her peers is getting wider as she gets older which suggest her Social/Emotional development is falling further behind.
Academically she can just about hold her own now but that is getting harder too.

I'm so glad. Not that I wouldn't love her whatever, but it just doesn't seem at all like that to me. This person also thought that the video was indicative of a relational issue between DD2 and I, but she reacts the same with DH, and I'm sure that she does more passive stuff at school, that isn't as volatile. She just feels safe with me/DH.

DD2 is an oddball She raged in that video - never said a word of apology at any time since.

Earlier today, she whined when we suggested spaghetti hoops because she preferred baked beans. We told her tough luck. She got on with it.

20 minutes after she'd eaten, she came to me with a very solemn face and said 'Mum, can I say something?'

'I'm sorry I was whiney about the spaghetti hoops because I wanted baked beans.'

Then she kissed me and hugged me.

Her emotional barometer is completely upside down, I think.

Yep, my relationship with Dd3 is exhausting, she is so over attached to me and yet I am always the first one to get it in the neck. She is very loving on her terms but can be vile when you rock her boat.

I honestly think it is Asd that effects her ability to do relationship, she uses people as tools.

I am impressed that your Dd2 said sorry!!

I know, and I'm grateful. But seriously:

Shouting, storming off, yelling, screaming, ranting and raving

vs

'I want beans, I don't really like spaghetti hoops'

Which would you feel the need to apologise for?

Re the apologizing, my dd2 is exactly the same

I think your dd2 has ASD, Lougle, and I think all your info gathering and evidence -filming should be geared towards whatever shows that. Just think Triad of Impairments.

If it's something else or nothing I'll eat my hat the Profs will clarify

I think so too, Handy. It's a complicated old world, isn't it?

My DS has AS and I can identify with the apologising thing. He is always apologising for things that he has no need to apologise for. It’s as if he is forever thinking about how I’m feeling which seems at odds with his diagnosis. However his over apologising isn’t NT behaviour either and that’s when I have to remind myself that his AS is a disorder rather than a condition which manefests itself by having a total absence of A, B or C. He was a difficult case to diagnose as he was a case of Now you see it, then you dont.

lougle just wanted to add that ds2 used to get increasingly agitated and angry when he needed a pee, and not tell us. You said that the two clips were separated by a three minute toilet break... perhaps that is the REAL explanation for her angry behaviour. My children often held on far too long, both the NT twin and the ASD twin. It is a form of control and also not recognising how one feels until the feeling is overwhelming, or be able to articulate how to solve the problem.

She apologised over the hoops because it was manners, and that is rules. She did not apologise over the homework because it was much more upsetting for her and not a question of manners or rules in her mind. It was a series of new ideas that made her struggle, rather than any established rules being flouted.
If on the other hand she was taught that homework was a form of social etiquette you might find that she did it by rote. But then it would have to be a different kind of homework. Not problem solving but copying or microskills.

I read somewhere in that book called Calmer Happier Parenting that there should be a short time every day of the week where parents did homework of some kind with their children, and if there was a struggle it should be practise of microskills rather than the wrong homework. I didn't really understand that at the time and (that book annoyed me intensely), but it is now much easier to see in action, now that ds2 is 11 and at secondary. He is happy happy happy with a worksheet to fill in, but hates any out of the box questions. Microskills are so much easier if you are trying to start instilling a homework Rule.

I still don't believe in homework though!!!!!!! It is just for some ASD children comprehensible rules might be the only way to turn it into a a kind of acceptable task.

This is all so useful, thanks.

She caught me showing DD1's carer the video and said 'You're showing someone else that I shouted at you to be sad of me.'

I said 'I'm not sad with you. Because I don't think you were being unkind or horrible. I think you were really upset. I was showing x so I could see if she had ideas to help you.'

She said she was so upset because I wanted her to write 'gymnastics' and she didn't know how and I didn't even have a piece of paper to write it on.

I showed her the video, where I ask her if she wants me to write it down and she says 'No!'. She grinned at me and said 'Oh. '

We've just had time to have a quiet hug (DD1 & 3 have gone to the park with DD1's carer and DD2 opted to stay at home).

not had a chance to see the vids yet, will do later.

thoughts
1)does she definitely learn to read and write phonetically (I mean not in the sense of what she is taught, but how SHE manages it). as with my DS am 99.9% sure he learnt literacy by shapes of word/sight, so for spelling queries I would just spell it out c-o-u-r-s-e style
2)Expectations of teacher re:homework are too high, particularly coopting parents into keeping children to learning targets.
3)does your school have a homework club by any chance? My DS's does, and it is an absolutely godsend, as otherwise we have lots of tears and hassle with literacy/writing homework.

btw my DS also takes longer than he should to produce written work (quite probably undiagnosed AS/HFA).

Hi Lightpassenger,

1. I'm not certain, but she definitely has a sound grasp of phonics. She was decoding fairly well at her old school in Y1 (Jolly Phonics) and seemed to really fly with decoding at her new school (Read, Write, Inc). She knows all the ditties fluently (ie. 'ow' brown cow, 'ou' shout it out, 'oo' poo at the zoo) When she comes across a word she's not read before, she sounds it out using phonics.

1. The teacher reinforced the targets/homework were for practicing with Mummy at home, in front of me. She also said 'it's about speed, too....' when I said that it had taken 20/12 minutes for sentence one/two. So DD2 isn't misunderstanding, and nor am I. They apparently, saw great success last year with Y2s when they started this, so they think it's a 'good thing'. On the face of it, it shouldn't be hard.

I got her to do sentence 4 by thinking of a sentence verbally, then writing it on a piece of scrap paper. We then looked at it together with the targets, to see what she needed to do to adjust it. So we looked and I said 'ok...so Capital letter at the beginning of the sentence?' and DD2 said 'oops...no. So we used a coloured pen to make the change from an 'a' to an 'A'. Then I said 'Full stop at the end of a sentence?' 'Yes'. 'Great!'. Ok....finger spaces between words? Connectives? etc.

Then she copied that into her book. She seemed happy with that.

1. No, unfortunately not. I could suggest it, although it might not fly. School has 420 pupils, so I'm not sure how they'd fairly manage that.

Ooh yes I used one of those to get dd2 to write something... anything in Y1

That might help your dd2's anxiety/fear of getting it wrong, Lougle