9 year old can't read

[Helena2000]

Hello everyone,
I'm feeling a bit lost and am looking for some advice.
My Dd is 9, and cannot read or spell.
She has no diagnosis of anything but school have placed her on their SEN register.
What this means in reality is that she gets taken out of class every day in to a group of 3 children and a TA to do different work to the rest of the class. The other 2 children have severe behavioural needs which the TA struggles to manage whilst my DD sits there not receiving any attention or input because she is well behaved and compliant.
School did a dyslexia screen which they've told me shows that she is not dyslexic.
I'm at a loss as to why she has such a significant learning delay in reading, spelling and also maths.
She is incredibly intelligent. She's bright, alert, astute, is fully engaged with the world around her, has a brilliant sense of humour, is extremely empathetic, kind, gentle, so very thoughtful, notices so much of what's going on around her and is very in tune with other people's feelings and emotions. She adores art, dance, stories - her favourite thing in the world is to be read to, animals, nature, playing, swimming, crafting. She's highly imaginative, loves playing with her sibling and her friends, she has friends who love her, her older sibling literally adores her, she is the chattiest little girl ever - she chats away to me non stop and her use of vocabulary is impressive and very varied, and her comprehension of what new words mean is really impressive. She's affectionate, loving, and just a little angel.
But tonight at bedtime she spent 2 hours crying her eyes out, her little face looked like she was in so much pain. She cried and cried about not being able to read. She told me her greatest wish is to be able to read, and said "I feel so stupid", "I feel so ashamed", "I'm so embarrassed about myself" all through terrible tears. She was clinging on to me, wrapped her whole body around mine, asking me to please help her. She said every day she misses her class lessons because she is taken out of class in to this little group of 3, that she gets no benefit from. She said co.ments from peers who ask her why she can't read are making her feel stupid and worthless.
I have spoken to the SENCO at school about her not benefiting from being in this group, and I was told there are no resources to give her any other input, i.e. not enough staff to offer any alternative.

I don't know how to help or what to do.
I've noticed that I can teach her a word, go over it in repetition, she'll appear to get it, and then within 20 seconds it's gone again and she can't recognise or remember the word.
Some words that I ask her to sound out, she guesses the word based on the 1st letter, or she says words that don't even contain the letters that are in the word I'm trying to teach her to read.
She is a gifted artist for her age, and often draws what she's seen that day, and she'll draw the most incredible detail in something that I can't believe she even noticed. So if she notices and remembers this much detail, how can she not notice the detail in a short word, or remember it through repetition?
School are adament it's not dyslexia because the school screening test came back as normal. I've had this conversation with them several times over.
Another thing is she cannot pronounce her words properly. Examples are that the W in 'Weather' is pronounced with her front teeth on her bottom lip. For Never she says 'Nether'. These are just 2 examples, but she mispronounces words hundreds of times a day. No amount of non-stop, endless correcting of her pronunciation by me ever, ever teaches her to remember how to say the word properly. In fact it's counter productive as it upsets her when I correct her, even though I do it in a softly spoken, swing and encouraging way. She just gets really frustrated.
She has very, very poor short term memory, but excellent long term memory.
She struggles to follow instructions that have more than 2 steps involved, or with any instruction that's too complex.
She regularly says "What?" "Pardon?" "Can you say that again please?" But it's not to do with her hearing ad she can hear a pin drop in the distance! She's had her hearing tested and it's good. It's more as though she is asking the person to repeat themselves so that she can give herself more time to process what they've said before she responds.
She needs a lot of time. Extra time to do things. Rushing her if we're late sends her in to a complete meltdown and she says she can't cope with hurrying up or rushing.
School teachers and SENCO don't even seem worried. Every school year is the same; unworried teachers. Every ADPR meeting is met with a teacher gushing with enthusiasm, telling me she's a pleasure to teach and that she's wonderful at drawing and popular with peers. I get inwardly really cross. I'm not there to hear about her drawing. And the teacher doesn't teach her. A TA does. And I happen to know the TA outside of school and she is new to the role and has no experience in education whatsoever, comes from a totally unrelated background of work.
I've been told by my local authority she doesn't qualify for an Ed psych referral.
When I relay my concerns to her teacher, she smiles brightly and says "Don't worry! She doesn't need a diagnosis! It makes no difference at all to the way we teach her!" all delivered with a megawatt smile.
she has started constantly apoligising for things she does not need to be apilogising for, and i think this is a sign that her self esteem is being affected, which I cant bear.
I have spent every day of her life telling her and showing her how much I love her. I continuously give her positive feedback, praise, encouragement, I listen to her, I try as hard as i can to give her a happy life filled with different experiences, but its not enough.
Can anyone advise me?
I need to know whats going on.
And my DD is begging me to know what's going on.
Phew, I haven't said all this to anyone in real life. Thanks for listening!

Glad you have some answers now @Helena2000. At least you can move forward now with a clearer picture of what’s going on.

Hi @Helena2000 I just saw your message and the outcome. I am very happy for you. You described my daughter who is also 9 and despite having all the support at school and she has an EHCP. I believe she has not properly diagnosed. I am going to as for a diagnose too for Dyslexia and working memory. I was just wondering which type of support did you find it?

Hi OP,

Realise this is an old post but I found it during a desperate search. It describes my funny, smart, sweet and creative daughter to a tee. She's 8 and still can't read despite having intervention from the school. Like your daughter she does have some issues relating to speech and memory and tidiness but otherwise is the perfect little student and peer.
I'm at a total loss on how to help her. My other kids (and myself and my husband were avid advanced readers so it's so new to us!)
We're in Scotland so not sure how much use a private diagnosis would be as we don't have EHCP plans, we just have to put up with what little support the LA give. Like yourself this has so far been given by a unqualified TA.
I'm getting so frustrated with the school constantly telling me how great she's doing when she still can't read and she gets upset telling me she's the only child in the class that can't.
Guess I was just wondering how you have gotten on over the past two years and what has worked to improve things?
Thanks

Hello @HevMc007
Shortly after I started this thread, I bit the bullet and took DD for a private Dyslexia assessment.
I over-thought it and went round and round in circles thinking "What if I pay for a private Dyslexia assessment and then it's found that she doesn't have Dyslexia? Then I'll have spent a fortune for nothing and we still won't know what the problem is."
The assessment cost £1,200 and to us that's a huge amount of money. It's an entire months' salary for me. It's not an amount of money we can afford to waste and I agonised over this.
Turns out it was the best £1,200 I ever could have spent.
DD was diagnosed with Dyslexia. It was a 5 hour assessment and I got a 38 page report detailing her profile, her learning difficulties and what types of support she needs to help her learn.
To DD, that diagnosis meant everything. Her reaction when she was told her diagnosis and what that meant will stay with me forever. It has given her a reason for why she struggles so much. It has helped her to understand herself better. It has given her a voice, to be able to say "I have Dyslexia". I can't put into words how important the diagnosis has been for her self esteem and her self confidence. We have been on a learning journey together. I have learnt so much about Dyslexia. It's so, so, so much more than difficulties with reading, which I never knew before. Not only has her diagnosis explained her reading difficulty, it has explained so much about all sorts of different things about her that started making perfect sense once we knew about her diagnosis and fully learnt about it.
So it hasn't made it any easier for her to read or spell. Knowing she has Dyslexia doesn't make reading easier. It's a difficult as ever. But it makes it easier to understand the difficulties. It makes it easier to understand why she struggles, what she struggles with, and the best methods to use to help support her. It makes it easier for me to advocate for her with her teachers, because I have concrete evidence now of why she reads 6 years behind her actual age.
I have taught myself all about how the Dyslexic brain works, and this means I can help her so much better now. Whereas before her diagnosis, I was at a loss as to what to do because I just didn't understand what was going on.
Having Dyslexia means being neurodivergent (which I hadn't appreciated until I started learning about it), and if you have a neurodivergent child then you really, really need to know about it because you really, really need to be able to understand how their ND brain works in order to be able to support them properly. And believe me, the older your DD gets, the more she is going to really need your support. I say this from experience.
It's been amazing getting a diagnosis.
I would say to anyone now, if your child can't read at an age where their peers are reading easily, then there's a reason.
Get an assessment.
It hasn't got her an EHCP though. I applied and provided her Dyslexia report which states all the way through it that she reads 6 years behind her chronological age and that she needs 1:1 teaching intervention in order to learn. It still got turned down by our LEA.

Did you appeal to SENDIST? The vast majority of appeals are upheld. LAs act unlawfully regularly.

The appeal process had a really small window of time in which to appeal, which I missed, sadly due to personal difficulties.

I would request another EHCNA and appeal if refused.

In case it is relevant in the future, you can request leave to appeal out of time. If there is a good reason for a late appeal sometimes SENDIST is willing to accept a late appeal.

Thank you for this advice.xx

OP, this is an outrage - how can any teacher or any school accept that they have a 9 year old who can't read and siphon her off into a small group that clearly isn't going to help her, but makes it look like they are helping? How are they going to send this child to secondary school without being able to read - her needs are critical and need a robust plan now. No one should be smiling and saying that her not being able to read doesn't disadvantage her in their classroom as that's patently untrue. I find sometimes schools have such unclear or diffuse accountability that no one person is accountable and then no one owns the problem, so it is passed on forever. She's being bullied by peers for not being able to read as well and it's clearly having a toll on her mental health.

Being a lovely, well behaved and polite girl who troubles nobody is also being used against her as she's low on the list of school priorities, which happened to my son as well.

Please talk to your local SENDIASS service (council run "local offer" support for families of additional needs children - diagnosed or not) and get help, writing formal letters supported by the council to make sure school actually puts a proper plan in place. Also GP referrals for speech and language support. This is no joke. They can't just kick this into each new school year until she goes to secondary. There are many specialists and services who can help, but school unlocks and facilitates - and primary school is a much better place to start than secondary.

Be careful with SENDAISS. Some are good but too many repeat the LA’s unlawful policies.