Mis-diagnosis dyslexia

choccymoose

Have you considered Mears Irlen ? My youngest, we thought was dyslexic however following further investigation with school, area senco and ed Psych and anomalies with signs and symptoms contradicting each other, we had him privately assessed for Mears Irlen ( visual stress or scotopic sensitivity ). He has visual distortions when looking at black text on white paper, this isn't the only thing but one that stands out the most. You have to go private for Mears Irlen as its a condition that isn't recognized by the NHS in all areas. Let me know if you would like further info on the condition. My son now wears cerium tinted lenses that are a specific tint that relieves his symptoms

Oh and in uni the support for dyslexia is excellent

travelgran

The Parent Partnership group are a national organisation supporting parents in discussion with schools. I would recommend you contact them before meeting with the SENCO and they can attend with you.
You need to establish if your daughter is getting any extra help at school eg small group work and for what purpose. Does she have an IEP, what are her targets and how frequently are they reviewed?
To get extra time it is a requirement of the exam boards that the school are already making such arrangements in regular school exams so anyone who needs this should be starting it much earlier than this.
Like others I cannot understand why she would be in a lower year. Schools are usually very reluctant to do this, especially at secondary level.

notakid

I work for a dyslexia charity in the West Midlands. Support varies in areas; some LEA's do not see it as a useful diagnosis. They claim that a child with a SLN (Sp Learning Need) will respond to SN's teaching as any other child.
Dyslexia itself is a hard condition to define; you can meet two dyslexics with nothing in common educationally. This makes it an easy condistion to dismiss. My daughters SEN teacher told me she didn't believe in dyslexia, her own son had been dianogisised with it but she thought he was just "lazy".

Teachers are not given much special needs training. Unless they have an interest or family members with the condition many have little idea. These attitudes coupled means sometimes; there is little help for a child at school with dyslexia.

From your first post OP I don't think there is any doubt that your daughter is dyslexic, many able dyslexics can disguise their weaknesses. I myself, left school with a spelling age of 9, not knowing my ABC's and only just knowing how to tell the time. I got a B in English O level along with 4 other O level passes in subjects that interested me and I could memorise. I went on to do an Art Degree, not really because I was that Arty more I needed to prove to myself I wasn't stupid. The problems are with me to this day and often work life can be difficult with the silly mistakes I can make. I would strongly suggest that you can a private dyslexia trained teacher. Contact the BDA for a list of your local association.
Also with your problems with the school contact SEN Parent Partnership.
I think the school has gone quiet because they have been proved wrong but I am worried about the breakdown of relations with you and the school, those are unpleasant threats. Has your own behavior been constant and reasonable? It may have been but it seems such as strong reaction from the school!
Support is much better at college and Uni, infact that is were many children receive help and diagnosis.

bestpud

Mulberry_bush wrote: »

Are you for real.

It seems clear there is a big discrepancy between her ability and her levels.

She has already been diagnosed with dyslexia and was considerably behind other children who received the same poor teaching despite a proven high IQ and excellent verbal understanding.

She is the only child to have been kept down a year in secondary school.

You and she have a misguided view of dyslexia and the impact of a diagnosis.

I don't want to offend as I can see how frustrating this all is for you, but there may well be more than poor teaching behind her poor academic achievement.

If she wants to go on to Oxford then the sooner you work out what is happening the better.

As I said, your fears are misguided so please don't leave her floundering simply because you are afraid of a label.

Whatever the outcome, you would have an up to date record of her strengths and weaknesses and can look to move forward with that information.

If she has a specific learning difficulty or Mears Irlen then there is lots of things that may help her. If she doesn't then you can work on her weaknesses once you've identified them.

I hope that explains where I'm coming from?

bestpud

Ask if a parent partnership rep will accompany you to a meeting with the school.

They will in this area.

I've never found them to be much use but we are members of our local dyslexia and dyspraxia groups and the support from them has been invaluable.

There is help out there - you don't have to battle the school alone.

notakid

choccymoose wrote: »

Have you considered Mears Irlen ? My youngest, we thought was dyslexic however following further investigation with school, area senco and ed Psych and anomalies with signs and symptoms contradicting each other, we had him privately assessed for Mears Irlen ( visual stress or scotopic sensitivity ). He has visual distortions when looking at black text on white paper, this isn't the only thing but one that stands out the most. You have to go private for Mears Irlen as its a condition that isn't recognized by the NHS in all areas. Let me know if you would like further info on the condition. My son now wears cerium tinted lenses that are a specific tint that relieves his symptoms

Oh and in uni the support for dyslexia is excellent

Mears Irlen is often confused with dyslexia as you say. It is also known as visual dyslexia even tho it is not dyslexia in the pure sense at all.

If the eye isn't tracking, it can cause the text to jump around causing problems similar to dyslexia.

Many dyslexics/dyspraxics/ADD/ASD can suffer from Irlen but it is separate from their other condistion.

So many people think that you can solve the problems of dyslexia with different coloured paper but it is only true in a small %.

aliasojo

bestpud wrote: »

As I said, your fears are misguided so please don't leave her floundering simply because you are afraid of a label.

I think you've made some good points but I honestly don't get the same interpretation as you with regards to the OP's feelings.

I see a confused parent. Not one who is afraid of labelling her child. :undecided

choccymoose

Agree with best pud, it's not so much a label labels sake, it's about getting the right support for you child!

With my Ds his self esteem was on he floor, he is able in Maths, science etc ( verbal hands on lessons ) but just couldn't get reading or writing no matter what they tried. This then started to impact on his learning in the other areas, he started to feel that he was stupid.

The label of having Mears Irlen has meant that before he received his lenses the school made adaptions and printed his work onto green paper ( his preferred colour) work on the white board was either printed onto his colour and given directly to him or the background colour was changed to green rather than white. He also has an IEP and they do a lot of one to one work with him and have finally made the decision to give up trying to get him to learn phonetically as he just can't and have invested in resources to teach him another way.
Now he has his lenses his work is now printed on cream paper ( the whole school now prints on cream as its less harsh) and he wears his glasses for all class work. He is coming on in leaps and bounds and his self esteem is on the way up as he is developing his skills.

If he didn't have that label then he wouldn't have had that support x

notakid

Oh and I forgot to add in my experience I have known serveral children who have been held back a year.

That is not usual esp if their birthday is near June/July.

Mojisola

notakid wrote: »

So many people think that you can solve the problems of dyslexia with different coloured paper but it is only true in a small %.

My son has glasses in one very particular shade of pink which help but certainly don't make his difficulties go away.

One thing that has helped over the years is having the computer and his Kindle read to him - he tracks the words while they're read out to him. It keeps the flow going - none of that awful stilted reading while stuck on one word - and the constant feed-back has helped him to read more fluently.