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Alisdair and Will started school on Wednesday. Alisdair has a new teacher. Three days in, and I'm already on a slow burn toward her.
See, I met with her before school started to check in, inform her of Alisdair's budding ADHD and how bored he can get, and generally make sure she checked in with the special ed teacher and that his IEP (Individual Education Plan) was put into place. I get some platitudes on how she will, but she's sure it'll be fine. Me, I'm seeing how she's going to have 30 kids in her class this year with no help, and I don't think fine is the word, but I let her know I was available to help whenever if she needed me.
Today, she sends a note home with Alisdair. Basically he has problems listening, problems focusing, problems being off in his own little world and forgetting where he was, and was "shooting off rockets" during Math. See, when he's bored, he pretends his pencils are rockets and makes them fly around above his desk. In this case, he's bored because he's mastered addition and subtraction, and his daddy's teaching him multiplication at home. Meanwhile, here at school, they're covering the basic numbers again for the benefit of the kids who haven't seen a number all summer and forgot. So yeah, he's bored. It was also rainy today, so they had no recess -- no chance for him to run around and work off extra energy.
She said "I hope his behavior improves next week." Well, unless they find a way to put him in a smaller class, let him run around, give him the attention needed to keep him on task, or start covering material he hasn't known for a year now, I personally don't see how it could. We've talked about it. It's just not altogether under his control, and I've not had the money to get him to a doctor to be tested and diagnosed formally for ADHD beyond the assessment the school gave last year. Nor do I want to resort to medicine straight off the bat just to keep him sedate in class. So I'm frustrated and pissed off, and so hoping I get to move in the next month or so, whether Seattle or just to the charter school in Wichita Falls. Anything but putting him through this.
Argh.
See, I met with her before school started to check in, inform her of Alisdair's budding ADHD and how bored he can get, and generally make sure she checked in with the special ed teacher and that his IEP (Individual Education Plan) was put into place. I get some platitudes on how she will, but she's sure it'll be fine. Me, I'm seeing how she's going to have 30 kids in her class this year with no help, and I don't think fine is the word, but I let her know I was available to help whenever if she needed me.
Today, she sends a note home with Alisdair. Basically he has problems listening, problems focusing, problems being off in his own little world and forgetting where he was, and was "shooting off rockets" during Math. See, when he's bored, he pretends his pencils are rockets and makes them fly around above his desk. In this case, he's bored because he's mastered addition and subtraction, and his daddy's teaching him multiplication at home. Meanwhile, here at school, they're covering the basic numbers again for the benefit of the kids who haven't seen a number all summer and forgot. So yeah, he's bored. It was also rainy today, so they had no recess -- no chance for him to run around and work off extra energy.
She said "I hope his behavior improves next week." Well, unless they find a way to put him in a smaller class, let him run around, give him the attention needed to keep him on task, or start covering material he hasn't known for a year now, I personally don't see how it could. We've talked about it. It's just not altogether under his control, and I've not had the money to get him to a doctor to be tested and diagnosed formally for ADHD beyond the assessment the school gave last year. Nor do I want to resort to medicine straight off the bat just to keep him sedate in class. So I'm frustrated and pissed off, and so hoping I get to move in the next month or so, whether Seattle or just to the charter school in Wichita Falls. Anything but putting him through this.
Argh.
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Date: 2004-08-20 03:02 pm (UTC)From:The problem is that I know he is being disruptive at times. There isn't enough room in the classroom for him to be seated away from the others, so even if he's just wiggling in his chair, he's being disruptive.
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Date: 2004-08-20 05:56 pm (UTC)From:Since Josh has ADD, his problem in the main is focusing in order to do the work in the first place. He picks up on what he's being taught as if by osmosis, but applying it via written work (instead of just demonstrating he knows) is another thing entirely. The outward manifestations of his focusing problem is almost the opposite -- no fidgeting, but no working -- so most of the suggestions and tricks I know are more for his sort of problems, unfortunately.