Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Twice Exceptional ADD/ADHD at private school

And even if you discover that some other deficit is presenting like ADHD, that might not be the "real" answer, either. We had our DD tested in the summer between 2nd and 3rd grade due to behaviors that the school thought seemed like ADHD. The neuropsych concluded that the root cause of her behaviors was dysgraphia. But by the end of 5th grade, she had developed the automaticity that she previously lacked, while still exhibiting unwelcome behaviors. Further testing revealed that she actually had ASD, not ADHD or dysgraphia. I think it's unlikely that we'll test her again in two more years and discover that it's not ASD, either - this diagnosis feels "more right" than the other one did - but it could happen. You can't spend too much time worrying about he long term when you're in the middle of this, because there's just no way to predict what might happen.

Thanks everyone for your input.

Edward: Thanks for the link. I don�t know what kind of tests the psychologist used to test my daughter�s Processing Speed. If writing is involved, my daughter does have some fine-motor skills problems. And in the trimester report, the teacher also mentioned that �she does tend to work at a slower pace.� I�m actually not asking the private school to divert resources for my daughter but rather hoping that they could be more tolerant of my daughter�s absent-mindedness and bad handwriting as long as she is not disrupting the classroom. What I am worried about is that getting them to accept that will require me to bring up the ADD/ADHD subject, which may very well cause the private school to simply ask us to transfer to a public school.

aeh: Thanks for the advice. Yes. I�m not looking for an ADD/ADHD diagnosis right now because my daughter is still happy at school with her friends and does OK as a new kindergartner (not to her full potential but still good). I was hoping that my daughter�s cognitive ability could carry her over until high school when she may be able to grow out of it. As for slow processing speed for GT individuals, I suspect that right-brained GT individuals tend to have slow processing speed while left-brained GT individuals tend to have high processing speed. Based on my observation, my daughter is a very visual person and definitely right-brained. She tends to overthink and easily gets distracted by fine details. She also has some problems in fine-motor skills so she works at a slower pace. I too have attention deficit problems (though never sought for diagnosis or treatment) but I am very sensitive to numbers and more left-brained. My problem is having too many ideas at the same times and struggling to get started. But once started, I work at a very fast pace as if there is map in my head with marks saying step 1/2/3/n. Many times I was going too fast that I missed fine details and made some careless errors. While for my daughter, she often writes the first couple of words to the questions like �Because� then starts thinking and thinking until time runs out. She also has a tendency to answer questions not in order, and to jump to the ones having cute pictures or familiar words. Many times she forgets to answer some questions.

Val: Thanks for the reply. My daughter does have problems keeping sitting still but if the teacher reminds her about that she is able to comply. I think the major problem with my daughter is that she is very easy to get distracted. I don�t have chance to observe a long period of time at school on how she does in the classroom but at her one-on-one violin lessons I always stay and watch from beginning to end. Her violin teacher needs to remind her many times to focus and to stand still during a 20-minute lesson. Just last week at the violin lesson, while in the middle of playing violin, my daughter suddenly stopped and asked the teacher why the small address plaque hanging from the ceiling outside the studio was lighted that day. The teacher had to tell her that it was due to Daylight Saving Time changes and that it now got darker earlier.

SaturnFan: Thanks for the reply. Glad to know that the private school your son is attending is willing to help him on ADHD issues. However, I really don�t want my daughter to take medications because of the side effects, like possible addiction, decreased appetite, and weight loss. My daughter is a picky eater and may have high gustatory sensitivity. I tested myself with couple of OTC supplements that claim to be Adderall/Ritalin alternatives, and found out that it did make me feel satisfied and calm for a short period of time. But I don�t want to let my daughter try that. I usually just let her play video games or watch TV for a long period of time until she gets very satisfied and kind of reaches a state of hallucinations. Then I ask my daughter to focus five to ten minutes to do some homework, e.g. vocabulary, reading comprehension test, math problems, and etc. So far it works OK.

ChasingTwo: Thanks for the reply. Yes. I really want my daughter to stay at this private school and haven�t thought about the possibility that she may need something different. All her friends since preschool are now at the private school and I can�t imagine how she could leave them and make friends in a new environment.

polarbear: Thanks for your detailed reply. Really appreciated. I feel that you really understand my concern. My daughter is very impulsive and easily gets upset. It is very hard for her to make new friends and to keep the friendship. Her good friends at the private school are those she has been friends with for over two years since preschool. So I am afraid to make changes and am afraid to break what currently seems working fine. I even think that it is OK for my daughter not to reach her full potential as long as she is happy. My wife and I overcame many difficulties to have our only daughter at a very late age. We just want her to be healthy and happy, and to live a simple life. It would be nice for her to excel at life but if there is too much risk involved, we probably wouldn�t encourage her to try. I know it may be unfair to her but I tend to prefer a minimax strategy in life to minimize the possible loss for a worst case (maximum loss) scenario.

Platypus101: Thanks for your reply. I may be a little bit overreacting after reading my daughter�s trimester report. She is generally happy at school. She sometimes does complain about teachers being too bossy and math class being too boring but she rarely says that she doesn�t want to go to school. And she does like playing with her friends at school. So hopefully it is just me overreacting and things will get better next year.

Gus: Thanks for your reply. I didn�t know anything about Tourette Syndrome until last year when my daughter started to make throat-clearing sound, constantly blink eyes and touch face, and etc. Then I googled about it and also realized that I may have it too. Fortunately my daughter doesn�t do facial grimacing or utter inappropriate words (she probably doesn�t know any) like what I tend to do. So it is not a problem for her at school.

I also would like to add some of my thoughts on ADD/ADHD being pseudo-science, which may be a little off topic. I came from an engineering background, so I think I probably could understand why Edward thinks this way. As the physicist Richard Feynman once said, �Social science is an example of a science which is not a science. They follow the forms. but they don't get any laws.� Social science studies do tend to have more trouble in reproducing the results, as shown in the 2015 paper �Estimating the Reproducibility of Psychological Science� published on the journal Science by UVA researchers. But I think as we realize that the universe is more and more like a stochastic system than a deterministic one, the laws are increasingly not just about true or false but more about probability. Furthermore, the observer effect probably is more obvious in social science studies thus the objectiveness is more likely to be questioned. However, �Nature does not know what you are looking at, and she behaves the way she is going to behave whether you bother to take down the data or not.� (ironically also by Richard Feynman) In summary, ADD/ADHD or not, I think my daughter does have many so-called symptoms so if I follow the methods other people have used on kids of similar symptoms, I probably will have a higher chance getting similar results on my daughter. That is why I am asking questions on this forum and that is also why I want to thank you all for your input. Thanks.

I don't know your school and can't possibly predict what they would do. But I would wonder which is more likely to result in them wanting your daughter to leave: problem behaviour, or a diagnosis that can reduce problem behaviour. If you know why your daughter is experiencing challenges, it's much easier to support, remediate, accommodate, whatever is needed. If necessary, the heavy lifting can be done at home, so you do much of the work, but the school can reap the benefit.

If - and obviously it's a big "if" in a six-year-old - she has a learning and/ or attention challenge, there is lots that can be done (most of which is not medication) to help build and/ or compensate for missing skills and processing deficits. The earlier the better. The longer these issues are left to grow, the harder it is to help.

How does your daughter feel with work? Is she learning and does she feel challenged? Is the slowness across all subjects or just some? Two things come to mind; 1. Either the work is to easy, or 2. She is genuinely being slowed down by something which could be anything out of well over a hundred possibilities.

Id imagine your daughter is articulate and she might be able to shed some light on the subject. This can be a great starting point in determining what the problem is.

Personally, in my humble view, I would much rather the school make accommodations than simply sitting back and ignoring said behavior. One reason being that your daughter might genuinely be struggling from it emotionally, and letting that go unchecked does more harm then good. Second most schools tend to look down on conduct and behavior more than a legit diagnosis which might simply require a little extra class room modification.


But, as mentioned it is difficult to say what your daughter's school may or may not do.

I didn't read all the responses but I see ADHD as a sort of spectrum where some people are mild and others are very severe. My daughter who is now 11 was very impaired in the classroom, esp. as she moved up through grades and the work became more complex and required more focus and writing. Early on some of the other kids looked off task as well but they improved and she didn't. We started medicating which helped with some symptoms but not others. She is now in middle school and hasn't grown out of it but is functioning fine with support. I don't believe she would thrive in a private school if they were not open to providing supports/modifications and just wanted high achievers. Her WISC GAI was 150 and she was in the low 90's average range for processing speed. The fact that there was such a large gap was concerning and it DID show up in real life as her just not getting her work done in a timely fashion. I think that's the key thing to look for at school. Is she getting the work done? Is it piling up? Is the school open to making any accommodations with or without a diagnosis? If not, then the school probably isn't going to work long term. you can't make it 8 more years if she is already struggling at this young of an age. I would look at work completion and work pace more than how well she focuses when the teacher or other kids are talking. Hope that helps. In terms of her having friends at the private school and being happy, she would most likely be happy and have friends at public as well and it's easier to switch her now (or at the end of the year) than in the third or fourth grade. Also, check out the gifted program that the public school offers. If it's no good and they won't challenge her, that may be a poor option as well. Sometimes even sp.ed at public schools is no good...our district adamantly refused to write an IEP for ADHD claiming she had to have failing grades and standardized achievement scores. She is now in a district that doesn't think that way and they have a stronger gifted program.